Chapter 16
Book 2, Chapter 2, Sections 7-8 of Bread. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, read by Wild Shimmering Path, Bread by Charles G. Norris. Book 2, Chapter 2, Sections 7-8. But the next morning Jeanette vigorously attacked the subject. There had been nothing extraordinary about the past evening. A man in conventional evening dress had taken her mother
and herself to dine in a restaurant, and afterwards had driven them in a taxi to the theater. What was there so remarkable in that? It was being done all the time. The restaurants were packed full of such parties night after night. It had merely seemed wonderful to a girl and her mother, unused to such entertainment. Jeanette kept reminding herself of this throughout the ensuing day, she did not propose to have her head turned, as her mother's evidently was, by a little splurge
of money. She was not in love with Martin Devlin. She did not care a snap of her finger for him. She would not marry him if he had a million. There was no sense in letting him think she would even consider such an idea. She couldn't help it if he was in love with her. She had done nothing to encourage him, and she didn't propose to begin. No, the whole thing had better come to an end. It had gone quite far enough. She'd have to call off any silly plans her mother might be
making. What? Marry Martin Devlin and give up her job? Never in the world. But Jeanette found she was dealing with a personality very different from that of Roy Beardsley. Mr. Devlin had one idea, one object. The idea was Jeanette. The object, matrimony. He besieged her with attentions. He gave her no peace, he hounded her footsteps. Mrs. Sturgis threw herself wholeheartedly upon his side. She was deaf to her daughter's remonstrances. She refused to be discourteous, as she described
it, to a young man so attentive and considerate. Mother and daughter actually quarreled about the matter, refused to speak to each other for a whole day, made up with tears and kisses, but this in No jot altered Mrs. Sturgis's purpose of being Mr. Devlin's friend and advocate. Jeanette was not to be shaken. She did not desire Mr. Devlin.
She did not want to marry anyone. She had no intention of abandoning her work. You got to marry me, Jeanette, this purposeful young man said to her one day. Never, said Jeanette resolutely. Oh, yes, you will, he told her with equal confidence.
Well, we'll see about that. I don't care for you. I wouldn't marry you if I did. You are only annoying me with your attentions. I would really like you much better if you'd leave me alone. The very evening this conversation took place, she found a beautiful little scarab pin waiting for her when she got home. She mailed it back to
him at the Gibbs Engraving Company. The next day came perfume, and a day or two later, a large roll of new magazines. He sent her candy, flowers, theater tickets. She gave the candy away, threw the flowers out of the window, tore up the theater tickets, and sent the torn pasteboards back to him in a letter in which she told him further gifts would only anger her. They kept on coming with undiminished regularity. She wept. Her mother scolded her. Devlin called. There was no evading
him. He was everywhere. One day he grabbed her, took her in his arms, beat down her resistance, strained her to him and kissed her savagely, hungrily on the mouth. In that instant she capitulated. Something broke within her. An overwhelming force rose like a great tide, welling up over her head and submerged her. She wilted in his embrace, succumbed like a crushed lily, and longed for him to trample on her. Love, glorious, intoxicating, passionate,
had sprung to life in her. She resented it. She was helpless against it. She fought, fought, fought to no purpose. It rode her, rowled her, harried her. Martin Devlin had conquered her heart, but her will was another matter. Jeanette became miserably unhappy. She imagined she had experienced all love's emotions when Roy Beardsley possessed her thoughts. She laughed now when she thought of them. She had been little more than a schoolgirl then, with a schoolgirl's capacity for love,
a maiden's love, virginal, immature. It was not to be compared with this flame that seethed within her now. Oh, God, her love for Martin Devlin was an agony. For the first time in her life, she knew the full meaning of fear. She feared this man with a fear like terror. Ruthlessly, he obtruded himself into her life. Ruthlessly he assaulted the securest fastness of it. Ruthlessly she dreaded he would strike them down and subdue her will as easily as he had won her love.
He was in her thoughts all day and all night. She trembled when he was near her. It was torment when they were apart. Again and again she returned to her determination to put him out of her life. He would only cause her trouble. There was only unhappiness in store for them both. It was useless. Neither her thoughts nor Devlin had any mercy upon her. She knew at last what love, real love, was like. It was a raging fire, white-hot, scorifying, consuming.
