SHERWOOD ANDERSON

Winesburg, Ohio

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION by Irving Howe

THE TALES AND THE PERSONS

THE BOOK OF THE GROTESQUE

HANDS, concerning Wing Biddlebaum

PAPER PILLS, concerning Doctor Reefy

MOTHER, concerning Elizabeth Willard

THE PHILOSOPHER, concerning Doctor Parcival

NOBODY KNOWS, concerning Louise Trunnion

GODLINESS, a Tale in Four Parts I, concerning Jesse Bentley II, also concerning Jesse Bentley III Surrender, concerning Louise Bentley IV Terror, concerning David Hardy

A MAN OF IDEAS, concerning Joe Welling

ADVENTURE, concerning Alice Hindman

RESPECTABILITY, concerning Wash Williams

THE THINKER, concerning Seth Richmond

TANDY, concerning Tandy Hard

THE STRENGTH OF GOD, concerning the Reverend Curtis Hartman

THE TEACHER, concerning Kate Swift

LONELINESS, concerning Enoch Robinson

AN AWAKENING, concerning Belle Carpenter

"QUEER, " concerning Elmer Cowley

THE UNTOLD LIE, concerning Ray Pearson

DRINK, concerning Tom Foster

DEATH, concerning Doctor Reefy and Elizabeth Willard

SOPHISTICATION, concerning Helen White

DEPARTURE, concerning George Willard

INTRODUCTION

by Irving Howe

I must have been no more than fifteen or sixteen years oldwhen I first chanced upon Winesburg, Ohio. Gripped by thesestories and sketches of Sherwood Anderson's small-town"grotesques, " I felt that he was opening for me new depthsof experience, touching upon half-buried truths whichnothing in my young life had prepared me for. A New YorkCity boy who never saw the crops grow or spent time in thesmall towns that lay sprinkled across America, I foundmyself overwhelmed by the scenes of wasted life, wastedlove--was this the "real" America?--that Anderson sketchedin Winesburg. In those days only one other book seemed tooffer so powerful a revelation, and that was Thomas Hardy'sJude the Obscure. 

Several years later, as I was about to go overseas asa soldier, I spent my last week-end pass on a somewhatquixotic journey to Clyde, Ohio, the town upon whichWinesburg was partly modeled. Clyde looked, I suppose, notvery different from most other American towns, and the fewof its residents I tried to engage in talk about Andersonseemed quite uninterested. This indifference would not havesurprised him; it certainly should not surprise anyone whoreads his book. 

Once freed from the army, I started to write literarycriticism, and in 1951 I published a critical biographyof Anderson. It came shortly after Lionel Trilling'sinfluential essay attacking Anderson, an attack fromwhich Anderson's reputation would never quite recover. Trilling charged Anderson with indulging a vaporoussentimentalism, a kind of vague emotional meandering instories that lacked social or spiritual solidity. Therewas a certain cogency in Trilling's attack, at leastwith regard to Anderson's inferior work, most of whichhe wrote after Winesburg, Ohio. In my book I tried, somewhat awkwardly, to bring together the kinds ofjudgment Trilling had made with my still keen affectionfor the best of Anderson's writings. By then, I hadread writers more complex, perhaps more distinguishedthan Anderson, but his muted stories kept a firm placein my memories, and the book I wrote might be seen as agesture of thanks for the light--a glow of darkness, you might say--that he had brought to me. 

Decades passed. I no longer read Anderson, perhapsfearing I might have to surrender an admiration ofyouth. (There are some writers one should never returnto. ) But now, in the fullness of age, when asked to saya few introductory words about Anderson and his work, Ihave again fallen under the spell of Winesburg, Ohio, again responded to the half-spoken desires, theflickers of longing that spot its pages. Naturally, Inow have some changes of response: a few of the storiesno longer haunt me as once they did, but the long story"Godliness, " which years ago I considered a failure, Inow see as a quaintly effective account of the wayreligious fanaticism and material acquisitiveness canbecome intertwined in American experience. 

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Sherwood Anderson was born in Ohio in 1876. Hischildhood and youth in Clyde, a town with perhaps threethousand souls, were scarred by bouts of poverty, buthe also knew some of the pleasures of pre-industrialAmerican society. The country was then experiencingwhat he would later call "a sudden and almost universalturning of men from the old handicrafts towards ourmodern life of machines. " There were still people inClyde who remembered the frontier, and like Americaitself, the town lived by a mixture of dilutedCalvinism and a strong belief in "progress, " YoungSherwood, known as "Jobby"--the boy always ready towork--showed the kind of entrepreneurial spirit thatClyde respected: folks expected him to become a"go-getter, " And for a time he did. Moving to Chicagoin his early twenties, he worked in an advertisingagency where he proved adept at turning out copy. "Icreate nothing, I boost, I boost, " he said abouthimself, even as, on the side, he was trying to writeshort stories. 

In 1904 Anderson married and three years later moved toElyria, a town forty miles west of Cleveland, where heestablished a firm that sold paint. "I was going to bea rich man. . . . Next year a bigger house; and afterthat, presumably, a country estate. " Later he would sayabout his years in Elyria, "I was a good deal of aBabbitt, but never completely one. " Something drove himto write, perhaps one of those shapeless hungers--aneed for self-expression? a wish to find a moreauthentic kind of experience?--that would become arecurrent motif in his fiction. 

And then, in 1912, occurred the great turning point inAnderson's life. Plainly put, he suffered a nervousbreakdown, though in his memoirs he would elevate thisinto a moment of liberation in which he abandoned thesterility of commerce and turned to the rewards ofliterature. Nor was this, I believe, merely a deceptionon Anderson's part, since the breakdown painful as itsurely was, did help precipitate a basic change in hislife. At the age of 36, he left behind his business andmoved to Chicago, becoming one of the rebelliouswriters and cultural bohemians in the group that hassince come to be called the "Chicago Renaissance. "Anderson soon adopted the posture of a free, liberatedspirit, and like many writers of the time, he presentedhimself as a sardonic critic of American provincialismand materialism. It was in the freedom of the city, inits readiness to put up with deviant styles of life, that Anderson found the strength to settle accountswith--but also to release his affection for--the worldof small-town America. The dream of an unconditionalpersonal freedom, that hazy American version of utopia, would remain central throughout Anderson's life andwork. It was an inspiration; it was a delusion. 

In 1916 and 1917 Anderson published two novels mostlywritten in Elyria, Windy McPherson's Son and MarchingMen, both by now largely forgotten. They show patchesof talent but also a crudity of thought andunsteadiness of language. No one reading these novelswas likely to suppose that its author could soonproduce anything as remarkable as Winesburg, Ohio. Occasionally there occurs in a writer's career asudden, almost mysterious leap of talent, beyondexplanation, perhaps beyond any need for explanation. 

In 1915-16 Anderson had begun to write and in 1919 hepublished the stories that comprise Winesburg, Ohio, stories that form, in sum, a sort of loosely-strungepisodic novel. The book was an immediate criticalsuccess, and soon Anderson was being ranked as asignificant literary figure. In 1921 the distinguishedliterary magazine The Dial awarded him its first annualliterary prize of $2, 000, the significance of which isperhaps best understood if one also knows that thesecond recipient was T. S. Eliot. But Anderson's momentof glory was brief, no more than a decade, and sadly, the remaining years until his death in 1940 were markedby a sharp decline in his literary standing. Somehow, except for an occasional story like the haunting "Deathin the Woods, " he was unable to repeat or surpass hisearly success. Still, about Winesburg, Ohio and a smallnumber of stories like "The Egg" and "The Man WhoBecame a Woman" there has rarely been any criticaldoubt. 

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No sooner did Winesburg, Ohio make its appearance thana number of critical labels were fixed on it: therevolt against the village, the espousal of sexualfreedom, the deepening of American realism. Such tagsmay once have had their point, but by now they seemdated and stale. The revolt against the village (aboutwhich Anderson was always ambivalent) has faded intohistory. The espousal of sexual freedom would soon beexceeded in boldness by other writers. And as for theeffort to place Winesburg, Ohio in a tradition ofAmerican realism, that now seems dubious. Only rarelyis the object of Anderson's stories socialverisimilitude, or the "photographing" of familiarappearances, in the sense, say, that one might use todescribe a novel by Theodore Dreiser or Sinclair Lewis. Only occasionally, and then with a very light touch, does Anderson try to fill out the social arrangementsof his imaginary town--although the fact that hisstories are set in a mid-American place like Winesburgdoes constitute an important formative condition. Youmight even say, with only slight overstatement, thatwhat Anderson is doing in Winesburg, Ohio could bedescribed as "antirealistic, " fictions notable less forprecise locale and social detail than for a highlypersonal, even strange vision of American life. Narrow, intense, almost claustrophobic, the result is a bookabout extreme states of being, the collapse of men andwomen who have lost their psychic bearings and nowhover, at best tolerated, at the edge of the littlecommunity in which they live. It would be a grossmistake, though not one likely to occur by now, if wewere to take Winesburg, Ohio as a social photograph of"the typical small town" (whatever that might be. )Anderson evokes a depressed landscape in which lostsouls wander about; they make their flittingappearances mostly in the darkness of night, thesestumps and shades of humanity. This vision has itstruth, and at its best it is a terrible if narrowtruth--but it is itself also grotesque, with the toneof the authorial voice and the mode of compositionforming muted signals of the book's content. Figureslike Dr. Parcival, Kate Swift, and Wash Williams arenot, nor are they meant to be, "fully-rounded"characters such as we can expect in realistic fiction;they are the shards of life, glimpsed for a moment, thedebris of suffering and defeat. In each story one ofthem emerges, shyly or with a false assertiveness, trying to reach out to companionship and love, drivenalmost mad by the search for human connection. In theeconomy of Winesburg these grotesques matter less intheir own right than as agents or symptoms of that"indefinable hunger" for meaning which is Anderson'spreoccupation. 

Brushing against one another, passing one another inthe streets or the fields, they see bodies and hearvoices, but it does not really matter--they aredisconnected, psychically lost. Is this due to theparticular circumstances of small-town America asAnderson saw it at the turn of the century? Or does hefeel that he is sketching an inescapable humancondition which makes all of us bear the burden ofloneliness? Alice Hindman in the story "Adventure"turns her face to the wall and tries "to force herselfto face the fact that many people must live and diealone, even in Winesburg. " Or especially in Winesburg?Such impressions have been put in more general terms inAnderson's only successful novel, Poor White:

 All men lead their lives behind a wall of misunderstanding they have themselves built, and most men die in silence and unnoticed behind the walls. Now and then a man, cut off from his fellows by the peculiarities of his nature, becomes absorbed in doing something that is personal, useful and beautiful. Word of his activities is carried over the walls. 

These "walls" of misunderstanding are only seldom dueto physical deformities (Wing Biddlebaum in "Hands") oroppressive social arrangements (Kate Swift in "TheTeacher. ") Misunderstanding, loneliness, the inabilityto articulate, are all seen by Anderson as virtually aroot condition, something deeply set in our natures. Nor are these people, the grotesques, simply to bepitied and dismissed; at some point in their lives theyhave known desire, have dreamt of ambition, have hopedfor friendship. In all of them there was once somethingsweet, "like the twisted little apples that grow in theorchards in Winesburg. " Now, broken and adrift, theyclutch at some rigid notion or idea, a "truth" whichturns out to bear the stamp of monomania, leaving themhelplessly sputtering, desperate to speak out butunable to. Winesburg, Ohio registers the lossesinescapable to life, and it does so with a deepfraternal sadness, a sympathy casting a mild glow overthe entire book. "Words, " as the American writer PaulaFox has said, "are nets through which all truthescapes. " Yet what do we have but words?

They want, these Winesburg grotesques, to unpack theirhearts, to release emotions buried and festering. WashWilliams tries to explain his eccentricity but hardlycan; Louise Bentley "tried to talk but could saynothing"; Enoch Robinson retreats to a fantasy world, inventing "his own people to whom he could really talkand to whom he explained the things he had been unableto explain to living people. "

In his own somber way, Anderson has here touched uponone of the great themes of American literature, especially Midwestern literature, in the latenineteenth and early twentieth centuries: the strugglefor speech as it entails a search for the self. Perhapsthe central Winesburg story, tracing the basicmovements of the book, is "Paper Pills, " in which theold Doctor Reefy sits "in his empty office close by awindow that was covered with cobwebs, " writes down somethoughts on slips of paper ("pyramids of truth, " hecalls them) and then stuffs them into his pockets wherethey "become round hard balls" soon to be discarded. What Dr. Reefy's "truths" may be we never know;Anderson simply persuades us that to this lonely oldman they are utterly precious and therebyincommunicable, forming a kind of blurred moralsignature. 

After a time the attentive reader will notice in thesestories a recurrent pattern of theme and incident: thegrotesques, gathering up a little courage, venture outinto the streets of Winesburg, often in the dark, thereto establish some initiatory relationship with GeorgeWillard, the young reporter who hasn't yet lived longenough to become a grotesque. Hesitantly, fearfully, orwith a sputtering incoherent rage, they approach him, pleading that he listen to their stories in the hopethat perhaps they can find some sort of renewal in hisyouthful voice. Upon this sensitive and fragile boythey pour out their desires and frustrations. Dr. Parcival hopes that George Willard "will write the bookI may never get written, " and for Enoch Robinson, theboy represents "the youthful sadness, young man'ssadness, the sadness of a growing boy in a village atthe year's end [which may open] the lips of the oldman. "

What the grotesques really need is each other, buttheir estrangement is so extreme they cannot establishdirect ties--they can only hope for connection throughGeorge Willard. The burden this places on the boy ismore than he can bear. He listens to them attentively, he is sympathetic to their complaints, but finally heis too absorbed in his own dreams. The grotesques turnto him because he seems "different"--younger, moreopen, not yet hardened--but it is precisely this"difference" that keeps him from responding as warmlyas they want. It is hardly the boy's fault; it issimply in the nature of things. For George Willard, thegrotesques form a moment in his education; for thegrotesques, their encounters with George Willard cometo seem like a stamp of hopelessness. 

The prose Anderson employs in telling these stories mayseem at first glance to be simple: short sentences, asparse vocabulary, uncomplicated syntax. In actuality, Anderson developed an artful style in which, followingMark Twain and preceding Ernest Hemingway, he tried touse American speech as the base of a tensed rhythmicprose that has an economy and a shapeliness seldomfound in ordinary speech or even oral narration. WhatAnderson employs here is a stylized version of theAmerican language, sometimes rising to quite formalrhetorical patterns and sometimes sinking to aself-conscious mannerism. But at its best, Anderson'sprose style in Winesburg, Ohio is a supple instrument, yielding that "low fine music" which he admired so muchin the stories of Turgenev. 

One of the worst fates that can befall a writer is thatof self-imitation: the effort later in life, oftendesperate, to recapture the tones and themes ofyouthful beginnings. Something of the sort happenedwith Anderson's later writings. Most critics andreaders grew impatient with the work he did after, say, 1927 or 1928; they felt he was constantly repeating hisgestures of emotional "groping"--what he had called inWinesburg, Ohio the "indefinable hunger" that prods andtorments people. It became the critical fashion to seeAnderson's "gropings" as a sign of delayed adolescence, a failure to develop as a writer. Once he wrote achilling reply to those who dismissed him in this way:"I don't think it matters much, all this calling a mana muddler, a groper, etc. . . . The very man who throwssuch words as these knows in his heart that he is alsofacing a wall. " This remark seems to me both dignifiedand strong, yet it must be admitted that there was somejustice in the negative responses to his later work. For what characterized it was not so much "groping" asthe imitation of "groping, " the self-caricature of awriter who feels driven back upon an earlier self thatis, alas, no longer available. 

But Winesburg, Ohio remains a vital work, fresh andauthentic. Most of its stories are composed in a minorkey, a tone of subdued pathos--pathos marking both thenature and limit of Anderson's talent. (He spoke ofhimself as a "minor writer. ") In a few stories, however, he was able to reach beyond pathos and tostrike a tragic note. The single best story inWinesburg, Ohio is, I think, "The Untold Lie, " in whichthe urgency of choice becomes an outer sign of a tragicelement in the human condition. And in Anderson'ssingle greatest story, "The Egg, " which appeared a fewyears after Winesburg, Ohio, he succeeded in bringingtogether a surface of farce with an undertone oftragedy. "The Egg" is an American masterpiece. 

Anderson's influence upon later American writers, especially those who wrote short stories, has beenenormous. Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner bothpraised him as a writer who brought a new tremor offeeling, a new sense of introspectiveness to theAmerican short story. As Faulkner put it, Anderson's"was the fumbling for exactitude, the exact word andphrase within the limited scope of a vocabularycontrolled and even repressed by what was in him almosta fetish of simplicity . . . To seek always to penetrateto thought's uttermost end. " And in many youngerwriters who may not even be aware of the Andersoninfluence, you can see touches of his approach, echoesof his voice. 

Writing about the Elizabethan playwright John Ford, thepoet Algernon Swinburne once said: "If he touches youonce he takes you, and what he takes he keeps hold of;his work becomes part of your thought and parcel ofyour spiritual furniture forever. " So it is, for me andmany others, with Sherwood Anderson. 

To the memory of my mother, EMMA SMITH ANDERSON, whose keen observations on the life abouther first awoke in me the hunger to seebeneath the surface of lives, this book is dedicated. 

THE TALESAND THE PERSONS

THE BOOK OFTHE GROTESQUE

The writer, an old man with a white mustache, had somedifficulty in getting into bed. The windows of thehouse in which he lived were high and he wanted to lookat the trees when he awoke in the morning. A carpentercame to fix the bed so that it would be on a level withthe window. 

Quite a fuss was made about the matter. The carpenter, who had been a soldier in the Civil War, came into thewriter's room and sat down to talk of building aplatform for the purpose of raising the bed. The writerhad cigars lying about and the carpenter smoked. 

For a time the two men talked of the raising of the bedand then they talked of other things. The soldier goton the subject of the war. The writer, in fact, led himto that subject. The carpenter had once been a prisonerin Andersonville prison and had lost a brother. Thebrother had died of starvation, and whenever thecarpenter got upon that subject he cried. He, like theold writer, had a white mustache, and when he cried hepuckered up his lips and the mustache bobbed up anddown. The weeping old man with the cigar in his mouthwas ludicrous. The plan the writer had for the raisingof his bed was forgotten and later the carpenter did itin his own way and the writer, who was past sixty, hadto help himself with a chair when he went to bed atnight. 

In his bed the writer rolled over on his side and layquite still. For years he had been beset with notionsconcerning his heart. He was a hard smoker and hisheart fluttered. The idea had got into his mind that hewould some time die unexpectedly and always when he gotinto bed he thought of that. It did not alarm him. Theeffect in fact was quite a special thing and not easilyexplained. It made him more alive, there in bed, thanat any other time. Perfectly still he lay and his bodywas old and not of much use any more, but somethinginside him was altogether young. He was like a pregnantwoman, only that the thing inside him was not a babybut a youth. No, it wasn't a youth, it was a woman, young, and wearing a coat of mail like a knight. It isabsurd, you see, to try to tell what was inside the oldwriter as he lay on his high bed and listened to thefluttering of his heart. The thing to get at is whatthe writer, or the young thing within the writer, wasthinking about. 

The old writer, like all of the people in the world, had got, during his long life, a great many notions inhis head. He had once been quite handsome and a numberof women had been in love with him. And then, ofcourse, he had known people, many people, known them ina peculiarly intimate way that was different from theway in which you and I know people. At least that iswhat the writer thought and the thought pleased him. Why quarrel with an old man concerning his thoughts?

In the bed the writer had a dream that was not a dream. As he grew somewhat sleepy but was still conscious, figures began to appear before his eyes. He imaginedthe young indescribable thing within himself wasdriving a long procession of figures before his eyes. 

You see the interest in all this lies in the figuresthat went before the eyes of the writer. They were allgrotesques. All of the men and women the writer hadever known had become grotesques. 

The grotesques were not all horrible. Some wereamusing, some almost beautiful, and one, a woman alldrawn out of shape, hurt the old man by hergrotesqueness. When she passed he made a noise like asmall dog whimpering. Had you come into the room youmight have supposed the old man had unpleasant dreamsor perhaps indigestion. 

For an hour the procession of grotesques passed beforethe eyes of the old man, and then, although it was apainful thing to do, he crept out of bed and began towrite. Some one of the grotesques had made a deepimpression on his mind and he wanted to describe it. 

At his desk the writer worked for an hour. In the endhe wrote a book which he called "The Book of theGrotesque. " It was never published, but I saw it onceand it made an indelible impression on my mind. Thebook had one central thought that is very strange andhas always remained with me. By remembering it I havebeen able to understand many people and things that Iwas never able to understand before. The thought wasinvolved but a simple statement of it would besomething like this:

That in the beginning when the world was young therewere a great many thoughts but no such thing as atruth. Man made the truths himself and each truth was acomposite of a great many vague thoughts. All about inthe world were the truths and they were all beautiful. 

The old man had listed hundreds of the truths in hisbook. I will not try to tell you of all of them. Therewas the truth of virginity and the truth of passion, the truth of wealth and of poverty, of thrift and ofprofligacy, of carelessness and abandon. Hundreds andhundreds were the truths and they were all beautiful. 

And then the people came along. Each as he appearedsnatched up one of the truths and some who were quitestrong snatched up a dozen of them. 

It was the truths that made the people grotesques. Theold man had quite an elaborate theory concerning thematter. It was his notion that the moment one of thepeople took one of the truths to himself, called it histruth, and tried to live his life by it, he became agrotesque and the truth he embraced became a falsehood. 

You can see for yourself how the old man, who had spentall of his life writing and was filled with words, would write hundreds of pages concerning this matter. The subject would become so big in his mind that hehimself would be in danger of becoming a grotesque. Hedidn't, I suppose, for the same reason that he neverpublished the book. It was the young thing inside himthat saved the old man. 

Concerning the old carpenter who fixed the bed for thewriter, I only mentioned him because he, like many ofwhat are called very common people, became the nearestthing to what is understandable and lovable of all thegrotesques in the writer's book. 

HANDS

Upon the half decayed veranda of a small frame housethat stood near the edge of a ravine near the town ofWinesburg, Ohio, a fat little old man walked nervouslyup and down. Across a long field that had been seededfor clover but that had produced only a dense crop ofyellow mustard weeds, he could see the public highwayalong which went a wagon filled with berry pickersreturning from the fields. The berry pickers, youthsand maidens, laughed and shouted boisterously. A boyclad in a blue shirt leaped from the wagon andattempted to drag after him one of the maidens, whoscreamed and protested shrilly. The feet of the boy inthe road kicked up a cloud of dust that floated acrossthe face of the departing sun. Over the long field camea thin girlish voice. "Oh, you Wing Biddlebaum, combyour hair, it's falling into your eyes, " commanded thevoice to the man, who was bald and whose nervous littlehands fiddled about the bare white forehead as thougharranging a mass of tangled locks. 

Wing Biddlebaum, forever frightened and beset by aghostly band of doubts, did not think of himself as inany way a part of the life of the town where he hadlived for twenty years. Among all the people ofWinesburg but one had come close to him. With GeorgeWillard, son of Tom Willard, the proprietor of the NewWillard House, he had formed something like afriendship. George Willard was the reporter on theWinesburg Eagle and sometimes in the evenings he walkedout along the highway to Wing Biddlebaum's house. Nowas the old man walked up and down on the veranda, hishands moving nervously about, he was hoping that GeorgeWillard would come and spend the evening with him. After the wagon containing the berry pickers hadpassed, he went across the field through the tallmustard weeds and climbing a rail fence peeredanxiously along the road to the town. For a moment hestood thus, rubbing his hands together and looking upand down the road, and then, fear overcoming him, ranback to walk again upon the porch on his own house. 

In the presence of George Willard, Wing Biddlebaum, whofor twenty years had been the town mystery, lostsomething of his timidity, and his shadowy personality, submerged in a sea of doubts, came forth to look at theworld. With the young reporter at his side, he venturedin the light of day into Main Street or strode up anddown on the rickety front porch of his own house, talking excitedly. The voice that had been low andtrembling became shrill and loud. The bent figurestraightened. With a kind of wriggle, like a fishreturned to the brook by the fisherman, Biddlebaum thesilent began to talk, striving to put into words theideas that had been accumulated by his mind during longyears of silence. 

Wing Biddlebaum talked much with his hands. The slenderexpressive fingers, forever active, forever striving toconceal themselves in his pockets or behind his back, came forth and became the piston rods of his machineryof expression. 

The story of Wing Biddlebaum is a story of hands. Theirrestless activity, like unto the beating of the wingsof an imprisoned bird, had given him his name. Someobscure poet of the town had thought of it. The handsalarmed their owner. He wanted to keep them hidden awayand looked with amazement at the quiet inexpressivehands of other men who worked beside him in the fields, or passed, driving sleepy teams on country roads. 

When he talked to George Willard, Wing Biddlebaumclosed his fists and beat with them upon a table or onthe walls of his house. The action made him morecomfortable. If the desire to talk came to him when thetwo were walking in the fields, he sought out a stumpor the top board of a fence and with his hands poundingbusily talked with renewed ease. 

The story of Wing Biddlebaum's hands is worth a book initself. Sympathetically set forth it would tap manystrange, beautiful qualities in obscure men. It is ajob for a poet. In Winesburg the hands had attractedattention merely because of their activity. With themWing Biddlebaum had picked as high as a hundred andforty quarts of strawberries in a day. They became hisdistinguishing feature, the source of his fame. Alsothey made more grotesque an already grotesque andelusive individuality. Winesburg was proud of the handsof Wing Biddlebaum in the same spirit in which it wasproud of Banker White's new stone house and WesleyMoyer's bay stallion, Tony Tip, that had won thetwo-fifteen trot at the fall races in Cleveland. 

As for George Willard, he had many times wanted to askabout the hands. At times an almost overwhelmingcuriosity had taken hold of him. He felt that theremust be a reason for their strange activity and theirinclination to keep hidden away and only a growingrespect for Wing Biddlebaum kept him from blurting outthe questions that were often in his mind. 

Once he had been on the point of asking. The two werewalking in the fields on a summer afternoon and hadstopped to sit upon a grassy bank. All afternoon WingBiddlebaum had talked as one inspired. By a fence hehad stopped and beating like a giant woodpecker uponthe top board had shouted at George Willard, condemninghis tendency to be too much influenced by the peopleabout him, "You are destroying yourself, " he cried. "You have the inclination to be alone and to dream andyou are afraid of dreams. You want to be like others intown here. You hear them talk and you try to imitatethem. "

On the grassy bank Wing Biddlebaum had tried again todrive his point home. His voice became soft andreminiscent, and with a sigh of contentment he launchedinto a long rambling talk, speaking as one lost in adream. 

Out of the dream Wing Biddlebaum made a picture forGeorge Willard. In the picture men lived again in akind of pastoral golden age. Across a green opencountry came clean-limbed young men, some afoot, somemounted upon horses. In crowds the young men came togather about the feet of an old man who sat beneath atree in a tiny garden and who talked to them. 

Wing Biddlebaum became wholly inspired. For once heforgot the hands. Slowly they stole forth and lay uponGeorge Willard's shoulders. Something new and bold cameinto the voice that talked. "You must try to forget allyou have learned, " said the old man. "You must begin todream. From this time on you must shut your ears to theroaring of the voices. "

Pausing in his speech, Wing Biddlebaum looked long andearnestly at George Willard. His eyes glowed. Again heraised the hands to caress the boy and then a look ofhorror swept over his face. 

With a convulsive movement of his body, Wing Biddlebaumsprang to his feet and thrust his hands deep into histrousers pockets. Tears came to his eyes. "I must begetting along home. I can talk no more with you, " hesaid nervously. 

Without looking back, the old man had hurried down thehillside and across a meadow, leaving George Willardperplexed and frightened upon the grassy slope. With ashiver of dread the boy arose and went along the roadtoward town. "I'll not ask him about his hands, " hethought, touched by the memory of the terror he hadseen in the man's eyes. "There's something wrong, but Idon't want to know what it is. His hands have somethingto do with his fear of me and of everyone. "

And George Willard was right. Let us look briefly intothe story of the hands. Perhaps our talking of themwill arouse the poet who will tell the hidden wonderstory of the influence for which the hands were butfluttering pennants of promise. 

In his youth Wing Biddlebaum had been a school teacherin a town in Pennsylvania. He was not then known asWing Biddlebaum, but went by the less euphonic name ofAdolph Myers. As Adolph Myers he was much loved by theboys of his school. 

Adolph Myers was meant by nature to be a teacher ofyouth. He was one of those rare, little-understood menwho rule by a power so gentle that it passes as alovable weakness. In their feeling for the boys undertheir charge such men are not unlike the finer sort ofwomen in their love of men. 

And yet that is but crudely stated. It needs the poetthere. With the boys of his school, Adolph Myers hadwalked in the evening or had sat talking until duskupon the schoolhouse steps lost in a kind of dream. Here and there went his hands, caressing the shouldersof the boys, playing about the tousled heads. As hetalked his voice became soft and musical. There was acaress in that also. In a way the voice and the hands, the stroking of the shoulders and the touching of thehair were a part of the schoolmaster's effort to carrya dream into the young minds. By the caress that was inhis fingers he expressed himself. He was one of thosemen in whom the force that creates life is diffused, not centralized. Under the caress of his hands doubtand disbelief went out of the minds of the boys andthey began also to dream. 

And then the tragedy. A half-witted boy of the schoolbecame enamored of the young master. In his bed atnight he imagined unspeakable things and in the morningwent forth to tell his dreams as facts. Strange, hideous accusations fell from his loosehung lips. Through the Pennsylvania town went a shiver. Hidden, shadowy doubts that had been in men's minds concerningAdolph Myers were galvanized into beliefs. 

The tragedy did not linger. Trembling lads were jerkedout of bed and questioned. "He put his arms about me, "said one. "His fingers were always playing in my hair, "said another. 

One afternoon a man of the town, Henry Bradford, whokept a saloon, came to the schoolhouse door. CallingAdolph Myers into the school yard he began to beat himwith his fists. As his hard knuckles beat down into thefrightened face of the school-master, his wrath becamemore and more terrible. Screaming with dismay, thechildren ran here and there like disturbed insects. "I'll teach you to put your hands on my boy, youbeast, " roared the saloon keeper, who, tired of beatingthe master, had begun to kick him about the yard. 

Adolph Myers was driven from the Pennsylvania town inthe night. With lanterns in their hands a dozen mencame to the door of the house where he lived alone andcommanded that he dress and come forth. It was rainingand one of the men had a rope in his hands. They hadintended to hang the school-master, but something in hisfigure, so small, white, and pitiful, touched theirhearts and they let him escape. As he ran away into thedarkness they repented of their weakness and ran afterhim, swearing and throwing sticks and great balls ofsoft mud at the figure that screamed and ran faster andfaster into the darkness. 

For twenty years Adolph Myers had lived alone inWinesburg. He was but forty but looked sixty-five. Thename of Biddlebaum he got from a box of goods seen at afreight station as he hurried through an eastern Ohiotown. He had an aunt in Winesburg, a black-toothed oldwoman who raised chickens, and with her he lived untilshe died. He had been ill for a year after theexperience in Pennsylvania, and after his recoveryworked as a day laborer in the fields, going timidlyabout and striving to conceal his hands. Although hedid not understand what had happened he felt that thehands must be to blame. Again and again the fathers ofthe boys had talked of the hands. "Keep your hands toyourself, " the saloon keeper had roared, dancing, withfury in the schoolhouse yard. 

Upon the veranda of his house by the ravine, WingBiddlebaum continued to walk up and down until the sunhad disappeared and the road beyond the field was lostin the grey shadows. Going into his house he cut slicesof bread and spread honey upon them. When the rumble ofthe evening train that took away the express carsloaded with the day's harvest of berries had passed andrestored the silence of the summer night, he went againto walk upon the veranda. In the darkness he could notsee the hands and they became quiet. Although he stillhungered for the presence of the boy, who was themedium through which he expressed his love of man, thehunger became again a part of his loneliness and hiswaiting. Lighting a lamp, Wing Biddlebaum washed thefew dishes soiled by his simple meal and, setting up afolding cot by the screen door that led to the porch, prepared to undress for the night. A few stray whitebread crumbs lay on the cleanly washed floor by thetable; putting the lamp upon a low stool he began topick up the crumbs, carrying them to his mouth one byone with unbelievable rapidity. In the dense blotch oflight beneath the table, the kneeling figure lookedlike a priest engaged in some service of his church. The nervous expressive fingers, flashing in and out ofthe light, might well have been mistaken for thefingers of the devotee going swiftly through decadeafter decade of his rosary. 

PAPER PILLS

He was an old man with a white beard and huge nose andhands. Long before the time during which we will knowhim, he was a doctor and drove a jaded white horse fromhouse to house through the streets of Winesburg. Laterhe married a girl who had money. She had been left alarge fertile farm when her father died. The girl wasquiet, tall, and dark, and to many people she seemedvery beautiful. Everyone in Winesburg wondered why shemarried the doctor. Within a year after the marriageshe died. 

The knuckles of the doctor's hands were extraordinarilylarge. When the hands were closed they looked likeclusters of unpainted wooden balls as large as walnutsfastened together by steel rods. He smoked a cob pipeand after his wife's death sat all day in his emptyoffice close by a window that was covered with cobwebs. He never opened the window. Once on a hot day in Augusthe tried but found it stuck fast and after that heforgot all about it. 

Winesburg had forgotten the old man, but in DoctorReefy there were the seeds of something very fine. Alone in his musty office in the Heffner Block abovethe Paris Dry Goods Company's store, he workedceaselessly, building up something that he himselfdestroyed. Little pyramids of truth he erected andafter erecting knocked them down again that he mighthave the truths to erect other pyramids. 

Doctor Reefy was a tall man who had worn one suit ofclothes for ten years. It was frayed at the sleeves andlittle holes had appeared at the knees and elbows. Inthe office he wore also a linen duster with hugepockets into which he continually stuffed scraps ofpaper. After some weeks the scraps of paper becamelittle hard round balls, and when the pockets werefilled he dumped them out upon the floor. For ten yearshe had but one friend, another old man named JohnSpaniard who owned a tree nursery. Sometimes, in aplayful mood, old Doctor Reefy took from his pockets ahandful of the paper balls and threw them at thenursery man. "That is to confound you, you blatheringold sentimentalist, " he cried, shaking with laughter. 

The story of Doctor Reefy and his courtship of the talldark girl who became his wife and left her money to himis a very curious story. It is delicious, like thetwisted little apples that grow in the orchards ofWinesburg. In the fall one walks in the orchards andthe ground is hard with frost underfoot. The appleshave been taken from the trees by the pickers. Theyhave been put in barrels and shipped to the citieswhere they will be eaten in apartments that are filledwith books, magazines, furniture, and people. On thetrees are only a few gnarled apples that the pickershave rejected. They look like the knuckles of DoctorReefy's hands. One nibbles at them and they aredelicious. Into a little round place at the side of theapple has been gathered all of its sweetness. One runsfrom tree to tree over the frosted ground picking thegnarled, twisted apples and filling his pockets withthem. Only the few know the sweetness of the twistedapples. 

The girl and Doctor Reefy began their courtship on asummer afternoon. He was forty-five then and already hehad begun the practice of filling his pockets with thescraps of paper that became hard balls and were thrownaway. The habit had been formed as he sat in his buggybehind the jaded white horse and went slowly alongcountry roads. On the papers were written thoughts, ends of thoughts, beginnings of thoughts. 

One by one the mind of Doctor Reefy had made thethoughts. Out of many of them he formed a truth thatarose gigantic in his mind. The truth clouded theworld. It became terrible and then faded away and thelittle thoughts began again. 

The tall dark girl came to see Doctor Reefy because shewas in the family way and had become frightened. Shewas in that condition because of a series ofcircumstances also curious. 

The death of her father and mother and the rich acresof land that had come down to her had set a train ofsuitors on her heels. For two years she saw suitorsalmost every evening. Except two they were all alike. They talked to her of passion and there was a strainedeager quality in their voices and in their eyes whenthey looked at her. The two who were different weremuch unlike each other. One of them, a slender youngman with white hands, the son of a jeweler inWinesburg, talked continually of virginity. When he waswith her he was never off the subject. The other, ablack-haired boy with large ears, said nothing at allbut always managed to get her into the darkness, wherehe began to kiss her. 

For a time the tall dark girl thought she would marrythe jeweler's son. For hours she sat in silencelistening as he talked to her and then she began to beafraid of something. Beneath his talk of virginity shebegan to think there was a lust greater than in all theothers. At times it seemed to her that as he talked hewas holding her body in his hands. She imagined himturning it slowly about in the white hands and staringat it. At night she dreamed that he had bitten into herbody and that his jaws were dripping. She had the dreamthree times, then she became in the family way to theone who said nothing at all but who in the moment ofhis passion actually did bite her shoulder so that fordays the marks of his teeth showed. 

After the tall dark girl came to know Doctor Reefy itseemed to her that she never wanted to leave him again. She went into his office one morning and without hersaying anything he seemed to know what had happened toher. 

In the office of the doctor there was a woman, the wifeof the man who kept the bookstore in Winesburg. Likeall old-fashioned country practitioners, Doctor Reefypulled teeth, and the woman who waited held ahandkerchief to her teeth and groaned. Her husband waswith her and when the tooth was taken out they bothscreamed and blood ran down on the woman's white dress. The tall dark girl did not pay any attention. When thewoman and the man had gone the doctor smiled. "I willtake you driving into the country with me, " he said. 

For several weeks the tall dark girl and the doctorwere together almost every day. The condition that hadbrought her to him passed in an illness, but she waslike one who has discovered the sweetness of thetwisted apples, she could not get her mind fixed againupon the round perfect fruit that is eaten in the cityapartments. In the fall after the beginning of heracquaintanceship with him she married Doctor Reefy andin the following spring she died. During the winter heread to her all of the odds and ends of thoughts he hadscribbled on the bits of paper. After he had read themhe laughed and stuffed them away in his pockets tobecome round hard balls. 

MOTHER

Elizabeth Willard, the mother of George Willard, wastall and gaunt and her face was marked with smallpoxscars. Although she was but forty-five, some obscuredisease had taken the fire out of her figure. Listlessly she went about the disorderly old hotellooking at the faded wall-paper and the ragged carpetsand, when she was able to be about, doing the work of achambermaid among beds soiled by the slumbers of fattraveling men. Her husband, Tom Willard, a slender, graceful man with square shoulders, a quick militarystep, and a black mustache trained to turn sharply upat the ends, tried to put the wife out of his mind. Thepresence of the tall ghostly figure, moving slowlythrough the halls, he took as a reproach to himself. When he thought of her he grew angry and swore. Thehotel was unprofitable and forever on the edge offailure and he wished himself out of it. He thought ofthe old house and the woman who lived there with him asthings defeated and done for. The hotel in which he hadbegun life so hopefully was now a mere ghost of what ahotel should be. As he went spruce and business-likethrough the streets of Winesburg, he sometimes stoppedand turned quickly about as though fearing that thespirit of the hotel and of the woman would follow himeven into the streets. "Damn such a life, damn it!" hesputtered aimlessly. 

