Part 22 (2/2)
Drusilla watched him interestedly.
”Now I know what this room needed. It needs tobacco. It'll make the curtains smell as if people lived here. You know the greatest trouble I find with this place, John, is to have it feel human. Everything is so sort of--sort of--dead--with just me a-creepin' round, and James and William tip-toein', and the hired girls never speakin' except to say, 'No, ma'am' or 'Yes, ma'am.' Why, sometimes I'd like to hear somebody drop somethin', or get mad, or stomp, or do _somethin'_ as if they was alive. Here, help me pull up the chair closer by the fire, where I can see you without putting on my specs. There, that is comfortable. Now tell me all about yourself.”
John looked into the fire dreamily.
”Drusilla, I am afraid I have been a failure. Your mother was right; I've been always a dreamer and a failure.”
Drusilla leaned toward him.
”Never you mind, John. So long as you haven't been a dreamer and a democrat, I can stand it. I never could abide democrats. Why didn't you ever marry?”
John looked at her.
”I couldn't, Drusilla.”
Drusilla flushed at the look in his face and sat back in her chair.
”Oh--Oh--”
John said again, earnestly: ”I just couldn't, Drusilla. When I got you out of my heart enough to look at another woman, I was too old to care.”
”What are you going to do now?” Drusilla asked, to turn the conversation into another channel.
”What I have done for the last few years--sit quietly by and wait for the messenger to come.”
”Stuff and nonsense, John! I don't believe in waitin' for messengers. That's meetin' them half way. I believe in bein' so busy that he'll have a hard time to catch up to me.”
”But I'm old, Drusilla, and--”
”Old, nothin' of the sort! You ain't but two years older'n me and I'm jest beginnin' to live. Why I've jest took to raisin' children, John, and I'm goin' to watch 'em grow up; so I can't afford to think about being old or dyin'. I got to see these babies get started someway.”
John looked at her curiously.
”Yes, you're surprised--so's everybody--and it kind of tickles me to surprise people. I've had to do the things expected of me all my life; I couldn't afford to surprise no one; so I feel like I'm breaking out now, and--and--” laughing, ”I like it, John--I like it.
Why, when Mr. Thornton stands up so stiff and straight and makes his mouth square and hard to say, _'Impossible!'_ why--why--my toes kind of wiggle around in delight like the babies do when you hold 'em to the fire. But I don't want to talk about myself; we got lots of time to do that. I want to know what you intend doin'.”
”Nothing, Drusilla. I have enough to live on in my little town; and with my books, and--”
”But, John, you can't live with jest _books.”_
”That's all I have left, Drusilla. All my friends are gone.”
”That's what I wanted to hear. You ain't got no one that draws your heart back to that place in Ohio, have you?”
”No one in the world, Drusilla.”
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