His lips never again found hers after that first terrible moment of weakness. Sometimes he caught her to him and strained her in his arms, but her cheek or hair or neck received his eager kiss. She resisted these embraces with all her strength, struggled in his grasp. She was mortally afraid of him, mortally afraid of herself. Desire throbbed in all her veins.
She clung desperately to the last redoubt in her defenses, behind which every instinct told her safety lay. She would allow him no avenue of approach. She would tolerate no moment's weakness in her fortitude. Jani, you love me, and by God I love you.
You are the finest woman I've ever known, Jani. When are you going to marry me? Martin had his arms about her, but both her hands were pressed against his breast. He seemed so big and powerful as he stood holding her. She knew his clean-shaven chin was rough with his beard, firm and cold. He smelled fragrantly of cigars. Ah, love, that was one thing. She had no control over her heart, but marriage was another. That was very different
indeed. Martin, dear, I do love you. I'm proud I love you, but I don't want to get married. Why not? Jeanette sighed wearily. I don't suppose I can ever make you understand. I like to live my own life. I like to come and go as I please. I like to have the money I earn myself to spend the way I like. And besides that, I love my work. I love being at the office. I've been part of this business now for three years. I've helped to build it up. I know every detail. It belongs to me in a
way. Does that sound unreasonable to you? No, not unreasonable exactly, but I don't think you see it right. You attach too much importance to it. You'll be just as free and independent as my wife as you are now. Would she? She wondered. It was of that that she had her gravest misgivings. And then there's Mr. Corey. I wouldn't feel right about leaving him. He depends on me so much. Well, for God's sake, exclaimed Martin. Do you mean to tell me you would let that stand in the way?
It's a consideration, said Jeanette honestly, Martin's face setting grimly. And then there's Mama, went on the girl. She's so happy now, living with me. She doesn't have to work so hard anymore, and she goes to concerts and visits Alice and does as she pleases. You see, if I married, that would have to come to an end. I don't know what she would do. Why, she could do a lot of things, argued Martin. She might go and live with your sister,
for instance, or come with us. She could divide her time between the two of you. Alice would love to have her, admitted Jeanette. Mama's crazy about Etta, and of course it would make it easier for Allie. But I don't think Mama would consent to live with either of her children. I've always been a fan for your ma, said Martin, and that just shows how dead sensible she is. Your sister's husband and I could each send her $25 a month, and she could find some place to
board easily for that. Roy hasn't got any $25. We can fix up some arrangement that will be satisfactory all round. Mama would never consent to give up her teaching. It really means too much to her. Well, there you are. You haven't got a real reason on earth for not marrying me tomorrow. But Jeanette felt she had, though she could find no one to agree with her. You're just playing with your happiness, dearie, her mother said to her. Martin Devlin's a fine
young man. You could go a long way before you'd find a better husband. I want to see my dearie girl in a little home of her own like her sister's. Oh, Janie, said Alice, you don't know what fun being married is. Why, after you've become a wife, you feel differently about the whole world. Why, I'd marry anybody rather than not be married at all. And then, Janny, you haven't got the faintest idea how sweet it is to have a baby of your own. Etta is just the joy of our lives.
You ought to see Roy playing with her when he comes home from the office, and I'm getting her bath ready. Jeanette studied her sister's radiant face curiously. There was a mystery here, something she did not understand. This was the girl who had borne her child in agony, who had endured nearly fifteen hours of labor, who had been torn and ripped, and had lain helpless on her back for six long months, fighting her way back to strength and normality, despairing
and weakly crying. Yet here she was, talking of the joy of a baby, urging her sister to a like experience. It was puzzling. How soon mothers forgot. Six months of helplessness already unremembered. It had not passed from Jeanette's recollection. It had been terrible. Terrible! And yet, she would like to have a baby of her own. A baby without that fearful ordeal. A little Martin Devlin. She kissed Etta on the back of her wrinkled fat neck,
where it was sweetly perspirey and fuzzy with the lint from her blankets. End of Book 2, Chapter 2, Sections 7-8