Tom Willard had a passion for village politics and foryears had been the leading Democrat in a stronglyRepublican community. Some day, he told himself, thefide of things political will turn in my favor and theyears of ineffectual service count big in the bestowalof rewards. He dreamed of going to Congress and even ofbecoming governor. Once when a younger member of theparty arose at a political conference and began toboast of his faithful service, Tom Willard grew whitewith fury. "Shut up, you, " he roared, glaring about. "What do you know of service? What are you but a boy?Look at what I've done here! I was a Democrat here inWinesburg when it was a crime to be a Democrat. In theold days they fairly hunted us with guns. "

Between Elizabeth and her one son George there was adeep unexpressed bond of sympathy, based on a girlhooddream that had long ago died. In the son's presence shewas timid and reserved, but sometimes while he hurriedabout town intent upon his duties as a reporter, shewent into his room and closing the door knelt by alittle desk, made of a kitchen table, that sat near awindow. In the room by the desk she went through aceremony that was half a prayer, half a demand, addressed to the skies. In the boyish figure sheyearned to see something half forgotten that had oncebeen a part of herself recreated. The prayer concernedthat. "Even though I die, I will in some way keepdefeat from you, " she cried, and so deep was herdetermination that her whole body shook. Her eyesglowed and she clenched her fists. "If I am dead andsee him becoming a meaningless drab figure like myself, I will come back, " she declared. "I ask God now to giveme that privilege. I demand it. I will pay for it. Godmay beat me with his fists. I will take any blow thatmay befall if but this my boy be allowed to expresssomething for us both. " Pausing uncertainly, the womanstared about the boy's room. "And do not let him becomesmart and successful either, " she added vaguely. 

The communion between George Willard and his mother wasoutwardly a formal thing without meaning. When she wasill and sat by the window in her room he sometimes wentin the evening to make her a visit. They sat by awindow that looked over the roof of a small framebuilding into Main Street. By turning their heads theycould see through another window, along an alleywaythat ran behind the Main Street stores and into theback door of Abner Groff's bakery. Sometimes as theysat thus a picture of village life presented itself tothem. At the back door of his shop appeared Abner Groffwith a stick or an empty milk bottle in his hand. For along time there was a feud between the baker and a greycat that belonged to Sylvester West, the druggist. Theboy and his mother saw the cat creep into the door ofthe bakery and presently emerge followed by the baker, who swore and waved his arms about. The baker's eyeswere small and red and his black hair and beard werefilled with flour dust. Sometimes he was so angry that, although the cat had disappeared, he hurled sticks, bits of broken glass, and even some of the tools of histrade about. Once he broke a window at the back ofSinning's Hardware Store. In the alley the grey catcrouched behind barrels filled with torn paper andbroken bottles above which flew a black swarm of flies. Once when she was alone, and after watching a prolongedand ineffectual outburst on the part of the baker, Elizabeth Willard put her head down on her long whitehands and wept. After that she did not look along thealleyway any more, but tried to forget the contestbetween the bearded man and the cat. It seemed like arehearsal of her own life, terrible in its vividness. 

In the evening when the son sat in the room with hismother, the silence made them both feel awkward. Darkness came on and the evening train came in at thestation. In the street below feet tramped up and downupon a board sidewalk. In the station yard, after theevening train had gone, there was a heavy silence. Perhaps Skinner Leason, the express agent, moved atruck the length of the station platform. Over on MainStreet sounded a man's voice, laughing. The door of theexpress office banged. George Willard arose andcrossing the room fumbled for the doorknob. Sometimeshe knocked against a chair, making it scrape along thefloor. By the window sat the sick woman, perfectlystill, listless. Her long hands, white and bloodless, could be seen drooping over the ends of the arms of thechair. "I think you had better be out among the boys. You are too much indoors, " she said, striving torelieve the embarrassment of the departure. "I thoughtI would take a walk, " replied George Willard, who feltawkward and confused. 

One evening in July, when the transient guests who madethe New Willard House their temporary home had becomescarce, and the hallways, lighted only by kerosenelamps turned low, were plunged in gloom, ElizabethWillard had an adventure. She had been ill in bed forseveral days and her son had not come to visit her. Shewas alarmed. The feeble blaze of life that remained inher body was blown into a flame by her anxiety and shecrept out of bed, dressed and hurried along the hallwaytoward her son's room, shaking with exaggerated fears. As she went along she steadied herself with her hand, slipped along the papered walls of the hall andbreathed with difficulty. The air whistled through herteeth. As she hurried forward she thought how foolishshe was. "He is concerned with boyish affairs, " shetold herself. "Perhaps he has now begun to walk aboutin the evening with girls. "

Elizabeth Willard had a dread of being seen by guestsin the hotel that had once belonged to her father andthe ownership of which still stood recorded in her namein the county courthouse. The hotel was continuallylosing patronage because of its shabbiness and shethought of herself as also shabby. Her own room was inan obscure corner and when she felt able to work shevoluntarily worked among the beds, preferring the laborthat could be done when the guests were abroad seekingtrade among the merchants of Winesburg. 

By the door of her son's room the mother knelt upon thefloor and listened for some sound from within. When sheheard the boy moving about and talking in low tones asmile came to her lips. George Willard had a habit oftalking aloud to himself and to hear him doing so hadalways given his mother a peculiar pleasure. The habitin him, she felt, strengthened the secret bond thatexisted between them. A thousand times she hadwhispered to herself of the matter. "He is gropingabout, trying to find himself, " she thought. "He is nota dull clod, all words and smartness. Within him thereis a secret something that is striving to grow. It isthe thing I let be killed in myself. "

In the darkness in the hallway by the door the sickwoman arose and started again toward her own room. Shewas afraid that the door would open and the boy comeupon her. When she had reached a safe distance and wasabout to turn a corner into a second hallway shestopped and bracing herself with her hands waited, thinking to shake off a trembling fit of weakness thathad come upon her. The presence of the boy in the roomhad made her happy. In her bed, during the long hoursalone, the little fears that had visited her had becomegiants. Now they were all gone. "When I get back to myroom I shall sleep, " she murmured gratefully. 

But Elizabeth Willard was not to return to her bed andto sleep. As she stood trembling in the darkness thedoor of her son's room opened and the boy's father, TomWillard, stepped out. In the light that steamed out atthe door he stood with the knob in his hand and talked. What he said infuriated the woman. 

Tom Willard was ambitious for his son. He had alwaysthought of himself as a successful man, althoughnothing he had ever done had turned out successfully. However, when he was out of sight of the New WillardHouse and had no fear of coming upon his wife, heswaggered and began to dramatize himself as one of thechief men of the town. He wanted his son to succeed. Heit was who had secured for the boy the position on theWinesburg Eagle. Now, with a ring of earnestness in hisvoice, he was advising concerning some course ofconduct. "I tell you what, George, you've got to wakeup, " he said sharply. "Will Henderson has spoken to methree times concerning the matter. He says you go alongfor hours not hearing when you are spoken to and actinglike a gawky girl. What ails you?" Tom Willard laughedgood-naturedly. "Well, I guess you'll get over it, " hesaid. "I told Will that. You're not a fool and you'renot a woman. You're Tom Willard's son and you'll wakeup. I'm not afraid. What you say clears things up. Ifbeing a newspaper man had put the notion of becoming awriter into your mind that's all right. Only I guessyou'll have to wake up to do that too, eh?"

Tom Willard went briskly along the hallway and down aflight of stairs to the office. The woman in thedarkness could hear him laughing and talking with aguest who was striving to wear away a dull evening bydozing in a chair by the office door. She returned tothe door of her son's room. The weakness had passedfrom her body as by a miracle and she stepped boldlyalong. A thousand ideas raced through her head. Whenshe heard the scraping of a chair and the sound of apen scratching upon paper, she again turned and wentback along the hallway to her own room. 

A definite determination had come into the mind of thedefeated wife of the Winesburg hotel keeper. Thedetermination was the result of long years of quiet andrather ineffectual thinking. "Now, " she told herself, "I will act. There is something threatening my boy andI will ward it off. " The fact that the conversationbetween Tom Willard and his son had been rather quietand natural, as though an understanding existed betweenthem, maddened her. Although for years she had hatedher husband, her hatred had always before been a quiteimpersonal thing. He had been merely a part ofsomething else that she hated. Now, and by the fewwords at the door, he had become the thing personified. In the darkness of her own room she clenched her fistsand glared about. Going to a cloth bag that hung on anail by the wall she took out a long pair of sewingscissors and held them in her hand like a dagger. "Iwill stab him, " she said aloud. "He has chosen to bethe voice of evil and I will kill him. When I havekilled him something will snap within myself and I willdie also. It will be a release for all of us. "

In her girlhood and before her marriage with TomWillard, Elizabeth had borne a somewhat shakyreputation in Winesburg. For years she had been what iscalled "stage-struck" and had paraded through thestreets with traveling men guests at her father'shotel, wearing loud clothes and urging them to tell herof life in the cities out of which they had come. Onceshe startled the town by putting on men's clothes andriding a bicycle down Main Street. 

In her own mind the tall dark girl had been in thosedays much confused. A great restlessness was in her andit expressed itself in two ways. First there was anuneasy desire for change, for some big definitemovement to her life. It was this feeling that hadturned her mind to the stage. She dreamed of joiningsome company and wandering over the world, seeingalways new faces and giving something out of herself toall people. Sometimes at night she was quite besideherself with the thought, but when she tried to talk ofthe matter to the members of the theatrical companiesthat came to Winesburg and stopped at her father'shotel, she got nowhere. They did not seem to know whatshe meant, or if she did get something of her passionexpressed, they only laughed. "It's not like that, "they said. "It's as dull and uninteresting as thishere. Nothing comes of it. "

With the traveling men when she walked about with them, and later with Tom Willard, it was quite different. Always they seemed to understand and sympathize withher. On the side streets of the village, in thedarkness under the trees, they took hold of her handand she thought that something unexpressed in herselfcame forth and became a part of an unexpressedsomething in them. 

And then there was the second expression of herrestlessness. When that came she felt for a timereleased and happy. She did not blame the men whowalked with her and later she did not blame TomWillard. It was always the same, beginning with kissesand ending, after strange wild emotions, with peace andthen sobbing repentance. When she sobbed she put herhand upon the face of the man and had always the samethought. Even though he were large and bearded shethought he had become suddenly a little boy. Shewondered why he did not sob also. 

In her room, tucked away in a corner of the old WillardHouse, Elizabeth Willard lighted a lamp and put it on adressing table that stood by the door. A thought hadcome into her mind and she went to a closet and broughtout a small square box and set it on the table. The boxcontained material for make-up and had been left withother things by a theatrical company that had once beenstranded in Winesburg. Elizabeth Willard had decidedthat she would be beautiful. Her hair was still blackand there was a great mass of it braided and coiledabout her head. The scene that was to take place in theoffice below began to grow in her mind. No ghostlyworn-out figure should confront Tom Willard, butsomething quite unexpected and startling. Tall and withdusky cheeks and hair that fell in a mass from hershoulders, a figure should come striding down thestairway before the startled loungers in the hoteloffice. The figure would be silent--it would be swiftand terrible. As a tigress whose cub had beenthreatened would she appear, coming out of the shadows, stealing noiselessly along and holding the long wickedscissors in her hand. 

With a little broken sob in her throat, ElizabethWillard blew out the light that stood upon the tableand stood weak and trembling in the darkness. Thestrength that had been as a miracle in her body leftand she half reeled across the floor, clutching at theback of the chair in which she had spent so many longdays staring out over the tin roofs into the mainstreet of Winesburg. In the hallway there was the soundof footsteps and George Willard came in at the door. Sitting in a chair beside his mother he began to talk. "I'm going to get out of here, " he said. "I don't knowwhere I shall go or what I shall do but I am goingaway. "

The woman in the chair waited and trembled. An impulsecame to her. "I suppose you had better wake up, " shesaid. "You think that? You will go to the city and makemoney, eh? It will be better for you, you think, to bea business man, to be brisk and smart and alive?" Shewaited and trembled. 

The son shook his head. "I suppose I can't make youunderstand, but oh, I wish I could, " he said earnestly. "I can't even talk to father about it. I don't try. There isn't any use. I don't know what I shall do. Ijust want to go away and look at people and think. "

Silence fell upon the room where the boy and woman sattogether. Again, as on the other evenings, they wereembarrassed. After a time the boy tried again to talk. "I suppose it won't be for a year or two but I've beenthinking about it, " he said, rising and going towardthe door. "Something father said makes it sure that Ishall have to go away. " He fumbled with the doorknob. In the room the silence became unbearable to the woman. She wanted to cry out with joy because of the wordsthat had come from the lips of her son, but theexpression of joy had become impossible to her. "Ithink you had better go out among the boys. You are toomuch indoors, " she said. "I thought I would go for alittle walk, " replied the son stepping awkwardly out ofthe room and closing the door. 

THE PHILOSOPHER

Doctor Parcival was a large man with a drooping mouthcovered by a yellow mustache. He always wore a dirtywhite waistcoat out of the pockets of which protruded anumber of the kind of black cigars known as stogies. His teeth were black and irregular and there wassomething strange about his eyes. The lid of the lefteye twitched; it fell down and snapped up; it wasexactly as though the lid of the eye were a windowshade and someone stood inside the doctor's headplaying with the cord. 

Doctor Parcival had a liking for the boy, GeorgeWillard. It began when George had been working for ayear on the Winesburg Eagle and the acquaintanceshipwas entirely a matter of the doctor's own making. 

In the late afternoon Will Henderson, owner and editorof the Eagle, went over to Tom Willy's saloon. Along analleyway he went and slipping in at the back door ofthe saloon began drinking a drink made of a combinationof sloe gin and soda water. Will Henderson was asensualist and had reached the age of forty-five. Heimagined the gin renewed the youth in him. Like mostsensualists he enjoyed talking of women, and for anhour he lingered about gossiping with Tom Willy. Thesaloon keeper was a short, broad-shouldered man withpeculiarly marked hands. That flaming kind of birthmarkthat sometimes paints with red the faces of men andwomen had touched with red Tom Willy's fingers and thebacks of his hands. As he stood by the bar talking toWill Henderson he rubbed the hands together. As he grewmore and more excited the red of his fingers deepened. It was as though the hands had been dipped in bloodthat had dried and faded. 

As Will Henderson stood at the bar looking at the redhands and talking of women, his assistant, GeorgeWillard, sat in the office of the Winesburg Eagle andlistened to the talk of Doctor Parcival. 

Doctor Parcival appeared immediately after WillHenderson had disappeared. One might have supposed thatthe doctor had been watching from his office window andhad seen the editor going along the alleyway. Coming inat the front door and finding himself a chair, helighted one of the stogies and crossing his legs beganto talk. He seemed intent upon convincing the boy ofthe advisability of adopting a line of conduct that hewas himself unable to define. 

"If you have your eyes open you will see that althoughI call myself a doctor I have mighty few patients, " hebegan. "There is a reason for that. It is not anaccident and it is not because I do not know as much ofmedicine as anyone here. I do not want patients. Thereason, you see, does not appear on the surface. Itlies in fact in my character, which has, if you thinkabout it, many strange turns. Why I want to talk to youof the matter I don't know. I might keep still and getmore credit in your eyes. I have a desire to make youadmire me, that's a fact. I don't know why. That's whyI talk. It's very amusing, eh?"

Sometimes the doctor launched into long talesconcerning himself. To the boy the tales were very realand full of meaning. He began to admire the fatunclean-looking man and, in the afternoon when WillHenderson had gone, looked forward with keen interestto the doctor's coming. 

Doctor Parcival had been in Winesburg about five years. He came from Chicago and when he arrived was drunk andgot into a fight with Albert Longworth, the baggageman. The fight concerned a trunk and ended by the doctor'sbeing escorted to the village lockup. When he wasreleased he rented a room above a shoe-repairing shopat the lower end of Main Street and put out the signthat announced himself as a doctor. Although he had butfew patients and these of the poorer sort who wereunable to pay, he seemed to have plenty of money forhis needs. He slept in the office that was unspeakablydirty and dined at Biff Carter's lunch room in a smallframe building opposite the railroad station. In thesummer the lunch room was filled with flies and BiffCarter's white apron was more dirty than his floor. Doctor Parcival did not mind. Into the lunch room hestalked and deposited twenty cents upon the counter. "Feed me what you wish for that, " he said laughing. "Use up food that you wouldn't otherwise sell. It makesno difference to me. I am a man of distinction, yousee. Why should I concern myself with what I eat. "

The tales that Doctor Parcival told George Willardbegan nowhere and ended nowhere. Sometimes the boythought they must all be inventions, a pack of lies. And then again he was convinced that they contained thevery essence of truth. 

"I was a reporter like you here, " Doctor Parcivalbegan. "It was in a town in Iowa--or was it inIllinois? I don't remember and anyway it makes nodifference. Perhaps I am trying to conceal my identityand don't want to be very definite. Have you everthought it strange that I have money for my needsalthough I do nothing? I may have stolen a great sum ofmoney or been involved in a murder before I came here. There is food for thought in that, eh? If you were areally smart newspaper reporter you would look me up. In Chicago there was a Doctor Cronin who was murdered. Have you heard of that? Some men murdered him and puthim in a trunk. In the early morning they hauled thetrunk across the city. It sat on the back of an expresswagon and they were on the seat as unconcerned asanything. Along they went through quiet streets whereeveryone was asleep. The sun was just coming up overthe lake. Funny, eh--just to think of them smokingpipes and chattering as they drove along as unconcernedas I am now. Perhaps I was one of those men. That wouldbe a strange turn of things, now wouldn't it, eh?"Again Doctor Parcival began his tale: "Well, anywaythere I was, a reporter on a paper just as you arehere, running about and getting little items to print. My mother was poor. She took in washing. Her dream wasto make me a Presbyterian minister and I was studyingwith that end in view. 

"My father had been insane for a number of years. Hewas in an asylum over at Dayton, Ohio. There you see Ihave let it slip out! All of this took place in Ohio, right here in Ohio. There is a clew if you ever get thenotion of looking me up. 

"I was going to tell you of my brother. That's theobject of all this. That's what I'm getting at. Mybrother was a railroad painter and had a job on the BigFour. You know that road runs through Ohio here. Withother men he lived in a box car and away they went fromtown to town painting the railroad property-switches, crossing gates, bridges, and stations. 

"The Big Four paints its stations a nasty orange color. How I hated that color! My brother was always coveredwith it. On pay days he used to get drunk and come homewearing his paint-covered clothes and bringing hismoney with him. He did not give it to mother but laidit in a pile on our kitchen table. 

"About the house he went in the clothes covered withthe nasty orange colored paint. I can see the picture. My mother, who was small and had red, sad-looking eyes, would come into the house from a little shed at theback. That's where she spent her time over the washtubscrubbing people's dirty clothes. In she would come andstand by the table, rubbing her eyes with her apronthat was covered with soap-suds. 

"'Don't touch it! Don't you dare touch that money, ' mybrother roared, and then he himself took five or tendollars and went tramping off to the saloons. When hehad spent what he had taken he came back for more. Henever gave my mother any money at all but stayed aboutuntil he had spent it all, a little at a time. Then hewent back to his job with the painting crew on therailroad. After he had gone things began to arrive atour house, groceries and such things. Sometimes therewould be a dress for mother or a pair of shoes for me. 

"Strange, eh? My mother loved my brother much more thanshe did me, although he never said a kind word toeither of us and always raved up and down threateningus if we dared so much as touch the money thatsometimes lay on the table three days. 

"We got along pretty well. I studied to be a ministerand prayed. I was a regular ass about saying prayers. You should have heard me. When my father died I prayedall night, just as I did sometimes when my brother wasin town drinking and going about buying the things forus. In the evening after supper I knelt by the tablewhere the money lay and prayed for hours. When no onewas looking I stole a dollar or two and put it in mypocket. That makes me laugh now but then it wasterrible. It was on my mind all the time. I got sixdollars a week from my job on the paper and always tookit straight home to mother. The few dollars I stolefrom my brother's pile I spent on myself, you know, fortrifles, candy and cigarettes and such things. 

"When my father died at the asylum over at Dayton, Iwent over there. I borrowed some money from the man forwhom I worked and went on the train at night. It wasraining. In the asylum they treated me as though I werea king. 

"The men who had jobs in the asylum had found out I wasa newspaper reporter. That made them afraid. There hadbeen some negligence, some carelessness, you see, whenfather was ill. They thought perhaps I would write itup in the paper and make a fuss. I never intended to doanything of the kind. 

"Anyway, in I went to the room where my father lay deadand blessed the dead body. I wonder what put thatnotion into my head. Wouldn't my brother, the painter, have laughed, though. There I stood over the dead bodyand spread out my hands. The superintendent of theasylum and some of his helpers came in and stood aboutlooking sheepish. It was very amusing. I spread out myhands and said, 'Let peace brood over this carcass. 'That's what I said. "

Jumping to his feet and breaking off the tale, DoctorParcival began to walk up and down in the office of theWinesburg Eagle where George Willard sat listening. Hewas awkward and, as the office was small, continuallyknocked against things. "What a fool I am to betalking, " he said. "That is not my object in cominghere and forcing my acquaintanceship upon you. I havesomething else in mind. You are a reporter just as Iwas once and you have attracted my attention. You mayend by becoming just such another fool. I want to warnyou and keep on warning you. That's why I seek youout. "

Doctor Parcival began talking of George Willard'sattitude toward men. It seemed to the boy that the manhad but one object in view, to make everyone seemdespicable. "I want to fill you with hatred andcontempt so that you will be a superior being, " hedeclared. "Look at my brother. There was a fellow, eh?He despised everyone, you see. You have no idea withwhat contempt he looked upon mother and me. And was henot our superior? You know he was. You have not seenhim and yet I have made you feel that. I have given youa sense of it. He is dead. Once when he was drunk helay down on the tracks and the car in which he livedwith the other painters ran over him. "

 * * *

One day in August Doctor Parcival had an adventure inWinesburg. For a month George Willard had been goingeach morning to spend an hour in the doctor's office. The visits came about through a desire on the part ofthe doctor to read to the boy from the pages of a bookhe was in the process of writing. To write the bookDoctor Parcival declared was the object of his comingto Winesburg to live. 

On the morning in August before the coming of the boy, an incident had happened in the doctor's office. Therehad been an accident on Main Street. A team of horseshad been frightened by a train and had run away. Alittle girl, the daughter of a farmer, had been thrownfrom a buggy and killed. 

On Main Street everyone had become excited and a cryfor doctors had gone up. All three of the activepractitioners of the town had come quickly but hadfound the child dead. From the crowd someone had run tothe office of Doctor Parcival who had bluntly refusedto go down out of his office to the dead child. Theuseless cruelty of his refusal had passed unnoticed. Indeed, the man who had come up the stairway to summonhim had hurried away without hearing the refusal. 

All of this, Doctor Parcival did not know and whenGeorge Willard came to his office he found the manshaking with terror. "What I have done will arouse thepeople of this town, " he declared excitedly. "Do I notknow human nature? Do I not know what will happen? Wordof my refusal will be whispered about. Presently menwill get together in groups and talk of it. They willcome here. We will quarrel and there will be talk ofhanging. Then they will come again bearing a rope intheir hands. "

Doctor Parcival shook with fright. "I have apresentiment, " he declared emphatically. "It may bethat what I am talking about will not occur thismorning. It may be put off until tonight but I will behanged. Everyone will get excited. I will be hanged toa lamp-post on Main Street. "

Going to the door of his dirty office, Doctor Parcivallooked timidly down the stairway leading to the street. When he returned the fright that had been in his eyeswas beginning to be replaced by doubt. Coming on tiptoeacross the room he tapped George Willard on theshoulder. "If not now, sometime, " he whispered, shakinghis head. "In the end I will be crucified, uselesslycrucified. "

Doctor Parcival began to plead with George Willard. "You must pay attention to me, " he urged. "If somethinghappens perhaps you will be able to write the book thatI may never get written. The idea is very simple, sosimple that if you are not careful you will forget it. It is this--that everyone in the world is Christ andthey are all crucified. That's what I want to say. Don't you forget that. Whatever happens, don't you darelet yourself forget. "

NOBODY KNOWS

Looking cautiously about, George Willard arose from hisdesk in the office of the Winesburg Eagle and wenthurriedly out at the back door. The night was warm andcloudy and although it was not yet eight o'clock, thealleyway back of the Eagle office was pitch dark. Ateam of horses tied to a post somewhere in the darknessstamped on the hard-baked ground. A cat sprang fromunder George Willard's feet and ran away into thenight. The young man was nervous. All day he had goneabout his work like one dazed by a blow. In thealleyway he trembled as though with fright. 

In the darkness George Willard walked along thealleyway, going carefully and cautiously. The backdoors of the Winesburg stores were open and he couldsee men sitting about under the store lamps. InMyerbaum's Notion Store Mrs. Willy the saloon keeper'swife stood by the counter with a basket on her arm. SidGreen the clerk was waiting on her. He leaned over thecounter and talked earnestly. 

George Willard crouched and then jumped through thepath of light that came out at the door. He began torun forward in the darkness. Behind Ed Griffith'ssaloon old Jerry Bird the town drunkard lay asleep onthe ground. The runner stumbled over the sprawlinglegs. He laughed brokenly. 

George Willard had set forth upon an adventure. All dayhe had been trying to make up his mind to go throughwith the adventure and now he was acting. In the officeof the Winesburg Eagle he had been sitting since sixo'clock trying to think. 

There had been no decision. He had just jumped to hisfeet, hurried past Will Henderson who was reading proofin the printshop and started to run along the alleyway. 

Through street after street went George Willard, avoiding the people who passed. He crossed andrecrossed the road. When he passed a street lamp hepulled his hat down over his face. He did not darethink. In his mind there was a fear but it was a newkind of fear. He was afraid the adventure on which hehad set out would be spoiled, that he would losecourage and turn back. 

George Willard found Louise Trunnion in the kitchen ofher father's house. She was washing dishes by the lightof a kerosene lamp. There she stood behind the screendoor in the little shedlike kitchen at the back of thehouse. George Willard stopped by a picket fence andtried to control the shaking of his body. Only a narrowpotato patch separated him from the adventure. Fiveminutes passed before he felt sure enough of himself tocall to her. "Louise! Oh, Louise!" he called. The crystuck in his throat. His voice became a hoarse whisper. 

Louise Trunnion came out across the potato patchholding the dish cloth in her hand. "How do you know Iwant to go out with you, " she said sulkily. "What makesyou so sure?"

George Willard did not answer. In silence the twostood in the darkness with the fence between them. "Yougo on along, " she said. "Pa's in there. I'll comealong. You wait by Williams' barn. "

The young newspaper reporter had received a letter fromLouise Trunnion. It had come that morning to the officeof the Winesburg Eagle. The letter was brief. "I'myours if you want me, " it said. He thought it annoyingthat in the darkness by the fence she had pretendedthere was nothing between them. "She has a nerve! Well, gracious sakes, she has a nerve, " he muttered as hewent along the street and passed a row of vacant lotswhere corn grew. The corn was shoulder high and hadbeen planted right down to the sidewalk. 

When Louise Trunnion came out of the front door of herhouse she still wore the gingham dress in which she hadbeen washing dishes. There was no hat on her head. Theboy could see her standing with the doorknob in herhand talking to someone within, no doubt to old JakeTrunnion, her father. Old Jake was half deaf and sheshouted. The door closed and everything was dark andsilent in the little side street. George Willardtrembled more violently than ever. 

In the shadows by Williams' barn George and Louisestood, not daring to talk. She was not particularlycomely and there was a black smudge on the side of hernose. George thought she must have rubbed her nose withher finger after she had been handling some of thekitchen pots. 

The young man began to laugh nervously. "It's warm, "he said. He wanted to touch her with his hand. "I'm notvery bold, " he thought. Just to touch the folds of thesoiled gingham dress would, he decided, be an exquisitepleasure. She began to quibble. "You think you'rebetter than I am. Don't tell me, I guess I know, " shesaid drawing closer to him. 

A flood of words burst from George Willard. Heremembered the look that had lurked in the girl's eyeswhen they had met on the streets and thought of thenote she had written. Doubt left him. The whisperedtales concerning her that had gone about town gave himconfidence. He became wholly the male, bold andaggressive. In his heart there was no sympathy for her. "Ah, come on, it'll be all right. There won't be anyoneknow anything. How can they know?" he urged. 

They began to walk along a narrow brick sidewalkbetween the cracks of which tall weeds grew. Some ofthe bricks were missing and the sidewalk was rough andirregular. He took hold of her hand that was also roughand thought it delightfully small. "I can't go far, "she said and her voice was quiet, unperturbed. 

They crossed a bridge that ran over a tiny stream andpassed another vacant lot in which corn grew. Thestreet ended. In the path at the side of the road theywere compelled to walk one behind the other. WillOverton's berry field lay beside the road and there wasa pile of boards. "Will is going to build a shed tostore berry crates here, " said George and they sat downupon the boards. 

 * * *

When George Willard got back into Main Street it waspast ten o'clock and had begun to rain. Three times hewalked up and down the length of Main Street. SylvesterWest's Drug Store was still open and he went in andbought a cigar. When Shorty Crandall the clerk came outat the door with him he was pleased. For five minutesthe two stood in the shelter of the store awning andtalked. George Willard felt satisfied. He had wantedmore than anything else to talk to some man. Around acorner toward the New Willard House he went whistlingsoftly. 

On the sidewalk at the side of Winney's Dry Goods Storewhere there was a high board fence covered with circuspictures, he stopped whistling and stood perfectlystill in the darkness, attentive, listening as thoughfor a voice calling his name. Then again he laughednervously. "She hasn't got anything on me. Nobodyknows, " he muttered doggedly and went on his way. 

GODLINESS

A Tale in Four Parts

There were always three or four old people sitting onthe front porch of the house or puttering about thegarden of the Bentley farm. Three of the old peoplewere women and sisters to Jesse. They were a colorless, soft voiced lot. Then there was a silent old man withthin white hair who was Jesse's uncle. 

The farmhouse was built of wood, a board outer-coveringover a framework of logs. It was in reality not onehouse but a cluster of houses joined together in arather haphazard manner. Inside, the place was full ofsurprises. One went up steps from the living room intothe dining room and there were always steps to beascended or descended in passing from one room toanother. At meal times the place was like a beehive. Atone moment all was quiet, then doors began to open, feet clattered on stairs, a murmur of soft voices aroseand people appeared from a dozen obscure corners. 

Besides the old people, already mentioned, many otherslived in the Bentley house. There were four hired men, a woman named Aunt Callie Beebe, who was in charge ofthe housekeeping, a dull-witted girl named ElizaStoughton, who made beds and helped with the milking, aboy who worked in the stables, and Jesse Bentleyhimself, the owner and overlord of it all. 

By the time the American Civil War had been over fortwenty years, that part of Northern Ohio where theBentley farms lay had begun to emerge from pioneerlife. Jesse then owned machinery for harvesting grain. He had built modern barns and most of his land wasdrained with carefully laid the drain, but in order tounderstand the man we will have to go back to anearlier day. 

The Bentley family had been in Northern Ohio forseveral generations before Jesse's time. They came fromNew York State and took up land when the country wasnew and land could be had at a low price. For a longtime they, in common with all the other Middle Westernpeople, were very poor. The land they had settled uponwas heavily wooded and covered with fallen logs andunderbrush. After the long hard labor of clearing theseaway and cutting the timber, there were still thestumps to be reckoned with. Plows run through thefields caught on hidden roots, stones lay all about, onthe low places water gathered, and the young cornturned yellow, sickened and died. 

When Jesse Bentley's father and brothers had come intotheir ownership of the place, much of the harder partof the work of clearing had been done, but they clungto old traditions and worked like driven animals. Theylived as practically all of the farming people of thetime lived. In the spring and through most of thewinter the highways leading into the town of Winesburgwere a sea of mud. The four young men of the familyworked hard all day in the fields, they ate heavily ofcoarse, greasy food, and at night slept like tiredbeasts on beds of straw. Into their lives came littlethat was not coarse and brutal and outwardly they werethemselves coarse and brutal. On Saturday afternoonsthey hitched a team of horses to a three-seated wagonand went off to town. In town they stood about thestoves in the stores talking to other farmers or to thestore keepers. They were dressed in overalls and in thewinter wore heavy coats that were flecked with mud. Their hands as they stretched them out to the heat ofthe stoves were cracked and red. It was difficult forthem to talk and so they for the most part kept silent. When they had bought meat, flour, sugar, and salt, theywent into one of the Winesburg saloons and drank beer. Under the influence of drink the naturally strong lustsof their natures, kept suppressed by the heroic laborof breaking up new ground, were released. A kind ofcrude and animal-like poetic fervor took possession ofthem. On the road home they stood up on the wagon seatsand shouted at the stars. Sometimes they fought longand bitterly and at other times they broke forth intosongs. Once Enoch Bentley, the older one of the boys, struck his father, old Tom Bentley, with the butt of ateamster's whip, and the old man seemed likely to die. For days Enoch lay hid in the straw in the loft of thestable ready to flee if the result of his momentarypassion turned out to be murder. He was kept alive withfood brought by his mother, who also kept him informedof the injured man's condition. When all turned outwell he emerged from his hiding place and went back tothe work of clearing land as though nothing hadhappened. 

 * * *

The Civil War brought a sharp turn to the fortunes ofthe Bentleys and was responsible for the rise of theyoungest son, Jesse. Enoch, Edward, Harry, and WillBentley all enlisted and before the long war ended theywere all killed. For a time after they went away to theSouth, old Tom tried to run the place, but he was notsuccessful. When the last of the four had been killedhe sent word to Jesse that he would have to come home. 

Then the mother, who had not been well for a year, diedsuddenly, and the father became altogether discouraged. He talked of selling the farm and moving into town. Allday he went about shaking his head and muttering. Thework in the fields was neglected and weeds grew high inthe corn. Old Tim hired men but he did not use themintelligently. When they had gone away to the fields inthe morning he wandered into the woods and sat down ona log. Sometimes he forgot to come home at night andone of the daughters had to go in search of him. 

When Jesse Bentley came home to the farm and began totake charge of things he was a slight, sensitive-looking man of twenty-two. At eighteen hehad left home to go to school to become a scholar andeventually to become a minister of the PresbyterianChurch. All through his boyhood he had been what in ourcountry was called an "odd sheep" and had not got onwith his brothers. Of all the family only his motherhad understood him and she was now dead. When he camehome to take charge of the farm, that had at that timegrown to more than six hundred acres, everyone on thefarms about and in the nearby town of Winesburg smiledat the idea of his trying to handle the work that hadbeen done by his four strong brothers. 

There was indeed good cause to smile. By the standardsof his day Jesse did not look like a man at all. He wassmall and very slender and womanish of body and, trueto the traditions of young ministers, wore a long blackcoat and a narrow black string tie. The neighbors wereamused when they saw him, after the years away, andthey were even more amused when they saw the woman hehad married in the city. 

As a matter of fact, Jesse's wife did soon go under. That was perhaps Jesse's fault. A farm in Northern Ohioin the hard years after the Civil War was no place fora delicate woman, and Katherine Bentley was delicate. Jesse was hard with her as he was with everybody abouthim in those days. She tried to do such work as all theneighbor women about her did and he let her go onwithout interference. She helped to do the milking anddid part of the housework; she made the beds for themen and prepared their food. For a year she workedevery day from sunrise until late at night and thenafter giving birth to a child she died. 

As for Jesse Bentley--although he was a delicatelybuilt man there was something within him that could noteasily be killed. He had brown curly hair and grey eyesthat were at times hard and direct, at times waveringand uncertain. Not only was he slender but he was alsoshort of stature. His mouth was like the mouth of asensitive and very determined child. Jesse Bentley wasa fanatic. He was a man born out of his time and placeand for this he suffered and made others suffer. Neverdid he succeed in getting what he wanted out of lifeand he did not know what he wanted. Within a very shorttime after he came home to the Bentley farm he madeeveryone there a little afraid of him, and his wife, who should have been close to him as his mother hadbeen, was afraid also. At the end of two weeks afterhis coming, old Tom Bentley made over to him the entireownership of the place and retired into the background. Everyone retired into the background. In spite of hisyouth and inexperience, Jesse had the trick ofmastering the souls of his people. He was so in earnestin everything he did and said that no one understoodhim. He made everyone on the farm work as they hadnever worked before and yet there was no joy in thework. If things went well they went well for Jesse andnever for the people who were his dependents. Like athousand other strong men who have come into the worldhere in America in these later times, Jesse was buthalf strong. He could master others but he could notmaster himself. The running of the farm as it had neverbeen run before was easy for him. When he came homefrom Cleveland where he had been in school, he shuthimself off from all of his people and began to makeplans. He thought about the farm night and day and thatmade him successful. Other men on the farms about himworked too hard and were too fired to think, but tothink of the farm and to be everlastingly making plansfor its success was a relief to Jesse. It partiallysatisfied something in his passionate nature. Immediately after he came home he had a wing built onto the old house and in a large room facing the west hehad windows that looked into the barnyard and otherwindows that looked off across the fields. By thewindow he sat down to think. Hour after hour and dayafter day he sat and looked over the land and thoughtout his new place in life. The passionate burning thingin his nature flamed up and his eyes became hard. Hewanted to make the farm produce as no farm in his statehad ever produced before and then he wanted somethingelse. It was the indefinable hunger within that madehis eyes waver and that kept him always more and moresilent before people. He would have given much toachieve peace and in him was a fear that peace was thething he could not achieve. 

All over his body Jesse Bentley was alive. In hissmall frame was gathered the force of a long line ofstrong men. He had always been extraordinarily alivewhen he was a small boy on the farm and later when hewas a young man in school. In the school he had studiedand thought of God and the Bible with his whole mindand heart. As time passed and he grew to know peoplebetter, he began to think of himself as anextraordinary man, one set apart from his fellows. Hewanted terribly to make his life a thing of greatimportance, and as he looked about at his fellow menand saw how like clods they lived it seemed to him thathe could not bear to become also such a clod. Althoughin his absorption in himself and in his own destiny hewas blind to the fact that his young wife was doing astrong woman's work even after she had become largewith child and that she was killing herself in hisservice, he did not intend to be unkind to her. Whenhis father, who was old and twisted with toil, madeover to him the ownership of the farm and seemedcontent to creep away to a corner and wait for death, he shrugged his shoulders and dismissed the old manfrom his mind. 

In the room by the window overlooking the land that hadcome down to him sat Jesse thinking of his own affairs. In the stables he could hear the tramping of his horsesand the restless movement of his cattle. Away in thefields he could see other cattle wandering over greenhills. The voices of men, his men who worked for him, came in to him through the window. From the milkhousethere was the steady thump, thump of a churn beingmanipulated by the half-witted girl, Eliza Stoughton. Jesse's mind went back to the men of Old Testament dayswho had also owned lands and herds. He remembered howGod had come down out of the skies and talked to thesemen and he wanted God to notice and to talk to himalso. A kind of feverish boyish eagerness to in someway achieve in his own life the flavor of significancethat had hung over these men took possession of him. Being a prayerful man he spoke of the matter aloud toGod and the sound of his own words strengthened and fedhis eagerness. 

"I am a new kind of man come into possession of thesefields, " he declared. "Look upon me, O God, and lookThou also upon my neighbors and all the men who havegone before me here! O God, create in me another Jesse, like that one of old, to rule over men and to be thefather of sons who shall be rulers!" Jesse grew excitedas he talked aloud and jumping to his feet walked upand down in the room. In fancy he saw himself living inold times and among old peoples. The land that laystretched out before him became of vast significance, aplace peopled by his fancy with a new race of mensprung from himself. It seemed to him that in his dayas in those other and older days, kingdoms might becreated and new impulses given to the lives of men bythe power of God speaking through a chosen servant. Helonged to be such a servant. "It is God's work I havecome to the land to do, " he declared in a loud voiceand his short figure straightened and he thought thatsomething like a halo of Godly approval hung over him. 

 * * *

It will perhaps be somewhat difficult for the men andwomen of a later day to understand Jesse Bentley. Inthe last fifty years a vast change has taken place inthe lives of our people. A revolution has in fact takenplace. The coming of industrialism, attended by all theroar and rattle of affairs, the shrill cries ofmillions of new voices that have come among us fromoverseas, the going and coming of trains, the growth ofcities, the building of the inter-urban car lines thatweave in and out of towns and past farmhouses, and nowin these later days the coming of the automobiles hasworked a tremendous change in the lives and in thehabits of thought of our people of Mid-America. Books, badly imagined and written though they may be in thehurry of our times, are in every household, magazinescirculate by the millions of copies, newspapers areeverywhere. In our day a farmer standing by the stovein the store in his village has his mind filled tooverflowing with the words of other men. The newspapersand the magazines have pumped him full. Much of the oldbrutal ignorance that had in it also a kind ofbeautiful childlike innocence is gone forever. Thefarmer by the stove is brother to the men of thecities, and if you listen you will find him talking asglibly and as senselessly as the best city man of usall. 

