The Hired Girl(9)

Father laughed. It wasn’t a natural sound, or a happy one. When most people laugh, it’s like water splashing over the lip of a pitcher. The thing happens easily, and it wants to go on. Father’s laugh was like coughing up something from the back of his throat.

“Marriage and motherhood!” he said. He jerked his head toward me. “Who’s going to marry her? No one’s going to take her off my hands. She don’t need books to fit her for marriage and motherhood.”

Miss Chandler glanced at me. It was a quick look, but I saw that she was sorry for me, and I was ashamed. Sometimes I’m glad when people are sorry for me, but this was different. Father never said before that no one would want to marry me. I didn’t know he’d thought it through.

“If Joan does not marry,” Miss Chandler said tremulously, “she will need an education more than ever. I understand that her mother —”

Father’s face darkened. “Her ma filled her head with nonsense,” he said. “She wanted Joan to be a schoolteacher. Well, she can’t be a schoolteacher, because she’s needed at home. She’s got work to do here, work she’s fit for.” He fixed his eyes on the trousers, then looked hard at Miss Chandler. “You needn’t come back,” he said, and went up the path to the house.

I stood dumbstruck. I couldn’t believe that he’d spoken to Miss Chandler that way — to Miss Chandler. I heard her take in her breath, and the way she did it, I didn’t have to look to know she was almost crying. I understood. There’s something about Father that weakens you. It’s the choked-down anger inside him. It’s like stagnant water, heavy and murky and sickening. Whenever I have words with Father, I feel poisoned, even two or three days after.

And of course, Miss Chandler isn’t used to being treated like that. Everyone in these parts knows she’s a good teacher and a real lady. I put out my hand to touch her sleeve. “Please —” I didn’t rightly know what I was saying please for. Please don’t cry, maybe. Or: Please don’t let him keep you from coming again. But she said under her breath, “I’d better leave,” and her hands were shaking as she jammed the books back in her satchel.

I followed her down the hill. I found myself jabbering, saying that Father hadn’t meant what he said, that it was just one of his humors. I told her she must come again and told her the times when Father is usually out. But she wasn’t listening. She wanted to get away so bad. She hadn’t even fastened the satchel properly, and through the open part I saw the gold letters on the green book. The Mill on the Floss. Miss Chandler had told me about that one, and I’d so wanted to read it. I felt the sting of that loss, and shame swept over me, because I was thinking about myself, instead of Miss Chandler. It isn’t that I don’t love Miss Chandler. I do — I do — with all my heart! It’s just that I couldn’t help seeing the title on the book.

I gave up pursuing her when we reached the spot where the hill leveled out. She wasn’t answering me, or even listening, because she was too busy pretending she wasn’t crying. I ought to have thanked her for all her kindness, but I didn’t think of it. Thank you goes with good-bye, and I wasn’t ready to say good-bye. But at last I blurted out that I would never forget her. And then we separated, and both of us were weeping.



Tuesday, June the twentieth, 1911

It’s past midnight and I can’t sleep. I can’t lie still. My face aches and I can’t stop hating Father. These past two hours, I’ve done nothing but toss and turn. I’ve been plumping and folding my pillow, trying to make it cradle my head, but it won’t. My hatred has crawled into the pillow slip and made a lump.

So I’ve left my bed and lit a candle to write in this book — dear Miss Chandler’s book. I remember how when she gave it to me, I had a notion that I might one day write something very eloquent and beautiful in it, something I could show her. Now I know I’ll never see her again.

I am heartbroken about Miss Chandler. It strikes me that I haven’t any other friends — Miss Chandler was the only, only one — and suddenly I’m so hot with rage that I want to pace and stalk the room and beat my fists against the wall. I think of everything that Father’s taken away — first my education, and now my last friend. And I want to shriek at him — but I only write in my book. I don’t want Father to hear me and come into my room. He’d take my candle — candles cost money, and he’d say I was wasting. He’d take my book. Only he doesn’t know about my book. I must be careful to hide it, always.