Jennie Gerhardt - Драйзер Теодор - Страница 27

For the first winter things went smoothly enough. By the closest economy

the children were clothed and kept in school, the rent paid, and the

instalments met. Once it looked as though there might be some difficulty

about the continuance of the home life, and that was when Gerhardt wrote

that he would be home for Christmas. The mill was to close down for a

short period at that time. He was naturally anxious to see what the new

life of his family at Cleveland was like.

Mrs. Gerhardt would have welcomed his return with unalloyed pleasure

had it not been for the fear she entertained of his creating a scene. Jennie talked it over with her mother, and Mrs. Gerhardt in turn spoke of it to

Bass, whose advice was to brave it out.

"Don't worry," he said; "he won't do anything about it. I'll talk to him if he says anything."

The scene did occur, but it was not so unpleasant as Mrs. Gerhardt had

feared. Gerhardt came home during the afternoon, while Bass, Jennie, and

George were at work. Two of the younger children went to the train to

meet him. When he entered Mrs. Gerhardt greeted him affectionately, but

she trembled for the discovery which was sure to come. Her suspense was

not for long. Gerhardt opened the front bedroom door only a few minutes

after he arrived. On the white counterpane of the bed was a pretty child, sleeping. He could not but know on the instant whose it was, but he

pretended ignorance.

"Whose child is that?" he questioned.

"It's Jennie's," said Mrs. Gerhardt, weakly.

"When did that come here?"

"Not so very long ago," answered the mother, nervously.

"I guess she is here, too," he declared, contemptuously, refusing to pronounce her name, a fact which he had already anticipated.

"She's working in a family," returned his wife in a pleading tone. "She's doing so well now. She had no place to go. Let her alone."

Gerhardt had received a light since he had been away. Certain

inexplicable thoughts and feelings had come to him in his religious

meditations. In his prayers he had admitted to the All-seeing that he might have done differently by his daughter. Yet he could not make up his mind

how to treat her for the future. She had committed a great sin; it was

impossible to get away from that.

When Jennie came home that night a meeting was unavoidable. Gerhardt

saw her coming, and pretended to be deeply engaged in a newspaper.

Mrs. Gerhardt, who had begged him not to ignore Jennie entirely,

trembled for fear he would say or do something which would hurt her

feelings.

"She is coming now," she said, crossing to the door of the front room, where he was sitting; but Gerhardt refused to look up. "Speak to her, anyhow," was her last appeal before the door opened; but he made no

reply.

When Jennie came in her mother whispered, "He is in the front room."

Jennie paled, put her thumb to her lip and stood irresolute, not knowing

how to meet the situation.

"Has he seen?"

Jennie paused as she realised from her mother's face and nod that

Gerhardt knew of the child's existence.

"Go ahead," said Mrs. Gerhardt; "it's all right. He won't say anything."

Jennie finally went to the door, and, seeing her father, his brow wrinkled as if in serious but not unkindly thought, she hesitated, but made her way forward.

"Papa," she said, unable to formulate a definite sentence.

Gerhardt looked up, his greyish-brown eyes a study under their heavy

sandy lashes. At the sight of his daughter he weakened internally; but

with the self-adjusted armour of resolve about him he showed no sign of

pleasure at seeing her. All the forces of his conventional understanding of morality and his naturally sympathetic and fatherly disposition were

battling within him, but, as in so many cases where the average mind is

concerned, convention was temporarily the victor.

"Yes," he said.

"Won't you forgive me, Papa?"

"I do," he returned grimly.

She hesitated a moment, and then stepped forward, for what purpose he

well understood.

"There," he said, pushing her gently away, as her lips barely touched his grizzled cheek.

It had been a frigid meeting.

When Jennie went out into the kitchen after this very trying ordeal she

lifted her eyes to her waiting mother and tried to make it seem as though all had been well, but her emotional disposition got the better of her.

"Did he make up to you?" her mother was about to ask; but the words were only half out of her mouth before her daughter sank down into one

of the chairs close to the kitchen table and, laying her head on her arm, burst forth into soft, convulsive, inaudible sobs.

"Now, now," said Mrs. Gerhardt. "There now, don't cry. What did he say?"

It was some time before Jennie recovered herself sufficiently to answer.

Her mother tried to treat the situation lightly.

"I wouldn't feel bad," she said. "He'll get over it. It's his way."

CHAPTER XV

The return of Gerhardt brought forward the child question in all its

bearings. He could not help considering it from the standpoint of a

grandparent, particularly since it was a human being possessed of a soul.

He wondered if it had been baptised. Then he inquired.

"No, not yet," said his wife, who had not forgotten this duty, but had been uncertain whether the little one would be welcome in the faith.

"No, of course not," sneered Gerhardt, whose opinion of his wife's religious devotion was not any too great. "Such carelessness! Such

irreligion! That is a fine thing."

He thought it over a few moments, and felt that this evil should be

corrected at once.

"It should be baptised," he said. "Why don't she take it and have it baptised?"

Mrs. Gerhardt reminded him that some one would have to stand godfather

to the child and there was no way to have the ceremony performed

without confessing the fact that it was without a legitimate father.

Gerhardt listened to this, and it quieted him for a few moments, but his

religion was something which he could not see put in the background by

any such difficulty. How would the Lord look upon quibbling like this? It was not Christian, and it was his duty to attend to the matter. It must be taken, forthwith, to the church, Jennie, himself, and his wife

accompanying it as sponsors; or, if he did not choose to condescend thus

far to his daughter, he must see that it was baptised when she was not

present. He brooded over this difficulty, and finally decided that the

ceremony should take place on one of these week-days, between

Christmas and New Year's, when Jennie would be at her work. This

proposal he broached to his wife, and, receiving her approval, he made

his next announcement. "It has no name," he said.

Jennie and her mother had talked over this very matter, and Jennie had

expressed a preference for Vesta. Now her mother made bold to suggest it

as her own choice.

"How would Vesta do?"

Gerhardt heard this with indifference. Secretly he had settled the question in his own mind. He had a name in store, left over from the halcyon

period of his youth, and never opportunely available in the case of his

own children—Wilhelmina. Of course he had no idea of unbending in the