In Jesse Bentley's time and in the country districts ofthe whole Middle West in the years after the Civil Warit was not so. Men labored too hard and were too tiredto read. In them was no desire for words printed uponpaper. As they worked in the fields, vague, half-formedthoughts took possession of them. They believed in Godand in God's power to control their lives. In thelittle Protestant churches they gathered on Sunday tohear of God and his works. The churches were the centerof the social and intellectual life of the times. Thefigure of God was big in the hearts of men. 

And so, having been born an imaginative child andhaving within him a great intellectual eagerness, JesseBentley had turned wholeheartedly toward God. When thewar took his brothers away, he saw the hand of God inthat. When his father became ill and could no longerattend to the running of the farm, he took that also asa sign from God. In the city, when the word came tohim, he walked about at night through the streetsthinking of the matter and when he had come home andhad got the work on the farm well under way, he wentagain at night to walk through the forests and over thelow hills and to think of God. 

As he walked the importance of his own figure in somedivine plan grew in his mind. He grew avaricious andwas impatient that the farm contained only six hundredacres. Kneeling in a fence corner at the edge of somemeadow, he sent his voice abroad into the silence andlooking up he saw the stars shining down at him. 

One evening, some months after his father's death, andwhen his wife Katherine was expecting at any moment tobe laid abed of childbirth, Jesse left his house andwent for a long walk. The Bentley farm was situated ina tiny valley watered by Wine Creek, and Jesse walkedalong the banks of the stream to the end of his ownland and on through the fields of his neighbors. As hewalked the valley broadened and then narrowed again. Great open stretches of field and wood lay before him. The moon came out from behind clouds, and, climbing alow hill, he sat down to think. 

Jesse thought that as the true servant of God theentire stretch of country through which he had walkedshould have come into his possession. He thought of hisdead brothers and blamed them that they had not workedharder and achieved more. Before him in the moonlightthe tiny stream ran down over stones, and he began tothink of the men of old times who like himself hadowned flocks and lands. 

A fantastic impulse, half fear, half greediness, tookpossession of Jesse Bentley. He remembered how in theold Bible story the Lord had appeared to that otherJesse and told him to send his son David to where Sauland the men of Israel were fighting the Philistines inthe Valley of Elah. Into Jesse's mind came theconviction that all of the Ohio farmers who owned landin the valley of Wine Creek were Philistines andenemies of God. "Suppose, " he whispered to himself, "there should come from among them one who, likeGoliath the Philistine of Gath, could defeat me andtake from me my possessions. " In fancy he felt thesickening dread that he thought must have lain heavy onthe heart of Saul before the coming of David. Jumpingto his feet, he began to run through the night. As heran he called to God. His voice carried far over thelow hills. "Jehovah of Hosts, " he cried, "send to methis night out of the womb of Katherine, a son. Let Thygrace alight upon me. Send me a son to be called Davidwho shall help me to pluck at last all of these landsout of the hands of the Philistines and turn them toThy service and to the building of Thy kingdom onearth. "

II

David Hardy of Winesburg, Ohio, was the grandson ofJesse Bentley, the owner of Bentley farms. When he wastwelve years old he went to the old Bentley place tolive. His mother, Louise Bentley, the girl who cameinto the world on that night when Jesse ran through thefields crying to God that he be given a son, had grownto womanhood on the farm and had married young JohnHardy of Winesburg, who became a banker. Louise and herhusband did not live happily together and everyoneagreed that she was to blame. She was a small womanwith sharp grey eyes and black hair. From childhood shehad been inclined to fits of temper and when not angryshe was often morose and silent. In Winesburg it wassaid that she drank. Her husband, the banker, who was acareful, shrewd man, tried hard to make her happy. Whenhe began to make money he bought for her a large brickhouse on Elm Street in Winesburg and he was the firstman in that town to keep a manservant to drive hiswife's carriage. 

But Louise could not be made happy. She flew into halfinsane fits of temper during which she was sometimessilent, sometimes noisy and quarrelsome. She swore andcried out in her anger. She got a knife from thekitchen and threatened her husband's life. Once shedeliberately set fire to the house, and often she hidherself away for days in her own room and would see noone. Her life, lived as a half recluse, gave rise toall sorts of stories concerning her. It was said thatshe took drugs and that she hid herself away frompeople because she was often so under the influence ofdrink that her condition could not be concealed. Sometimes on summer afternoons she came out of thehouse and got into her carriage. Dismissing the drivershe took the reins in her own hands and drove off attop speed through the streets. If a pedestrian got inher way she drove straight ahead and the frightenedcitizen had to escape as best he could. To the peopleof the town it seemed as though she wanted to run themdown. When she had driven through several streets, tearing around corners and beating the horses with thewhip, she drove off into the country. On the countryroads after she had gotten out of sight of the housesshe let the horses slow down to a walk and her wild, reckless mood passed. She became thoughtful andmuttered words. Sometimes tears came into her eyes. Andthen when she came back into town she again drovefuriously through the quiet streets. But for theinfluence of her husband and the respect he inspired inpeople's minds she would have been arrested more thanonce by the town marshal. 

Young David Hardy grew up in the house with this womanand as can well be imagined there was not much joy inhis childhood. He was too young then to have opinionsof his own about people, but at times it was difficultfor him not to have very definite opinions about thewoman who was his mother. David was always a quiet, orderly boy and for a long time was thought by thepeople of Winesburg to be something of a dullard. Hiseyes were brown and as a child he had a habit oflooking at things and people a long time withoutappearing to see what he was looking at. When he heardhis mother spoken of harshly or when he overheard herberating his father, he was frightened and ran away tohide. Sometimes he could not find a hiding place andthat confused him. Turning his face toward a tree or ifhe was indoors toward the wall, he closed his eyes andtried not to think of anything. He had a habit oftalking aloud to himself, and early in life a spirit ofquiet sadness often took possession of him. 

On the occasions when David went to visit hisgrandfather on the Bentley farm, he was altogethercontented and happy. Often he wished that he wouldnever have to go back to town and once when he had comehome from the farm after a long visit, somethinghappened that had a lasting effect on his mind. 

David had come back into town with one of the hiredmen. The man was in a hurry to go about his own affairsand left the boy at the head of the street in which theHardy house stood. It was early dusk of a fall eveningand the sky was overcast with clouds. Somethinghappened to David. He could not bear to go into thehouse where his mother and father lived, and on animpulse he decided to run away from home. He intendedto go back to the farm and to his grandfather, but losthis way and for hours he wandered weeping andfrightened on country roads. It started to rain andlightning flashed in the sky. The boy's imagination wasexcited and he fancied that he could see and hearstrange things in the darkness. Into his mind came theconviction that he was walking and running in someterrible void where no one had ever been before. Thedarkness about him seemed limitless. The sound of thewind blowing in trees was terrifying. When a team ofhorses approached along the road in which he walked hewas frightened and climbed a fence. Through a field heran until he came into another road and getting uponhis knees felt of the soft ground with his fingers. Butfor the figure of his grandfather, whom he was afraidhe would never find in the darkness, he thought theworld must be altogether empty. When his cries wereheard by a farmer who was walking home from town and hewas brought back to his father's house, he was so tiredand excited that he did not know what was happening tohim. 

By chance David's father knew that he had disappeared. On the street he had met the farm hand from the Bentleyplace and knew of his son's return to town. When theboy did not come home an alarm was set up and JohnHardy with several men of the town went to search thecountry. The report that David had been kidnapped ranabout through the streets of Winesburg. When he camehome there were no lights in the house, but his motherappeared and clutched him eagerly in her arms. Davidthought she had suddenly become another woman. He couldnot believe that so delightful a thing had happened. With her own hands Louise Hardy bathed his tired youngbody and cooked him food. She would not let him go tobed but, when he had put on his nightgown, blew out thelights and sat down in a chair to hold him in her arms. For an hour the woman sat in the darkness and held herboy. All the time she kept talking in a low voice. David could not understand what had so changed her. Herhabitually dissatisfied face had become, he thought, the most peaceful and lovely thing he had ever seen. When he began to weep she held him more and moretightly. On and on went her voice. It was not harsh orshrill as when she talked to her husband, but was likerain falling on trees. Presently men began coming tothe door to report that he had not been found, but shemade him hide and be silent until she had sent themaway. He thought it must be a game his mother and themen of the town were playing with him and laughedjoyously. Into his mind came the thought that hishaving been lost and frightened in the darkness was analtogether unimportant matter. He thought that he wouldhave been willing to go through the frightfulexperience a thousand times to be sure of finding atthe end of the long black road a thing so lovely as hismother had suddenly become. 

 * * *

During the last years of young David's boyhood he sawhis mother but seldom and she became for him just awoman with whom he had once lived. Still he could notget her figure out of his mind and as he grew older itbecame more definite. When he was twelve years old hewent to the Bentley farm to live. Old Jesse came intotown and fairly demanded that he be given charge of theboy. The old man was excited and determined on havinghis own way. He talked to John Hardy in the office ofthe Winesburg Savings Bank and then the two men went tothe house on Elm Street to talk with Louise. They bothexpected her to make trouble but were mistaken. She wasvery quiet and when Jesse had explained his mission andhad gone on at some length about the advantages to comethrough having the boy out of doors and in the quietatmosphere of the old farmhouse, she nodded her head inapproval. "It is an atmosphere not corrupted by mypresence, " she said sharply. Her shoulders shook andshe seemed about to fly into a fit of temper. "It is aplace for a man child, although it was never a placefor me, " she went on. "You never wanted me there and ofcourse the air of your house did me no good. It waslike poison in my blood but it will be different withhim. "

Louise turned and went out of the room, leaving the twomen to sit in embarrassed silence. As very oftenhappened she later stayed in her room for days. Evenwhen the boy's clothes were packed and he was takenaway she did not appear. The loss of her son made asharp break in her life and she seemed less inclined toquarrel with her husband. John Hardy thought it had allturned out very well indeed. 

And so young David went to live in the Bentleyfarmhouse with Jesse. Two of the old farmer's sisterswere alive and still lived in the house. They wereafraid of Jesse and rarely spoke when he was about. Oneof the women who had been noted for her flaming redhair when she was younger was a born mother and becamethe boy's caretaker. Every night when he had gone tobed she went into his room and sat on the floor untilhe fell asleep. When he became drowsy she became boldand whispered things that he later thought he must havedreamed. 

Her soft low voice called him endearing names and hedreamed that his mother had come to him and that shehad changed so that she was always as she had been thattime after he ran away. He also grew bold and reachingout his hand stroked the face of the woman on the floorso that she was ecstatically happy. Everyone in the oldhouse became happy after the boy went there. The hardinsistent thing in Jesse Bentley that had kept thepeople in the house silent and timid and that had neverbeen dispelled by the presence of the girl Louise wasapparently swept away by the coming of the boy. It wasas though God had relented and sent a son to the man. 

The man who had proclaimed himself the only trueservant of God in all the valley of Wine Creek, and whohad wanted God to send him a sign of approval by way ofa son out of the womb of Katherine, began to think thatat last his prayers had been answered. Although he wasat that time only fifty-five years old he lookedseventy and was worn out with much thinking andscheming. The effort he had made to extend his landholdings had been successful and there were few farmsin the valley that did not belong to him, but untilDavid came he was a bitterly disappointed man. 

There were two influences at work in Jesse Bentley andall his life his mind had been a battleground for theseinfluences. First there was the old thing in him. Hewanted to be a man of God and a leader among men ofGod. His walking in the fields and through the forestsat night had brought him close to nature and there wereforces in the passionately religious man that ran outto the forces in nature. The disappointment that hadcome to him when a daughter and not a son had been bornto Katherine had fallen upon him like a blow struck bysome unseen hand and the blow had somewhat softened hisegotism. He still believed that God might at any momentmake himself manifest out of the winds or the clouds, but he no longer demanded such recognition. Instead heprayed for it. Sometimes he was altogether doubtful andthought God had deserted the world. He regretted thefate that had not let him live in a simpler and sweetertime when at the beckoning of some strange cloud in thesky men left their lands and houses and went forth intothe wilderness to create new races. While he workednight and day to make his farms more productive and toextend his holdings of land, he regretted that he couldnot use his own restless energy in the building oftemples, the slaying of unbelievers and in general inthe work of glorifying God's name on earth. 

That is what Jesse hungered for and then also hehungered for something else. He had grown into maturityin America in the years after the Civil War and he, like all men of his time, had been touched by the deepinfluences that were at work in the country duringthose years when modern industrialism was being born. He began to buy machines that would permit him to dothe work of the farms while employing fewer men and hesometimes thought that if he were a younger man hewould give up farming altogether and start a factory inWinesburg for the making of machinery. Jesse formed thehabit of reading newspapers and magazines. He inventeda machine for the making of fence out of wire. Faintlyhe realized that the atmosphere of old times and placesthat he had always cultivated in his own mind wasstrange and foreign to the thing that was growing up inthe minds of others. The beginning of the mostmaterialistic age in the history of the world, whenwars would be fought without patriotism, when men wouldforget God and only pay attention to moral standards, when the will to power would replace the will to serveand beauty would be well-nigh forgotten in the terribleheadlong rush of mankind toward the acquiring ofpossessions, was telling its story to Jesse the man ofGod as it was to the men about him. The greedy thing inhim wanted to make money faster than it could be madeby tilling the land. More than once he went intoWinesburg to talk with his son-in-law John Hardy aboutit. "You are a banker and you will have chances I neverhad, " he said and his eyes shone. "I am thinking aboutit all the time. Big things are going to be done in thecountry and there will be more money to be made than Iever dreamed of. You get into it. I wish I were youngerand had your chance. " Jesse Bentley walked up and downin the bank office and grew more and more excited as hetalked. At one time in his life he had been threatenedwith paralysis and his left side remained somewhatweakened. As he talked his left eyelid twitched. Laterwhen he drove back home and when night came on and thestars came out it was harder to get back the oldfeeling of a close and personal God who lived in thesky overhead and who might at any moment reach out hishand, touch him on the shoulder, and appoint for himsome heroic task to be done. Jesse's mind was fixedupon the things read in newspapers and magazines, onfortunes to be made almost without effort by shrewd menwho bought and sold. For him the coming of the boyDavid did much to bring back with renewed force the oldfaith and it seemed to him that God had at last lookedwith favor upon him. 

As for the boy on the farm, life began to reveal itselfto him in a thousand new and delightful ways. Thekindly attitude of all about him expanded his quietnature and he lost the half timid, hesitating manner hehad always had with his people. At night when he wentto bed after a long day of adventures in the stables, in the fields, or driving about from farm to farm withhis grandfather, he wanted to embrace everyone in thehouse. If Sherley Bentley, the woman who came eachnight to sit on the floor by his bedside, did notappear at once, he went to the head of the stairs andshouted, his young voice ringing through the narrowhalls where for so long there had been a tradition ofsilence. In the morning when he awoke and lay still inbed, the sounds that came in to him through the windowsfilled him with delight. He thought with a shudder ofthe life in the house in Winesburg and of his mother'sangry voice that had always made him tremble. There inthe country all sounds were pleasant sounds. When heawoke at dawn the barnyard back of the house alsoawoke. In the house people stirred about. ElizaStoughton the half-witted girl was poked in the ribs bya farm hand and giggled noisily, in some distant fielda cow bawled and was answered by the cattle in thestables, and one of the farm hands spoke sharply to thehorse he was grooming by the stable door. David leapedout of bed and ran to a window. All of the peoplestirring about excited his mind, and he wondered whathis mother was doing in the house in town. 

From the windows of his own room he could not seedirectly into the barnyard where the farm hands had nowall assembled to do the morning shores, but he couldhear the voices of the men and the neighing of thehorses. When one of the men laughed, he laughed also. Leaning out at the open window, he looked into anorchard where a fat sow wandered about with a litter oftiny pigs at her heels. Every morning he counted thepigs. "Four, five, six, seven, " he said slowly, wettinghis finger and making straight up and down marks on thewindow ledge. David ran to put on his trousers andshirt. A feverish desire to get out of doors tookpossession of him. Every morning he made such a noisecoming down stairs that Aunt Callie, the housekeeper, declared he was trying to tear the house down. When hehad run through the long old house, shutting the doorsbehind him with a bang, he came into the barnyard andlooked about with an amazed air of expectancy. Itseemed to him that in such a place tremendous thingsmight have happened during the night. The farm handslooked at him and laughed. Henry Strader, an old manwho had been on the farm since Jesse came intopossession and who before David's time had never beenknown to make a joke, made the same joke every morning. It amused David so that he laughed and clapped hishands. "See, come here and look, " cried the old man. "Grandfather Jesse's white mare has torn the blackstocking she wears on her foot. "

Day after day through the long summer, Jesse Bentleydrove from farm to farm up and down the valley of WineCreek, and his grandson went with him. They rode in acomfortable old phaeton drawn by the white horse. Theold man scratched his thin white beard and talked tohimself of his plans for increasing the productivenessof the fields they visited and of God's part in theplans all men made. Sometimes he looked at David andsmiled happily and then for a long time he appeared toforget the boy's existence. More and more every day nowhis mind turned back again to the dreams that hadfilled his mind when he had first come out of the cityto live on the land. One afternoon he startled David byletting his dreams take entire possession of him. Withthe boy as a witness, he went through a ceremony andbrought about an accident that nearly destroyed thecompanionship that was growing up between them. 

Jesse and his grandson were driving in a distant partof the valley some miles from home. A forest came downto the road and through the forest Wine Creek wriggledits way over stones toward a distant river. All theafternoon Jesse had been in a meditative mood and nowhe began to talk. His mind went back to the night whenhe had been frightened by thoughts of a giant thatmight come to rob and plunder him of his possessions, and again as on that night when he had run through thefields crying for a son, he became excited to the edgeof insanity. Stopping the horse he got out of the buggyand asked David to get out also. The two climbed over afence and walked along the bank of the stream. The boypaid no attention to the muttering of his grandfather, but ran along beside him and wondered what was going tohappen. When a rabbit jumped up and ran away throughthe woods, he clapped his hands and danced withdelight. He looked at the tall trees and was sorry thathe was not a little animal to climb high in the airwithout being frightened. Stooping, he picked up asmall stone and threw it over the head of hisgrandfather into a clump of bushes. "Wake up, littleanimal. Go and climb to the top of the trees, " heshouted in a shrill voice. 

Jesse Bentley went along under the trees with his headbowed and with his mind in a ferment. His earnestnessaffected the boy, who presently became silent and alittle alarmed. Into the old man's mind had come thenotion that now he could bring from God a word or asign out of the sky, that the presence of the boy andman on their knees in some lonely spot in the forestwould make the miracle he had been waiting for almostinevitable. "It was in just such a place as this thatother David tended the sheep when his father came andtold him to go down unto Saul, " he muttered. 

Taking the boy rather roughly by the shoulder, heclimbed over a fallen log and when he had come to anopen place among the trees he dropped upon his kneesand began to pray in a loud voice. 

A kind of terror he had never known before tookpossession of David. Crouching beneath a tree hewatched the man on the ground before him and his ownknees began to tremble. It seemed to him that he was inthe presence not only of his grandfather but of someoneelse, someone who might hurt him, someone who was notkindly but dangerous and brutal. He began to cry andreaching down picked up a small stick, which he heldtightly gripped in his fingers. When Jesse Bentley, absorbed in his own idea, suddenly arose and advancedtoward him, his terror grew until his whole body shook. In the woods an intense silence seemed to lie overeverything and suddenly out of the silence came the oldman's harsh and insistent voice. Gripping the boy'sshoulders, Jesse turned his face to the sky andshouted. The whole left side of his face twitched andhis hand on the boy's shoulder twitched also. "Make asign to me, God, " he cried. "Here I stand with the boyDavid. Come down to me out of the sky and make Thypresence known to me. "

With a cry of fear, David turned and, shaking himselfloose from the hands that held him, ran away throughthe forest. He did not believe that the man who turnedup his face and in a harsh voice shouted at the sky washis grandfather at all. The man did not look like hisgrandfather. The conviction that something strange andterrible had happened, that by some miracle a new anddangerous person had come into the body of the kindlyold man, took possession of him. On and on he ran downthe hillside, sobbing as he ran. When he fell over theroots of a tree and in falling struck his head, hearose and tried to run on again. His head hurt so thatpresently he fell down and lay still, but it was onlyafter Jesse had carried him to the buggy and he awoketo find the old man's hand stroking his head tenderlythat the terror left him. "Take me away. There is aterrible man back there in the woods, " he declaredfirmly, while Jesse looked away over the tops of thetrees and again his lips cried out to God. "What have Idone that Thou dost not approve of me, " he whisperedsoftly, saying the words over and over as he droverapidly along the road with the boy's cut and bleedinghead held tenderly against his shoulder. 

III

Surrender

The story of Louise Bentley, who became Mrs. John Hardyand lived with her husband in a brick house on ElmStreet in Winesburg, is a story of misunderstanding. 

Before such women as Louise can be understood and theirlives made livable, much will have to be done. Thoughtful books will have to be written and thoughtfullives lived by people about them. 

Born of a delicate and overworked mother, and animpulsive, hard, imaginative father, who did not lookwith favor upon her coming into the world, Louise wasfrom childhood a neurotic, one of the race ofover-sensitive women that in later days industrialismwas to bring in such great numbers into the world. 

During her early years she lived on the Bentley farm, asilent, moody child, wanting love more than anythingelse in the world and not getting it. When she wasfifteen she went to live in Winesburg with the familyof Albert Hardy, who had a store for the sale ofbuggies and wagons, and who was a member of the townboard of education. 

Louise went into town to be a student in the WinesburgHigh School and she went to live at the Hardys' becauseAlbert Hardy and her father were friends. 

Hardy, the vehicle merchant of Winesburg, likethousands of other men of his times, was an enthusiaston the subject of education. He had made his own way inthe world without learning got from books, but he wasconvinced that had he but known books things would havegone better with him. To everyone who came into hisshop he talked of the matter, and in his own householdhe drove his family distracted by his constant harpingon the subject. 

He had two daughters and one son, John Hardy, and morethan once the daughters threatened to leave schoolaltogether. As a matter of principle they did justenough work in their classes to avoid punishment. "Ihate books and I hate anyone who likes books, " Harriet, the younger of the two girls, declared passionately. 

In Winesburg as on the farm Louise was not happy. Foryears she had dreamed of the time when she could goforth into the world, and she looked upon the move intothe Hardy household as a great step in the direction offreedom. Always when she had thought of the matter, ithad seemed to her that in town all must be gaiety andlife, that there men and women must live happily andfreely, giving and taking friendship and affection asone takes the feel of a wind on the cheek. After thesilence and the cheerlessness of life in the Bentleyhouse, she dreamed of stepping forth into an atmospherethat was warm and pulsating with life and reality. Andin the Hardy household Louise might have got somethingof the thing for which she so hungered but for amistake she made when she had just come to town. 

Louise won the disfavor of the two Hardy girls, Maryand Harriet, by her application to her studies inschool. She did not come to the house until the daywhen school was to begin and knew nothing of thefeeling they had in the matter. She was timid andduring the first month made no acquaintances. EveryFriday afternoon one of the hired men from the farmdrove into Winesburg and took her home for theweek-end, so that she did not spend the Saturdayholiday with the town people. Because she wasembarrassed and lonely she worked constantly at herstudies. To Mary and Harriet, it seemed as though shetried to make trouble for them by her proficiency. Inher eagerness to appear well Louise wanted to answerevery question put to the class by the teacher. Shejumped up and down and her eyes flashed. Then when shehad answered some question the others in the class hadbeen unable to answer, she smiled happily. "See, I havedone it for you, " her eyes seemed to say. "You need notbother about the matter. I will answer all questions. For the whole class it will be easy while I am here. "

In the evening after supper in the Hardy house, AlbertHardy began to praise Louise. One of the teachers hadspoken highly of her and he was delighted. "Well, againI have heard of it, " he began, looking hard at hisdaughters and then turning to smile at Louise. "Anotherof the teachers has told me of the good work Louise isdoing. Everyone in Winesburg is telling me how smartshe is. I am ashamed that they do not speak so of myown girls. " Arising, the merchant marched about theroom and lighted his evening cigar. 

The two girls looked at each other and shook theirheads wearily. Seeing their indifference the fatherbecame angry. "I tell you it is something for you twoto be thinking about, " he cried, glaring at them. "There is a big change coming here in America and inlearning is the only hope of the coming generations. Louise is the daughter of a rich man but she is notashamed to study. It should make you ashamed to seewhat she does. "

The merchant took his hat from a rack by the door andprepared to depart for the evening. At the door hestopped and glared back. So fierce was his manner thatLouise was frightened and ran upstairs to her own room. The daughters began to speak of their own affairs. "Payattention to me, " roared the merchant. "Your minds arelazy. Your indifference to education is affecting yourcharacters. You will amount to nothing. Now mark what Isay--Louise will be so far ahead of you that you willnever catch up. "

The distracted man went out of the house and into thestreet shaking with wrath. He went along mutteringwords and swearing, but when he got into Main Streethis anger passed. He stopped to talk of the weather orthe crops with some other merchant or with a farmer whohad come into town and forgot his daughters altogetheror, if he thought of them, only shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, well, girls will be girls, " he mutteredphilosophically. 

In the house when Louise came down into the room wherethe two girls sat, they would have nothing to do withher. One evening after she had been there for more thansix weeks and was heartbroken because of the continuedair of coldness with which she was always greeted, sheburst into tears. "Shut up your crying and go back toyour own room and to your books, " Mary Hardy saidsharply. 

 * * *

The room occupied by Louise was on the second floor ofthe Hardy house, and her window looked out upon anorchard. There was a stove in the room and everyevening young John Hardy carried up an armful of woodand put it in a box that stood by the wall. During thesecond month after she came to the house, Louise gaveup all hope of getting on a friendly footing with theHardy girls and went to her own room as soon as theevening meal was at an end. 

Her mind began to play with thoughts of making friendswith John Hardy. When he came into the room with thewood in his arms, she pretended to be busy with herstudies but watched him eagerly. When he had put thewood in the box and turned to go out, she put down herhead and blushed. She tried to make talk but could saynothing, and after he had gone she was angry at herselffor her stupidity. 

The mind of the country girl became filled with theidea of drawing close to the young man. She thoughtthat in him might be found the quality she had all herlife been seeking in people. It seemed to her thatbetween herself and all the other people in the world, a wall had been built up and that she was living juston the edge of some warm inner circle of life that mustbe quite open and understandable to others. She becameobsessed with the thought that it wanted but acourageous act on her part to make all of herassociation with people something quite different, andthat it was possible by such an act to pass into a newlife as one opens a door and goes into a room. Day andnight she thought of the matter, but although the thingshe wanted so earnestly was something very warm andclose it had as yet no conscious connection with sex. It had not become that definite, and her mind had onlyalighted upon the person of John Hardy because he wasat hand and unlike his sisters had not been unfriendlyto her. 

The Hardy sisters, Mary and Harriet, were both olderthan Louise. In a certain kind of knowledge of theworld they were years older. They lived as all of theyoung women of Middle Western towns lived. In thosedays young women did not go out of our towns to Easterncolleges and ideas in regard to social classes hadhardly begun to exist. A daughter of a laborer was inmuch the same social position as a daughter of a farmeror a merchant, and there were no leisure classes. Agirl was "nice" or she was "not nice. " If a nice girl, she had a young man who came to her house to see her onSunday and on Wednesday evenings. Sometimes she wentwith her young man to a dance or a church social. Atother times she received him at the house and was giventhe use of the parlor for that purpose. No one intrudedupon her. For hours the two sat behind closed doors. Sometimes the lights were turned low and the young manand woman embraced. Cheeks became hot and hairdisarranged. After a year or two, if the impulse withinthem became strong and insistent enough, they married. 

One evening during her first winter in Winesburg, Louise had an adventure that gave a new impulse to herdesire to break down the wall that she thought stoodbetween her and John Hardy. It was Wednesday andimmediately after the evening meal Albert Hardy put onhis hat and went away. Young John brought the wood andput it in the box in Louise's room. "You do work hard, don't you?" he said awkwardly, and then before shecould answer he also went away. 

Louise heard him go out of the house and had a maddesire to run after him. Opening her window she leanedout and called softly, "John, dear John, come back, don't go away. " The night was cloudy and she could notsee far into the darkness, but as she waited shefancied she could hear a soft little noise as ofsomeone going on tiptoes through the trees in theorchard. She was frightened and closed the windowquickly. For an hour she moved about the room tremblingwith excitement and when she could not longer bear thewaiting, she crept into the hall and down the stairsinto a closet-like room that opened off the parlor. 

Louise had decided that she would perform thecourageous act that had for weeks been in her mind. Shewas convinced that John Hardy had concealed himself inthe orchard beneath her window and she was determinedto find him and tell him that she wanted him to comeclose to her, to hold her in his arms, to tell her ofhis thoughts and dreams and to listen while she toldhim her thoughts and dreams. "In the darkness it willbe easier to say things, " she whispered to herself, asshe stood in the little room groping for the door. 

And then suddenly Louise realized that she was notalone in the house. In the parlor on the other side ofthe door a man's voice spoke softly and the dooropened. Louise just had time to conceal herself in alittle opening beneath the stairway when Mary Hardy, accompanied by her young man, came into the little darkroom. 

For an hour Louise sat on the floor in the darkness andlistened. Without words Mary Hardy, with the aid of theman who had come to spend the evening with her, broughtto the country girl a knowledge of men and women. Putting her head down until she was curled into alittle ball she lay perfectly still. It seemed to herthat by some strange impulse of the gods, a great gifthad been brought to Mary Hardy and she could notunderstand the older woman's determined protest. 

The young man took Mary Hardy into his arms and kissedher. When she struggled and laughed, he but held herthe more tightly. For an hour the contest between themwent on and then they went back into the parlor andLouise escaped up the stairs. "I hope you were quietout there. You must not disturb the little mouse at herstudies, " she heard Harriet saying to her sister as shestood by her own door in the hallway above. 

Louise wrote a note to John Hardy and late that night, when all in the house were asleep, she crept downstairsand slipped it under his door. She was afraid that ifshe did not do the thing at once her courage wouldfail. In the note she tried to be quite definite aboutwhat she wanted. "I want someone to love me and I wantto love someone, " she wrote. "If you are the one for meI want you to come into the orchard at night and make anoise under my window. It will be easy for me to crawldown over the shed and come to you. I am thinking aboutit all the time, so if you are to come at all you mustcome soon. "

For a long time Louise did not know what would be theoutcome of her bold attempt to secure for herself alover. In a way she still did not know whether or notshe wanted him to come. Sometimes it seemed to her thatto be held tightly and kissed was the whole secret oflife, and then a new impulse came and she was terriblyafraid. The age-old woman's desire to be possessed hadtaken possession of her, but so vague was her notion oflife that it seemed to her just the touch of JohnHardy's hand upon her own hand would satisfy. Shewondered if he would understand that. At the table nextday while Albert Hardy talked and the two girlswhispered and laughed, she did not look at John but atthe table and as soon as possible escaped. In theevening she went out of the house until she was sure hehad taken the wood to her room and gone away. Whenafter several evenings of intense listening she heardno call from the darkness in the orchard, she was halfbeside herself with grief and decided that for herthere was no way to break through the wall that hadshut her off from the joy of life. 

And then on a Monday evening two or three weeks afterthe writing of the note, John Hardy came for her. Louise had so entirely given up the thought of hiscoming that for a long time she did not hear the callthat came up from the orchard. On the Friday eveningbefore, as she was being driven back to the farm forthe week-end by one of the hired men, she had on animpulse done a thing that had startled her, and as JohnHardy stood in the darkness below and called her namesoftly and insistently, she walked about in her roomand wondered what new impulse had led her to commit soridiculous an act. 

The farm hand, a young fellow with black curly hair, had come for her somewhat late on that Friday eveningand they drove home in the darkness. Louise, whose mindwas filled with thoughts of John Hardy, tried to maketalk but the country boy was embarrassed and would saynothing. Her mind began to review the loneliness of herchildhood and she remembered with a pang the sharp newloneliness that had just come to her. "I hateeveryone, " she cried suddenly, and then broke forthinto a tirade that frightened her escort. "I hatefather and the old man Hardy, too, " she declaredvehemently. "I get my lessons there in the school intown but I hate that also. "

Louise frightened the farm hand still more by turningand putting her cheek down upon his shoulder. Vaguelyshe hoped that he like that young man who had stood inthe darkness with Mary would put his arms about her andkiss her, but the country boy was only alarmed. Hestruck the horse with the whip and began to whistle. "The road is rough, eh?" he said loudly. Louise was soangry that reaching up she snatched his hat from hishead and threw it into the road. When he jumped out ofthe buggy and went to get it, she drove off and lefthim to walk the rest of the way back to the farm. 

Louise Bentley took John Hardy to be her lover. Thatwas not what she wanted but it was so the young man hadinterpreted her approach to him, and so anxious was sheto achieve something else that she made no resistance. When after a few months they were both afraid that shewas about to become a mother, they went one evening tothe county seat and were married. For a few months theylived in the Hardy house and then took a house of theirown. All during the first year Louise tried to make herhusband understand the vague and intangible hunger thathad led to the writing of the note and that was stillunsatisfied. Again and again she crept into his armsand tried to talk of it, but always without success. Filled with his own notions of love between men andwomen, he did not listen but began to kiss her upon thelips. That confused her so that in the end she did notwant to be kissed. She did not know what she wanted. 

When the alarm that had tricked them into marriageproved to be groundless, she was angry and said bitter, hurtful things. Later when her son David was born, shecould not nurse him and did not know whether she wantedhim or not. Sometimes she stayed in the room with himall day, walking about and occasionally creeping closeto touch him tenderly with her hands, and then otherdays came when she did not want to see or be near thetiny bit of humanity that had come into the house. WhenJohn Hardy reproached her for her cruelty, she laughed. "It is a man child and will get what it wants anyway, "she said sharply. "Had it been a woman child there isnothing in the world I would not have done for it. "

IV

Terror

When David Hardy was a tall boy of fifteen, he, likehis mother, had an adventure that changed the wholecurrent of his life and sent him out of his quietcorner into the world. The shell of the circumstancesof his life was broken and he was compelled to startforth. He left Winesburg and no one there ever saw himagain. After his disappearance, his mother andgrandfather both died and his father became very rich. He spent much money in trying to locate his son, butthat is no part of this story. 

It was in the late fall of an unusual year on theBentley farms. Everywhere the crops had been heavy. That spring, Jesse had bought part of a long strip ofblack swamp land that lay in the valley of Wine Creek. He got the land at a low price but had spent a largesum of money to improve it. Great ditches had to be dugand thousands of tile laid. Neighboring farmers shooktheir heads over the expense. Some of them laughed andhoped that Jesse would lose heavily by the venture, butthe old man went silently on with the work and saidnothing. 

When the land was drained he planted it to cabbages andonions, and again the neighbors laughed. The crop was, however, enormous and brought high prices. In the oneyear Jesse made enough money to pay for all the cost ofpreparing the land and had a surplus that enabled himto buy two more farms. He was exultant and could notconceal his delight. For the first time in all thehistory of his ownership of the farms, he went amonghis men with a smiling face. 

Jesse bought a great many new machines for cutting downthe cost of labor and all of the remaining acres in thestrip of black fertile swamp land. One day he went intoWinesburg and bought a bicycle and a new suit ofclothes for David and he gave his two sisters moneywith which to go to a religious convention atCleveland, Ohio. 

In the fall of that year when the frost came and thetrees in the forests along Wine Creek were goldenbrown, David spent every moment when he did not have toattend school, out in the open. Alone or with otherboys he went every afternoon into the woods to gathernuts. The other boys of the countryside, most of themsons of laborers on the Bentley farms, had guns withwhich they went hunting rabbits and squirrels, butDavid did not go with them. He made himself a slingwith rubber bands and a forked stick and went off byhimself to gather nuts. As he went about thoughts cameto him. He realized that he was almost a man andwondered what he would do in life, but before they cameto anything, the thoughts passed and he was a boyagain. One day he killed a squirrel that sat on one ofthe lower branches of a tree and chattered at him. Homehe ran with the squirrel in his hand. One of theBentley sisters cooked the little animal and he ate itwith great gusto. The skin he tacked on a board andsuspended the board by a string from his bedroomwindow. 

That gave his mind a new turn. After that he neverwent into the woods without carrying the sling in hispocket and he spent hours shooting at imaginary animalsconcealed among the brown leaves in the trees. Thoughtsof his coming manhood passed and he was content to be aboy with a boy's impulses. 

One Saturday morning when he was about to set off forthe woods with the sling in his pocket and a bag fornuts on his shoulder, his grandfather stopped him. Inthe eyes of the old man was the strained serious lookthat always a little frightened David. At such timesJesse Bentley's eyes did not look straight ahead butwavered and seemed to be looking at nothing. Somethinglike an invisible curtain appeared to have come betweenthe man and all the rest of the world. "I want you tocome with me, " he said briefly, and his eyes lookedover the boy's head into the sky. "We have somethingimportant to do today. You may bring the bag for nutsif you wish. It does not matter and anyway we will begoing into the woods. "

Jesse and David set out from the Bentley farmhouse inthe old phaeton that was drawn by the white horse. Whenthey had gone along in silence for a long way theystopped at the edge of a field where a flock of sheepwere grazing. Among the sheep was a lamb that had beenborn out of season, and this David and his grandfathercaught and tied so tightly that it looked like a littlewhite ball. When they drove on again Jesse let Davidhold the lamb in his arms. "I saw it yesterday and itput me in mind of what I have long wanted to do, " hesaid, and again he looked away over the head of the boywith the wavering, uncertain stare in his eyes. 

After the feeling of exaltation that had come to thefarmer as a result of his successful year, another moodhad taken possession of him. For a long time he hadbeen going about feeling very humble and prayerful. Again he walked alone at night thinking of God and ashe walked he again connected his own figure with thefigures of old days. Under the stars he knelt on thewet grass and raised up his voice in prayer. Now he haddecided that like the men whose stories filled thepages of the Bible, he would make a sacrifice to God. "I have been given these abundant crops and God hasalso sent me a boy who is called David, " he whisperedto himself. "Perhaps I should have done this thing longago. " He was sorry the idea had not come into his mindin the days before his daughter Louise had been bornand thought that surely now when he had erected a pileof burning sticks in some lonely place in the woods andhad offered the body of a lamb as a burnt offering, Godwould appear to him and give him a message. 

More and more as he thought of the matter, he thoughtalso of David and his passionate self-love waspartially forgotten. "It is time for the boy to beginthinking of going out into the world and the messagewill be one concerning him, " he decided. "God will makea pathway for him. He will tell me what place David isto take in life and when he shall set out on hisjourney. It is right that the boy should be there. If Iam fortunate and an angel of God should appear, Davidwill see the beauty and glory of God made manifest toman. It will make a true man of God of him also. "

In silence Jesse and David drove along the road untilthey came to that place where Jesse had once beforeappealed to God and had frightened his grandson. Themorning had been bright and cheerful, but a cold windnow began to blow and clouds hid the sun. When Davidsaw the place to which they had come he began totremble with fright, and when they stopped by thebridge where the creek came down from among the trees, he wanted to spring out of the phaeton and run away. 

