My Ántonia, Willa Cather [i want to read a book TXT] 📗

to the perfect utterance of the Georgics, where the pen was fitted to the matter as the plough is to the furrow; and he must have said to himself, with the thankfulness of a good man, “I was the first to bring the Muse into my country.”

We left the classroom quietly, conscious that we had been brushed by the wing of a great feeling, though perhaps I alone knew Cleric intimately enough to guess what that feeling was. In the evening, as I sat staring at my book, the fervor of his voice stirred through the quantities on the page before me. I was wondering whether that particular rocky strip of New England coast about which he had so often told me was Cleric’s patria. Before I had got far with my reading, I was disturbed by a knock. I hurried to the door and when I opened it saw a woman standing in the dark hall.

“I expect you hardly know me, Jim.”

The voice seemed familiar, but I did not recognize her until she stepped into the light of my doorway and I beheld⁠—Lena Lingard! She was so quietly conventionalized by city clothes that I might have passed her on the street without seeing her. Her black suit fitted her figure smoothly, and a black lace hat, with pale-blue forget-me-nots, sat demurely on her yellow hair.

I led her toward Cleric’s chair, the only comfortable one I had, questioning her confusedly.

She was not disconcerted by my embarrassment. She looked about her with the naive curiosity I remembered so well. “You are quite comfortable here, aren’t you? I live in Lincoln now, too, Jim. I’m in business for myself. I have a dressmaking shop in the Raleigh Block, out on O Street. I’ve made a real good start.”

“But, Lena, when did you come?”

“Oh, I’ve been here all winter. Didn’t your grandmother ever write you? I’ve thought about looking you up lots of times. But we’ve all heard what a studious young man you’ve got to be, and I felt bashful. I didn’t know whether you’d be glad to see me.” She laughed her mellow, easy laugh, that was either very artless or very comprehending, one never quite knew which. “You seem the same, though⁠—except you’re a young man, now, of course. Do you think I’ve changed?”

“Maybe you’re prettier⁠—though you were always pretty enough. Perhaps it’s your clothes that make a difference.”

“You like my new suit? I have to dress pretty well in my business.” She took off her jacket and sat more at ease in her blouse, of some soft, flimsy silk. She was already at home in my place, had slipped quietly into it, as she did into everything. She told me her business was going well, and she had saved a little money.

“This summer I’m going to build the house for mother I’ve talked about so long. I won’t be able to pay up on it at first, but I want her to have it before she is too old to enjoy it. Next summer I’ll take her down new furniture and carpets, so she’ll have something to look forward to all winter.”

I watched Lena sitting there so smooth and sunny and well cared-for, and thought of how she used to run barefoot over the prairie until after the snow began to fly, and how Crazy Mary chased her round and round the cornfields. It seemed to me wonderful that she should have got on so well in the world. Certainly she had no one but herself to thank for it.

“You must feel proud of yourself, Lena,” I said heartily. “Look at me; I’ve never earned a dollar, and I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to.”

“Tony says you’re going to be richer than Mr. Harling some day. She’s always bragging about you, you know.”

“Tell me, how is Tony?”

“She’s fine. She works for Mrs. Gardener at the hotel now. She’s housekeeper. Mrs. Gardener’s health isn’t what it was, and she can’t see after everything like she used to. She has great confidence in Tony. Tony’s made it up with the Harlings, too. Little Nina is so fond of her that Mrs. Harling kind of overlooked things.”

“Is she still going with Larry Donovan?”

“Oh, that’s on, worse than ever! I guess they’re engaged. Tony talks about him like he was president of the railroad. Everybody laughs about it, because she was never a girl to be soft. She won’t hear a word against him. She’s so sort of innocent.”

I said I didn’t like Larry, and never would.

Lena’s face dimpled. “Some of us could tell her things, but it wouldn’t do any good. She’d always believe him. That’s Ántonia’s failing, you know; if she once likes people, she won’t hear anything against them.”

“I think I’d better go home and look after Ántonia,” I said.

“I think you had.” Lena looked up at me in frank amusement. “It’s a good thing the Harlings are friendly with her again. Larry’s afraid of them. They ship so much grain, they have influence with the railroad people. What are you studying?” She leaned her elbows on the table and drew my book toward her. I caught a faint odor of violet sachet. “So that’s Latin, is it? It looks hard. You do go to the theater sometimes, though, for I’ve seen you there. Don’t you just love a good play, Jim? I can’t stay at home in the evening if there’s one in town. I’d be willing to work like a slave, it seems to me, to live in a place where there are theaters.”

“Let’s go to a show together sometime. You are going to let me come to see you, aren’t you?”

“Would you like to? I’d be ever so pleased. I’m never busy after six o’clock, and I let my sewing girls go at half-past five. I board, to save time, but sometimes I cook a chop for myself, and I’d be glad to cook one for you. Well,”⁠—she began to put on her white gloves⁠—“it’s been