What will happen, Widow La Rue? For last night at three o'clock You woke and saw by your window again Amid the shadowy locust grove The phantom of the old soldier: A shadow of blue, like mercury light-- What will happen, Widow La Rue? * * * * * What may not happen In this place of summer loneliness? For neither the sunlight of July, Nor the blue of the lake, Nor the green boundaries of cool woodlands, Nor the song of larks and thrushes, Nor the bravuras of bobolinks, Nor scents of hay new mown, Nor the ox-blood sumach cones, Nor the snow of nodding yarrow, Nor clover blossoms on the dizzy crest Of the bluff by the lake Can take away the loneliness Of this July by the lake! * * * * * Last night you saw the old soldier By your window, Widow La Rue! Or was it your husband you saw, As he lay by the gate so long ago? With the iris of his eyes so black, And the white of his eyes so china-blue, And specks of blood on his face, Like a wall specked by a shake a brush; And something like blubber or pinkish wax, Hiding the gash in his throat---- The serum and blood blown up by the breath From emptied lungs. II So Widow La Rue has gone to a friend For the afternoon and the night, Where the phantom will not come, Where the phantom may be forgotten. And scarcely has she turned the road, Round the water-mill by the creek, When the telephone rings and daughter Flora Springs up from a drowsy chair And the ennui of a book, And runs to answer the call. And her heart gives a bound, And her heart stops still, As she hears the voice, and a faintness courses Quick as poison through all her frame. And something like bees swarming in her breast Comes to her throat in a surge of fear, Rapture, passion, for what is the voice But the voice of her lover? And just because she is here alone In this desolate summer-house by the lake; And just because this man is forbidden To cross her way, for a taint in his blood Of drink, from a father who died of drink; And just because he is in her thought By night and day, The voice of him heats her through like fire. She sways from dizziness, The telephone falls from her shaking hand. ... He is in the village, is walking out, He will be at the door in an hour. III