A dozen plans for escape ran through David's head, butwhen Jesse stopped the horse and climbed over the fenceinto the wood, he followed. "It is foolish to beafraid. Nothing will happen, " he told himself as hewent along with the lamb in his arms. There wassomething in the helplessness of the little animal heldso tightly in his arms that gave him courage. He couldfeel the rapid beating of the beast's heart and thatmade his own heart beat less rapidly. As he walkedswiftly along behind his grandfather, he untied thestring with which the four legs of the lamb werefastened together. "If anything happens we will runaway together, " he thought. 

In the woods, after they had gone a long way from theroad, Jesse stopped in an opening among the trees wherea clearing, overgrown with small bushes, ran up fromthe creek. He was still silent but began at once toerect a heap of dry sticks which he presently setafire. The boy sat on the ground with the lamb in hisarms. His imagination began to invest every movement ofthe old man with significance and he became everymoment more afraid. "I must put the blood of the lambon the head of the boy, " Jesse muttered when the stickshad begun to blaze greedily, and taking a long knifefrom his pocket he turned and walked rapidly across theclearing toward David. 

Terror seized upon the soul of the boy. He was sickwith it. For a moment he sat perfectly still and thenhis body stiffened and he sprang to his feet. His facebecame as white as the fleece of the lamb that, nowfinding itself suddenly released, ran down the hill. David ran also. Fear made his feet fly. Over the lowbushes and logs he leaped frantically. As he ran he puthis hand into his pocket and took out the branchedstick from which the sling for shooting squirrels wassuspended. When he came to the creek that was shallowand splashed down over the stones, he dashed into thewater and turned to look back, and when he saw hisgrandfather still running toward him with the longknife held tightly in his hand he did not hesitate, butreaching down, selected a stone and put it in thesling. With all his strength he drew back the heavyrubber bands and the stone whistled through the air. Ithit Jesse, who had entirely forgotten the boy and waspursuing the lamb, squarely in the head. With a groanhe pitched forward and fell almost at the boy's feet. When David saw that he lay still and that he wasapparently dead, his fright increased immeasurably. Itbecame an insane panic. 

With a cry he turned and ran off through the woodsweeping convulsively. "I don't care--I killed him, butI don't care, " he sobbed. As he ran on and on hedecided suddenly that he would never go back again tothe Bentley farms or to the town of Winesburg. "I havekilled the man of God and now I will myself be a manand go into the world, " he said stoutly as he stoppedrunning and walked rapidly down a road that followedthe windings of Wine Creek as it ran through fields andforests into the west. 

On the ground by the creek Jesse Bentley moved uneasilyabout. He groaned and opened his eyes. For a long timehe lay perfectly still and looked at the sky. When atlast he got to his feet, his mind was confused and hewas not surprised by the boy's disappearance. By theroadside he sat down on a log and began to talk aboutGod. That is all they ever got out of him. WheneverDavid's name was mentioned he looked vaguely at the skyand said that a messenger from God had taken the boy. "It happened because I was too greedy for glory, " hedeclared, and would have no more to say in the matter. 

A MAN OF IDEAS

He lived with his mother, a grey, silent woman with apeculiar ashy complexion. The house in which they livedstood in a little grove of trees beyond where the mainstreet of Winesburg crossed Wine Creek. His name wasJoe Welling, and his father had been a man of somedignity in the community, a lawyer, and a member of thestate legislature at Columbus. Joe himself was small ofbody and in his character unlike anyone else in town. He was like a tiny little volcano that lies silent fordays and then suddenly spouts fire. No, he wasn't likethat--he was like a man who is subject to fits, onewho walks among his fellow men inspiring fear because afit may come upon him suddenly and blow him away into astrange uncanny physical state in which his eyes rolland his legs and arms jerk. He was like that, only thatthe visitation that descended upon Joe Welling was amental and not a physical thing. He was beset by ideasand in the throes of one of his ideas wasuncontrollable. Words rolled and tumbled from hismouth. A peculiar smile came upon his lips. The edgesof his teeth that were tipped with gold glistened inthe light. Pouncing upon a bystander he began to talk. For the bystander there was no escape. The excited manbreathed into his face, peered into his eyes, poundedupon his chest with a shaking forefinger, demanded, compelled attention. 

In those days the Standard Oil Company did not deliveroil to the consumer in big wagons and motor trucks asit does now, but delivered instead to retail grocers, hardware stores, and the like. Joe was the Standard Oilagent in Winesburg and in several towns up and down therailroad that went through Winesburg. He collectedbills, booked orders, and did other things. His father, the legislator, had secured the job for him. 

In and out of the stores of Winesburg went JoeWelling--silent, excessively polite, intent upon hisbusiness. Men watched him with eyes in which lurkedamusement tempered by alarm. They were waiting for himto break forth, preparing to flee. Although theseizures that came upon him were harmless enough, theycould not be laughed away. They were overwhelming. Astride an idea, Joe was overmastering. His personalitybecame gigantic. It overrode the man to whom he talked, swept him away, swept all away, all who stood withinsound of his voice. 

In Sylvester West's Drug Store stood four men who weretalking of horse racing. Wesley Moyer's stallion, TonyTip, was to race at the June meeting at Tiffin, Ohio, and there was a rumor that he would meet the stiffestcompetition of his career. It was said that Pop Geers, the great racing driver, would himself be there. Adoubt of the success of Tony Tip hung heavy in the airof Winesburg. 

Into the drug store came Joe Welling, brushing thescreen door violently aside. With a strange absorbedlight in his eyes he pounced upon Ed Thomas, he whoknew Pop Geers and whose opinion of Tony Tip's chanceswas worth considering. 

"The water is up in Wine Creek, " cried Joe Welling withthe air of Pheidippides bringing news of the victory ofthe Greeks in the struggle at Marathon. His finger beata tattoo upon Ed Thomas's broad chest. "By Trunionbridge it is within eleven and a half inches of theflooring, " he went on, the words coming quickly andwith a little whistling noise from between his teeth. An expression of helpless annoyance crept over thefaces of the four. 

"I have my facts correct. Depend upon that. I went toSinnings' Hardware Store and got a rule. Then I wentback and measured. I could hardly believe my own eyes. It hasn't rained you see for ten days. At first Ididn't know what to think. Thoughts rushed through myhead. I thought of subterranean passages and springs. Down under the ground went my mind, delving about. Isat on the floor of the bridge and rubbed my head. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, not one. Come out intothe street and you'll see. There wasn't a cloud. Thereisn't a cloud now. Yes, there was a cloud. I don't wantto keep back any facts. There was a cloud in the westdown near the horizon, a cloud no bigger than a man'shand. 

"Not that I think that has anything to do with it. There it is, you see. You understand how puzzled I was. 

"Then an idea came to me. I laughed. You'll laugh, too. Of course it rained over in Medina County. That'sinteresting, eh? If we had no trains, no mails, notelegraph, we would know that it rained over in MedinaCounty. That's where Wine Creek comes from. Everyoneknows that. Little old Wine Creek brought us the news. That's interesting. I laughed. I thought I'd tellyou--it's interesting, eh?"

Joe Welling turned and went out at the door. Taking abook from his pocket, he stopped and ran a finger downone of the pages. Again he was absorbed in his dutiesas agent of the Standard Oil Company. "Hern's Grocerywill be getting low on coal oil. I'll see them, " hemuttered, hurrying along the street, and bowingpolitely to the right and left at the people walkingpast. 

When George Willard went to work for the WinesburgEagle he was besieged by Joe Welling. Joe envied theboy. It seemed to him that he was meant by Nature to bea reporter on a newspaper. "It is what I should bedoing, there is no doubt of that, " he declared, stopping George Willard on the sidewalk beforeDaugherty's Feed Store. His eyes began to glisten andhis forefinger to tremble. "Of course I make more moneywith the Standard Oil Company and I'm only tellingyou, " he added. "I've got nothing against you but Ishould have your place. I could do the work at oddmoments. Here and there I would run finding out thingsyou'll never see. "

Becoming more excited Joe Welling crowded the youngreporter against the front of the feed store. Heappeared to be lost in thought, rolling his eyes aboutand running a thin nervous hand through his hair. Asmile spread over his face and his gold teethglittered. "You get out your note book, " he commanded. "You carry a little pad of paper in your pocket, don'tyou? I knew you did. Well, you set this down. I thoughtof it the other day. Let's take decay. Now what isdecay? It's fire. It burns up wood and other things. You never thought of that? Of course not. This sidewalkhere and this feed store, the trees down the streetthere--they're all on fire. They're burning up. Decayyou see is always going on. It doesn't stop. Water andpaint can't stop it. If a thing is iron, then what? Itrusts, you see. That's fire, too. The world is on fire. Start your pieces in the paper that way. Just say inbig letters 'The World Is On Fire. ' That will make 'emlook up. They'll say you're a smart one. I don't care. I don't envy you. I just snatched that idea out of theair. I would make a newspaper hum. You got to admitthat. "'

Turning quickly, Joe Welling walked rapidly away. Whenhe had taken several steps he stopped and looked back. "I'm going to stick to you, " he said. "I'm going tomake you a regular hummer. I should start a newspapermyself, that's what I should do. I'd be a marvel. Everybody knows that. "

When George Willard had been for a year on theWinesburg Eagle, four things happened to Joe Welling. His mother died, he came to live at the New WillardHouse, he became involved in a love affair, and heorganized the Winesburg Baseball Club. 

Joe organized the baseball club because he wanted to bea coach and in that position he began to win therespect of his townsmen. "He is a wonder, " theydeclared after Joe's team had whipped the team fromMedina County. "He gets everybody working together. Youjust watch him. "

Upon the baseball field Joe Welling stood by firstbase, his whole body quivering with excitement. Inspite of themselves all the players watched himclosely. The opposing pitcher became confused. 

"Now! Now! Now! Now!" shouted the excited man. "Watchme! Watch me! Watch my fingers! Watch my hands! Watchmy feet! Watch my eyes! Let's work together here! Watchme! In me you see all the movements of the game! Workwith me! Work with me! Watch me! Watch me! Watch me!"

With runners of the Winesburg team on bases, JoeWelling became as one inspired. Before they knew whathad come over them, the base runners were watching theman, edging off the bases, advancing, retreating, heldas by an invisible cord. The players of the opposingteam also watched Joe. They were fascinated. For amoment they watched and then, as though to break aspell that hung over them, they began hurling the ballwildly about, and amid a series of fierce animal-likecries from the coach, the runners of the Winesburg teamscampered home. 

Joe Welling's love affair set the town of Winesburg onedge. When it began everyone whispered and shook hishead. When people tried to laugh, the laughter wasforced and unnatural. Joe fell in love with Sarah King, a lean, sad-looking woman who lived with her father andbrother in a brick house that stood opposite the gateleading to the Winesburg Cemetery. 

The two Kings, Edward the father, and Tom the son, werenot popular in Winesburg. They were called proud anddangerous. They had come to Winesburg from some placein the South and ran a cider mill on the Trunion Pike. Tom King was reported to have killed a man before hecame to Winesburg. He was twenty-seven years old androde about town on a grey pony. Also he had a longyellow mustache that dropped down over his teeth, andalways carried a heavy, wicked-looking walking stick inhis hand. Once he killed a dog with the stick. The dogbelonged to Win Pawsey, the shoe merchant, and stood onthe sidewalk wagging its tail. Tom King killed it withone blow. He was arrested and paid a fine of tendollars. 

Old Edward King was small of stature and when he passedpeople in the street laughed a queer unmirthful laugh. When he laughed he scratched his left elbow with hisright hand. The sleeve of his coat was almost wornthrough from the habit. As he walked along the street, looking nervously about and laughing, he seemed moredangerous than his silent, fierce-looking son. 

When Sarah King began walking out in the evening withJoe Welling, people shook their heads in alarm. She wastall and pale and had dark rings under her eyes. Thecouple looked ridiculous together. Under the trees theywalked and Joe talked. His passionate eagerprotestations of love, heard coming out of the darknessby the cemetery wall, or from the deep shadows of thetrees on the hill that ran up to the Fair Grounds fromWaterworks Pond, were repeated in the stores. Men stoodby the bar in the New Willard House laughing andtalking of Joe's courtship. After the laughter came thesilence. The Winesburg baseball team, under hismanagement, was winning game after game, and the townhad begun to respect him. Sensing a tragedy, theywaited, laughing nervously. 

Late on a Saturday afternoon the meeting between JoeWelling and the two Kings, the anticipation of whichhad set the town on edge, took place in Joe Welling'sroom in the New Willard House. George Willard was awitness to the meeting. It came about in this way:

When the young reporter went to his room after theevening meal he saw Tom King and his father sitting inthe half darkness in Joe's room. The son had the heavywalking stick in his hand and sat near the door. OldEdward King walked nervously about, scratching his leftelbow with his right hand. The hallways were empty andsilent. 

George Willard went to his own room and sat down at hisdesk. He tried to write but his hand trembled so thathe could not hold the pen. He also walked nervously upand down. Like the rest of the town of Winesburg he wasperplexed and knew not what to do. 

It was seven-thirty and fast growing dark when JoeWelling came along the station platform toward the NewWillard House. In his arms he held a bundle of weedsand grasses. In spite of the terror that made his bodyshake, George Willard was amused at the sight of thesmall spry figure holding the grasses and half runningalong the platform. 

Shaking with fright and anxiety, the young reporterlurked in the hallway outside the door of the room inwhich Joe Welling talked to the two Kings. There hadbeen an oath, the nervous giggle of old Edward King, and then silence. Now the voice of Joe Welling, sharpand clear, broke forth. George Willard began to laugh. He understood. As he had swept all men before him, sonow Joe Welling was carrying the two men in the roomoff their feet with a tidal wave of words. The listenerin the hall walked up and down, lost in amazement. 

Inside the room Joe Welling had paid no attention tothe grumbled threat of Tom King. Absorbed in an idea heclosed the door and, lighting a lamp, spread thehandful of weeds and grasses upon the floor. "I've gotsomething here, " he announced solemnly. "I was going totell George Willard about it, let him make a piece outof it for the paper. I'm glad you're here. I wish Sarahwere here also. I've been going to come to your houseand tell you of some of my ideas. They're interesting. Sarah wouldn't let me. She said we'd quarrel. That'sfoolish. "

Running up and down before the two perplexed men, JoeWelling began to explain. "Don't you make a mistakenow, " he cried. "This is something big. " His voice wasshrill with excitement. "You just follow me, you'll beinterested. I know you will. Suppose this--suppose allof the wheat, the corn, the oats, the peas, thepotatoes, were all by some miracle swept away. Now herewe are, you see, in this county. There is a high fencebuilt all around us. We'll suppose that. No one can getover the fence and all the fruits of the earth aredestroyed, nothing left but these wild things, thesegrasses. Would we be done for? I ask you that. Would webe done for?" Again Tom King growled and for a momentthere was silence in the room. Then again Joe plungedinto the exposition of his idea. "Things would go hardfor a time. I admit that. I've got to admit that. Nogetting around it. We'd be hard put to it. More thanone fat stomach would cave in. But they couldn't downus. I should say not. "

Tom King laughed good naturedly and the shivery, nervous laugh of Edward King rang through the house. Joe Welling hurried on. "We'd begin, you see, to breedup new vegetables and fruits. Soon we'd regain all wehad lost. Mind, I don't say the new things would be thesame as the old. They wouldn't. Maybe they'd be better, maybe not so good. That's interesting, eh? You canthink about that. It starts your mind working, nowdon't it?"

In the room there was silence and then again old EdwardKing laughed nervously. "Say, I wish Sarah was here, "cried Joe Welling. "Let's go up to your house. I wantto tell her of this. "

There was a scraping of chairs in the room. It wasthen that George Willard retreated to his own room. Leaning out at the window he saw Joe Welling goingalong the street with the two Kings. Tom King wasforced to take extraordinary long strides to keep pacewith the little man. As he strode along, he leanedover, listening--absorbed, fascinated. Joe Wellingagain talked excitedly. "Take milkweed now, " he cried. "A lot might be done with milkweed, eh? It's almostunbelievable. I want you to think about it. I want youtwo to think about it. There would be a new vegetablekingdom you see. It's interesting, eh? It's an idea. Wait till you see Sarah, she'll get the idea. She'll beinterested. Sarah is always interested in ideas. Youcan't be too smart for Sarah, now can you? Of courseyou can't. You know that. "

ADVENTURE

Alice Hindman, a woman of twenty-seven when GeorgeWillard was a mere boy, had lived in Winesburg all herlife. She clerked in Winney's Dry Goods Store and livedwith her mother, who had married a second husband. 

Alice's step-father was a carriage painter, and givento drink. His story is an odd one. It will be worthtelling some day. 

At twenty-seven Alice was tall and somewhat slight. Her head was large and overshadowed her body. Hershoulders were a little stooped and her hair and eyesbrown. She was very quiet but beneath a placid exteriora continual ferment went on. 

When she was a girl of sixteen and before she began towork in the store, Alice had an affair with a youngman. The young man, named Ned Currie, was older thanAlice. He, like George Willard, was employed on theWinesburg Eagle and for a long time he went to seeAlice almost every evening. Together the two walkedunder the trees through the streets of the town andtalked of what they would do with their lives. Alicewas then a very pretty girl and Ned Currie took herinto his arms and kissed her. He became excited andsaid things he did not intend to say and Alice, betrayed by her desire to have something beautiful comeinto her rather narrow life, also grew excited. Shealso talked. The outer crust of her life, all of hernatural diffidence and reserve, was torn away and shegave herself over to the emotions of love. When, latein the fall of her sixteenth year, Ned Currie went awayto Cleveland where he hoped to get a place on a citynewspaper and rise in the world, she wanted to go withhim. With a trembling voice she told him what was inher mind. "I will work and you can work, " she said. "Ido not want to harness you to a needless expense thatwill prevent your making progress. Don't marry me now. We will get along without that and we can be together. Even though we live in the same house no one will sayanything. In the city we will be unknown and peoplewill pay no attention to us. "

Ned Currie was puzzled by the determination and abandonof his sweetheart and was also deeply touched. He hadwanted the girl to become his mistress but changed hismind. He wanted to protect and care for her. "You don'tknow what you're talking about, " he said sharply; "youmay be sure I'll let you do no such thing. As soon as Iget a good job I'll come back. For the present you'llhave to stay here. It's the only thing we can do. "

On the evening before he left Winesburg to take up hisnew life in the city, Ned Currie went to call on Alice. They walked about through the streets for an hour andthen got a rig from Wesley Moyer's livery and went fora drive in the country. The moon came up and they foundthemselves unable to talk. In his sadness the young manforgot the resolutions he had made regarding hisconduct with the girl. 

They got out of the buggy at a place where a longmeadow ran down to the bank of Wine Creek and there inthe dim light became lovers. When at midnight theyreturned to town they were both glad. It did not seemto them that anything that could happen in the futurecould blot out the wonder and beauty of the thing thathad happened. "Now we will have to stick to each other, whatever happens we will have to do that, " Ned Curriesaid as he left the girl at her father's door. 

The young newspaper man did not succeed in getting aplace on a Cleveland paper and went west to Chicago. For a time he was lonely and wrote to Alice almostevery day. Then he was caught up by the life of thecity; he began to make friends and found new interestsin life. In Chicago he boarded at a house where therewere several women. One of them attracted his attentionand he forgot Alice in Winesburg. At the end of a yearhe had stopped writing letters, and only once in a longtime, when he was lonely or when he went into one ofthe city parks and saw the moon shining on the grass asit had shone that night on the meadow by Wine Creek, did he think of her at all. 

In Winesburg the girl who had been loved grew to be awoman. When she was twenty-two years old her father, who owned a harness repair shop, died suddenly. Theharness maker was an old soldier, and after a fewmonths his wife received a widow's pension. She usedthe first money she got to buy a loom and became aweaver of carpets, and Alice got a place in Winney'sstore. For a number of years nothing could have inducedher to believe that Ned Currie would not in the endreturn to her. 

She was glad to be employed because the daily round oftoil in the store made the time of waiting seem lesslong and uninteresting. She began to save money, thinking that when she had saved two or three hundreddollars she would follow her lover to the city and tryif her presence would not win back his affections. 

Alice did not blame Ned Currie for what had happened inthe moonlight in the field, but felt that she couldnever marry another man. To her the thought of givingto another what she still felt could belong only to Nedseemed monstrous. When other young men tried to attracther attention she would have nothing to do with them. "I am his wife and shall remain his wife whether hecomes back or not, " she whispered to herself, and forall of her willingness to support herself could nothave understood the growing modern idea of a woman'sowning herself and giving and taking for her own endsin life. 

Alice worked in the dry goods store from eight in themorning until six at night and on three evenings a weekwent back to the store to stay from seven until nine. As time passed and she became more and more lonely shebegan to practice the devices common to lonely people. When at night she went upstairs into her own room sheknelt on the floor to pray and in her prayers whisperedthings she wanted to say to her lover. She becameattached to inanimate objects, and because it was herown, could not bare to have anyone touch the furnitureof her room. The trick of saving money, begun for apurpose, was carried on after the scheme of going tothe city to find Ned Currie had been given up. Itbecame a fixed habit, and when she needed new clothesshe did not get them. Sometimes on rainy afternoons inthe store she got out her bank book and, letting it lieopen before her, spent hours dreaming impossible dreamsof saving money enough so that the interest wouldsupport both herself and her future husband. 

"Ned always liked to travel about, " she thought. "I'llgive him the chance. Some day when we are married and Ican save both his money and my own, we will be rich. Then we can travel together all over the world. "

In the dry goods store weeks ran into months and monthsinto years as Alice waited and dreamed of her lover'sreturn. Her employer, a grey old man with false teethand a thin grey mustache that drooped down over hismouth, was not given to conversation, and sometimes, onrainy days and in the winter when a storm raged in MainStreet, long hours passed when no customers came in. Alice arranged and rearranged the stock. She stood nearthe front window where she could look down the desertedstreet and thought of the evenings when she had walkedwith Ned Currie and of what he had said. "We will haveto stick to each other now. " The words echoed andre-echoed through the mind of the maturing woman. Tearscame into her eyes. Sometimes when her employer hadgone out and she was alone in the store she put herhead on the counter and wept. "Oh, Ned, I am waiting, "she whispered over and over, and all the time thecreeping fear that he would never come back grewstronger within her. 

In the spring when the rains have passed and before thelong hot days of summer have come, the country aboutWinesburg is delightful. The town lies in the midst ofopen fields, but beyond the fields are pleasant patchesof woodlands. In the wooded places are many littlecloistered nooks, quiet places where lovers go to siton Sunday afternoons. Through the trees they look outacross the fields and see farmers at work about thebarns or people driving up and down on the roads. Inthe town bells ring and occasionally a train passes, looking like a toy thing in the distance. 

For several years after Ned Currie went away Alice didnot go into the wood with the other young people onSunday, but one day after he had been gone for two orthree years and when her loneliness seemed unbearable, she put on her best dress and set out. Finding a littlesheltered place from which she could see the town and along stretch of the fields, she sat down. Fear of ageand ineffectuality took possession of her. She couldnot sit still, and arose. As she stood looking out overthe land something, perhaps the thought of neverceasing life as it expresses itself in the flow of theseasons, fixed her mind on the passing years. With ashiver of dread, she realized that for her the beautyand freshness of youth had passed. For the first timeshe felt that she had been cheated. She did not blameNed Currie and did not know what to blame. Sadnessswept over her. Dropping to her knees, she tried topray, but instead of prayers words of protest came toher lips. "It is not going to come to me. I will neverfind happiness. Why do I tell myself lies?" she cried, and an odd sense of relief came with this, her firstbold attempt to face the fear that had become a part ofher everyday life. 

In the year when Alice Hindman became twenty-five twothings happened to disturb the dull uneventfulness ofher days. Her mother married Bush Milton, the carriagepainter of Winesburg, and she herself became a memberof the Winesburg Methodist Church. Alice joined thechurch because she had become frightened by theloneliness of her position in life. Her mother's secondmarriage had emphasized her isolation. "I am becomingold and queer. If Ned comes he will not want me. In thecity where he is living men are perpetually young. There is so much going on that they do not have time togrow old, " she told herself with a grim little smile, and went resolutely about the business of becomingacquainted with people. Every Thursday evening when thestore had closed she went to a prayer meeting in thebasement of the church and on Sunday evening attended ameeting of an organization called The Epworth League. 

When Will Hurley, a middle-aged man who clerked in adrug store and who also belonged to the church, offeredto walk home with her she did not protest. "Of course Iwill not let him make a practice of being with me, butif he comes to see me once in a long time there can beno harm in that, " she told herself, still determined inher loyalty to Ned Currie. 

Without realizing what was happening, Alice was tryingfeebly at first, but with growing determination, to geta new hold upon life. Beside the drug clerk she walkedin silence, but sometimes in the darkness as they wentstolidly along she put out her hand and touched softlythe folds of his coat. When he left her at the gatebefore her mother's house she did not go indoors, butstood for a moment by the door. She wanted to call tothe drug clerk, to ask him to sit with her in thedarkness on the porch before the house, but was afraidhe would not understand. "It is not him that I want, "she told herself; "I want to avoid being so much alone. If I am not careful I will grow unaccustomed to beingwith people. "

 * * *

During the early fall of her twenty-seventh year apassionate restlessness took possession of Alice. Shecould not bear to be in the company of the drug clerk, and when, in the evening, he came to walk with her shesent him away. Her mind became intensely active andwhen, weary from the long hours of standing behind thecounter in the store, she went home and crawled intobed, she could not sleep. With staring eyes she lookedinto the darkness. Her imagination, like a childawakened from long sleep, played about the room. Deepwithin her there was something that would not becheated by phantasies and that demanded some definiteanswer from life. 

Alice took a pillow into her arms and held it tightlyagainst her breasts. Getting out of bed, she arranged ablanket so that in the darkness it looked like a formlying between the sheets and, kneeling beside the bed, she caressed it, whispering words over and over, like arefrain. "Why doesn't something happen? Why am I lefthere alone?" she muttered. Although she sometimesthought of Ned Currie, she no longer depended on him. Her desire had grown vague. She did not want Ned Currieor any other man. She wanted to be loved, to havesomething answer the call that was growing louder andlouder within her. 

And then one night when it rained Alice had anadventure. It frightened and confused her. She had comehome from the store at nine and found the house empty. Bush Milton had gone off to town and her mother to thehouse of a neighbor. Alice went upstairs to her roomand undressed in the darkness. For a moment she stoodby the window hearing the rain beat against the glassand then a strange desire took possession of her. Without stopping to think of what she intended to do, she ran downstairs through the dark house and out intothe rain. As she stood on the little grass plot beforethe house and felt the cold rain on her body a maddesire to run naked through the streets took possessionof her. 

She thought that the rain would have some creative andwonderful effect on her body. Not for years had shefelt so full of youth and courage. She wanted to leapand run, to cry out, to find some other lonely humanand embrace him. On the brick sidewalk before the housea man stumbled homeward. Alice started to run. A wild, desperate mood took possession of her. "What do I carewho it is. He is alone, and I will go to him, " shethought; and then without stopping to consider thepossible result of her madness, called softly. "Wait!"she cried. "Don't go away. Whoever you are, you mustwait. "

The man on the sidewalk stopped and stood listening. He was an old man and somewhat deaf. Putting his handto his mouth, he shouted. "What? What say?" he called. 

Alice dropped to the ground and lay trembling. She wasso frightened at the thought of what she had done thatwhen the man had gone on his way she did not dare getto her feet, but crawled on hands and knees through thegrass to the house. When she got to her own room shebolted the door and drew her dressing table across thedoorway. Her body shook as with a chill and her handstrembled so that she had difficulty getting into hernightdress. When she got into bed she buried her facein the pillow and wept brokenheartedly. "What is thematter with me? I will do something dreadful if I amnot careful, " she thought, and turning her face to thewall, began trying to force herself to face bravely thefact that many people must live and die alone, even inWinesburg. 

RESPECTABILITY

If you have lived in cities and have walked in the parkon a summer afternoon, you have perhaps seen, blinkingin a corner of his iron cage, a huge, grotesque kind ofmonkey, a creature with ugly, sagging, hairless skinbelow his eyes and a bright purple underbody. Thismonkey is a true monster. In the completeness of hisugliness he achieved a kind of perverted beauty. Children stopping before the cage are fascinated, menturn away with an air of disgust, and women linger fora moment, trying perhaps to remember which one of theirmale acquaintances the thing in some faint wayresembles. 

Had you been in the earlier years of your life acitizen of the village of Winesburg, Ohio, there wouldhave been for you no mystery in regard to the beast inhis cage. "It is like Wash Williams, " you would havesaid. "As he sits in the corner there, the beast isexactly like old Wash sitting on the grass in thestation yard on a summer evening after he has closedhis office for the night. "

Wash Williams, the telegraph operator of Winesburg, wasthe ugliest thing in town. His girth was immense, hisneck thin, his legs feeble. He was dirty. Everythingabout him was unclean. Even the whites of his eyeslooked soiled. 

I go too fast. Not everything about Wash was unclean. He took care of his hands. His fingers were fat, butthere was something sensitive and shapely in the handthat lay on the table by the instrument in thetelegraph office. In his youth Wash Williams had beencalled the best telegraph operator in the state, and inspite of his degradement to the obscure office atWinesburg, he was still proud of his ability. 

Wash Williams did not associate with the men of thetown in which he lived. "I'll have nothing to do withthem, " he said, looking with bleary eyes at the men whowalked along the station platform past the telegraphoffice. Up along Main Street he went in the evening toEd Griffith's saloon, and after drinking unbelievablequantities of beer staggered off to his room in the NewWillard House and to his bed for the night. 

Wash Williams was a man of courage. A thing hadhappened to him that made him hate life, and he hatedit wholeheartedly, with the abandon of a poet. First ofall, he hated women. "Bitches, " he called them. Hisfeeling toward men was somewhat different. He pitiedthem. "Does not every man let his life be managed forhim by some bitch or another?" he asked. 

In Winesburg no attention was paid to Wash Williams andhis hatred of his fellows. Once Mrs. White, thebanker's wife, complained to the telegraph company, saying that the office in Winesburg was dirty andsmelled abominably, but nothing came of her complaint. Here and there a man respected the operator. Instinctively the man felt in him a glowing resentmentof something he had not the courage to resent. WhenWash walked through the streets such a one had aninstinct to pay him homage, to raise his hat or to bowbefore him. The superintendent who had supervision overthe telegraph operators on the railroad that wentthrough Winesburg felt that way. He had put Wash intothe obscure office at Winesburg to avoid discharginghim, and he meant to keep him there. When he receivedthe letter of complaint from the banker's wife, he toreit up and laughed unpleasantly. For some reason hethought of his own wife as he tore up the letter. 

Wash Williams once had a wife. When he was still ayoung man he married a woman at Dayton, Ohio. The womanwas tall and slender and had blue eyes and yellow hair. Wash was himself a comely youth. He loved the womanwith a love as absorbing as the hatred he later feltfor all women. 

In all of Winesburg there was but one person who knewthe story of the thing that had made ugly the personand the character of Wash Williams. He once told thestory to George Willard and the telling of the talecame about in this way:

George Willard went one evening to walk with BelleCarpenter, a trimmer of women's hats who worked in amillinery shop kept by Mrs. Kate McHugh. The young manwas not in love with the woman, who, in fact, had asuitor who worked as bartender in Ed Griffith's saloon, but as they walked about under the trees theyoccasionally embraced. The night and their own thoughtshad aroused something in them. As they were returningto Main Street they passed the little lawn beside therailroad station and saw Wash Williams apparentlyasleep on the grass beneath a tree. On the next eveningthe operator and George Willard walked out together. Down the railroad they went and sat on a pile ofdecaying railroad ties beside the tracks. It was thenthat the operator told the young reporter his story ofhate. 

Perhaps a dozen times George Willard and the strange, shapeless man who lived at his father's hotel had beenon the point of talking. The young man looked at thehideous, leering face staring about the hotel diningroom and was consumed with curiosity. Something he sawlurking in the staring eyes told him that the man whohad nothing to say to others had nevertheless somethingto say to him. On the pile of railroad ties on thesummer evening, he waited expectantly. When theoperator remained silent and seemed to have changed hismind about talking, he tried to make conversation. "Were you ever married, Mr. Williams?" he began. "Isuppose you were and your wife is dead, is that it?"

Wash Williams spat forth a succession of vile oaths. "Yes, she is dead, " he agreed. "She is dead as allwomen are dead. She is a living-dead thing, walking inthe sight of men and making the earth foul by herpresence. " Staring into the boy's eyes, the man becamepurple with rage. "Don't have fool notions in yourhead, " he commanded. "My wife, she is dead; yes, surely. I tell you, all women are dead, my mother, yourmother, that tall dark woman who works in the millinerystore and with whom I saw you walking aboutyesterday--all of them, they are all dead. I tell youthere is something rotten about them. I was married, sure. My wife was dead before she married me, she was afoul thing come out a woman more foul. She was a thingsent to make life unbearable to me. I was a fool, doyou see, as you are now, and so I married this woman. Iwould like to see men a little begin to understandwomen. They are sent to prevent men making the worldworth while. It is a trick in Nature. Ugh! They arecreeping, crawling, squirming things, they with theirsoft hands and their blue eyes. The sight of a womansickens me. Why I don't kill every woman I see I don'tknow. "

Half frightened and yet fascinated by the light burningin the eyes of the hideous old man, George Willardlistened, afire with curiosity. Darkness came on and heleaned forward trying to see the face of the man whotalked. When, in the gathering darkness, he could nolonger see the purple, bloated face and the burningeyes, a curious fancy came to him. Wash Williams talkedin low even tones that made his words seem the moreterrible. In the darkness the young reporter foundhimself imagining that he sat on the railroad tiesbeside a comely young man with black hair and blackshining eyes. There was something almost beautiful inthe voice of Wash Williams, the hideous, telling hisstory of hate. 

The telegraph operator of Winesburg, sitting in thedarkness on the railroad ties, had become a poet. Hatred had raised him to that elevation. "It is becauseI saw you kissing the lips of that Belle Carpenter thatI tell you my story, " he said. "What happened to me maynext happen to you. I want to put you on your guard. Already you may be having dreams in your head. I wantto destroy them. "

Wash Williams began telling the story of his marriedlife with the tall blonde girl with the blue eyes whomhe had met when he was a young operator at Dayton, Ohio. Here and there his story was touched with momentsof beauty intermingled with strings of vile curses. Theoperator had married the daughter of a dentist who wasthe youngest of three sisters. On his marriage day, because of his ability, he was promoted to a positionas dispatcher at an increased salary and sent to anoffice at Columbus, Ohio. There he settled down withhis young wife and began buying a house on theinstallment plan. 

The young telegraph operator was madly in love. With akind of religious fervor he had managed to go throughthe pitfalls of his youth and to remain virginal untilafter his marriage. He made for George Willard apicture of his life in the house at Columbus, Ohio, with the young wife. "In the garden back of our housewe planted vegetables, " he said, "you know, peas andcorn and such things. We went to Columbus in earlyMarch and as soon as the days became warm I went towork in the garden. With a spade I turned up the blackground while she ran about laughing and pretending tobe afraid of the worms I uncovered. Late in April camethe planting. In the little paths among the seed bedsshe stood holding a paper bag in her hand. The bag wasfilled with seeds. A few at a time she handed me theseeds that I might thrust them into the warm, softground. "

For a moment there was a catch in the voice of the mantalking in the darkness. "I loved her, " he said. "Idon't claim not to be a fool. I love her yet. There inthe dusk in the spring evening I crawled along theblack ground to her feet and groveled before her. Ikissed her shoes and the ankles above her shoes. Whenthe hem of her garment touched my face I trembled. Whenafter two years of that life I found she had managed toacquire three other lovers who came regularly to ourhouse when I was away at work, I didn't want to touchthem or her. I just sent her home to her mother andsaid nothing. There was nothing to say. I had fourhundred dollars in the bank and I gave her that. Ididn't ask her reasons. I didn't say anything. When shehad gone I cried like a silly boy. Pretty soon I had achance to sell the house and I sent that money to her. "

Wash Williams and George Willard arose from the pile ofrailroad ties and walked along the tracks toward town. The operator finished his tale quickly, breathlessly. 

"Her mother sent for me, " he said. "She wrote me aletter and asked me to come to their house at Dayton. When I got there it was evening about this time. "

Wash Williams' voice rose to a half scream. "I sat inthe parlor of that house two hours. Her mother took mein there and left me. Their house was stylish. Theywere what is called respectable people. There wereplush chairs and a couch in the room. I was tremblingall over. I hated the men I thought had wronged her. Iwas sick of living alone and wanted her back. Thelonger I waited the more raw and tender I became. Ithought that if she came in and just touched me withher hand I would perhaps faint away. I ached to forgiveand forget. "

Wash Williams stopped and stood staring at GeorgeWillard. The boy's body shook as from a chill. Againthe man's voice became soft and low. "She came into theroom naked, " he went on. "Her mother did that. While Isat there she was taking the girl's clothes off, perhaps coaxing her to do it. First I heard voices atthe door that led into a little hallway and then itopened softly. The girl was ashamed and stood perfectlystill staring at the floor. The mother didn't come intothe room. When she had pushed the girl in through thedoor she stood in the hallway waiting, hoping wewould--well, you see--waiting. "

George Willard and the telegraph operator came into themain street of Winesburg. The lights from the storewindows lay bright and shining on the sidewalks. Peoplemoved about laughing and talking. The young reporterfelt ill and weak. In imagination, he also became oldand shapeless. "I didn't get the mother killed, " saidWash Williams, staring up and down the street. "Istruck her once with a chair and then the neighborscame in and took it away. She screamed so loud you see. I won't ever have a chance to kill her now. She died ofa fever a month after that happened. "

THE THINKER

The house in which Seth Richmond of Winesburg livedwith his mother had been at one time the show place ofthe town, but when young Seth lived there its glory hadbecome somewhat dimmed. The huge brick house whichBanker White had built on Buckeye Street hadovershadowed it. The Richmond place was in a littlevalley far out at the end of Main Street. Farmerscoming into town by a dusty road from the south passedby a grove of walnut trees, skirted the Fair Groundwith its high board fence covered with advertisements, and trotted their horses down through the valley pastthe Richmond place into town. As much of the countrynorth and south of Winesburg was devoted to fruit andberry raising, Seth saw wagon-loads of berrypickers--boys, girls, and women--going to the fields inthe morning and returning covered with dust in theevening. The chattering crowd, with their rude jokescried out from wagon to wagon, sometimes irritated himsharply. He regretted that he also could not laughboisterously, shout meaningless jokes and make ofhimself a figure in the endless stream of moving, giggling activity that went up and down the road. 

The Richmond house was built of limestone, and, although it was said in the village to have become rundown, had in reality grown more beautiful with everypassing year. Already time had begun a little to colorthe stone, lending a golden richness to its surface andin the evening or on dark days touching the shadedplaces beneath the eaves with wavering patches ofbrowns and blacks. 

The house had been built by Seth's grandfather, a stonequarryman, and it, together with the stone quarries onLake Erie eighteen miles to the north, had been left tohis son, Clarence Richmond, Seth's father. ClarenceRichmond, a quiet passionate man extraordinarilyadmired by his neighbors, had been killed in a streetfight with the editor of a newspaper in Toledo, Ohio. The fight concerned the publication of ClarenceRichmond's name coupled with that of a woman schoolteacher, and as the dead man had begun the row byfiring upon the editor, the effort to punish the slayerwas unsuccessful. After the quarryman's death it wasfound that much of the money left to him had beensquandered in speculation and in insecure investmentsmade through the influence of friends. 

