New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction; Women -- Suffrage -- United States -- Fiction; Young women -- Fiction
"I see the saffron woods of yesterday!" (I see, too, the setting sun
shining on the yellow leaves, clinging frailly. I see myself standing
beneath a tree holding up an overcoat--his overcoat, thrown across my
outstretched arms to catch the pelting burrs that he is shaking off. I
see his eyes looking down from the tree into mine. Later as we lean over
a rock to crack open the prickly burrs, I feel our shoulders touch! Did
he feel them, too, I wonder? If he were any other man I would say that
he meant that our eyes should meet too long, our shoulders lean too
near, and our silence, as we walked home in the dark, continue too
tense. But he is different. He is not a lover. He is a friend--a
comrade.) "I see the saffron woods of yesterday!"
Abruptly I lay aside my pad and pencil. I put on my coat and hat, pull
on my gloves, and in self-defense plunge out into the cold November
afternoon. I avoid the country, and try to keep my recreant thoughts on
such practical subjects as trolley cars, motor-trucks and delivery
wagons, rumbling noisily beside me along the street. A sudden "To Let"
card appears in a new apartment. I wonder how much the rent is. I wonder
how much the salary of an assistant professor is. Probably something
under five thousand a year. The income from the investments left me by
my father amounts to almost eight hundred dollars. Clothes alone cost me
more than a thousand. Of course one wouldn't need so many, but what with
rent, and food, and service, and--what am I thinking of? Why, I've
known the man only four weeks, and considering my recent relations with
Breckenridge Sewall such mad air-castling is lacking in good taste.
Besides, a teacher--a professor! I've always scorned professors. I was
predestined to fill a high and influential place. A professor's wife? It
is unthinkable! And then abruptly appears a street vender beside me. I
smell his roasting chestnuts. And again--again, "I see the saffron woods
of yesterday!"
About two days after I went chestnutting with Mr. Jennings, I went
picnicking. We built a fire in the corner of two stones and cooked chops
and bacon. Two days after that we tramped to an old farm-house, five
miles straight-away north, and drank sweet cider--rather warm--from a
jelly tumbler with a rough rim. Once we had some tea and thick slabs of
bread in a country hotel by the roadside. Often we pillage orchards for
apples. Day before yesterday we stopped in a dismantled vegetable garden
and pulled a raw turnip from out of the frosty ground. Mr. Jennings
scraped the dirt away and pared off a little morsel with his pocket
knife. He offered it to me, then took a piece himself.
"Same old taste," I laughed.
"Same old taste," he laughed back. And we looked into each other's eyes
in sympathetic appreciation of raw turnip. As he wiped the blade of his
knife he added, "If I didn't know it wasn't so, I would swear we played
together as children. Most young ladies, of this age, do not care for
raw turnips."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account