Left with but a small income, Virginia Richmond hadsettled down to a retired life in the village and tothe raising of her son. Although she had been deeplymoved by the death of the husband and father, she didnot at all believe the stories concerning him that ranabout after his death. To her mind, the sensitive, boyish man whom all had instinctively loved, was but anunfortunate, a being too fine for everyday life. "You'll be hearing all sorts of stories, but you arenot to believe what you hear, " she said to her son. "Hewas a good man, full of tenderness for everyone, andshould not have tried to be a man of affairs. No matterhow much I were to plan and dream of your future, Icould not imagine anything better for you than that youturn out as good a man as your father. "

Several years after the death of her husband, VirginiaRichmond had become alarmed at the growing demands uponher income and had set herself to the task ofincreasing it. She had learned stenography and throughthe influence of her husband's friends got the positionof court stenographer at the county seat. There shewent by train each morning during the sessions of thecourt, and when no court sat, spent her days workingamong the rosebushes in her garden. She was a tall, straight figure of a woman with a plain face and agreat mass of brown hair. 

In the relationship between Seth Richmond and hismother, there was a quality that even at eighteen hadbegun to color all of his traffic with men. An almostunhealthy respect for the youth kept the mother for themost part silent in his presence. When she did speaksharply to him he had only to look steadily into hereyes to see dawning there the puzzled look he hadalready noticed in the eyes of others when he looked atthem. 

The truth was that the son thought with remarkableclearness and the mother did not. She expected from allpeople certain conventional reactions to life. A boywas your son, you scolded him and he trembled andlooked at the floor. When you had scolded enough hewept and all was forgiven. After the weeping and whenhe had gone to bed, you crept into his room and kissedhim. 

Virginia Richmond could not understand why her son didnot do these things. After the severest reprimand, hedid not tremble and look at the floor but insteadlooked steadily at her, causing uneasy doubts to invadeher mind. As for creeping into his room--after Sethhad passed his fifteenth year, she would have been halfafraid to do anything of the kind. 

Once when he was a boy of sixteen, Seth in company withtwo other boys ran away from home. The three boysclimbed into the open door of an empty freight car androde some forty miles to a town where a fair was beingheld. One of the boys had a bottle filled with acombination of whiskey and blackberry wine, and thethree sat with legs dangling out of the car doordrinking from the bottle. Seth's two companions sangand waved their hands to idlers about the stations ofthe towns through which the train passed. They plannedraids upon the baskets of farmers who had come withtheir families to the fair. "We will five like kingsand won't have to spend a penny to see the fair andhorse races, " they declared boastfully. 

After the disappearance of Seth, Virginia Richmondwalked up and down the floor of her home filled withvague alarms. Although on the next day she discovered, through an inquiry made by the town marshal, on whatadventure the boys had gone, she could not quietherself. All through the night she lay awake hearingthe clock tick and telling herself that Seth, like hisfather, would come to a sudden and violent end. Sodetermined was she that the boy should this time feelthe weight of her wrath that, although she would notallow the marshal to interfere with his adventure, shegot out a pencil and paper and wrote down a series ofsharp, stinging reproofs she intended to pour out uponhim. The reproofs she committed to memory, going aboutthe garden and saying them aloud like an actormemorizing his part. 

And when, at the end of the week, Seth returned, alittle weary and with coal soot in his ears and abouthis eyes, she again found herself unable to reprovehim. Walking into the house he hung his cap on a nailby the kitchen door and stood looking steadily at her. "I wanted to turn back within an hour after we hadstarted, " he explained. "I didn't know what to do. Iknew you would be bothered, but I knew also that if Ididn't go on I would be ashamed of myself. I wentthrough with the thing for my own good. It wasuncomfortable, sleeping on wet straw, and two drunkenNegroes came and slept with us. When I stole a lunchbasket out of a farmer's wagon I couldn't help thinkingof his children going all day without food. I was sickof the whole affair, but I was determined to stick itout until the other boys were ready to come back. "

"I'm glad you did stick it out, " replied the mother, half resentfully, and kissing him upon the foreheadpretended to busy herself with the work about thehouse. 

On a summer evening Seth Richmond went to the NewWillard House to visit his friend, George Willard. Ithad rained during the afternoon, but as he walkedthrough Main Street, the sky had partially cleared anda golden glow lit up the west. Going around a corner, he turned in at the door of the hotel and began toclimb the stairway leading up to his friend's room. Inthe hotel office the proprietor and two traveling menwere engaged in a discussion of politics. 

On the stairway Seth stopped and listened to the voicesof the men below. They were excited and talked rapidly. Tom Willard was berating the traveling men. "I am aDemocrat but your talk makes me sick, " he said. "Youdon't understand McKinley. McKinley and Mark Hanna arefriends. It is impossible perhaps for your mind tograsp that. If anyone tells you that a friendship canbe deeper and bigger and more worth while than dollarsand cents, or even more worth while than statepolitics, you snicker and laugh. "

The landlord was interrupted by one of the guests, atall, grey-mustached man who worked for a wholesalegrocery house. "Do you think that I've lived inCleveland all these years without knowing Mark Hanna?"he demanded. "Your talk is piffle. Hanna is after moneyand nothing else. This McKinley is his tool. He hasMcKinley bluffed and don't you forget it. "

The young man on the stairs did not linger to hear therest of the discussion, but went on up the stairway andinto the little dark hall. Something in the voices ofthe men talking in the hotel office started a chain ofthoughts in his mind. He was lonely and had begun tothink that loneliness was a part of his character, something that would always stay with him. Steppinginto a side hall he stood by a window that looked intoan alleyway. At the back of his shop stood Abner Groff, the town baker. His tiny bloodshot eyes looked up anddown the alleyway. In his shop someone called thebaker, who pretended not to hear. The baker had anempty milk bottle in his hand and an angry sullen lookin his eyes. 

In Winesburg, Seth Richmond was called the "deep one. ""He's like his father, " men said as he went through thestreets. "He'll break out some of these days. You waitand see. "

The talk of the town and the respect with which men andboys instinctively greeted him, as all men greet silentpeople, had affected Seth Richmond's outlook on lifeand on himself. He, like most boys, was deeper thanboys are given credit for being, but he was not whatthe men of the town, and even his mother, thought himto be. No great underlying purpose lay back of hishabitual silence, and he had no definite plan for hislife. When the boys with whom he associated were noisyand quarrelsome, he stood quietly at one side. Withcalm eyes he watched the gesticulating lively figuresof his companions. He wasn't particularly interested inwhat was going on, and sometimes wondered if he wouldever be particularly interested in anything. Now, as hestood in the half-darkness by the window watching thebaker, he wished that he himself might becomethoroughly stirred by something, even by the fits ofsullen anger for which Baker Groff was noted. "It wouldbe better for me if I could become excited and wrangleabout politics like windy old Tom Willard, " he thought, as he left the window and went again along the hallwayto the room occupied by his friend, George Willard. 

George Willard was older than Seth Richmond, but in therather odd friendship between the two, it was he whowas forever courting and the younger boy who was beingcourted. The paper on which George worked had onepolicy. It strove to mention by name in each issue, asmany as possible of the inhabitants of the village. Like an excited dog, George Willard ran here and there, noting on his pad of paper who had gone on business tothe county seat or had returned from a visit to aneighboring village. All day he wrote little facts uponthe pad. "A. P. Wringlet had received a shipment ofstraw hats. Ed Byerbaum and Tom Marshall were inCleveland Friday. Uncle Tom Sinnings is building a newbarn on his place on the Valley Road. "

The idea that George Willard would some day become awriter had given him a place of distinction inWinesburg, and to Seth Richmond he talked continuallyof the matter, "It's the easiest of all lives to live, "he declared, becoming excited and boastful. "Here andthere you go and there is no one to boss you. Thoughyou are in India or in the South Seas in a boat, youhave but to write and there you are. Wait till I get myname up and then see what fun I shall have. "

In George Willard's room, which had a window lookingdown into an alleyway and one that looked acrossrailroad tracks to Biff Carter's Lunch Room facing therailroad station, Seth Richmond sat in a chair andlooked at the floor. George Willard, who had beensitting for an hour idly playing with a lead pencil, greeted him effusively. "I've been trying to write alove story, " he explained, laughing nervously. Lightinga pipe he began walking up and down the room. "I knowwhat I'm going to do. I'm going to fall in love. I'vebeen sitting here and thinking it over and I'm going todo it. "

As though embarrassed by his declaration, George wentto a window and turning his back to his friend leanedout. "I know who I'm going to fall in love with, " hesaid sharply. "It's Helen White. She is the only girlin town with any 'get-up' to her. "

Struck with a new idea, young Willard turned and walkedtoward his visitor. "Look here, " he said. "You knowHelen White better than I do. I want you to tell herwhat I said. You just get to talking to her and saythat I'm in love with her. See what she says to that. See how she takes it, and then you come and tell me. "

Seth Richmond arose and went toward the door. The wordsof his comrade irritated him unbearably. "Well, good-bye, " he said briefly. 

George was amazed. Running forward he stood in thedarkness trying to look into Seth's face. "What's thematter? What are you going to do? You stay here andlet's talk, " he urged. 

A wave of resentment directed against his friend, themen of the town who were, he thought, perpetuallytalking of nothing, and most of all, against his ownhabit of silence, made Seth half desperate. "Aw, speakto her yourself, " he burst forth and then, goingquickly through the door, slammed it sharply in hisfriend's face. "I'm going to find Helen White and talkto her, but not about him, " he muttered. 

Seth went down the stairway and out at the front doorof the hotel muttering with wrath. Crossing a littledusty street and climbing a low iron railing, he wentto sit upon the grass in the station yard. GeorgeWillard he thought a profound fool, and he wished thathe had said so more vigorously. Although hisacquaintanceship with Helen White, the banker'sdaughter, was outwardly but casual, she was often thesubject of his thoughts and he felt that she wassomething private and personal to himself. "The busyfool with his love stories, " he muttered, staring backover his shoulder at George Willard's room, "why doeshe never tire of his eternal talking. "

It was berry harvest time in Winesburg and upon thestation platform men and boys loaded the boxes of red, fragrant berries into two express cars that stood uponthe siding. A June moon was in the sky, although in thewest a storm threatened, and no street lamps werelighted. In the dim light the figures of the menstanding upon the express truck and pitching the boxesin at the doors of the cars were but dimly discernible. Upon the iron railing that protected the station lawnsat other men. Pipes were lighted. Village jokes wentback and forth. Away in the distance a train whistledand the men loading the boxes into the cars worked withrenewed activity. 

Seth arose from his place on the grass and wentsilently past the men perched upon the railing and intoMain Street. He had come to a resolution. "I'll get outof here, " he told himself. "What good am I here? I'mgoing to some city and go to work. I'll tell motherabout it tomorrow. "

Seth Richmond went slowly along Main Street, pastWacker's Cigar Store and the Town Hall, and intoBuckeye Street. He was depressed by the thought that hewas not a part of the life in his own town, but thedepression did not cut deeply as he did not think ofhimself as at fault. In the heavy shadows of a big treebefore Doctor Welling's house, he stopped and stoodwatching half-witted Turk Smollet, who was pushing awheelbarrow in the road. The old man with his absurdlyboyish mind had a dozen long boards on the wheelbarrow, and, as he hurried along the road, balanced the loadwith extreme nicety. "Easy there, Turk! Steady now, oldboy!" the old man shouted to himself, and laughed sothat the load of boards rocked dangerously. 

Seth knew Turk Smollet, the half dangerous old woodchopper whose peculiarities added so much of color tothe life of the village. He knew that when Turk gotinto Main Street he would become the center of awhirlwind of cries and comments, that in truth the oldman was going far out of his way in order to passthrough Main Street and exhibit his skill in wheelingthe boards. "If George Willard were here, he'd havesomething to say, " thought Seth. "George belongs tothis town. He'd shout at Turk and Turk would shout athim. They'd both be secretly pleased by what they hadsaid. It's different with me. I don't belong. I'll notmake a fuss about it, but I'm going to get out ofhere. "

Seth stumbled forward through the half-darkness, feeling himself an outcast in his own town. He began topity himself, but a sense of the absurdity of histhoughts made him smile. In the end he decided that hewas simply old beyond his years and not at all asubject for self-pity. "I'm made to go to work. I maybe able to make a place for myself by steady working, and I might as well be at it, " he decided. 

Seth went to the house of Banker White and stood in thedarkness by the front door. On the door hung a heavybrass knocker, an innovation introduced into thevillage by Helen White's mother, who had also organizeda women's club for the study of poetry. Seth raised theknocker and let it fall. Its heavy clatter sounded likea report from distant guns. "How awkward and foolish Iam, " he thought. "If Mrs. White comes to the door, Iwon't know what to say. "

It was Helen White who came to the door and found Sethstanding at the edge of the porch. Blushing withpleasure, she stepped forward, closing the door softly. "I'm going to get out of town. I don't know what I'lldo, but I'm going to get out of here and go to work. Ithink I'll go to Columbus, " he said. "Perhaps I'll getinto the State University down there. Anyway, I'mgoing. I'll tell mother tonight. " He hesitated andlooked doubtfully about. "Perhaps you wouldn't mindcoming to walk with me?"

Seth and Helen walked through the streets beneath thetrees. Heavy clouds had drifted across the face of themoon, and before them in the deep twilight went a manwith a short ladder upon his shoulder. Hurryingforward, the man stopped at the street crossing and, putting the ladder against the wooden lamp-post, lighted the village lights so that their way was halflighted, half darkened, by the lamps and by thedeepening shadows cast by the low-branched trees. Inthe tops of the trees the wind began to play, disturbing the sleeping birds so that they flew aboutcalling plaintively. In the lighted space before one ofthe lamps, two bats wheeled and circled, pursuing thegathering swarm of night flies. 

Since Seth had been a boy in knee trousers there hadbeen a half expressed intimacy between him and themaiden who now for the first time walked beside him. For a time she had been beset with a madness forwriting notes which she addressed to Seth. He had foundthem concealed in his books at school and one had beengiven him by a child met in the street, while severalhad been delivered through the village post office. 

The notes had been written in a round, boyish hand andhad reflected a mind inflamed by novel reading. Sethhad not answered them, although he had been moved andflattered by some of the sentences scrawled in pencilupon the stationery of the banker's wife. Putting theminto the pocket of his coat, he went through the streetor stood by the fence in the school yard with somethingburning at his side. He thought it fine that he shouldbe thus selected as the favorite of the richest andmost attractive girl in town. 

Helen and Seth stopped by a fence near where a low darkbuilding faced the street. The building had once been afactory for the making of barrel staves but was nowvacant. Across the street upon the porch of a house aman and woman talked of their childhood, their voicescoming dearly across to the half-embarrassed youth andmaiden. There was the sound of scraping chairs and theman and woman came down the gravel path to a woodengate. Standing outside the gate, the man leaned overand kissed the woman. "For old times' sake, " he saidand, turning, walked rapidly away along the sidewalk. 

"That's Belle Turner, " whispered Helen, and put herhand boldly into Seth's hand. "I didn't know she had afellow. I thought she was too old for that. " Sethlaughed uneasily. The hand of the girl was warm and astrange, dizzy feeling crept over him. Into his mindcame a desire to tell her something he had beendetermined not to tell. "George Willard's in love withyou, " he said, and in spite of his agitation his voicewas low and quiet. "He's writing a story, and he wantsto be in love. He wants to know how it feels. He wantedme to tell you and see what you said. "

Again Helen and Seth walked in silence. They came tothe garden surrounding the old Richmond place and goingthrough a gap in the hedge sat on a wooden benchbeneath a bush. 

On the street as he walked beside the girl new anddaring thoughts had come into Seth Richmond's mind. Hebegan to regret his decision to get out of town. "Itwould be something new and altogether delightful toremain and walk often through the streets with HelenWhite, " he thought. In imagination he saw himselfputting his arm about her waist and feeling her armsclasped tightly about his neck. One of those oddcombinations of events and places made him connect theidea of love-making with this girl and a spot he hadvisited some days before. He had gone on an errand tothe house of a farmer who lived on a hillside beyondthe Fair Ground and had returned by a path through afield. At the foot of the hill below the farmer's houseSeth had stopped beneath a sycamore tree and lookedabout him. A soft humming noise had greeted his ears. For a moment he had thought the tree must be the homeof a swarm of bees. 

And then, looking down, Seth had seen the beeseverywhere all about him in the long grass. He stood ina mass of weeds that grew waist-high in the field thatran away from the hillside. The weeds were abloom withtiny purple blossoms and gave forth an overpoweringfragrance. Upon the weeds the bees were gathered inarmies, singing as they worked. 

Seth imagined himself lying on a summer evening, burieddeep among the weeds beneath the tree. Beside him, inthe scene built in his fancy, lay Helen White, her handlying in his hand. A peculiar reluctance kept him fromkissing her lips, but he felt he might have done thatif he wished. Instead, he lay perfectly still, lookingat her and listening to the army of bees that sang thesustained masterful song of labor above his head. 

On the bench in the garden Seth stirred uneasily. Releasing the hand of the girl, he thrust his handsinto his trouser pockets. A desire to impress the mindof his companion with the importance of the resolutionhe had made came over him and he nodded his head towardthe house. "Mother'll make a fuss, I suppose, " hewhispered. "She hasn't thought at all about what I'mgoing to do in life. She thinks I'm going to stay onhere forever just being a boy. "

Seth's voice became charged with boyish earnestness. "You see, I've got to strike out. I've got to get towork. It's what I'm good for. "

Helen White was impressed. She nodded her head and afeeling of admiration swept over her. "This is as itshould be, " she thought. "This boy is not a boy at all, but a strong, purposeful man. " Certain vague desiresthat had been invading her body were swept away and shesat up very straight on the bench. The thundercontinued to rumble and flashes of heat lightning litup the eastern sky. The garden that had been somysterious and vast, a place that with Seth beside hermight have become the background for strange andwonderful adventures, now seemed no more than anordinary Winesburg back yard, quite definite andlimited in its outlines. 

"What will you do up there?" she whispered. 

Seth turned half around on the bench, striving to seeher face in the darkness. He thought her infinitelymore sensible and straightforward than George Willard, and was glad he had come away from his friend. Afeeling of impatience with the town that had been inhis mind returned, and he tried to tell her of it. "Everyone talks and talks, " he began. "I'm sick of it. I'll do something, get into some kind of work wheretalk don't count. Maybe I'll just be a mechanic in ashop. I don't know. I guess I don't care much. I justwant to work and keep quiet. That's all I've got in mymind. "

Seth arose from the bench and put out his hand. He didnot want to bring the meeting to an end but could notthink of anything more to say. "It's the last timewe'll see each other, " he whispered. 

A wave of sentiment swept over Helen. Putting her handupon Seth's shoulder, she started to draw his face downtoward her own upturned face. The act was one of pureaffection and cutting regret that some vague adventurethat had been present in the spirit of the night wouldnow never be realized. "I think I'd better be goingalong, " she said, letting her hand fall heavily to herside. A thought came to her. "Don't you go with me; Iwant to be alone, " she said. "You go and talk with yourmother. You'd better do that now. "

Seth hesitated and, as he stood waiting, the girlturned and ran away through the hedge. A desire to runafter her came to him, but he only stood staring, perplexed and puzzled by her action as he had beenperplexed and puzzled by all of the life of the townout of which she had come. Walking slowly toward thehouse, he stopped in the shadow of a large tree andlooked at his mother sitting by a lighted window busilysewing. The feeling of loneliness that had visited himearlier in the evening returned and colored histhoughts of the adventure through which he had justpassed. "Huh!" he exclaimed, turning and staring in thedirection taken by Helen White. "That's how things'llturn out. She'll be like the rest. I suppose she'llbegin now to look at me in a funny way. " He looked atthe ground and pondered this thought. "She'll beembarrassed and feel strange when I'm around, " hewhispered to himself. "That's how it'll be. That's howeverything'll turn out. When it comes to lovingsomeone, it won't never be me. It'll be someoneelse--some fool--someone who talks a lot--someone likethat George Willard. "

TANDY

Until she was seven years old she lived in an oldunpainted house on an unused road that led off TrunionPike. Her father gave her but little attention and hermother was dead. The father spent his time talking andthinking of religion. He proclaimed himself an agnosticand was so absorbed in destroying the ideas of God thathad crept into the minds of his neighbors that he neversaw God manifesting himself in the little child that, half forgotten, lived here and there on the bounty ofher dead mother's relatives. 

A stranger came to Winesburg and saw in the child whatthe father did not see. He was a tall, redhaired youngman who was almost always drunk. Sometimes he sat in achair before the New Willard House with Tom Hard, thefather. As Tom talked, declaring there could be no God, the stranger smiled and winked at the bystanders. Heand Tom became friends and were much together. 

The stranger was the son of a rich merchant ofCleveland and had come to Winesburg on a mission. Hewanted to cure himself of the habit of drink, andthought that by escaping from his city associates andliving in a rural community he would have a betterchance in the struggle with the appetite that wasdestroying him. 

His sojourn in Winesburg was not a success. Thedullness of the passing hours led to his drinkingharder than ever. But he did succeed in doingsomething. He gave a name rich with meaning to TomHard's daughter. 

One evening when he was recovering from a long debauchthe stranger came reeling along the main street of thetown. Tom Hard sat in a chair before the New WillardHouse with his daughter, then a child of five, on hisknees. Beside him on the board sidewalk sat youngGeorge Willard. The stranger dropped into a chairbeside them. His body shook and when he tried to talkhis voice trembled. 

It was late evening and darkness lay over the town andover the railroad that ran along the foot of a littleincline before the hotel. Somewhere in the distance, off to the west, there was a prolonged blast from thewhistle of a passenger engine. A dog that had beensleeping in the roadway arose and barked. The strangerbegan to babble and made a prophecy concerning thechild that lay in the arms of the agnostic. 

"I came here to quit drinking, " he said, and tearsbegan to run down his cheeks. He did not look at TomHard, but leaned forward and stared into the darknessas though seeing a vision. "I ran away to the countryto be cured, but I am not cured. There is a reason. " Heturned to look at the child who sat up very straight onher father's knee and returned the look. 

The stranger touched Tom Hard on the arm. "Drink is notthe only thing to which I am addicted, " he said. "Thereis something else. I am a lover and have not found mything to love. That is a big point if you know enoughto realize what I mean. It makes my destructioninevitable, you see. There are few who understandthat. "

The stranger became silent and seemed overcome withsadness, but another blast from the whistle of thepassenger engine aroused him. "I have not lost faith. Iproclaim that. I have only been brought to the placewhere I know my faith will not be realized, " hedeclared hoarsely. He looked hard at the child andbegan to address her, paying no more attention to thefather. "There is a woman coming, " he said, and hisvoice was now sharp and earnest. "I have missed her, you see. She did not come in my time. You may be thewoman. It would be like fate to let me stand in herpresence once, on such an evening as this, when I havedestroyed myself with drink and she is as yet only achild. "

The shoulders of the stranger shook violently, and whenhe tried to roll a cigarette the paper fell from histrembling fingers. He grew angry and scolded. "Theythink it's easy to be a woman, to be loved, but I knowbetter, " he declared. Again he turned to the child. "Iunderstand, " he cried. "Perhaps of all men I aloneunderstand. "

His glance again wandered away to the darkened street. "I know about her, although she has never crossed mypath, " he said softly. "I know about her struggles andher defeats. It is because of her defeats that she isto me the lovely one. Out of her defeats has been borna new quality in woman. I have a name for it. I call itTandy. I made up the name when I was a true dreamer andbefore my body became vile. It is the quality of beingstrong to be loved. It is something men need from womenand that they do not get. "

The stranger arose and stood before Tom Hard. His bodyrocked back and forth and he seemed about to fall, butinstead he dropped to his knees on the sidewalk andraised the hands of the little girl to his drunkenlips. He kissed them ecstatically. "Be Tandy, littleone, " he pleaded. "Dare to be strong and courageous. That is the road. Venture anything. Be brave enough todare to be loved. Be something more than man or woman. Be Tandy. "

The stranger arose and staggered off down the street. A day or two later he got aboard a train and returnedto his home in Cleveland. On the summer evening, afterthe talk before the hotel, Tom Hard took the girl childto the house of a relative where she had been invitedto spend the night. As he went along in the darknessunder the trees he forgot the babbling voice of thestranger and his mind returned to the making ofarguments by which he might destroy men's faith in God. He spoke his daughter's name and she began to weep. 

"I don't want to be called that, " she declared. "Iwant to be called Tandy--Tandy Hard. " The child wept sobitterly that Tom Hard was touched and tried to comforther. He stopped beneath a tree and, taking her into hisarms, began to caress her. "Be good, now, " he saidsharply; but she would not be quieted. With childishabandon she gave herself over to grief, her voicebreaking the evening stillness of the street. "I wantto be Tandy. I want to be Tandy. I want to be TandyHard, " she cried, shaking her head and sobbing asthough her young strength were not enough to bear thevision the words of the drunkard had brought to her. 

THE STRENGTH OF GOD

The Reverend Curtis Hartman was pastor of thePresbyterian Church of Winesburg, and had been in thatposition ten years. He was forty years old, and by hisnature very silent and reticent. To preach, standing inthe pulpit before the people, was always a hardship forhim and from Wednesday morning until Saturday eveninghe thought of nothing but the two sermons that must bepreached on Sunday. Early on Sunday morning he wentinto a little room called a study in the bell tower ofthe church and prayed. In his prayers there was onenote that always predominated. "Give me strength andcourage for Thy work, O Lord!" he pleaded, kneeling onthe bare floor and bowing his head in the presence ofthe task that lay before him. 

The Reverend Hartman was a tall man with a brown beard. His wife, a stout, nervous woman, was the daughter of amanufacturer of underwear at Cleveland, Ohio. Theminister himself was rather a favorite in the town. Theelders of the church liked him because he was quiet andunpretentious and Mrs. White, the banker's wife, thought him scholarly and refined. 

The Presbyterian Church held itself somewhat aloof fromthe other churches of Winesburg. It was larger and moreimposing and its minister was better paid. He even hada carriage of his own and on summer evenings sometimesdrove about town with his wife. Through Main Street andup and down Buckeye Street he went, bowing gravely tothe people, while his wife, afire with secret pride, looked at him out of the corners of her eyes andworried lest the horse become frightened and run away. 

For a good many years after he came to Winesburg thingswent well with Curtis Hartman. He was not one to arousekeen enthusiasm among the worshippers in his church buton the other hand he made no enemies. In reality he wasmuch in earnest and sometimes suffered prolongedperiods of remorse because he could not go crying theword of God in the highways and byways of the town. Hewondered if the flame of the spirit really burned inhim and dreamed of a day when a strong sweet newcurrent of power would come like a great wind into hisvoice and his soul and the people would tremble beforethe spirit of God made manifest in him. "I am a poorstick and that will never really happen to me, " hemused dejectedly, and then a patient smile lit up hisfeatures. "Oh well, I suppose I'm doing well enough, "he added philosophically. 

The room in the bell tower of the church, where onSunday mornings the minister prayed for an increase inhim of the power of God, had but one window. It waslong and narrow and swung outward on a hinge like adoor. On the window, made of little leaded panes, was adesign showing the Christ laying his hand upon the headof a child. One Sunday morning in the summer as he satby his desk in the room with a large Bible openedbefore him, and the sheets of his sermon scatteredabout, the minister was shocked to see, in the upperroom of the house next door, a woman lying in her bedand smoking a cigarette while she read a book. CurtisHartman went on tiptoe to the window and closed itsoftly. He was horror stricken at the thought of awoman smoking and trembled also to think that his eyes, just raised from the pages of the book of God, hadlooked upon the bare shoulders and white throat of awoman. With his brain in a whirl he went down into thepulpit and preached a long sermon without once thinkingof his gestures or his voice. The sermon attractedunusual attention because of its power and clearness. "I wonder if she is listening, if my voice is carryinga message into her soul, " he thought and began to hopethat on future Sunday mornings he might be able to saywords that would touch and awaken the woman apparentlyfar gone in secret sin. 

The house next door to the Presbyterian Church, throughthe windows of which the minister had seen the sightthat had so upset him, was occupied by two women. AuntElizabeth Swift, a grey competent-looking widow withmoney in the Winesburg National Bank, lived there withher daughter Kate Swift, a school teacher. The schoolteacher was thirty years old and had a neattrim-looking figure. She had few friends and bore areputation of having a sharp tongue. When he began tothink about her, Curtis Hartman remembered that she hadbeen to Europe and had lived for two years in New YorkCity. "Perhaps after all her smoking means nothing, " hethought. He began to remember that when he was astudent in college and occasionally read novels, goodalthough somewhat worldly women, had smoked through thepages of a book that had once fallen into his hands. With a rush of new determination he worked on hissermons all through the week and forgot, in his zeal toreach the ears and the soul of this new listener, bothhis embarrassment in the pulpit and the necessity ofprayer in the study on Sunday mornings. 

Reverend Hartman's experience with women had beensomewhat limited. He was the son of a wagon maker fromMuncie, Indiana, and had worked his way throughcollege. The daughter of the underwear manufacturer hadboarded in a house where he lived during his schooldays and he had married her after a formal andprolonged courtship, carried on for the most part bythe girl herself. On his marriage day the underwearmanufacturer had given his daughter five thousanddollars and he promised to leave her at least twicethat amount in his will. The minister had thoughthimself fortunate in marriage and had never permittedhimself to think of other women. He did not want tothink of other women. What he wanted was to do the workof God quietly and earnestly. 

In the soul of the minister a struggle awoke. Fromwanting to reach the ears of Kate Swift, and throughhis sermons to delve into her soul, he began to wantalso to look again at the figure lying white and quietin the bed. On a Sunday morning when he could not sleepbecause of his thoughts he arose and went to walk inthe streets. When he had gone along Main Street almostto the old Richmond place he stopped and picking up astone rushed off to the room in the bell tower. Withthe stone he broke out a corner of the window and thenlocked the door and sat down at the desk before theopen Bible to wait. When the shade of the window toKate Swift's room was raised he could see, through thehole, directly into her bed, but she was not there. Shealso had arisen and had gone for a walk and the handthat raised the shade was the hand of Aunt ElizabethSwift. 

The minister almost wept with joy at this deliverancefrom the carnal desire to "peep" and went back to hisown house praising God. In an ill moment he forgot, however, to stop the hole in the window. The piece ofglass broken out at the corner of the window justnipped off the bare heel of the boy standing motionlessand looking with rapt eyes into the face of the Christ. 

Curtis Hartman forgot his sermon on that Sundaymorning. He talked to his congregation and in his talksaid that it was a mistake for people to think of theirminister as a man set aside and intended by nature tolead a blameless life. "Out of my own experience I knowthat we, who are the ministers of God's word, are besetby the same temptations that assail you, " he declared. "I have been tempted and have surrendered totemptation. It is only the hand of God, placed beneathmy head, that has raised me up. As he has raised me soalso will he raise you. Do not despair. In your hour ofsin raise your eyes to the skies and you will be againand again saved. "

Resolutely the minister put the thoughts of the womanin the bed out of his mind and began to be somethinglike a lover in the presence of his wife. One eveningwhen they drove out together he turned the horse out ofBuckeye Street and in the darkness on Gospel Hill, above Waterworks Pond, put his arm about SarahHartman's waist. When he had eaten breakfast in themorning and was ready to retire to his study at theback of his house he went around the table and kissedhis wife on the cheek. When thoughts of Kate Swift cameinto his head, he smiled and raised his eyes to theskies. "Intercede for me, Master, " he muttered, "keepme in the narrow path intent on Thy work. "

And now began the real struggle in the soul of thebrown-bearded minister. By chance he discovered thatKate Swift was in the habit of lying in her bed in theevenings and reading a book. A lamp stood on a table bythe side of the bed and the light streamed down uponher white shoulders and bare throat. On the eveningwhen he made the discovery the minister sat at the deskin the dusty room from nine until after eleven and whenher light was put out stumbled out of the church tospend two more hours walking and praying in thestreets. He did not want to kiss the shoulders and thethroat of Kate Swift and had not allowed his mind todwell on such thoughts. He did not know what he wanted. "I am God's child and he must save me from myself, " hecried, in the darkness under the trees as he wanderedin the streets. By a tree he stood and looked at thesky that was covered with hurrying clouds. He began totalk to God intimately and closely. "Please, Father, donot forget me. Give me power to go tomorrow and repairthe hole in the window. Lift my eyes again to theskies. Stay with me, Thy servant, in his hour of need. "

Up and down through the silent streets walked theminister and for days and weeks his soul was troubled. He could not understand the temptation that had come tohim nor could he fathom the reason for its coming. In away he began to blame God, saying to himself that hehad tried to keep his feet in the true path and had notrun about seeking sin. "Through my days as a young manand all through my life here I have gone quietly aboutmy work, " he declared. "Why now should I be tempted?What have I done that this burden should be laid onme?"

Three times during the early fall and winter of thatyear Curtis Hartman crept out of his house to the roomin the bell tower to sit in the darkness looking at thefigure of Kate Swift lying in her bed and later went towalk and pray in the streets. He could not understandhimself. For weeks he would go along scarcely thinkingof the school teacher and telling himself that he hadconquered the carnal desire to look at her body. Andthen something would happen. As he sat in the study ofhis own house, hard at work on a sermon, he wouldbecome nervous and begin to walk up and down the room. "I will go out into the streets, " he told himself andeven as he let himself in at the church door hepersistently denied to himself the cause of his beingthere. "I will not repair the hole in the window and Iwill train myself to come here at night and sit in thepresence of this woman without raising my eyes. I willnot be defeated in this thing. The Lord has devisedthis temptation as a test of my soul and I will gropemy way out of darkness into the light ofrighteousness. "

One night in January when it was bitter cold and snowlay deep on the streets of Winesburg Curtis Hartmanpaid his last visit to the room in the bell tower ofthe church. It was past nine o'clock when he left hisown house and he set out so hurriedly that he forgot toput on his overshoes. In Main Street no one was abroadbut Hop Higgins the night watchman and in the wholetown no one was awake but the watchman and young GeorgeWillard, who sat in the office of the Winesburg Eagletrying to write a story. Along the street to the churchwent the minister, plowing through the drifts andthinking that this time he would utterly give way tosin. "I want to look at the woman and to think ofkissing her shoulders and I am going to let myselfthink what I choose, " he declared bitterly and tearscame into his eyes. He began to think that he would getout of the ministry and try some other way of life. "Ishall go to some city and get into business, " hedeclared. "If my nature is such that I cannot resistsin, I shall give myself over to sin. At least I shallnot be a hypocrite, preaching the word of God with mymind thinking of the shoulders and neck of a woman whodoes not belong to me. "

It was cold in the room of the bell tower of the churchon that January night and almost as soon as he cameinto the room Curtis Hartman knew that if he stayed hewould be ill. His feet were wet from tramping in thesnow and there was no fire. In the room in the housenext door Kate Swift had not yet appeared. With grimdetermination the man sat down to wait. Sitting in thechair and gripping the edge of the desk on which laythe Bible he stared into the darkness thinking theblackest thoughts of his life. He thought of his wifeand for the moment almost hated her. "She has alwaysbeen ashamed of passion and has cheated me, " hethought. "Man has a right to expect living passion andbeauty in a woman. He has no right to forget that he isan animal and in me there is something that is Greek. Iwill throw off the woman of my bosom and seek otherwomen. I will besiege this school teacher. I will flyin the face of all men and if I am a creature of carnallusts I will live then for my lusts. "

The distracted man trembled from head to foot, partlyfrom cold, partly from the struggle in which he wasengaged. Hours passed and a fever assailed his body. His throat began to hurt and his teeth chattered. Hisfeet on the study floor felt like two cakes of ice. Still he would not give up. "I will see this woman andwill think the thoughts I have never dared to think, "he told himself, gripping the edge of the desk andwaiting. 

Curtis Hartman came near dying from the effects of thatnight of waiting in the church, and also he found inthe thing that happened what he took to be the way oflife for him. On other evenings when he had waited hehad not been able to see, through the little hole inthe glass, any part of the school teacher's room exceptthat occupied by her bed. In the darkness he had waiteduntil the woman suddenly appeared sitting in the bed inher white nightrobe. When the light was turned up shepropped herself up among the pillows and read a book. Sometimes she smoked one of the cigarettes. Only herbare shoulders and throat were visible. 

On the January night, after he had come near dying withcold and after his mind had two or three times actuallyslipped away into an odd land of fantasy so that he hadby an exercise of will power to force himself back intoconsciousness, Kate Swift appeared. In the room nextdoor a lamp was lighted and the waiting man stared intoan empty bed. Then upon the bed before his eyes a nakedwoman threw herself. Lying face downward she wept andbeat with her fists upon the pillow. With a finaloutburst of weeping she half arose, and in the presenceof the man who had waited to look and not to thinkthoughts the woman of sin began to pray. In thelamplight her figure, slim and strong, looked like thefigure of the boy in the presence of the Christ on theleaded window. 

Curtis Hartman never remembered how he got out of thechurch. With a cry he arose, dragging the heavy deskalong the floor. The Bible fell, making a great clatterin the silence. When the light in the house next doorwent out he stumbled down the stairway and into thestreet. Along the street he went and ran in at the doorof the Winesburg Eagle. To George Willard, who wastramping up and down in the office undergoing astruggle of his own, he began to talk halfincoherently. "The ways of God are beyond humanunderstanding, " he cried, running in quickly andclosing the door. He began to advance upon the youngman, his eyes glowing and his voice ringing withfervor. "I have found the light, " he cried. "After tenyears in this town, God has manifested himself to me inthe body of a woman. " His voice dropped and he began towhisper. "I did not understand, " he said. "What I tookto be a trial of my soul was only a preparation for anew and more beautiful fervor of the spirit. God hasappeared to me in the person of Kate Swift, the schoolteacher, kneeling naked on a bed. Do you know KateSwift? Although she may not be aware of it, she is aninstrument of God, bearing the message of truth. "

Reverend Curtis Hartman turned and ran out of theoffice. At the door he stopped, and after looking upand down the deserted street, turned again to GeorgeWillard. "I am delivered. Have no fear. " He held up ableeding fist for the young man to see. "I smashed theglass of the window, " he cried. "Now it will have to bewholly replaced. The strength of God was in me and Ibroke it with my fist. "

THE TEACHER

Snow lay deep in the streets of Winesburg. It hadbegun to snow about ten o'clock in the morning and awind sprang up and blew the snow in clouds along MainStreet. The frozen mud roads that led into town werefairly smooth and in places ice covered the mud. "Therewill be good sleighing, " said Will Henderson, standingby the bar in Ed Griffith's saloon. Out of the saloonhe went and met Sylvester West the druggist stumblingalong in the kind of heavy overshoes called arctics. "Snow will bring the people into town on Saturday, "said the druggist. The two men stopped and discussedtheir affairs. Will Henderson, who had on a lightovercoat and no overshoes, kicked the heel of his leftfoot with the toe of the right. "Snow will be good forthe wheat, " observed the druggist sagely. 

Young George Willard, who had nothing to do, was gladbecause he did not feel like working that day. Theweekly paper had been printed and taken to the postoffice Wednesday evening and the snow began to fall onThursday. At eight o'clock, after the morning train hadpassed, he put a pair of skates in his pocket and wentup to Waterworks Pond but did not go skating. Past thepond and along a path that followed Wine Creek he wentuntil he came to a grove of beech trees. There he builta fire against the side of a log and sat down at theend of the log to think. When the snow began to falland the wind to blow he hurried about getting fuel forthe fire. 

The young reporter was thinking of Kate Swift, who hadonce been his school teacher. On the evening before hehad gone to her house to get a book she wanted him toread and had been alone with her for an hour. For thefourth or fifth time the woman had talked to him withgreat earnestness and he could not make out what shemeant by her talk. He began to believe she must be inlove with him and the thought was both pleasing andannoying. 

Up from the log he sprang and began to pile sticks onthe fire. Looking about to be sure he was alone hetalked aloud pretending he was in the presence of thewoman, "Oh, you're just letting on, you know you are, "he declared. "I am going to find out about you. Youwait and see. "

The young man got up and went back along the pathtoward town leaving the fire blazing in the wood. As hewent through the streets the skates clanked in hispocket. In his own room in the New Willard House hebuilt a fire in the stove and lay down on top of thebed. He began to have lustful thoughts and pulling downthe shade of the window closed his eyes and turned hisface to the wall. He took a pillow into his arms andembraced it thinking first of the school teacher, whoby her words had stirred something within him, andlater of Helen White, the slim daughter of the townbanker, with whom he had been for a long time half inlove. 

By nine o'clock of that evening snow lay deep in thestreets and the weather had become bitter cold. It wasdifficult to walk about. The stores were dark and thepeople had crawled away to their houses. The eveningtrain from Cleveland was very late but nobody wasinterested in its arrival. By ten o'clock all but fourof the eighteen hundred citizens of the town were inbed. 

Hop Higgins, the night watchman, was partially awake. He was lame and carried a heavy stick. On dark nightshe carried a lantern. Between nine and ten o'clock hewent his rounds. Up and down Main Street he stumbledthrough the drifts trying the doors of the stores. Thenhe went into alleyways and tried the back doors. Finding all tight he hurried around the corner to theNew Willard House and beat on the door. Through therest of the night he intended to stay by the stove. "You go to bed. I'll keep the stove going, " he said tothe boy who slept on a cot in the hotel office. 

Hop Higgins sat down by the stove and took off hisshoes. When the boy had gone to sleep he began to thinkof his own affairs. He intended to paint his house inthe spring and sat by the stove calculating the cost ofpaint and labor. That led him into other calculations. The night watchman was sixty years old and wanted toretire. He had been a soldier in the Civil War and drewa small pension. He hoped to find some new method ofmaking a living and aspired to become a professionalbreeder of ferrets. Already he had four of thestrangely shaped savage little creatures, that are usedby sportsmen in the pursuit of rabbits, in the cellarof his house. "Now I have one male and three females, "he mused. "If I am lucky by spring I shall have twelveor fifteen. In another year I shall be able to beginadvertising ferrets for sale in the sporting papers. "

The nightwatchman settled into his chair and his mindbecame a blank. He did not sleep. By years of practicehe had trained himself to sit for hours through thelong nights neither asleep nor awake. In the morning hewas almost as refreshed as though he had slept. 

With Hop Higgins safely stowed away in the chair behindthe stove only three people were awake in Winesburg. George Willard was in the office of the Eaglepretending to be at work on the writing of a story butin reality continuing the mood of the morning by thefire in the wood. In the bell tower of the PresbyterianChurch the Reverend Curtis Hartman was sitting in thedarkness preparing himself for a revelation from God, and Kate Swift, the school teacher, was leaving herhouse for a walk in the storm. 

It was past ten o'clock when Kate Swift set out and thewalk was unpremeditated. It was as though the man andthe boy, by thinking of her, had driven her forth intothe wintry streets. Aunt Elizabeth Swift had gone tothe county seat concerning some business in connectionwith mortgages in which she had money invested andwould not be back until the next day. By a huge stove, called a base burner, in the living room of the housesat the daughter reading a book. Suddenly she sprang toher feet and, snatching a cloak from a rack by thefront door, ran out of the house. 

At the age of thirty Kate Swift was not known inWinesburg as a pretty woman. Her complexion was notgood and her face was covered with blotches thatindicated ill health. Alone in the night in the winterstreets she was lovely. Her back was straight, hershoulders square, and her features were as the featuresof a tiny goddess on a pedestal in a garden in the dimlight of a summer evening. 

During the afternoon the school teacher had been to seeDoctor Welling concerning her health. The doctor hadscolded her and had declared she was in danger oflosing her hearing. It was foolish for Kate Swift to beabroad in the storm, foolish and perhaps dangerous. 

The woman in the streets did not remember the words ofthe doctor and would not have turned back had sheremembered. She was very cold but after walking forfive minutes no longer minded the cold. First she wentto the end of her own street and then across a pair ofhay scales set in the ground before a feed barn andinto Trunion Pike. Along Trunion Pike she went to NedWinters' barn and turning east followed a street of lowframe houses that led over Gospel Hill and into SuckerRoad that ran down a shallow valley past Ike Smead'schicken farm to Waterworks Pond. As she went along, thebold, excited mood that had driven her out of doorspassed and then returned again. 

There was something biting and forbidding in thecharacter of Kate Swift. Everyone felt it. In theschoolroom she was silent, cold, and stern, and yet inan odd way very close to her pupils. Once in a longwhile something seemed to have come over her and shewas happy. All of the children in the schoolroom feltthe effect of her happiness. For a time they did notwork but sat back in their chairs and looked at her. 

With hands clasped behind her back the school teacherwalked up and down in the schoolroom and talked veryrapidly. It did not seem to matter what subject cameinto her mind. Once she talked to the children ofCharles Lamb and made up strange, intimate littlestories concerning the life of the dead writer. Thestories were told with the air of one who had lived ina house with Charles Lamb and knew all the secrets ofhis private life. The children were somewhat confused, thinking Charles Lamb must be someone who had oncelived in Winesburg. 

On another occasion the teacher talked to the childrenof Benvenuto Cellini. That time they laughed. What abragging, blustering, brave, lovable fellow she made ofthe old artist! Concerning him also she inventedanecdotes. There was one of a German music teacher whohad a room above Cellini's lodgings in the city ofMilan that made the boys guffaw. Sugars McNutts, a fatboy with red cheeks, laughed so hard that he becamedizzy and fell off his seat and Kate Swift laughed withhim. Then suddenly she became again cold and stern. 

On the winter night when she walked through thedeserted snow-covered streets, a crisis had come intothe life of the school teacher. Although no one inWinesburg would have suspected it, her life had beenvery adventurous. It was still adventurous. Day by dayas she worked in the schoolroom or walked in thestreets, grief, hope, and desire fought within her. Behind a cold exterior the most extraordinary eventstranspired in her mind. The people of the town thoughtof her as a confirmed old maid and because she spokesharply and went her own way thought her lacking in allthe human feeling that did so much to make and martheir own lives. In reality she was the most eagerlypassionate soul among them, and more than once, in thefive years since she had come back from her travels tosettle in Winesburg and become a school teacher, hadbeen compelled to go out of the house and walk halfthrough the night fighting out some battle ragingwithin. Once on a night when it rained she had stayedout six hours and when she came home had a quarrel withAunt Elizabeth Swift. "I am glad you're not a man, "said the mother sharply. "More than once I've waitedfor your father to come home, not knowing what new messhe had got into. I've had my share of uncertainty andyou cannot blame me if I do not want to see the worstside of him reproduced in you. "

 * * *

Kate Swift's mind was ablaze with thoughts of GeorgeWillard. In something he had written as a school boyshe thought she had recognized the spark of genius andwanted to blow on the spark. One day in the summer shehad gone to the Eagle office and finding the boyunoccupied had taken him out Main Street to the FairGround, where the two sat on a grassy bank and talked. The school teacher tried to bring home to the mind ofthe boy some conception of the difficulties he wouldhave to face as a writer. "You will have to know life, "she declared, and her voice trembled with earnestness. She took hold of George Willard's shoulders and turnedhim about so that she could look into his eyes. Apasser-by might have thought them about to embrace. "Ifyou are to become a writer you'll have to stop foolingwith words, " she explained. "It would be better to giveup the notion of writing until you are better prepared. Now it's time to be living. I don't want to frightenyou, but I would like to make you understand the importof what you think of attempting. You must not become amere peddler of words. The thing to learn is to knowwhat people are thinking about, not what they say. "

On the evening before that stormy Thursday night whenthe Reverend Curtis Hartman sat in the bell tower ofthe church waiting to look at her body, young Willardhad gone to visit the teacher and to borrow a book. Itwas then the thing happened that confused and puzzledthe boy. He had the book under his arm and waspreparing to depart. Again Kate Swift talked with greatearnestness. Night was coming on and the light in theroom grew dim. As he turned to go she spoke his namesoftly and with an impulsive movement took hold of hishand. Because the reporter was rapidly becoming a mansomething of his man's appeal, combined with thewinsomeness of the boy, stirred the heart of the lonelywoman. A passionate desire to have him understand theimport of life, to learn to interpret it truly andhonestly, swept over her. Leaning forward, her lipsbrushed his cheek. At the same moment he for the firsttime became aware of the marked beauty of her features. They were both embarrassed, and to relieve her feelingshe became harsh and domineering. "What's the use? Itwill be ten years before you begin to understand what Imean when I talk to you, " she cried passionately. 

 * * *

On the night of the storm and while the minister sat inthe church waiting for her, Kate Swift went to theoffice of the Winesburg Eagle, intending to haveanother talk with the boy. After the long walk in thesnow she was cold, lonely, and tired. As she camethrough Main Street she saw the fight from theprintshop window shining on the snow and on an impulseopened the door and went in. For an hour she sat by thestove in the office talking of life. She talked withpassionate earnestness. The impulse that had driven herout into the snow poured itself out into talk. Shebecame inspired as she sometimes did in the presence ofthe children in school. A great eagerness to open thedoor of life to the boy, who had been her pupil and whoshe thought might possess a talent for theunderstanding of life, had possession of her. So strongwas her passion that it became something physical. Again her hands took hold of his shoulders and sheturned him about. In the dim light her eyes blazed. Shearose and laughed, not sharply as was customary withher, but in a queer, hesitating way. "I must be going, "she said. "In a moment, if I stay, I'll be wanting tokiss you. "

In the newspaper office a confusion arose. Kate Swiftturned and walked to the door. She was a teacher butshe was also a woman. As she looked at George Willard, the passionate desire to be loved by a man, that had athousand times before swept like a storm over her body, took possession of her. In the lamplight George Willardlooked no longer a boy, but a man ready to play thepart of a man. 

The school teacher let George Willard take her into hisarms. In the warm little office the air became suddenlyheavy and the strength went out of her body. Leaningagainst a low counter by the door she waited. When hecame and put a hand on her shoulder she turned and lether body fall heavily against him. For George Willardthe confusion was immediately increased. For a momenthe held the body of the woman tightly against his bodyand then it stiffened. Two sharp little fists began tobeat on his face. When the school teacher had run awayand left him alone, he walked up and down the officeswearing furiously. 

It was into this confusion that the Reverend CurtisHartman protruded himself. When he came in GeorgeWillard thought the town had gone mad. Shaking ableeding fist in the air, the minister proclaimed thewoman George had only a moment before held in his armsan instrument of God bearing a message of truth. 

 * * *

George blew out the lamp by the window and locking thedoor of the printshop went home. Through the hoteloffice, past Hop Higgins lost in his dream of theraising of ferrets, he went and up into his own room. The fire in the stove had gone out and he undressed inthe cold. When he got into bed the sheets were likeblankets of dry snow. 

George Willard rolled about in the bed on which hadlain in the afternoon hugging the pillow and thinkingthoughts of Kate Swift. The words of the minister, whohe thought had gone suddenly insane, rang in his ears. His eyes stared about the room. The resentment, naturalto the baffled male, passed and he tried to understandwhat had happened. He could not make it out. Over andover he turned the matter in his mind. Hours passed andhe began to think it must be time for another day tocome. At four o'clock he pulled the covers up about hisneck and tried to sleep. When he became drowsy andclosed his eyes, he raised a hand and with it gropedabout in the darkness. "I have missed something. I havemissed something Kate Swift was trying to tell me, " hemuttered sleepily. Then he slept and in all Winesburghe was the last soul on that winter night to go tosleep. 

LONELINESS

He was the son of Mrs. Al Robinson who once owned afarm on a side road leading off Trunion Pike, east ofWinesburg and two miles beyond the town limits. Thefarmhouse was painted brown and the blinds to all ofthe windows facing the road were kept closed. In theroad before the house a flock of chickens, accompaniedby two guinea hens, lay in the deep dust. Enoch livedin the house with his mother in those days and when hewas a young boy went to school at the Winesburg HighSchool. Old citizens remembered him as a quiet, smilingyouth inclined to silence. He walked in the middle ofthe road when he came into town and sometimes read abook. Drivers of teams had to shout and swear to makehim realize where he was so that he would turn out ofthe beaten track and let them pass. 

When he was twenty-one years old Enoch went to New YorkCity and was a city man for fifteen years. He studiedFrench and went to an art school, hoping to develop afaculty he had for drawing. In his own mind he plannedto go to Paris and to finish his art education amongthe masters there, but that never turned out. 

Nothing ever turned out for Enoch Robinson. He coulddraw well enough and he had many odd delicate thoughtshidden away in his brain that might have expressedthemselves through the brush of a painter, but he wasalways a child and that was a handicap to his worldlydevelopment. He never grew up and of course he couldn'tunderstand people and he couldn't make peopleunderstand him. The child in him kept bumping againstthings, against actualities like money and sex andopinions. Once he was hit by a street car and thrownagainst an iron post. That made him lame. It was one ofthe many things that kept things from turning out forEnoch Robinson. 

In New York City, when he first went there to live andbefore he became confused and disconcerted by the factsof life, Enoch went about a good deal with young men. He got into a group of other young artists, both menand women, and in the evenings they sometimes came tovisit him in his room. Once he got drunk and was takento a police station where a police magistratefrightened him horribly, and once he tried to have anaffair with a woman of the town met on the sidewalkbefore his lodging house. The woman and Enoch walkedtogether three blocks and then the young man grewafraid and ran away. The woman had been drinking andthe incident amused her. She leaned against the wall ofa building and laughed so heartily that another manstopped and laughed with her. The two went awaytogether, still laughing, and Enoch crept off to hisroom trembling and vexed. 

The room in which young Robinson lived in New Yorkfaced Washington Square and was long and narrow like ahallway. It is important to get that fixed in yourmind. The story of Enoch is in fact the story of a roomalmost more than it is the story of a man. 

And so into the room in the evening came young Enoch'sfriends. There was nothing particularly striking aboutthem except that they were artists of the kind thattalk. Everyone knows of the talking artists. Throughoutall of the known history of the world they havegathered in rooms and talked. They talk of art and arepassionately, almost feverishly, in earnest about it. They think it matters much more than it does. 

And so these people gathered and smoked cigarettes andtalked and Enoch Robinson, the boy from the farm nearWinesburg, was there. He stayed in a corner and for themost part said nothing. How his big blue childlike eyesstared about! On the walls were pictures he had made, crude things, half finished. His friends talked ofthese. Leaning back in their chairs, they talked andtalked with their heads rocking from side to side. Words were said about line and values and composition, lots of words, such as are always being said. 

Enoch wanted to talk too but he didn't know how. He wastoo excited to talk coherently. When he tried hesputtered and stammered and his voice sounded strangeand squeaky to him. That made him stop talking. He knewwhat he wanted to say, but he knew also that he couldnever by any possibility say it. When a picture he hadpainted was under discussion, he wanted to burst outwith something like this: "You don't get the point, " hewanted to explain; "the picture you see doesn't consistof the things you see and say words about. There issomething else, something you don't see at all, something you aren't intended to see. Look at this oneover here, by the door here, where the light from thewindow falls on it. The dark spot by the road that youmight not notice at all is, you see, the beginning ofeverything. There is a clump of elders there such asused to grow beside the road before our house back inWinesburg, Ohio, and in among the elders there issomething hidden. It is a woman, that's what it is. Shehas been thrown from a horse and the horse has run awayout of sight. Do you not see how the old man who drivesa cart looks anxiously about? That is Thad Grayback whohas a farm up the road. He is taking corn to Winesburgto be ground into meal at Comstock's mill. He knowsthere is something in the elders, something hiddenaway, and yet he doesn't quite know. 

"It's a woman you see, that's what it is! It's a womanand, oh, she is lovely! She is hurt and is sufferingbut she makes no sound. Don't you see how it is? Shelies quite still, white and still, and the beauty comesout from her and spreads over everything. It is in thesky back there and all around everywhere. I didn't tryto paint the woman, of course. She is too beautiful tobe painted. How dull to talk of composition and suchthings! Why do you not look at the sky and then runaway as I used to do when I was a boy back there inWinesburg, Ohio?"

That is the kind of thing young Enoch Robinson trembledto say to the guests who came into his room when he wasa young fellow in New York City, but he always ended bysaying nothing. Then he began to doubt his own mind. Hewas afraid the things he felt were not gettingexpressed in the pictures he painted. In a halfindignant mood he stopped inviting people into his roomand presently got into the habit of locking the door. He began to think that enough people had visited him, that he did not need people any more. With quickimagination he began to invent his own people to whomhe could really talk and to whom he explained thethings he had been unable to explain to living people. His room began to be inhabited by the spirits of menand women among whom he went, in his turn saying words. It was as though everyone Enoch Robinson had ever seenhad left with him some essence of himself, something hecould mould and change to suit his own fancy, somethingthat understood all about such things as the woundedwoman behind the elders in the pictures. 

The mild, blue-eyed young Ohio boy was a completeegotist, as all children are egotists. He did not wantfriends for the quite simple reason that no child wantsfriends. He wanted most of all the people of his ownmind, people with whom he could really talk, people hecould harangue and scold by the hour, servants, yousee, to his fancy. Among these people he was alwaysself-confident and bold. They might talk, to be sure, and even have opinions of their own, but always hetalked last and best. He was like a writer busy amongthe figures of his brain, a kind of tiny blue-eyed kinghe was, in a six-dollar room facing Washington Square inthe city of New York. 

Then Enoch Robinson got married. He began to getlonely and to want to touch actual flesh-and-bonepeople with his hands. Days passed when his room seemedempty. Lust visited his body and desire grew in hismind. At night strange fevers, burning within, kept himawake. He married a girl who sat in a chair next to hisown in the art school and went to live in an apartmenthouse in Brooklyn. Two children were born to the womanhe married, and Enoch got a job in a place whereillustrations are made for advertisements. 

That began another phase of Enoch's life. He began toplay at a new game. For a while he was very proud ofhimself in the role of producing citizen of the world. He dismissed the essence of things and played withrealities. In the fall he voted at an election and hehad a newspaper thrown on his porch each morning. Whenin the evening he came home from work he got off astreetcar and walked sedately along behind somebusiness man, striving to look very substantial andimportant. As a payer of taxes he thought he shouldpost himself on how things are run. "I'm getting to beof some moment, a real part of things, of the state andthe city and all that, " he told himself with an amusingminiature air of dignity. Once, coming home fromPhiladelphia, he had a discussion with a man met on atrain. Enoch talked about the advisability of thegovernment's owning and operating the railroads and theman gave him a cigar. It was Enoch's notion that such amove on the part of the government would be a goodthing, and he grew quite excited as he talked. Later heremembered his own words with pleasure. "I gave himsomething to think about, that fellow, " he muttered tohimself as he climbed the stairs to his Brooklynapartment. 

To be sure, Enoch's marriage did not turn out. Hehimself brought it to an end. He began to feel chokedand walled in by the life in the apartment, and to feeltoward his wife and even toward his children as he hadfelt concerning the friends who once came to visit him. He began to tell little lies about business engagementsthat would give him freedom to walk alone in the streetat night and, the chance offering, he secretlyre-rented the room facing Washington Square. Then Mrs. Al Robinson died on the farm near Winesburg, and he goteight thousand dollars from the bank that acted astrustee of her estate. That took Enoch out of the worldof men altogether. He gave the money to his wife andtold her he could not live in the apartment any more. She cried and was angry and threatened, but he onlystared at her and went his own way. In reality the wifedid not care much. She thought Enoch slightly insaneand was a little afraid of him. When it was quite surethat he would never come back, she took the twochildren and went to a village in Connecticut where shehad lived as a girl. In the end she married a man whobought and sold real estate and was contented enough. 

And so Enoch Robinson stayed in the New York room amongthe people of his fancy, playing with them, talking tothem, happy as a child is happy. They were an odd lot, Enoch's people. They were made, I suppose, out of realpeople he had seen and who had for some obscure reasonmade an appeal to him. There was a woman with a swordin her hand, an old man with a long white beard whowent about followed by a dog, a young girl whosestockings were always coming down and hanging over hershoe tops. There must have been two dozen of the shadowpeople, invented by the child-mind of Enoch Robinson, who lived in the room with him. 

And Enoch was happy. Into the room he went and lockedthe door. With an absurd air of importance he talkedaloud, giving instructions, making comments on life. Hewas happy and satisfied to go on making his living inthe advertising place until something happened. Ofcourse something did happen. That is why he went backto live in Winesburg and why we know about him. Thething that happened was a woman. It would be that way. He was too happy. Something had to come into his world. Something had to drive him out of the New York room tolive out his life an obscure, jerky little figure, bobbing up and down on the streets of an Ohio town atevening when the sun was going down behind the roof ofWesley Moyer's livery barn. 

About the thing that happened. Enoch told GeorgeWillard about it one night. He wanted to talk tosomeone, and he chose the young newspaper reporterbecause the two happened to be thrown together at atime when the younger man was in a mood to understand. 

Youthful sadness, young man's sadness, the sadness of agrowing boy in a village at the year's end, opened thelips of the old man. The sadness was in the heart ofGeorge Willard and was without meaning, but it appealedto Enoch Robinson. 

It rained on the evening when the two met and talked, adrizzly wet October rain. The fruition of the year hadcome and the night should have been fine with a moon inthe sky and the crisp sharp promise of frost in theair, but it wasn't that way. It rained and littlepuddles of water shone under the street lamps on MainStreet. In the woods in the darkness beyond the FairGround water dripped from the black trees. Beneath thetrees wet leaves were pasted against tree roots thatprotruded from the ground. In gardens back of houses inWinesburg dry shriveled potato vines lay sprawling onthe ground. Men who had finished the evening meal andwho had planned to go uptown to talk the evening awaywith other men at the back of some store changed theirminds. George Willard tramped about in the rain and wasglad that it rained. He felt that way. He was likeEnoch Robinson on the evenings when the old man camedown out of his room and wandered alone in the streets. He was like that only that George Willard had become atall young man and did not think it manly to weep andcarry on. For a month his mother had been very ill andthat had something to do with his sadness, but notmuch. He thought about himself and to the young thatalways brings sadness. 

Enoch Robinson and George Willard met beneath a woodenawning that extended out over the sidewalk beforeVoight's wagon shop on Maumee Street just off the mainstreet of Winesburg. They went together from therethrough the rain-washed streets to the older man's roomon the third floor of the Heffner Block. The youngreporter went willingly enough. Enoch Robinson askedhim to go after the two had talked for ten minutes. Theboy was a little afraid but had never been more curiousin his life. A hundred times he had heard the old manspoken of as a little off his head and he thoughthimself rather brave and manly to go at all. From thevery beginning, in the street in the rain, the old mantalked in a queer way, trying to tell the story of theroom in Washington Square and of his life in the room. "You'll understand if you try hard enough, " he saidconclusively. "I have looked at you when you went pastme on the street and I think you can understand. Itisn't hard. All you have to do is to believe what Isay, just listen and believe, that's all there is toit. "

It was past eleven o'clock that evening when old Enoch, talking to George Willard in the room in the HeffnerBlock, came to the vital thing, the story of the womanand of what drove him out of the city to live out hislife alone and defeated in Winesburg. He sat on a cotby the window with his head in his hand and GeorgeWillard was in a chair by a table. A kerosene lamp saton the table and the room, although almost bare offurniture, was scrupulously clean. As the man talkedGeorge Willard began to feel that he would like to getout of the chair and sit on the cot also. He wanted toput his arms about the little old man. In the halfdarkness the man talked and the boy listened, filledwith sadness. 

"She got to coming in there after there hadn't beenanyone in the room for years, " said Enoch Robinson. "She saw me in the hallway of the house and we gotacquainted. I don't know just what she did in her ownroom. I never went there. I think she was a musicianand played a violin. Every now and then she came andknocked at the door and I opened it. In she came andsat down beside me, just sat and looked about and saidnothing. Anyway, she said nothing that mattered. "

The old man arose from the cot and moved about theroom. The overcoat he wore was wet from the rain anddrops of water kept falling with a soft thump on thefloor. When he again sat upon the cot George Willardgot out of the chair and sat beside him. 

"I had a feeling about her. She sat there in the roomwith me and she was too big for the room. I felt thatshe was driving everything else away. We just talked oflittle things, but I couldn't sit still. I wanted totouch her with my fingers and to kiss her. Her handswere so strong and her face was so good and she lookedat me all the time. "

The trembling voice of the old man became silent andhis body shook as from a chill. "I was afraid, " hewhispered. "I was terribly afraid. I didn't want to lether come in when she knocked at the door but I couldn'tsit still. 'No, no, ' I said to myself, but I got up andopened the door just the same. She was so grown up, yousee. She was a woman. I thought she would be biggerthan I was there in that room. "

Enoch Robinson stared at George Willard, his childlikeblue eyes shining in the lamplight. Again he shivered. "I wanted her and all the time I didn't want her, " heexplained. "Then I began to tell her about my people, about everything that meant anything to me. I tried tokeep quiet, to keep myself to myself, but I couldn't. Ifelt just as I did about opening the door. Sometimes Iached to have her go away and never come back anymore. "

The old man sprang to his feet and his voice shook withexcitement. "One night something happened. I became madto make her understand me and to know what a big thingI was in that room. I wanted her to see how important Iwas. I told her over and over. When she tried to goaway, I ran and locked the door. I followed her about. I talked and talked and then all of a sudden thingswent to smash. A look came into her eyes and I knew shedid understand. Maybe she had understood all the time. I was furious. I couldn't stand it. I wanted her tounderstand but, don't you see, I couldn't let herunderstand. I felt that then she would know everything, that I would be submerged, drowned out, you see. That'show it is. I don't know why. "

The old man dropped into a chair by the lamp and theboy listened, filled with awe. "Go away, boy, " said theman. "Don't stay here with me any more. I thought itmight be a good thing to tell you but it isn't. I don'twant to talk any more. Go away. "

George Willard shook his head and a note of commandcame into his voice. "Don't stop now. Tell me the restof it, " he commanded sharply. "What happened? Tell methe rest of the story. "

Enoch Robinson sprang to his feet and ran to the windowthat looked down into the deserted main street ofWinesburg. George Willard followed. By the window thetwo stood, the tall awkward boy-man and the littlewrinkled man-boy. The childish, eager voice carriedforward the tale. "I swore at her, " he explained. "Isaid vile words. I ordered her to go away and not tocome back. Oh, I said terrible things. At first shepretended not to understand but I kept at it. Iscreamed and stamped on the floor. I made the housering with my curses. I didn't want ever to see heragain and I knew, after some of the things I said, thatI never would see her again. "

The old man's voice broke and he shook his head. "Things went to smash, " he said quietly and sadly. "Outshe went through the door and all the life there hadbeen in the room followed her out. She took all of mypeople away. They all went out through the door afterher. That's the way it was. "

George Willard turned and went out of Enoch Robinson'sroom. In the darkness by the window, as he went throughthe door, he could hear the thin old voice whimperingand complaining. "I'm alone, all alone here, " said thevoice. "It was warm and friendly in my room but now I'mall alone. "

AN AWAKENING

Belle Carpenter had a dark skin, grey eyes, and thicklips. She was tall and strong. When black thoughtsvisited her she grew angry and wished she were a manand could fight someone with her fists. She worked inthe millinery shop kept by Mrs. Kate McHugh and duringthe day sat trimming hats by a window at the rear ofthe store. She was the daughter of Henry Carpenter, bookkeeper in the First National Bank of Winesburg, andlived with him in a gloomy old house far out at the endof Buckeye Street. The house was surrounded by pinetrees and there was no grass beneath the trees. A rustytin eaves-trough had slipped from its fastenings at theback of the house and when the wind blew it beatagainst the roof of a small shed, making a dismaldrumming noise that sometimes persisted all through thenight. 

When she was a young girl Henry Carpenter made lifealmost unbearable for Belle, but as she emerged fromgirlhood into womanhood he lost his power over her. Thebookkeeper's life was made up of innumerable littlepettinesses. When he went to the bank in the morning hestepped into a closet and put on a black alpaca coatthat had become shabby with age. At night when hereturned to his home he donned another black alpacacoat. Every evening he pressed the clothes worn in thestreets. He had invented an arrangement of boards forthe purpose. The trousers to his street suit wereplaced between the boards and the boards were clampedtogether with heavy screws. In the morning he wiped theboards with a damp cloth and stood them upright behindthe dining room door. If they were moved during the dayhe was speechless with anger and did not recover hisequilibrium for a week. 

The bank cashier was a little bully and was afraid ofhis daughter. She, he realized, knew the story of hisbrutal treatment of her mother and hated him for it. One day she went home at noon and carried a handful ofsoft mud, taken from the road, into the house. With themud she smeared the face of the boards used for thepressing of trousers and then went back to her workfeeling relieved and happy. 

Belle Carpenter occasionally walked out in the eveningwith George Willard. Secretly she loved another man, but her love affair, about which no one knew, causedher much anxiety. She was in love with Ed Handby, bartender in Ed Griffith's Saloon, and went about withthe young reporter as a kind of relief to her feelings. She did not think that her station in life would permither to be seen in the company of the bartender andwalked about under the trees with George Willard andlet him kiss her to relieve a longing that was veryinsistent in her nature. She felt that she could keepthe younger man within bounds. About Ed Handby she wassomewhat uncertain. 

Handby, the bartender, was a tall, broad-shouldered manof thirty who lived in a room upstairs above Griffith'ssaloon. His fists were large and his eyes unusuallysmall, but his voice, as though striving to conceal thepower back of his fists, was soft and quiet. 

At twenty-five the bartender had inherited a large farmfrom an uncle in Indiana. When sold, the farm broughtin eight thousand dollars, which Ed spent in sixmonths. Going to Sandusky, on Lake Erie, he began anorgy of dissipation, the story of which afterwardfilled his home town with awe. Here and there he wentthrowing the money about, driving carriages through thestreets, giving wine parties to crowds of men andwomen, playing cards for high stakes and keepingmistresses whose wardrobes cost him hundreds ofdollars. One night at a resort called Cedar Point, hegot into a fight and ran amuck like a wild thing. Withhis fist he broke a large mirror in the wash room of ahotel and later went about smashing windows andbreaking chairs in dance halls for the joy of hearingthe glass rattle on the floor and seeing the terror inthe eyes of clerks who had come from Sandusky to spendthe evening at the resort with their sweethearts. 

The affair between Ed Handby and Belle Carpenter on thesurface amounted to nothing. He had succeeded inspending but one evening in her company. On thatevening he hired a horse and buggy at Wesley Moyer'slivery barn and took her for a drive. The convictionthat she was the woman his nature demanded and that hemust get her settled upon him and he told her of hisdesires. The bartender was ready to marry and to begintrying to earn money for the support of his wife, butso simple was his nature that he found it difficult toexplain his intentions. His body ached with physicallonging and with his body he expressed himself. Takingthe milliner into his arms and holding her tightly inspite of her struggles, he kissed her until she becamehelpless. Then he brought her back to town and let herout of the buggy. "When I get hold of you again I'llnot let you go. You can't play with me, " he declared ashe turned to drive away. Then, jumping out of thebuggy, he gripped her shoulders with his strong hands. "I'll keep you for good the next time, " he said. "Youmight as well make up your mind to that. It's you andme for it and I'm going to have you before I getthrough. "

One night in January when there was a new moon GeorgeWillard, who was in Ed Handby's mind the only obstacleto his getting Belle Carpenter, went for a walk. Earlythat evening George went into Ransom Surbeck's poolroom with Seth Richmond and Art Wilson, son of the townbutcher. Seth Richmond stood with his back against thewall and remained silent, but George Willard talked. The pool room was filled with Winesburg boys and theytalked of women. The young reporter got into that vein. He said that women should look out for themselves, thatthe fellow who went out with a girl was not responsiblefor what happened. As he talked he looked about, eagerfor attention. He held the floor for five minutes andthen Art Wilson began to talk. Art was learning thebarber's trade in Cal Prouse's shop and already beganto consider himself an authority in such matters asbaseball, horse racing, drinking, and going about withwomen. He began to tell of a night when he with two menfrom Winesburg went into a house of prostitution at thecounty seat. The butcher's son held a cigar in the sideof his mouth and as he talked spat on the floor. "Thewomen in the place couldn't embarrass me although theytried hard enough, " he boasted. "One of the girls inthe house tried to get fresh, but I fooled her. As soonas she began to talk I went and sat in her lap. Everyone in the room laughed when I kissed her. Itaught her to let me alone. "

George Willard went out of the pool room and into MainStreet. For days the weather had been bitter cold witha high wind blowing down on the town from Lake Erie, eighteen miles to the north, but on that night the windhad died away and a new moon made the night unusuallylovely. Without thinking where he was going or what hewanted to do, George went out of Main Street and beganwalking in dimly lighted streets filled with framehouses. 

Out of doors under the black sky filled with stars heforgot his companions of the pool room. Because it wasdark and he was alone he began to talk aloud. In aspirit of play he reeled along the street imitating adrunken man and then imagined himself a soldier clad inshining boots that reached to the knees and wearing asword that jingled as he walked. As a soldier hepictured himself as an inspector, passing before a longline of men who stood at attention. He began to examinethe accoutrements of the men. Before a tree he stoppedand began to scold. "Your pack is not in order, " hesaid sharply. "How many times will I have to speak ofthis matter? Everything must be in order here. We havea difficult task before us and no difficult task can bedone without order. "

Hypnotized by his own words, the young man stumbledalong the board sidewalk saying more words. "There is alaw for armies and for men too, " he muttered, lost inreflection. "The law begins with little things andspreads out until it covers everything. In every littlething there must be order, in the place where men work, in their clothes, in their thoughts. I myself must beorderly. I must learn that law. I must get myself intotouch with something orderly and big that swingsthrough the night like a star. In my little way I mustbegin to learn something, to give and swing and workwith life, with the law. "

George Willard stopped by a picket fence near a streetlamp and his body began to tremble. He had never beforethought such thoughts as had just come into his headand he wondered where they had come from. For themoment it seemed to him that some voice outside ofhimself had been talking as he walked. He was amazedand delighted with his own mind and when he walked onagain spoke of the matter with fervor. "To come out ofRansom Surbeck's pool room and think things like that, "he whispered. "It is better to be alone. If I talkedlike Art Wilson the boys would understand me but theywouldn't understand what I've been thinking down here. "

In Winesburg, as in all Ohio towns of twenty years ago, there was a section in which lived day laborers. As thetime of factories had not yet come, the laborers workedin the fields or were section hands on the railroads. They worked twelve hours a day and received one dollarfor the long day of toil. The houses in which theylived were small cheaply constructed wooden affairswith a garden at the back. The more comfortable amongthem kept cows and perhaps a pig, housed in a littleshed at the rear of the garden. 

With his head filled with resounding thoughts, GeorgeWillard walked into such a street on the clear Januarynight. The street was dimly lighted and in places therewas no sidewalk. In the scene that lay about him therewas something that excited his already aroused fancy. For a year he had been devoting all of his odd momentsto the reading of books and now some tale he had readconcerning life in old world towns of the middle agescame sharply back to his mind so that he stumbledforward with the curious feeling of one revisiting aplace that had been a part of some former existence. Onan impulse he turned out of the street and went into alittle dark alleyway behind the sheds in which livedthe cows and pigs. 

For a half hour he stayed in the alleyway, smelling thestrong smell of animals too closely housed and lettinghis mind play with the strange new thoughts that cameto him. The very rankness of the smell of manure in theclear sweet air awoke something heady in his brain. Thepoor little houses lighted by kerosene lamps, the smokefrom the chimneys mounting straight up into the clearair, the grunting of pigs, the women clad in cheapcalico dresses and washing dishes in the kitchens, thefootsteps of men coming out of the houses and going offto the stores and saloons of Main Street, the dogsbarking and the children crying--all of these thingsmade him seem, as he lurked in the darkness, oddlydetached and apart from all life. 

The excited young man, unable to bear the weight of hisown thoughts, began to move cautiously along thealleyway. A dog attacked him and had to be driven awaywith stones, and a man appeared at the door of one ofthe houses and swore at the dog. George went into avacant lot and throwing back his head looked up at thesky. He felt unutterably big and remade by the simpleexperience through which he had been passing and in akind of fervor of emotion put up his hands, thrustingthem into the darkness above his head and mutteringwords. The desire to say words overcame him and he saidwords without meaning, rolling them over on his tongueand saying them because they were brave words, full ofmeaning. "Death, " he muttered, "night, the sea, fear, loveliness. "

George Willard came out of the vacant lot and stoodagain on the sidewalk facing the houses. He felt thatall of the people in the little street must be brothersand sisters to him and he wished he had the courage tocall them out of their houses and to shake their hands. "If there were only a woman here I would take hold ofher hand and we would run until we were both tiredout, " he thought. "That would make me feel better. "With the thought of a woman in his mind he walked outof the street and went toward the house where BelleCarpenter lived. He thought she would understand hismood and that he could achieve in her presence aposition he had long been wanting to achieve. In thepast when he had been with her and had kissed her lipshe had come away filled with anger at himself. He hadfelt like one being used for some obscure purpose andhad not enjoyed the feeling. Now he thought he hadsuddenly become too big to be used. 

When George got to Belle Carpenter's house there hadalready been a visitor there before him. Ed Handby hadcome to the door and calling Belle out of the house hadtried to talk to her. He had wanted to ask the woman tocome away with him and to be his wife, but when shecame and stood by the door he lost his self-assuranceand became sullen. "You stay away from that kid, " hegrowled, thinking of George Willard, and then, notknowing what else to say, turned to go away. "If Icatch you together I will break your bones and histoo, " he added. The bartender had come to woo, not tothreaten, and was angry with himself because of hisfailure. 

When her lover had departed Belle went indoors and ranhurriedly upstairs. From a window at the upper part ofthe house she saw Ed Handby cross the street and sitdown on a horse block before the house of a neighbor. In the dim light the man sat motionless holding hishead in his hands. She was made happy by the sight, andwhen George Willard came to the door she greeted himeffusively and hurriedly put on her hat. She thoughtthat, as she walked through the streets with youngWillard, Ed Handby would follow and she wanted to makehim suffer. 

For an hour Belle Carpenter and the young reporterwalked about under the trees in the sweet night air. George Willard was full of big words. The sense ofpower that had come to him during the hour in thedarkness in the alleyway remained with him and hetalked boldly, swaggering along and swinging his armsabout. He wanted to make Belle Carpenter realize thathe was aware of his former weakness and that he hadchanged. "You'll find me different, " he declared, thrusting his hands into his pockets and looking boldlyinto her eyes. "I don't know why but it is so. You'vegot to take me for a man or let me alone. That's how itis. "

Up and down the quiet streets under the new moon wentthe woman and the boy. When George had finished talkingthey turned down a side street and went across a bridgeinto a path that ran up the side of a hill. The hillbegan at Waterworks Pond and climbed upward to theWinesburg Fair Grounds. On the hillside grew densebushes and small trees and among the bushes were littleopen spaces carpeted with long grass, now stiff andfrozen. 

As he walked behind the woman up the hill GeorgeWillard's heart began to beat rapidly and his shouldersstraightened. Suddenly he decided that Belle Carpenterwas about to surrender herself to him. The new forcethat had manifested itself in him had, he felt, been atwork upon her and had led to her conquest. The thoughtmade him half drunk with the sense of masculine power. Although he had been annoyed that as they walked aboutshe had not seemed to be listening to his words, thefact that she had accompanied him to this place tookall his doubts away. "It is different. Everything hasbecome different, " he thought and taking hold of hershoulder turned her about and stood looking at her, hiseyes shining with pride. 

Belle Carpenter did not resist. When he kissed herupon the lips she leaned heavily against him and lookedover his shoulder into the darkness. In her wholeattitude there was a suggestion of waiting. Again, asin the alleyway, George Willard's mind ran off intowords and, holding the woman tightly he whispered thewords into the still night. "Lust, " he whispered, "lustand night and women. "

George Willard did not understand what happened to himthat night on the hillside. Later, when he got to hisown room, he wanted to weep and then grew half insanewith anger and hate. He hated Belle Carpenter and wassure that all his life he would continue to hate her. On the hillside he had led the woman to one of thelittle open spaces among the bushes and had dropped tohis knees beside her. As in the vacant lot, by thelaborers' houses, he had put up his hands in gratitudefor the new power in himself and was waiting for thewoman to speak when Ed Handby appeared. 

The bartender did not want to beat the boy, who hethought had tried to take his woman away. He knew thatbeating was unnecessary, that he had power withinhimself to accomplish his purpose without using hisfists. Gripping George by the shoulder and pulling himto his feet, he held him with one hand while he lookedat Belle Carpenter seated on the grass. Then with aquick wide movement of his arm he sent the younger mansprawling away into the bushes and began to bully thewoman, who had risen to her feet. "You're no good, " hesaid roughly. "I've half a mind not to bother with you. I'd let you alone if I didn't want you so much. "

On his hands and knees in the bushes George Willardstared at the scene before him and tried hard to think. He prepared to spring at the man who had humiliatedhim. To be beaten seemed to be infinitely better thanto be thus hurled ignominiously aside. 

Three times the young reporter sprang at Ed Handby andeach time the bartender, catching him by the shoulder, hurled him back into the bushes. The older man seemedprepared to keep the exercise going indefinitely butGeorge Willard's head struck the root of a tree and helay still. Then Ed Handby took Belle Carpenter by thearm and marched her away. 

George heard the man and woman making their way throughthe bushes. As he crept down the hillside his heart wassick within him. He hated himself and he hated the fatethat had brought about his humiliation. When his mindwent back to the hour alone in the alleyway he waspuzzled and stopping in the darkness listened, hopingto hear again the voice outside himself that had soshort a time before put new courage into his heart. When his way homeward led him again into the street offrame houses he could not bear the sight and began torun, wanting to get quickly out of the neighborhoodthat now seemed to him utterly squalid and commonplace. 

"QUEER"

From his seat on a box in the rough board shed thatstuck like a burr on the rear of Cowley & Son's storein Winesburg, Elmer Cowley, the junior member of thefirm, could see through a dirty window into theprintshop of the Winesburg Eagle. Elmer was putting newshoelaces in his shoes. They did not go in readily andhe had to take the shoes off. With the shoes in hishand he sat looking at a large hole in the heel of oneof his stockings. Then looking quickly up he saw GeorgeWillard, the only newspaper reporter in Winesburg, standing at the back door of the Eagle printshop andstaring absentmindedly about. "Well, well, what next!"exclaimed the young man with the shoes in his hand, jumping to his feet and creeping away from the window. 

A flush crept into Elmer Cowley's face and his handsbegan to tremble. In Cowley & Son's store a Jewishtraveling salesman stood by the counter talking to hisfather. He imagined the reporter could hear what wasbeing said and the thought made him furious. With oneof the shoes still held in his hand he stood in acorner of the shed and stamped with a stockinged footupon the board floor. 

Cowley & Son's store did not face the main street ofWinesburg. The front was on Maumee Street and beyond itwas Voight's wagon shop and a shed for the shelteringof farmers' horses. Beside the store an alleyway ranbehind the main street stores and all day drays anddelivery wagons, intent on bringing in and taking outgoods, passed up and down. The store itself wasindescribable. Will Henderson once said of it that itsold everything and nothing. In the window facingMaumee Street stood a chunk of coal as large as anapple barrel, to indicate that orders for coal weretaken, and beside the black mass of the coal stoodthree combs of honey grown brown and dirty in theirwooden frames. 

The honey had stood in the store window for six months. It was for sale as were also the coat hangers, patentsuspender buttons, cans of roof paint, bottles ofrheumatism cure, and a substitute for coffee thatcompanioned the honey in its patient willingness toserve the public. 

Ebenezer Cowley, the man who stood in the storelistening to the eager patter of words that fell fromthe lips of the traveling man, was tall and lean andlooked unwashed. On his scrawny neck was a large wenpartially covered by a grey beard. He wore a longPrince Albert coat. The coat had been purchased toserve as a wedding garment. Before he became a merchantEbenezer was a farmer and after his marriage he worethe Prince Albert coat to church on Sundays and onSaturday afternoons when he came into town to trade. When he sold the farm to become a merchant he wore thecoat constantly. It had become brown with age and wascovered with grease spots, but in it Ebenezer alwaysfelt dressed up and ready for the day in town. 

As a merchant Ebenezer was not happily placed in lifeand he had not been happily placed as a farmer. Stillhe existed. His family, consisting of a daughter namedMabel and the son, lived with him in rooms above thestore and it did not cost them much to live. Histroubles were not financial. His unhappiness as amerchant lay in the fact that when a traveling man withwares to be sold came in at the front door he wasafraid. Behind the counter he stood shaking his head. He was afraid, first that he would stubbornly refuse tobuy and thus lose the opportunity to sell again; secondthat he would not be stubborn enough and would in amoment of weakness buy what could not be sold. 

In the store on the morning when Elmer Cowley sawGeorge Willard standing and apparently listening at theback door of the Eagle printshop, a situation hadarisen that always stirred the son's wrath. Thetraveling man talked and Ebenezer listened, his wholefigure expressing uncertainty. "You see how quickly itis done, " said the traveling man, who had for sale asmall flat metal substitute for collar buttons. Withone hand he quickly unfastened a collar from his shirtand then fastened it on again. He assumed a flatteringwheedling tone. "I tell you what, men have come to theend of all this fooling with collar buttons and you arethe man to make money out of the change that is coming. I am offering you the exclusive agency for this town. Take twenty dozen of these fasteners and I'll not visitany other store. I'll leave the field to you. "

The traveling man leaned over the counter and tappedwith his finger on Ebenezer's breast. "It's anopportunity and I want you to take it, " he urged. "Afriend of mine told me about you. 'See that manCowley, ' he said. 'He's a live one. '"

The traveling man paused and waited. Taking a bookfrom his pocket he began writing out the order. Stillholding the shoe in his hand Elmer Cowley went throughthe store, past the two absorbed men, to a glassshowcase near the front door. He took a cheap revolverfrom the case and began to wave it about. "You get outof here!" he shrieked. "We don't want any collarfasteners here. " An idea came to him. "Mind, I'm notmaking any threat, " he added. "I don't say I'll shoot. Maybe I just took this gun out of the case to look atit. But you better get out. Yes sir, I'll say that. Youbetter grab up your things and get out. "

The young storekeeper's voice rose to a scream andgoing behind the counter he began to advance upon thetwo men. "We're through being fools here!" he cried. "We ain't going to buy any more stuff until we begin tosell. We ain't going to keep on being queer and havefolks staring and listening. You get out of here!"

The traveling man left. Raking the samples of collarfasteners off the counter into a black leather bag, heran. He was a small man and very bow-legged and he ranawkwardly. The black bag caught against the door and hestumbled and fell. "Crazy, that's what he is--crazy!"he sputtered as he arose from the sidewalk and hurriedaway. 

In the store Elmer Cowley and his father stared at eachother. Now that the immediate object of his wrath hadfled, the younger man was embarrassed. "Well, I meantit. I think we've been queer long enough, " he declared, going to the showcase and replacing the revolver. Sitting on a barrel he pulled on and fastened the shoehe had been holding in his hand. He was waiting forsome word of understanding from his father but whenEbenezer spoke his words only served to reawaken thewrath in the son and the young man ran out of the storewithout replying. Scratching his grey beard with hislong dirty fingers, the merchant looked at his son withthe same wavering uncertain stare with which he hadconfronted the traveling man. "I'll be starched, " hesaid softly. "Well, well, I'll be washed and ironed andstarched!"

Elmer Cowley went out of Winesburg and along a countryroad that paralleled the railroad track. He did notknow where he was going or what he was going to do. Inthe shelter of a deep cut where the road, after turningsharply to the right, dipped under the tracks hestopped and the passion that had been the cause of hisoutburst in the store began to again find expression. "I will not be queer--one to be looked at and listenedto, " he declared aloud. "I'll be like other people. I'll show that George Willard. He'll find out. I'llshow him!"

The distraught young man stood in the middle of theroad and glared back at the town. He did not know thereporter George Willard and had no special feelingconcerning the tall boy who ran about town gatheringthe town news. The reporter had merely come, by hispresence in the office and in the printshop of theWinesburg Eagle, to stand for something in the youngmerchant's mind. He thought the boy who passed andrepassed Cowley & Son's store and who stopped to talkto people in the street must be thinking of him andperhaps laughing at him. George Willard, he felt, belonged to the town, typified the town, represented inhis person the spirit of the town. Elmer Cowley couldnot have believed that George Willard had also his daysof unhappiness, that vague hungers and secret unnamabledesires visited also his mind. Did he not representpublic opinion and had not the public opinion ofWinesburg condemned the Cowleys to queerness? Did henot walk whistling and laughing through Main Street?Might not one by striking his person strike also thegreater enemy--the thing that smiled and went its ownway--the judgment of Winesburg?

Elmer Cowley was extraordinarily tall and his arms werelong and powerful. His hair, his eyebrows, and thedowny beard that had begun to grow upon his chin, werepale almost to whiteness. His teeth protruded frombetween his lips and his eyes were blue with thecolorless blueness of the marbles called "aggies" thatthe boys of Winesburg carried in their pockets. Elmerhad lived in Winesburg for a year and had made nofriends. He was, he felt, one condemned to go throughlife without friends and he hated the thought. 

Sullenly the tall young man tramped along the road withhis hands stuffed into his trouser pockets. The day wascold with a raw wind, but presently the sun began toshine and the road became soft and muddy. The tops ofthe ridges of frozen mud that formed the road began tomelt and the mud clung to Elmer's shoes. His feetbecame cold. When he had gone several miles he turnedoff the road, crossed a field and entered a wood. Inthe wood he gathered sticks to build a fire, by whichhe sat trying to warm himself, miserable in body and inmind. 

For two hours he sat on the log by the fire and then, arising and creeping cautiously through a mass ofunderbrush, he went to a fence and looked across fieldsto a small farmhouse surrounded by low sheds. A smilecame to his lips and he began making motions with hislong arms to a man who was husking corn in one of thefields. 

In his hour of misery the young merchant had returnedto the farm where he had lived through boyhood andwhere there was another human being to whom he felt hecould explain himself. The man on the farm was ahalf-witted old fellow named Mook. He had once beenemployed by Ebenezer Cowley and had stayed on the farmwhen it was sold. The old man lived in one of theunpainted sheds back of the farmhouse and putteredabout all day in the fields. 

Mook the half-wit lived happily. With childlike faithhe believed in the intelligence of the animals thatlived in the sheds with him, and when he was lonelyheld long conversations with the cows, the pigs, andeven with the chickens that ran about the barnyard. Heit was who had put the expression regarding being"laundered" into the mouth of his former employer. Whenexcited or surprised by anything he smiled vaguely andmuttered: "I'll be washed and ironed. Well, well, I'llbe washed and ironed and starched. "

When the half-witted old man left his husking of cornand came into the wood to meet Elmer Cowley, he wasneither surprised nor especially interested in thesudden appearance of the young man. His feet also werecold and he sat on the log by the fire, grateful forthe warmth and apparently indifferent to what Elmer hadto say. 

Elmer talked earnestly and with great freedom, walkingup and down and waving his arms about. "You don'tunderstand what's the matter with me so of course youdon't care, " he declared. "With me it's different. Lookhow it has always been with me. Father is queer andmother was queer, too. Even the clothes mother used towear were not like other people's clothes, and look atthat coat in which father goes about there in town, thinking he's dressed up, too. Why don't he get a newone? It wouldn't cost much. I'll tell you why. Fatherdoesn't know and when mother was alive she didn't knoweither. Mabel is different. She knows but she won't sayanything. I will, though. I'm not going to be stared atany longer. Why look here, Mook, father doesn't knowthat his store there in town is just a queer jumble, that he'll never sell the stuff he buys. He knowsnothing about it. Sometimes he's a little worried thattrade doesn't come and then he goes and buys somethingelse. In the evenings he sits by the fire upstairs andsays trade will come after a while. He isn't worried. He's queer. He doesn't know enough to be worried. "

The excited young man became more excited. "He don'tknow but I know, " he shouted, stopping to gaze downinto the dumb, unresponsive face of the half-wit. "Iknow too well. I can't stand it. When we lived out hereit was different. I worked and at night I went to bedand slept. I wasn't always seeing people and thinkingas I am now. In the evening, there in town, I go to thepost office or to the depot to see the train come in, and no one says anything to me. Everyone stands aroundand laughs and they talk but they say nothing to me. Then I feel so queer that I can't talk either. I goaway. I don't say anything. I can't. "

The fury of the young man became uncontrollable. "Iwon't stand it, " he yelled, looking up at the barebranches of the trees. "I'm not made to stand it. "

Maddened by the dull face of the man on the log by thefire, Elmer turned and glared at him as he had glaredback along the road at the town of Winesburg. "Go onback to work, " he screamed. "What good does it do me totalk to you?" A thought came to him and his voicedropped. "I'm a coward too, eh?" he muttered. "Do youknow why I came clear out here afoot? I had to tellsomeone and you were the only one I could tell. Ihunted out another queer one, you see. I ran away, that's what I did. I couldn't stand up to someone likethat George Willard. I had to come to you. I ought totell him and I will. "

Again his voice arose to a shout and his arms flewabout. "I will tell him. I won't be queer. I don't carewhat they think. I won't stand it. "

Elmer Cowley ran out of the woods leaving the half-witsitting on the log before the fire. Presently the oldman arose and climbing over the fence went back to hiswork in the corn. "I'll be washed and ironed andstarched, " he declared. "Well, well, I'll be washed andironed. " Mook was interested. He went along a lane to afield where two cows stood nibbling at a straw stack. "Elmer was here, " he said to the cows. "Elmer is crazy. You better get behind the stack where he don't see you. He'll hurt someone yet, Elmer will. "

At eight o'clock that evening Elmer Cowley put his headin at the front door of the office of the WinesburgEagle where George Willard sat writing. His cap waspulled down over his eyes and a sullen determined lookwas on his face. "You come on outside with me, " hesaid, stepping in and closing the door. He kept hishand on the knob as though prepared to resist anyoneelse coming in. "You just come along outside. I want tosee you. "

George Willard and Elmer Cowley walked through the mainstreet of Winesburg. The night was cold and GeorgeWillard had on a new overcoat and looked very spruceand dressed up. He thrust his hands into the overcoatpockets and looked inquiringly at his companion. He hadlong been wanting to make friends with the youngmerchant and find out what was in his mind. Now hethought he saw a chance and was delighted. "I wonderwhat he's up to? Perhaps he thinks he has a piece ofnews for the paper. It can't be a fire because Ihaven't heard the fire bell and there isn't anyonerunning, " he thought. 

In the main street of Winesburg, on the cold Novemberevening, but few citizens appeared and these hurriedalong bent on getting to the stove at the back of somestore. The windows of the stores were frosted and thewind rattled the tin sign that hung over the entranceto the stairway leading to Doctor Welling's office. Before Hern's Grocery a basket of apples and a rackfilled with new brooms stood on the sidewalk. ElmerCowley stopped and stood facing George Willard. Hetried to talk and his arms began to pump up and down. His face worked spasmodically. He seemed about toshout. "Oh, you go on back, " he cried. "Don't stay outhere with me. I ain't got anything to tell you. I don'twant to see you at all. "

For three hours the distracted young merchant wanderedthrough the resident streets of Winesburg blind withanger, brought on by his failure to declare hisdetermination not to be queer. Bitterly the sense ofdefeat settled upon him and he wanted to weep. Afterthe hours of futile sputtering at nothingness that hadoccupied the afternoon and his failure in the presenceof the young reporter, he thought he could see no hopeof a future for himself. 

And then a new idea dawned for him. In the darknessthat surrounded him he began to see a light. Going tothe now darkened store, where Cowley & Son had for overa year waited vainly for trade to come, he creptstealthily in and felt about in a barrel that stood bythe stove at the rear. In the barrel beneath shavingslay a tin box containing Cowley & Son's cash. Everyevening Ebenezer Cowley put the box in the barrel whenhe closed the store and went upstairs to bed. "Theywouldn't never think of a careless place like that, " hetold himself, thinking of robbers. 

Elmer took twenty dollars, two ten-dollar bills, fromthe little roll containing perhaps four hundreddollars, the cash left from the sale of the farm. Thenreplacing the box beneath the shavings he went quietlyout at the front door and walked again in the streets. 

The idea that he thought might put an end to all of hisunhappiness was very simple. "I will get out of here, run away from home, " he told himself. He knew that alocal freight train passed through Winesburg atmidnight and went on to Cleveland, where it arrived atdawn. He would steal a ride on the local and when hegot to Cleveland would lose himself in the crowdsthere. He would get work in some shop and becomefriends with the other workmen and would beindistinguishable. Then he could talk and laugh. Hewould no longer be queer and would make friends. Lifewould begin to have warmth and meaning for him as ithad for others. 

The tall awkward young man, striding through thestreets, laughed at himself because he had been angryand had been half afraid of George Willard. He decidedhe would have his talk with the young reporter beforehe left town, that he would tell him about things, perhaps challenge him, challenge all of Winesburgthrough him. 

Aglow with new confidence Elmer went to the office ofthe New Willard House and pounded on the door. Asleep-eyed boy slept on a cot in the office. Hereceived no salary but was fed at the hotel table andbore with pride the title of "night clerk. " Before theboy Elmer was bold, insistent. "You 'wake him up, " hecommanded. "You tell him to come down by the depot. Igot to see him and I'm going away on the local. Tellhim to dress and come on down. I ain't got much time. "

The midnight local had finished its work in Winesburgand the trainsmen were coupling cars, swinging lanternsand preparing to resume their flight east. GeorgeWillard, rubbing his eyes and again wearing the newovercoat, ran down to the station platform afire withcuriosity. "Well, here I am. What do you want? You'vegot something to tell me, eh?" he said. 

Elmer tried to explain. He wet his lips with histongue and looked at the train that had begun to groanand get under way. "Well, you see, " he began, and thenlost control of his tongue. "I'll be washed and ironed. I'll be washed and ironed and starched, " he mutteredhalf incoherently. 

Elmer Cowley danced with fury beside the groaning trainin the darkness on the station platform. Lights leapedinto the air and bobbed up and down before his eyes. Taking the two ten-dollar bills from his pocket hethrust them into George Willard's hand. "Take them, " hecried. "I don't want them. Give them to father. I stolethem. " With a snarl of rage he turned and his long armsbegan to flay the air. Like one struggling for releasefrom hands that held him he struck out, hitting GeorgeWillard blow after blow on the breast, the neck, themouth. The young reporter rolled over on the platformhalf unconscious, stunned by the terrific force of theblows. Springing aboard the passing train and runningover the tops of cars, Elmer sprang down to a flat carand lying on his face looked back, trying to see thefallen man in the darkness. Pride surged up in him. "Ishowed him, " he cried. "I guess I showed him. I ain'tso queer. I guess I showed him I ain't so queer. "

THE UNTOLD LIE

Ray Pearson and Hal Winters were farm hands employed ona farm three miles north of Winesburg. On Saturdayafternoons they came into town and wandered aboutthrough the streets with other fellows from thecountry. 

Ray was a quiet, rather nervous man of perhaps fiftywith a brown beard and shoulders rounded by too muchand too hard labor. In his nature he was as unlike HalWinters as two men can be unlike. 

Ray was an altogether serious man and had a littlesharp-featured wife who had also a sharp voice. Thetwo, with half a dozen thin-legged children, lived in atumble-down frame house beside a creek at the back endof the Wills farm where Ray was employed. 

Hal Winters, his fellow employee, was a young fellow. He was not of the Ned Winters family, who were veryrespectable people in Winesburg, but was one of thethree sons of the old man called Windpeter Winters whohad a sawmill near Unionville, six miles away, and whowas looked upon by everyone in Winesburg as a confirmedold reprobate. 

People from the part of Northern Ohio in whichWinesburg lies will remember old Windpeter by hisunusual and tragic death. He got drunk one evening intown and started to drive home to Unionville along therailroad tracks. Henry Brattenburg, the butcher, wholived out that way, stopped him at the edge of the townand told him he was sure to meet the down train butWindpeter slashed at him with his whip and drove on. When the train struck and killed him and his two horsesa farmer and his wife who were driving home along anearby road saw the accident. They said that oldWindpeter stood up on the seat of his wagon, raving andswearing at the onrushing locomotive, and that hefairly screamed with delight when the team, maddened byhis incessant slashing at them, rushed straight aheadto certain death. Boys like young George Willard andSeth Richmond will remember the incident quite vividlybecause, although everyone in our town said that theold man would go straight to hell and that thecommunity was better off without him, they had a secretconviction that he knew what he was doing and admiredhis foolish courage. Most boys have seasons of wishingthey could die gloriously instead of just being groceryclerks and going on with their humdrum lives. 

But this is not the story of Windpeter Winters nor yetof his son Hal who worked on the Wills farm with RayPearson. It is Ray's story. It will, however, benecessary to talk a little of young Hal so that youwill get into the spirit of it. 

Hal was a bad one. Everyone said that. There werethree of the Winters boys in that family, John, Hal, and Edward, all broad-shouldered big fellows like oldWindpeter himself and all fighters and woman-chasersand generally all-around bad ones. 

Hal was the worst of the lot and always up to somedevilment. He once stole a load of boards from hisfather's mill and sold them in Winesburg. With themoney he bought himself a suit of cheap, flashyclothes. Then he got drunk and when his father cameraving into town to find him, they met and fought withtheir fists on Main Street and were arrested and putinto jail together. 

Hal went to work on the Wills farm because there was acountry school teacher out that way who had taken hisfancy. He was only twenty-two then but had already beenin two or three of what were spoken of in Winesburg as"women scrapes. " Everyone who heard of his infatuationfor the school teacher was sure it would turn outbadly. "He'll only get her into trouble, you'll see, "was the word that went around. 

And so these two men, Ray and Hal, were at work in afield on a day in the late October. They were huskingcorn and occasionally something was said and theylaughed. Then came silence. Ray, who was the moresensitive and always minded things more, had chappedhands and they hurt. He put them into his coat pocketsand looked away across the fields. He was in a sad, distracted mood and was affected by the beauty of thecountry. If you knew the Winesburg country in the falland how the low hills are all splashed with yellows andreds you would understand his feeling. He began tothink of the time, long ago when he was a young fellowliving with his father, then a baker in Winesburg, andhow on such days he had wandered away into the woods togather nuts, hunt rabbits, or just to loaf about andsmoke his pipe. His marriage had come about through oneof his days of wandering. He had induced a girl whowaited on trade in his father's shop to go with him andsomething had happened. He was thinking of thatafternoon and how it had affected his whole life when aspirit of protest awoke in him. He had forgotten aboutHal and muttered words. "Tricked by Gad, that's what Iwas, tricked by life and made a fool of, " he said in alow voice. 

As though understanding his thoughts, Hal Winters spokeup. "Well, has it been worth while? What about it, eh?What about marriage and all that?" he asked and thenlaughed. Hal tried to keep on laughing but he too wasin an earnest mood. He began to talk earnestly. "Has afellow got to do it?" he asked. "Has he got to beharnessed up and driven through life like a horse?"

Hal didn't wait for an answer but sprang to his feetand began to walk back and forth between the cornshocks. He was getting more and more excited. Bendingdown suddenly he picked up an ear of the yellow cornand threw it at the fence. "I've got Nell Gunther introuble, " he said. "I'm telling you, but you keep yourmouth shut. "

Ray Pearson arose and stood staring. He was almost afoot shorter than Hal, and when the younger man cameand put his two hands on the older man's shoulders theymade a picture. There they stood in the big empty fieldwith the quiet corn shocks standing in rows behind themand the red and yellow hills in the distance, and frombeing just two indifferent workmen they had become allalive to each other. Hal sensed it and because that washis way he laughed. "Well, old daddy, " he saidawkwardly, "come on, advise me. I've got Nell introuble. Perhaps you've been in the same fix yourself. I know what everyone would say is the right thing todo, but what do you say? Shall I marry and settle down?Shall I put myself into the harness to be worn out likean old horse? You know me, Ray. There can't anyonebreak me but I can break myself. Shall I do it or shallI tell Nell to go to the devil? Come on, you tell me. Whatever you say, Ray, I'll do. "

Ray couldn't answer. He shook Hal's hands loose andturning walked straight away toward the barn. He was asensitive man and there were tears in his eyes. He knewthere was only one thing to say to Hal Winters, son ofold Windpeter Winters, only one thing that all his owntraining and all the beliefs of the people he knewwould approve, but for his life he couldn't say what heknew he should say. 

At half-past four that afternoon Ray was putteringabout the barnyard when his wife came up the lane alongthe creek and called him. After the talk with Hal hehadn't returned to the cornfield but worked about thebarn. He had already done the evening chores and hadseen Hal, dressed and ready for a roistering night intown, come out of the farmhouse and go into the road. Along the path to his own house he trudged behind hiswife, looking at the ground and thinking. He couldn'tmake out what was wrong. Every time he raised his eyesand saw the beauty of the country in the failing lighthe wanted to do something he had never done before, shout or scream or hit his wife with his fists orsomething equally unexpected and terrifying. Along thepath he went scratching his head and trying to make itout. He looked hard at his wife's back but she seemedall right. 

She only wanted him to go into town for groceries andas soon as she had told him what she wanted began toscold. "You're always puttering, " she said. "Now I wantyou to hustle. There isn't anything in the house forsupper and you've got to get to town and back in ahurry. "

Ray went into his own house and took an overcoat from ahook back of the door. It was torn about the pocketsand the collar was shiny. His wife went into thebedroom and presently came out with a soiled cloth inone hand and three silver dollars in the other. Somewhere in the house a child wept bitterly and a dogthat had been sleeping by the stove arose and yawned. Again the wife scolded. "The children will cry and cry. Why are you always puttering?" she asked. 

Ray went out of the house and climbed the fence into afield. It was just growing dark and the scene that laybefore him was lovely. All the low hills were washedwith color and even the little clusters of bushes inthe corners of the fences were alive with beauty. Thewhole world seemed to Ray Pearson to have become alivewith something just as he and Hal had suddenly becomealive when they stood in the corn field stating intoeach other's eyes. 

The beauty of the country about Winesburg was too muchfor Ray on that fall evening. That is all there was toit. He could not stand it. Of a sudden he forgot allabout being a quiet old farm hand and throwing off thetorn overcoat began to run across the field. As he ranhe shouted a protest against his life, against alllife, against everything that makes life ugly. "Therewas no promise made, " he cried into the empty spacesthat lay about him. "I didn't promise my Minnieanything and Hal hasn't made any promise to Nell. Iknow he hasn't. She went into the woods with himbecause she wanted to go. What he wanted she wanted. Why should I pay? Why should Hal pay? Why should anyonepay? I don't want Hal to become old and worn out. I'lltell him. I won't let it go on. I'll catch Hal beforehe gets to town and I'll tell him. "

Ray ran clumsily and once he stumbled and fell down. "I must catch Hal and tell him, " he kept thinking, andalthough his breath came in gasps he kept runningharder and harder. As he ran he thought of things thathadn't come into his mind for years--how at the time hemarried he had planned to go west to his uncle inPortland, Oregon--how he hadn't wanted to be a farmhand, but had thought when he got out West he would goto sea and be a sailor or get a job on a ranch and ridea horse into Western towns, shouting and laughing andwaking the people in the houses with his wild cries. Then as he ran he remembered his children and in fancyfelt their hands clutching at him. All of his thoughtsof himself were involved with the thoughts of Hal andhe thought the children were clutching at the youngerman also. "They are the accidents of life, Hal, " hecried. "They are not mine or yours. I had nothing to dowith them. "

Darkness began to spread over the fields as Ray Pearsonran on and on. His breath came in little sobs. When hecame to the fence at the edge of the road andconfronted Hal Winters, all dressed up and smoking apipe as he walked jauntily along, he could not havetold what he thought or what he wanted. 

Ray Pearson lost his nerve and this is really the endof the story of what happened to him. It was almostdark when he got to the fence and he put his hands onthe top bar and stood staring. Hal Winters jumped aditch and coming up close to Ray put his hands into hispockets and laughed. He seemed to have lost his ownsense of what had happened in the corn field and whenhe put up a strong hand and took hold of the lapel ofRay's coat he shook the old man as he might have shakena dog that had misbehaved. 

"You came to tell me, eh?" he said. "Well, never mindtelling me anything. I'm not a coward and I've alreadymade up my mind. " He laughed again and jumped backacross the ditch. "Nell ain't no fool, " he said. "Shedidn't ask me to marry her. I want to marry her. I wantto settle down and have kids. "

Ray Pearson also laughed. He felt like laughing athimself and all the world. 

As the form of Hal Winters disappeared in the dusk thatlay over the road that led to Winesburg, he turned andwalked slowly back across the fields to where he hadleft his torn overcoat. As he went some memory ofpleasant evenings spent with the thin-legged childrenin the tumble-down house by the creek must have comeinto his mind, for he muttered words. "It's just aswell. Whatever I told him would have been a lie, " hesaid softly, and then his form also disappeared intothe darkness of the fields. 

DRINK

Tom Foster came to Winesburg from Cincinnati when hewas still young and could get many new impressions. Hisgrandmother had been raised on a farm near the town andas a young girl had gone to school there when Winesburgwas a village of twelve or fifteen houses clusteredabout a general store on the Trunion Pike. 

What a life the old woman had led since she went awayfrom the frontier settlement and what a strong, capablelittle old thing she was! She had been in Kansas, inCanada, and in New York City, traveling about with herhusband, a mechanic, before he died. Later she went tostay with her daughter, who had also married a mechanicand lived in Covington, Kentucky, across the river fromCincinnati. 

Then began the hard years for Tom Foster's grandmother. First her son-in-law was killed by a policeman during astrike and then Tom's mother became an invalid and diedalso. The grandmother had saved a little money, but itwas swept away by the illness of the daughter and bythe cost of the two funerals. She became a halfworn-out old woman worker and lived with the grandsonabove a junk shop on a side street in Cincinnati. Forfive years she scrubbed the floors in an officebuilding and then got a place as dish washer in arestaurant. Her hands were all twisted out of shape. When she took hold of a mop or a broom handle the handslooked like the dried stems of an old creeping vineclinging to a tree. 

The old woman came back to Winesburg as soon as she gotthe chance. One evening as she was coming home fromwork she found a pocket-book containing thirty-sevendollars, and that opened the way. The trip was a greatadventure for the boy. It was past seven o'clock atnight when the grandmother came home with thepocket-book held tightly in her old hands and she wasso excited she could scarcely speak. She insisted onleaving Cincinnati that night, saying that if theystayed until morning the owner of the money would besure to find them out and make trouble. Tom, who wasthen sixteen years old, had to go trudging off to thestation with the old woman, bearing all of theirearthly belongings done up in a worn-out blanket andslung across his back. By his side walked thegrandmother urging him forward. Her toothless old mouthtwitched nervously, and when Tom grew weary and wantedto put the pack down at a street crossing, she snatchedit up and if he had not prevented would have slung itacross her own back. When they got into the train andit had run out of the city she was as delighted as agirl and talked as the boy had never heard her talkbefore. 

All through the night as the train rattled along, thegrandmother told Tom tales of Winesburg and of how hewould enjoy his life working in the fields and shootingwild things in the woods there. She could not believethat the tiny village of fifty years before had growninto a thriving town in her absence, and in the morningwhen the train came to Winesburg did not want to getoff. "It isn't what I thought. It may be hard for youhere, " she said, and then the train went on its way andthe two stood confused, not knowing where to turn, inthe presence of Albert Longworth, the Winesburg baggagemaster. 

But Tom Foster did get along all right. He was one toget along anywhere. Mrs. White, the banker's wife, employed his grandmother to work in the kitchen and hegot a place as stable boy in the banker's new brickbarn. 

In Winesburg servants were hard to get. The woman whowanted help in her housework employed a "hired girl"who insisted on sitting at the table with the family. Mrs. White was sick of hired girls and snatched at thechance to get hold of the old city woman. She furnisheda room for the boy Tom upstairs in the barn. "He canmow the lawn and run errands when the horses do notneed attention, " she explained to her husband. 

Tom Foster was rather small for his age and had a largehead covered with stiff black hair that stood straightup. The hair emphasized the bigness of his head. Hisvoice was the softest thing imaginable, and he washimself so gentle and quiet that he slipped into thelife of the town without attracting the least bit ofattention. 

One could not help wondering where Tom Foster got hisgentleness. In Cincinnati he had lived in aneighborhood where gangs of tough boys prowled throughthe streets, and all through his early formative yearshe ran about with tough boys. For a while he was amessenger for a telegraph company and deliveredmessages in a neighborhood sprinkled with houses ofprostitution. The women in the houses knew and lovedTom Foster and the tough boys in the gangs loved himalso. 

He never asserted himself. That was one thing thathelped him escape. In an odd way he stood in the shadowof the wall of life, was meant to stand in the shadow. He saw the men and women in the houses of lust, sensedtheir casual and horrible love affairs, saw boysfighting and listened to their tales of thieving anddrunkenness, unmoved and strangely unaffected. 

Once Tom did steal. That was while he still lived inthe city. The grandmother was ill at the time and hehimself was out of work. There was nothing to eat inthe house, and so he went into a harness shop on a sidestreet and stole a dollar and seventy-five cents out ofthe cash drawer. 

The harness shop was run by an old man with a longmustache. He saw the boy lurking about and thoughtnothing of it. When he went out into the street to talkto a teamster Tom opened the cash drawer and taking themoney walked away. Later he was caught and hisgrandmother settled the matter by offering to cometwice a week for a month and scrub the shop. The boywas ashamed, but he was rather glad, too. "It is allright to be ashamed and makes me understand newthings, " he said to the grandmother, who didn't knowwhat the boy was talking about but loved him so muchthat it didn't matter whether she understood or not. 

For a year Tom Foster lived in the banker's stable andthen lost his place there. He didn't take very goodcare of the horses and he was a constant source ofirritation to the banker's wife. She told him to mowthe lawn and he forgot. Then she sent him to the storeor to the post office and he did not come back butjoined a group of men and boys and spent the wholeafternoon with them, standing about, listening andoccasionally, when addressed, saying a few words. As inthe city in the houses of prostitution and with therowdy boys running through the streets at night, so inWinesburg among its citizens he had always the power tobe a part of and yet distinctly apart from the lifeabout him. 

After Tom lost his place at Banker White's he did notlive with his grandmother, although often in theevening she came to visit him. He rented a room at therear of a little frame building belonging to old RufusWhiting. The building was on Duane Street, just offMain Street, and had been used for years as a lawoffice by the old man, who had become too feeble andforgetful for the practice of his profession but didnot realize his inefficiency. He liked Tom and let himhave the room for a dollar a month. In the lateafternoon when the lawyer had gone home the boy had theplace to himself and spent hours lying on the floor bythe stove and thinking of things. In the evening thegrandmother came and sat in the lawyer's chair to smokea pipe while Tom remained silent, as he always, did inthe presence of everyone. 

Often the old woman talked with great vigor. Sometimesshe was angry about some happening at the banker'shouse and scolded away for hours. Out of her ownearnings she bought a mop and regularly scrubbed thelawyer's office. Then when the place was spotlesslyclean and smelled clean she lighted her clay pipe andshe and Tom had a smoke together. "When you get readyto die then I will die also, " she said to the boy lyingon the floor beside her chair. 

Tom Foster enjoyed life in Winesburg. He did odd jobs, such as cutting wood for kitchen stoves and mowing thegrass before houses. In late May and early June hepicked strawberries in the fields. He had time to loafand he enjoyed loafing. Banker White had given him acast-off coat which was too large for him, but hisgrandmother cut it down, and he had also an overcoat, got at the same place, that was lined with fur. The furwas worn away in spots, but the coat was warm and inthe winter Tom slept in it. He thought his method ofgetting along good enough and was happy and satisfiedwith the way life in Winesburg had turned out for him. 

The most absurd little things made Tom Foster happy. That, I suppose, was why people loved him. In Hern'sGrocery they would be roasting coffee on Fridayafternoon, preparatory to the Saturday rush of trade, and the rich odor invaded lower Main Street. Tom Fosterappeared and sat on a box at the rear of the store. Foran hour he did not move but sat perfectly still, filling his being with the spicy odor that made himhalf drunk with happiness. "I like it, " he said gently. "It makes me think of things far away, places andthings like that. "

One night Tom Foster got drunk. That came about in acurious way. He never had been drunk before, and indeedin all his life had never taken a drink of anythingintoxicating, but he felt he needed to be drunk thatone time and so went and did it. 

In Cincinnati, when he lived there, Tom had found outmany things, things about ugliness and crime and lust. Indeed, he knew more of these things than anyone elsein Winesburg. The matter of sex in particular hadpresented itself to him in a quite horrible way and hadmade a deep impression on his mind. He thought, afterwhat he had seen of the women standing before thesqualid houses on cold nights and the look he had seenin the eyes of the men who stopped to talk to them, that he would put sex altogether out of his own life. One of the women of the neighborhood tempted him onceand he went into a room with her. He never forgot thesmell of the room nor the greedy look that came intothe eyes of the woman. It sickened him and in a veryterrible way left a scar on his soul. He had alwaysbefore thought of women as quite innocent things, muchlike his grandmother, but after that one experience inthe room he dismissed women from his mind. So gentlewas his nature that he could not hate anything and notbeing able to understand he decided to forget. 

And Tom did forget until he came to Winesburg. After hehad lived there for two years something began to stirin him. On all sides he saw youth making love and hewas himself a youth. Before he knew what had happenedhe was in love also. He fell in love with Helen White, daughter of the man for whom he had worked, and foundhimself thinking of her at night. 

That was a problem for Tom and he settled it in his ownway. He let himself think of Helen White whenever herfigure came into his mind and only concerned himselfwith the manner of his thoughts. He had a fight, aquiet determined little fight of his own, to keep hisdesires in the channel where he thought they belonged, but on the whole he was victorious. 

And then came the spring night when he got drunk. Tomwas wild on that night. He was like an innocent youngbuck of the forest that has eaten of some maddeningweed. The thing began, ran its course, and was ended inone night, and you may be sure that no one in Winesburgwas any the worse for Tom's outbreak. 

In the first place, the night was one to make asensitive nature drunk. The trees along the residencestreets of the town were all newly clothed in softgreen leaves, in the gardens behind the houses men wereputtering about in vegetable gardens, and in the airthere was a hush, a waiting kind of silence verystirring to the blood. 

Tom left his room on Duane Street just as the youngnight began to make itself felt. First he walkedthrough the streets, going softly and quietly along, thinking thoughts that he tried to put into words. Hesaid that Helen White was a flame dancing in the airand that he was a little tree without leaves standingout sharply against the sky. Then he said that she wasa wind, a strong terrible wind, coming out of thedarkness of a stormy sea and that he was a boat left onthe shore of the sea by a fisherman. 

That idea pleased the boy and he sauntered alongplaying with it. He went into Main Street and sat onthe curbing before Wacker's tobacco store. For an hourhe lingered about listening to the talk of men, but itdid not interest him much and he slipped away. Then hedecided to get drunk and went into Willy's saloon andbought a bottle of whiskey. Putting the bottle into hispocket, he walked out of town, wanting to be alone tothink more thoughts and to drink the whiskey. 

Tom got drunk sitting on a bank of new grass beside theroad about a mile north of town. Before him was a whiteroad and at his back an apple orchard in full bloom. Hetook a drink out of the bottle and then lay down on thegrass. He thought of mornings in Winesburg and of howthe stones in the graveled driveway by Banker White'shouse were wet with dew and glistened in the morninglight. He thought of the nights in the barn when itrained and he lay awake hearing the drumming of theraindrops and smelling the warm smell of horses and ofhay. Then he thought of a storm that had gone roaringthrough Winesburg several days before and, his mindgoing back, he relived the night he had spent on thetrain with his grandmother when the two were comingfrom Cincinnati. Sharply he remembered how strange ithad seemed to sit quietly in the coach and to feel thepower of the engine hurling the train along through thenight. 

Tom got drunk in a very short time. He kept takingdrinks from the bottle as the thoughts visited him andwhen his head began to reel got up and walked along theroad going away from Winesburg. There was a bridge onthe road that ran out of Winesburg north to Lake Erieand the drunken boy made his way along the road to thebridge. There he sat down. He tried to drink again, butwhen he had taken the cork out of the bottle he becameill and put it quickly back. His head was rocking backand forth and so he sat on the stone approach to thebridge and sighed. His head seemed to be flying aboutlike a pinwheel and then projecting itself off intospace and his arms and legs flopped helplessly about. 

At eleven o'clock Tom got back into town. GeorgeWillard found him wandering about and took him into theEagle printshop. Then he became afraid that the drunkenboy would make a mess on the floor and helped him intothe alleyway. 

The reporter was confused by Tom Foster. The drunkenboy talked of Helen White and said he had been with heron the shore of a sea and had made love to her. Georgehad seen Helen White walking in the street with herfather during the evening and decided that Tom was outof his head. A sentiment concerning Helen White thatlurked in his own heart flamed up and he became angry. "Now you quit that, " he said. "I won't let HelenWhite's name be dragged into this. I won't let thathappen. " He began shaking Tom's shoulder, trying tomake him understand. "You quit it, " he said again. 

For three hours the two young men, thus strangelythrown together, stayed in the printshop. When he had alittle recovered George took Tom for a walk. They wentinto the country and sat on a log near the edge of awood. Something in the still night drew them togetherand when the drunken boy's head began to clear theytalked. 

"It was good to be drunk, " Tom Foster said. "It taughtme something. I won't have to do it again. I will thinkmore dearly after this. You see how it is. "

George Willard did not see, but his anger concerningHelen White passed and he felt drawn toward the pale, shaken boy as he had never before been drawn towardanyone. With motherly solicitude, he insisted that Tomget to his feet and walk about. Again they went back tothe printshop and sat in silence in the darkness. 

The reporter could not get the purpose of Tom Foster'saction straightened out in his mind. When Tom spokeagain of Helen White he again grew angry and began toscold. "You quit that, " he said sharply. "You haven'tbeen with her. What makes you say you have? What makesyou keep saying such things? Now you quit it, do youhear?"

Tom was hurt. He couldn't quarrel with George Willardbecause he was incapable of quarreling, so he got up togo away. When George Willard was insistent he put outhis hand, laying it on the older boy's arm, and triedto explain. 

"Well, " he said softly, "I don't know how it was. I washappy. You see how that was. Helen White made me happyand the night did too. I wanted to suffer, to be hurtsomehow. I thought that was what I should do. I wantedto suffer, you see, because everyone suffers and doeswrong. I thought of a lot of things to do, but theywouldn't work. They all hurt someone else. "

Tom Foster's voice arose, and for once in his life hebecame almost excited. "It was like making love, that'swhat I mean, " he explained. "Don't you see how it is?It hurt me to do what I did and made everythingstrange. That's why I did it. I'm glad, too. It taughtme something, that's it, that's what I wanted. Don'tyou understand? I wanted to learn things, you see. That's why I did it. "

DEATH

The stairway leading up to Doctor Reefy's office, inthe Heffner Block above the Paris Dry Goods store, wasbut dimly lighted. At the head of the stairway hung alamp with a dirty chimney that was fastened by abracket to the wall. The lamp had a tin reflector, brown with rust and covered with dust. The people whowent up the stairway followed with their feet the feetof many who had gone before. The soft boards of thestairs had yielded under the pressure of feet and deephollows marked the way. 

At the top of the stairway a turn to the right broughtyou to the doctor's door. To the left was a darkhallway filled with rubbish. Old chairs, carpenter'shorses, step ladders and empty boxes lay in thedarkness waiting for shins to be barked. The pile ofrubbish belonged to the Paris Dry Goods Company. When acounter or a row of shelves in the store becameuseless, clerks carried it up the stairway and threw iton the pile. 

Doctor Reefy's office was as large as a barn. A stovewith a round paunch sat in the middle of the room. Around its base was piled sawdust, held in place byheavy planks nailed to the floor. By the door stood ahuge table that had once been a part of the furnitureof Herrick's Clothing Store and that had been used fordisplaying custom-made clothes. It was covered withbooks, bottles, and surgical instruments. Near the edgeof the table lay three or four apples left by JohnSpaniard, a tree nurseryman who was Doctor Reefy'sfriend, and who had slipped the apples out of hispocket as he came in at the door. 

At middle age Doctor Reefy was tall and awkward. Thegrey beard he later wore had not yet appeared, but onthe upper lip grew a brown mustache. He was not agraceful man, as when he grew older, and was muchoccupied with the problem of disposing of his hands andfeet. 

On summer afternoons, when she had been married manyyears and when her son George was a boy of twelve orfourteen, Elizabeth Willard sometimes went up the wornsteps to Doctor Reefy's office. Already the woman'snaturally tall figure had begun to droop and to dragitself listlessly about. Ostensibly she went to see thedoctor because of her health, but on the half dozenoccasions when she had been to see him the outcome ofthe visits did not primarily concern her health. Sheand the doctor talked of that but they talked most ofher life, of their two lives and of the ideas that hadcome to them as they lived their lives in Winesburg. 

In the big empty office the man and the woman satlooking at each other and they were a good deal alike. Their bodies were different, as were also the color oftheir eyes, the length of their noses, and thecircumstances of their existence, but something insidethem meant the same thing, wanted the same release, would have left the same impression on the memory of anonlooker. Later, and when he grew older and married ayoung wife, the doctor often talked to her of the hoursspent with the sick woman and expressed a good manythings he had been unable to express to Elizabeth. Hewas almost a poet in his old age and his notion of whathappened took a poetic turn. "I had come to the time inmy life when prayer became necessary and so I inventedgods and prayed to them, " he said. "I did not say myprayers in words nor did I kneel down but sat perfectlystill in my chair. In the late afternoon when it washot and quiet on Main Street or in the winter when thedays were gloomy, the gods came into the office and Ithought no one knew about them. Then I found that thiswoman Elizabeth knew, that she worshipped also the samegods. I have a notion that she came to the officebecause she thought the gods would be there but she washappy to find herself not alone just the same. It wasan experience that cannot be explained, although Isuppose it is always happening to men and women in allsorts of places. "

 * * *

On the summer afternoons when Elizabeth and the doctorsat in the office and talked of their two lives theytalked of other lives also. Sometimes the doctor madephilosophic epigrams. Then he chuckled with amusement. Now and then after a period of silence, a word was saidor a hint given that strangely illuminated the life ofthe speaker, a wish became a desire, or a dream, halfdead, flared suddenly into life. For the most part thewords came from the woman and she said them withoutlooking at the man. 

Each time she came to see the doctor the hotel keeper'swife talked a little more freely and after an hour ortwo in his presence went down the stairway into MainStreet feeling renewed and strengthened against thedullness of her days. With something approaching agirlhood swing to her body she walked along, but whenshe had got back to her chair by the window of her roomand when darkness had come on and a girl from the hoteldining room brought her dinner on a tray, she let itgrow cold. Her thoughts ran away to her girlhood withits passionate longing for adventure and she rememberedthe arms of men that had held her when adventure was apossible thing for her. Particularly she remembered onewho had for a time been her lover and who in the momentof his passion had cried out to her more than a hundredtimes, saying the same words madly over and over: "Youdear! You dear! You lovely dear!" The words, shethought, expressed something she would have liked tohave achieved in life. 

In her room in the shabby old hotel the sick wife ofthe hotel keeper began to weep and, putting her handsto her face, rocked back and forth. The words of herone friend, Doctor Reefy, rang in her ears. "Love islike a wind stirring the grass beneath trees on a blacknight, " he had said. "You must not try to make lovedefinite. It is the divine accident of life. If you tryto be definite and sure about it and to live beneaththe trees, where soft night winds blow, the long hotday of disappointment comes swiftly and the gritty dustfrom passing wagons gathers upon lips inflamed and madetender by kisses. "

Elizabeth Willard could not remember her mother who haddied when she was but five years old. Her girlhood hadbeen lived in the most haphazard manner imaginable. Herfather was a man who had wanted to be let alone and theaffairs of the hotel would not let him alone. He alsohad lived and died a sick man. Every day he arose witha cheerful face, but by ten o'clock in the morning allthe joy had gone out of his heart. When a guestcomplained of the fare in the hotel dining room or oneof the girls who made up the beds got married and wentaway, he stamped on the floor and swore. At night whenhe went to bed he thought of his daughter growing upamong the stream of people that drifted in and out ofthe hotel and was overcome with sadness. As the girlgrew older and began to walk out in the evening withmen he wanted to talk to her, but when he tried was notsuccessful. He always forgot what he wanted to say andspent the time complaining of his own affairs. 

In her girlhood and young womanhood Elizabeth had triedto be a real adventurer in life. At eighteen life hadso gripped her that she was no longer a virgin but, although she had a half dozen lovers before she marriedTom Willard, she had never entered upon an adventureprompted by desire alone. Like all the women in theworld, she wanted a real lover. Always there wassomething she sought blindly, passionately, some hiddenwonder in life. The tall beautiful girl with theswinging stride who had walked under the trees with menwas forever putting out her hand into the darkness andtrying to get hold of some other hand. In all thebabble of words that fell from the lips of the men withwhom she adventured she was trying to find what wouldbe for her the true word. 

Elizabeth had married Tom Willard, a clerk in herfather's hotel, because he was at hand and wanted tomarry at the time when the determination to marry cameto her. For a while, like most young girls, she thoughtmarriage would change the face of life. If there was inher mind a doubt of the outcome of the marriage withTom she brushed it aside. Her father was ill and neardeath at the time and she was perplexed because of themeaningless outcome of an affair in which she had justbeen involved. Other girls of her age in Winesburg weremarrying men she had always known, grocery clerks oryoung farmers. In the evening they walked in MainStreet with their husbands and when she passed theysmiled happily. She began to think that the fact ofmarriage might be full of some hidden significance. Young wives with whom she talked spoke softly andshyly. "It changes things to have a man of your own, "they said. 

On the evening before her marriage the perplexed girlhad a talk with her father. Later she wondered if thehours alone with the sick man had not led to herdecision to marry. The father talked of his life andadvised the daughter to avoid being led into anothersuch muddle. He abused Tom Willard, and that ledElizabeth to come to the clerk's defense. The sick manbecame excited and tried to get out of bed. When shewould not let him walk about he began to complain. "I've never been let alone, " he said. "Although I'veworked hard I've not made the hotel pay. Even now I owemoney at the bank. You'll find that out when I'm gone. "

The voice of the sick man became tense withearnestness. Being unable to arise, he put out his handand pulled the girl's head down beside his own. "There's a way out, " he whispered. "Don't marry TomWillard or anyone else here in Winesburg. There iseight hundred dollars in a tin box in my trunk. Take itand go away. "

Again the sick man's voice became querulous. "You'vegot to promise, " he declared. "If you won't promise notto marry, give me your word that you'll never tell Tomabout the money. It is mine and if I give it to youI've the right to make that demand. Hide it away. It isto make up to you for my failure as a father. Some timeit may prove to be a door, a great open door to you. Come now, I tell you I'm about to die, give me yourpromise. "

 * * *

In Doctor Reefy's office, Elizabeth, a tired gaunt oldwoman at forty-one, sat in a chair near the stove andlooked at the floor. By a small desk near the windowsat the doctor. His hands played with a lead pencilthat lay on the desk. Elizabeth talked of her life as amarried woman. She became impersonal and forgot herhusband, only using him as a lay figure to give pointto her tale. "And then I was married and it did notturn out at all, " she said bitterly. "As soon as I hadgone into it I began to be afraid. Perhaps I knew toomuch before and then perhaps I found out too muchduring my first night with him. I don't remember. 

"What a fool I was. When father gave me the money andtried to talk me out of the thought of marriage, Iwould not listen. I thought of what the girls who weremarried had said of it and I wanted marriage also. Itwasn't Tom I wanted, it was marriage. When father wentto sleep I leaned out of the window and thought of thelife I had led. I didn't want to be a bad woman. Thetown was full of stories about me. I even began to beafraid Tom would change his mind. "

The woman's voice began to quiver with excitement. ToDoctor Reefy, who without realizing what was happeninghad begun to love her, there came an odd illusion. Hethought that as she talked the woman's body waschanging, that she was becoming younger, straighter, stronger. When he could not shake off the illusion hismind gave it a professional twist. "It is good for bothher body and her mind, this talking, " he muttered. 

The woman began telling of an incident that hadhappened one afternoon a few months after her marriage. Her voice became steadier. "In the late afternoon Iwent for a drive alone, " she said. "I had a buggy and alittle grey pony I kept in Moyer's Livery. Tom waspainting and repapering rooms in the hotel. He wantedmoney and I was trying to make up my mind to tell himabout the eight hundred dollars father had given to me. I couldn't decide to do it. I didn't like him wellenough. There was always paint on his hands and faceduring those days and he smelled of paint. He wastrying to fix up the old hotel, and make it new andsmart. "

The excited woman sat up very straight in her chair andmade a quick girlish movement with her hand as she toldof the drive alone on the spring afternoon. "It wascloudy and a storm threatened, " she said. "Black cloudsmade the green of the trees and the grass stand out sothat the colors hurt my eyes. I went out Trunion Pike amile or more and then turned into a side road. Thelittle horse went quickly along up hill and down. I wasimpatient. Thoughts came and I wanted to get away frommy thoughts. I began to beat the horse. The blackclouds settled down and it began to rain. I wanted togo at a terrible speed, to drive on and on forever. Iwanted to get out of town, out of my clothes, out of mymarriage, out of my body, out of everything. I almostkilled the horse, making him run, and when he could notrun any more I got out of the buggy and ran afoot intothe darkness until I fell and hurt my side. I wanted torun away from everything but I wanted to run towardssomething too. Don't you see, dear, how it was?"

Elizabeth sprang out of the chair and began to walkabout in the office. She walked as Doctor Reefy thoughthe had never seen anyone walk before. To her whole bodythere was a swing, a rhythm that intoxicated him. Whenshe came and knelt on the floor beside his chair hetook her into his arms and began to kiss herpassionately. "I cried all the way home, " she said, asshe tried to continue the story of her wild ride, buthe did not listen. "You dear! You lovely dear! Oh youlovely dear!" he muttered and thought he held in hisarms not the tired-out woman of forty-one but a lovelyand innocent girl who had been able by some miracle toproject herself out of the husk of the body of thetired-out woman. 

Doctor Reefy did not see the woman he had held in hisarms again until after her death. On the summerafternoon in the office when he was on the point ofbecoming her lover a half grotesque little incidentbrought his love-making quickly to an end. As the manand woman held each other tightly heavy feet cametramping up the office stairs. The two sprang to theirfeet and stood listening and trembling. The noise onthe stairs was made by a clerk from the Paris Dry GoodsCompany. With a loud bang he threw an empty box on thepile of rubbish in the hallway and then went heavilydown the stairs. Elizabeth followed him almostimmediately. The thing that had come to life in her asshe talked to her one friend died suddenly. She washysterical, as was also Doctor Reefy, and did not wantto continue the talk. Along the street she went withthe blood still singing in her body, but when sheturned out of Main Street and saw ahead the lights ofthe New Willard House, she began to tremble and herknees shook so that for a moment she thought she wouldfall in the street. 

The sick woman spent the last few months of her lifehungering for death. Along the road of death she went, seeking, hungering. She personified the figure of deathand made him now a strong black-haired youth runningover hills, now a stem quiet man marked and scarred bythe business of living. In the darkness of her room sheput out her hand, thrusting it from under the covers ofher bed, and she thought that death like a living thingput out his hand to her. "Be patient, lover, " shewhispered. "Keep yourself young and beautiful and bepatient. "

On the evening when disease laid its heavy hand uponher and defeated her plans for telling her son Georgeof the eight hundred dollars hidden away, she got outof bed and crept half across the room pleading withdeath for another hour of life. "Wait, dear! The boy!The boy! The boy!" she pleaded as she tried with all ofher strength to fight off the arms of the lover she hadwanted so earnestly. 

 * * *

Elizabeth died one day in March in the year when herson George became eighteen, and the young man had butlittle sense of the meaning of her death. Only timecould give him that. For a month he had seen her lyingwhite and still and speechless in her bed, and then oneafternoon the doctor stopped him in the hallway andsaid a few words. 

The young man went into his own room and closed thedoor. He had a queer empty feeling in the region of hisstomach. For a moment he sat staring at, the floor andthen jumping up went for a walk. Along the stationplatform he went, and around through residence streetspast the high-school building, thinking almost entirelyof his own affairs. The notion of death could not gethold of him and he was in fact a little annoyed thathis mother had died on that day. He had just received anote from Helen White, the daughter of the town banker, in answer to one from him. "Tonight I could have goneto see her and now it will have to be put off, " hethought half angrily. 

Elizabeth died on a Friday afternoon at three o'clock. It had been cold and rainy in the morning but in theafternoon the sun came out. Before she died she layparalyzed for six days unable to speak or move and withonly her mind and her eyes alive. For three of the sixdays she struggled, thinking of her boy, trying to saysome few words in regard to his future, and in her eyesthere was an appeal so touching that all who saw itkept the memory of the dying woman in their minds foryears. Even Tom Willard, who had always half resentedhis wife, forgot his resentment and the tears ran outof his eyes and lodged in his mustache. The mustachehad begun to turn grey and Tom colored it with dye. There was oil in the preparation he used for thepurpose and the tears, catching in the mustache andbeing brushed away by his hand, formed a fine mist-likevapor. In his grief Tom Willard's face looked like theface of a little dog that has been out a long time inbitter weather. 

George came home along Main Street at dark on the dayof his mother's death and, after going to his own roomto brush his hair and clothes, went along the hallwayand into the room where the body lay. There was acandle on the dressing table by the door and DoctorReefy sat in a chair by the bed. The doctor arose andstarted to go out. He put out his hand as though togreet the younger man and then awkwardly drew it backagain. The air of the room was heavy with the presenceof the two self-conscious human beings, and the manhurried away. 

The dead woman's son sat down in a chair and looked atthe floor. He again thought of his own affairs anddefinitely decided he would make a change in his life, that he would leave Winesburg. "I will go to some city. Perhaps I can get a job on some newspaper, " he thought, and then his mind turned to the girl with whom he wasto have spent this evening and again he was half angryat the turn of events that had prevented his going toher. 

In the dimly lighted room with the dead woman the youngman began to have thoughts. His mind played withthoughts of life as his mother's mind had played withthe thought of death. He closed his eyes and imaginedthat the red young lips of Helen White touched his ownlips. His body trembled and his hands shook. And thensomething happened. The boy sprang to his feet andstood stiffly. He looked at the figure of the deadwoman under the sheets and shame for his thoughts sweptover him so that he began to weep. A new notion cameinto his mind and he turned and looked guiltily aboutas though afraid he would be observed. 

George Willard became possessed of a madness to liftthe sheet from the body of his mother and look at herface. The thought that had come into his mind grippedhim terribly. He became convinced that not his motherbut someone else lay in the bed before him. Theconviction was so real that it was almost unbearable. The body under the sheets was long and in death lookedyoung and graceful. To the boy, held by some strangefancy, it was unspeakably lovely. The feeling that thebody before him was alive, that in another moment alovely woman would spring out of the bed and confronthim, became so overpowering that he could not bear thesuspense. Again and again he put out his hand. Once hetouched and half lifted the white sheet that coveredher, but his courage failed and he, like Doctor Reefy, turned and went out of the room. In the hallway outsidethe door he stopped and trembled so that he had to puta hand against the wall to support himself. "That's notmy mother. That's not my mother in there, " he whisperedto himself and again his body shook with fright anduncertainty. When Aunt Elizabeth Swift, who had come towatch over the body, came out of an adjoining room heput his hand into hers and began to sob, shaking hishead from side to side, half blind with grief. "Mymother is dead, " he said, and then forgetting the womanhe turned and stared at the door through which he hadjust come. "The dear, the dear, oh the lovely dear, "the boy, urged by some impulse outside himself, muttered aloud. 

As for the eight hundred dollars the dead woman hadkept hidden so long and that was to give George Willardhis start in the city, it lay in the tin box behind theplaster by the foot of his mother's bed. Elizabeth hadput it there a week after her marriage, breaking theplaster away with a stick. Then she got one of theworkmen her husband was at that time employing aboutthe hotel to mend the wall. "I jammed the corner of thebed against it, " she had explained to her husband, unable at the moment to give up her dream of release, the release that after all came to her but twice in herlife, in the moments when her lovers Death and DoctorReefy held her in their arms. 

SOPHISTICATION

It was early evening of a day in, the late fall and theWinesburg County Fair had brought crowds of countrypeople into town. The day had been clear and the nightcame on warm and pleasant. On the Trunion Pike, wherethe road after it left town stretched away betweenberry fields now covered with dry brown leaves, thedust from passing wagons arose in clouds. Children, curled into little balls, slept on the straw scatteredon wagon beds. Their hair was full of dust and theirfingers black and sticky. The dust rolled away over thefields and the departing sun set it ablaze with colors. 

In the main street of Winesburg crowds filled thestores and the sidewalks. Night came on, horseswhinnied, the clerks in the stores ran madly about, children became lost and cried lustily, an Americantown worked terribly at the task of amusing itself. 

Pushing his way through the crowds in Main Street, young George Willard concealed himself in the stairwayleading to Doctor Reefy's office and looked at thepeople. With feverish eyes he watched the facesdrifting past under the store lights. Thoughts keptcoming into his head and he did not want to think. Hestamped impatiently on the wooden steps and lookedsharply about. "Well, is she going to stay with him allday? Have I done all this waiting for nothing?" hemuttered. 

George Willard, the Ohio village boy, was fast growinginto manhood and new thoughts had been coming into hismind. All that day, amid the jam of people at the Fair, he had gone about feeling lonely. He was about to leaveWinesburg to go away to some city where he hoped to getwork on a city newspaper and he felt grown up. The moodthat had taken possession of him was a thing known tomen and unknown to boys. He felt old and a littletired. Memories awoke in him. To his mind his new senseof maturity set him apart, made of him a half-tragicfigure. He wanted someone to understand the feelingthat had taken possession of him after his mother'sdeath. 

There is a time in the life of every boy when he forthe first time takes the backward view of life. Perhapsthat is the moment when he crosses the line intomanhood. The boy is walking through the street of histown. He is thinking of the future and of the figure hewill cut in the world. Ambitions and regrets awakewithin him. Suddenly something happens; he stops undera tree and waits as for a voice calling his name. Ghosts of old things creep into his consciousness; thevoices outside of himself whisper a message concerningthe limitations of life. From being quite sure ofhimself and his future he becomes not at all sure. Ifhe be an imaginative boy a door is torn open and for thefirst time he looks out upon the world, seeing, asthough they marched in procession before him, thecountless figures of men who before his time have comeout of nothingness into the world, lived their livesand again disappeared into nothingness. The sadness ofsophistication has come to the boy. With a little gasphe sees himself as merely a leaf blown by the windthrough the streets of his village. He knows that inspite of all the stout talk of his fellows he must liveand die in uncertainty, a thing blown by the winds, athing destined like corn to wilt in the sun. He shiversand looks eagerly about. The eighteen years he haslived seem but a moment, a breathing space in the longmarch of humanity. Already he hears death calling. Withall his heart he wants to come close to some otherhuman, touch someone with his hands, be touched by thehand of another. If he prefers that the other be awoman, that is because he believes that a woman will begentle, that she will understand. He wants, most ofall, understanding. 

When the moment of sophistication came to GeorgeWillard his mind turned to Helen White, the Winesburgbanker's daughter. Always he had been conscious of thegirl growing into womanhood as he grew into manhood. Once on a summer night when he was eighteen, he hadwalked with her on a country road and in her presencehad given way to an impulse to boast, to make himselfappear big and significant in her eyes. Now he wantedto see her for another purpose. He wanted to tell herof the new impulses that had come to him. He had triedto make her think of him as a man when he knew nothingof manhood and now he wanted to be with her and to tryto make her feel the change he believed had taken placein his nature. 

As for Helen White, she also had come to a period ofchange. What George felt, she in her young woman's wayfelt also. She was no longer a girl and hungered toreach into the grace and beauty of womanhood. She hadcome home from Cleveland, where she was attendingcollege, to spend a day at the Fair. She also had begunto have memories. During the day she sat in thegrand-stand with a young man, one of the instructorsfrom the college, who was a guest of her mother's. Theyoung man was of a pedantic turn of mind and she feltat once he would not do for her purpose. At the Fairshe was glad to be seen in his company as he was welldressed and a stranger. She knew that the fact of hispresence would create an impression. During the day shewas happy, but when night came on she began to growrestless. She wanted to drive the instructor away, toget out of his presence. While they sat together in thegrand-stand and while the eyes of former schoolmateswere upon them, she paid so much attention to herescort that he grew interested. "A scholar needs money. I should marry a woman with money, " he mused. 

Helen White was thinking of George Willard even as hewandered gloomily through the crowds thinking of her. She remembered the summer evening when they had walkedtogether and wanted to walk with him again. She thoughtthat the months she had spent in the city, the going totheaters and the seeing of great crowds wandering inlighted thoroughfares, had changed her profoundly. Shewanted him to feel and be conscious of the change inher nature. 

The summer evening together that had left its mark onthe memory of both the young man and woman had, whenlooked at quite sensibly, been rather stupidly spent. They had walked out of town along a country road. Thenthey had stopped by a fence near a field of young cornand George had taken off his coat and let it hang onhis arm. "Well, I've stayed here inWinesburg--yes--I've not yet gone away but I'm growingup, " he had said. "I've been reading books and I'vebeen thinking. I'm going to try to amount to somethingin life. 

"Well, " he explained, "that isn't the point. PerhapsI'd better quit talking. "

The confused boy put his hand on the girl's arm. Hisvoice trembled. The two started to walk back along theroad toward town. In his desperation George boasted, "I'm going to be a big man, the biggest that ever livedhere in Winesburg, " he declared. "I want you to dosomething, I don't know what. Perhaps it is none of mybusiness. I want you to try to be different from otherwomen. You see the point. It's none of my business Itell you. I want you to be a beautiful woman. You seewhat I want. "

The boy's voice failed and in silence the two came backinto town and went along the street to Helen White'shouse. At the gate he tried to say somethingimpressive. Speeches he had thought out came into hishead, but they seemed utterly pointless. "I thought--Iused to think--I had it in my mind you would marry SethRichmond. Now I know you won't, " was all he could findto say as she went through the gate and toward the doorof her house. 

On the warm fall evening as he stood in the stairwayand looked at the crowd drifting through Main Street, George thought of the talk beside the field of youngcorn and was ashamed of the figure he had made ofhimself. In the street the people surged up and downlike cattle confined in a pen. Buggies and wagonsalmost filled the narrow thoroughfare. A band playedand small boys raced along the sidewalk, diving betweenthe legs of men. Young men with shining red faceswalked awkwardly about with girls on their arms. In aroom above one of the stores, where a dance was to beheld, the fiddlers tuned their instruments. The brokensounds floated down through an open window and outacross the murmur of voices and the loud blare of thehorns of the band. The medley of sounds got on youngWillard's nerves. Everywhere, on all sides, the senseof crowding, moving life closed in about him. He wantedto run away by himself and think. "If she wants to staywith that fellow she may. Why should I care? Whatdifference does it make to me?" he growled and wentalong Main Street and through Hern's Grocery into aside street. 

George felt so utterly lonely and dejected that hewanted to weep but pride made him walk rapidly along, swinging his arms. He came to Wesley Moyer's liverybarn and stopped in the shadows to listen to a group ofmen who talked of a race Wesley's stallion, Tony Tip, had won at the Fair during the afternoon. A crowd hadgathered in front of the barn and before the crowdwalked Wesley, prancing up and down boasting. He held awhip in his hand and kept tapping the ground. Littlepuffs of dust arose in the lamplight. "Hell, quit yourtalking, " Wesley exclaimed. "I wasn't afraid, I knew Ihad 'em beat all the time. I wasn't afraid. "

Ordinarily George Willard would have been intenselyinterested in the boasting of Moyer, the horseman. Nowit made him angry. He turned and hurried away along thestreet. "Old windbag, " he sputtered. "Why does he wantto be bragging? Why don't he shut up?"

George went into a vacant lot and, as he hurried along, fell over a pile of rubbish. A nail protruding from anempty barrel tore his trousers. He sat down on theground and swore. With a pin he mended the torn placeand then arose and went on. "I'll go to Helen White'shouse, that's what I'll do. I'll walk right in. I'llsay that I want to see her. I'll walk right in and sitdown, that's what I'll do, " he declared, climbing overa fence and beginning to run. 

 * * *

On the veranda of Banker White's house Helen wasrestless and distraught. The instructor sat between themother and daughter. His talk wearied the girl. Although he had also been raised in an Ohio town, theinstructor began to put on the airs of the city. Hewanted to appear cosmopolitan. "I like the chance youhave given me to study the background out of which mostof our girls come, " he declared. "It was good of you, Mrs. White, to have me down for the day. " He turned toHelen and laughed. "Your life is still bound up withthe life of this town?" he asked. "There are peoplehere in whom you are interested?" To the girl his voicesounded pompous and heavy. 

Helen arose and went into the house. At the doorleading to a garden at the back she stopped and stoodlistening. Her mother began to talk. "There is no onehere fit to associate with a girl of Helen's breeding, "she said. 

Helen ran down a flight of stairs at the back of thehouse and into the garden. In the darkness she stoppedand stood trembling. It seemed to her that the worldwas full of meaningless people saying words. Afire witheagerness she ran through a garden gate and, turning acorner by the banker's barn, went into a little sidestreet. "George! Where are you, George?" she cried, filled with nervous excitement. She stopped running, and leaned against a tree to laugh hysterically. Alongthe dark little street came George Willard, stillsaying words. "I'm going to walk right into her house. I'll go right in and sit down, " he declared as he cameup to her. He stopped and stared stupidly. "Come on, "he said and took hold of her hand. With hanging headsthey walked away along the street under the trees. Dryleaves rustled under foot. Now that he had found herGeorge wondered what he had better do and say. 

 * * *

At the upper end of the Fair Ground, in Winesburg, there is a half decayed old grand-stand. It has neverbeen painted and the boards are all warped out ofshape. The Fair Ground stands on top of a low hillrising out of the valley of Wine Creek and from thegrand-stand one can see at night, over a cornfield, thelights of the town reflected against the sky. 

George and Helen climbed the hill to the Fair Ground, coming by the path past Waterworks Pond. The feeling ofloneliness and isolation that had come to the young manin the crowded streets of his town was both broken andintensified by the presence of Helen. What he felt wasreflected in her. 

In youth there are always two forces fighting inpeople. The warm unthinking little animal strugglesagainst the thing that reflects and remembers, and theolder, the more sophisticated thing had possession ofGeorge Willard. Sensing his mood, Helen walked besidehim filled with respect. When they got to thegrand-stand they climbed up under the roof and sat downon one of the long bench-like seats. 

There is something memorable in the experience to behad by going into a fair ground that stands at the edgeof a Middle Western town on a night after the annualfair has been held. The sensation is one never to beforgotten. On all sides are ghosts, not of the dead, but of living people. Here, during the day just passed, have come the people pouring in from the town and thecountry around. Farmers with their wives and childrenand all the people from the hundreds of little framehouses have gathered within these board walls. Younggirls have laughed and men with beards have talked ofthe affairs of their lives. The place has been filledto overflowing with life. It has itched and squirmedwith life and now it is night and the life has all goneaway. The silence is almost terrifying. One concealsoneself standing silently beside the trunk of a treeand what there is of a reflective tendency in hisnature is intensified. One shudders at the thought ofthe meaninglessness of life while at the same instant, and if the people of the town are his people, one loveslife so intensely that tears come into the eyes. 

In the darkness under the roof of the grand-stand, George Willard sat beside Helen White and felt verykeenly his own insignificance in the scheme ofexistence. Now that he had come out of town where thepresence of the people stirring about, busy with amultitude of affairs, had been so irritating, theirritation was all gone. The presence of Helen renewedand refreshed him. It was as though her woman's handwas assisting him to make some minute readjustment ofthe machinery of his life. He began to think of thepeople in the town where he had always lived withsomething like reverence. He had reverence for Helen. He wanted to love and to be loved by her, but he didnot want at the moment to be confused by her womanhood. In the darkness he took hold of her hand and when shecrept close put a hand on her shoulder. A wind began toblow and he shivered. With all his strength he tried tohold and to understand the mood that had come upon him. In that high place in the darkness the two oddlysensitive human atoms held each other tightly andwaited. In the mind of each was the same thought. "Ihave come to this lonely place and here is this other, "was the substance of the thing felt. 

In Winesburg the crowded day had run itself out intothe long night of the late fall. Farm horses joggedaway along lonely country roads pulling their portionof weary people. Clerks began to bring samples of goodsin off the sidewalks and lock the doors of stores. Inthe Opera House a crowd had gathered to see a show andfurther down Main Street the fiddlers, theirinstruments tuned, sweated and worked to keep the feetof youth flying over a dance floor. 

In the darkness in the grand-stand Helen White andGeorge Willard remained silent. Now and then the spellthat held them was broken and they turned and tried inthe dim light to see into each other's eyes. Theykissed but that impulse did not last. At the upper endof the Fair Ground a half dozen men worked over horsesthat had raced during the afternoon. The men had builta fire and were heating kettles of water. Only theirlegs could be seen as they passed back and forth in thelight. When the wind blew the little flames of the firedanced crazily about. 

George and Helen arose and walked away into thedarkness. They went along a path past a field of cornthat had not yet been cut. The wind whispered among thedry corn blades. For a moment during the walk back intotown the spell that held them was broken. When they hadcome to the crest of Waterworks Hill they stopped by atree and George again put his hands on the girl'sshoulders. She embraced him eagerly and then again theydrew quickly back from that impulse. They stoppedkissing and stood a little apart. Mutual respect grewbig in them. They were both embarrassed and to relievetheir embarrassment dropped into the animalism ofyouth. They laughed and began to pull and haul at eachother. In some way chastened and purified by the moodthey had been in, they became, not man and woman, notboy and girl, but excited little animals. 

It was so they went down the hill. In the darknessthey played like two splendid young things in a youngworld. Once, running swiftly forward, Helen trippedGeorge and he fell. He squirmed and shouted. Shakingwith laughter, he roiled down the hill. Helen ran afterhim. For just a moment she stopped in the darkness. There was no way of knowing what woman's thoughts wentthrough her mind but, when the bottom of the hill wasreached and she came up to the boy, she took his armand walked beside him in dignified silence. For somereason they could not have explained they had both gotfrom their silent evening together the thing needed. Man or boy, woman or girl, they had for a moment takenhold of the thing that makes the mature life of men andwomen in the modern world possible. 

DEPARTURE

Young George Willard got out of bed at four in themorning. It was April and the young tree leaves werejust coming out of their buds. The trees along theresidence streets in Winesburg are maple and the seedsare winged. When the wind blows they whirl crazilyabout, filling the air and making a carpet underfoot. 

George came downstairs into the hotel office carrying abrown leather bag. His trunk was packed for departure. Since two o'clock he had been awake thinking of thejourney he was about to take and wondering what hewould find at the end of his journey. The boy who sleptin the hotel office lay on a cot by the door. His mouthwas open and he snored lustily. George crept past thecot and went out into the silent deserted main street. The east was pink with the dawn and long streaks oflight climbed into the sky where a few stars stillshone. 

Beyond the last house on Trunion Pike in Winesburgthere is a great stretch of open fields. The fields areowned by farmers who live in town and drive homeward atevening along Trunion Pike in light creaking wagons. Inthe fields are planted berries and small fruits. In thelate afternoon in the hot summers when the road and thefields are covered with dust, a smoky haze lies overthe great flat basin of land. To look across it is likelooking out across the sea. In the spring when the landis green the effect is somewhat different. The landbecomes a wide green billiard table on which tiny humaninsects toil up and down. 

All through his boyhood and young manhood GeorgeWillard had been in the habit of walking on TrunionPike. He had been in the midst of the great open placeon winter nights when it was covered with snow and onlythe moon looked down at him; he had been there in thefall when bleak winds blew and on summer evenings whenthe air vibrated with the song of insects. On the Aprilmorning he wanted to go there again, to walk again inthe silence. He did walk to where the road dipped downby a little stream two miles from town and then turnedand walked silently back again. When he got to MainStreet clerks were sweeping the sidewalks before thestores. "Hey, you George. How does it feel to be goingaway?" they asked. 

The westbound train leaves Winesburg at sevenforty-five in the morning. Tom Little is conductor. Histrain runs from Cleveland to where it connects with agreat trunk line railroad with terminals in Chicago andNew York. Tom has what in railroad circles is called an"easy run. " Every evening he returns to his family. Inthe fall and spring he spends his Sundays fishing inLake Erie. He has a round red face and small blue eyes. He knows the people in the towns along his railroadbetter than a city man knows the people who live in hisapartment building. 

George came down the little incline from the NewWillard House at seven o'clock. Tom Willard carried hisbag. The son had become taller than the father. 

On the station platform everyone shook the young man'shand. More than a dozen people waited about. Then theytalked of their own affairs. Even Will Henderson, whowas lazy and often slept until nine, had got out ofbed. George was embarrassed. Gertrude Wilmot, a tallthin woman of fifty who worked in the Winesburg postoffice, came along the station platform. She had neverbefore paid any attention to George. Now she stoppedand put out her hand. In two words she voiced whateveryone felt. "Good luck, " she said sharply and thenturning went on her way. 

When the train came into the station George feltrelieved. He scampered hurriedly aboard. Helen Whitecame running along Main Street hoping to have a partingword with him, but he had found a seat and did not seeher. When the train started Tom Little punched histicket, grinned and, although he knew George well andknew on what adventure he was just setting out, made nocomment. Tom had seen a thousand George Willards go outof their towns to the city. It was a commonplace enoughincident with him. In the smoking car there was a manwho had just invited Tom to go on a fishing trip toSandusky Bay. He wanted to accept the invitation andtalk over details. 

George glanced up and down the car to be sure no onewas looking, then took out his pocket-book and countedhis money. His mind was occupied with a desire not toappear green. Almost the last words his father had saidto him concerned the matter of his behavior when he gotto the city. "Be a sharp one, " Tom Willard had said. "Keep your eyes on your money. Be awake. That's theticket. Don't let anyone think you're a greenhorn. "

After George counted his money he looked out of thewindow and was surprised to see that the train wasstill in Winesburg. 

The young man, going out of his town to meet theadventure of life, began to think but he did not thinkof anything very big or dramatic. Things like hismother's death, his departure from Winesburg, theuncertainty of his future life in the city, the seriousand larger aspects of his life did not come into hismind. 

He thought of little things--Turk Smollet wheelingboards through the main street of his town in themorning, a tall woman, beautifully gowned, who had oncestayed overnight at his father's hotel, Butch Wheelerthe lamp lighter of Winesburg hurrying through thestreets on a summer evening and holding a torch in hishand, Helen White standing by a window in the Winesburgpost office and putting a stamp on an envelope. 

The young man's mind was carried away by his growingpassion for dreams. One looking at him would not havethought him particularly sharp. With the recollectionof little things occupying his mind he closed his eyesand leaned back in the car seat. He stayed that way fora long time and when he aroused himself and againlooked out of the car window the town of Winesburg haddisappeared and his life there had become but abackground on which to paint the dreams of his manhood.