Speaker 1: Her letters Kate Chopin. She had given orders that she
wished to remain undisturbed, and moreover had locked the doors
of her room. The house was very still. The rain
was falling steadily from a laden sky in which there
was no gleam, no wrift, no promise. A generous wood
fire had been lighted in the ample fireplace, and it
brightened and illumined the luxurious apartment to its furthermost corners.
From some remote nook of her writing desk, the woman
took a thick bundle of letters, bound tightly together with strong,
coarse swine, and placed it upon the table in the
center of the room. For weeks she had been schooling
herself for what she was about to do. There was
a strong deliberation in the lines of her long, thin,
sensitive face. Her hands, too, were long and delicate and
blue veined. With a pair of scissors, she snapped the
cord by the letters together, thus released the ones which
were topmost slid down to the table, and she, with
a quick movement, thrust her fingers among them, scattering and
churning them over till they quite covered the broad surface
of the table. Before her were envelopes of various sizes
and shapes, all of them addressed in the handwriting of
one man and one woman. He had sent her letters
all back to her one day, when sick with the
dread of possibilities, she had asked to have them returned.
She had meant them to destroy them, all his and
her own. That was four years ago, and she had
been feeding upon them ever since. They had sustained her,
she believed and kept her spirit from perishing utterly. Now
the day had come when the premonition of danger could
no longer remain unheeded. She knew that before many months repast,
she would have to part from her treasure, leaving it unguarded.
She shrank from inflicting the pain the anguish which the
discovery of these letters would bring to others. To one
above all, who was near to her, and whose tenderness
and years of devotion had made him, in a manner
dear to her, she calmly selected a letter at random
from the piled and cast it into the roaring fire.
A second one followed, almost as calmly. With the third,
her hand began to tremble, when, in a sudden paroxysm,
she cast a fourth, A fifth and a sixth into
the flames in breathless succession. Then she stopped and began
to pant, for she was far from strong, and she
stayed staring into the fire with pained and savage eyes.
Oh what had she done? What had she not done?
With feverish apprehension, she began to search among the letters
before her. Which of them had she so ruthlessly, so
so cruelly put out of her existence? Heaven to grant
not the first, that very first one, written before they
had learned or dared to say to each other, I
love you. No, No, there it was safe enough. She
laughed with pleasure and held it to her lips. What
if that other, most precious and most imprudent one was missing,
in which every word of untempered passion had long ago
eaten its way into her brain, and which stirred her
still today as it had done a hundred times before.
When she thought of it, she crushed it between her palms.
When she found it, she kissed it again and again.
With her sharp white teeth, she tore the far corner
from the letter where the name was written. She bit
the torn scrap and tasted it between her lips, and
upon her tongue like some god given morsel. What unbounded
thankfulness she felt it not having destroyed them all. How
desolate and empty would have been her remaining days without them,
with only her thoughts, elusive thoughts that she could not
hold in her hands and press as she did these
to her cheeks and her heart. This man had changed
the water in her veins to wine, whose taste had
brought delirium to both of them. It was all one
and past now, save for these letters that she held
encircled in her arms. She stayed breathing softly and contentedly,
and with the hectic cheek resting upon them, she was thinking, think,
you have a way to keep them without possible ultimate
injury to that other one, whom they would stab more
cruelly than keen nie blades. At last she felt the way.
It was a way that frightened and bewildered her to
think of at first, but she had reached it by deduction,
too sure to admit of doubt. She meant, of course,
to destroy them herself before the inn came. But how
does the end? And when? Who can tell? She would
guard again the possibility of accident by leaving them in
charge of the very one who, above all should be
spared a knowledge of their contempts. She roused herself from
the stupor of thought and gathered the scattered letters once
more together, binding them again with a tough twine. She
wrapped the compact bulana tight sheet of white, polished paper.
Then she wrote an ink upon the back of it,
in the large, firm characters, I leave this package to
the care of my husband, with perfect faith in his
loyalty and his love. I asked him to destroy it unopened.
It was not sealed. Only a bit of string held
the wrapper, which she could remove and replace it will
whenever the humor came to her, to pass an hour
in some intoxicating dream of the days when she felt
she had lived. If he had come upon that bundle
of letters in the first flush of his poignant sorrow,
there would not have been an instant's hesitancy to destroy
it promptly and without question. Would have seemed a welcome
expression of devotion, a way of reaching her, of crying
out his love to her while the world was still
filled with the illusion of her presence. But months had
passed since that spring day when they had found her
stretched upon the floor, clutching the key of her writing desk,
which she appeared to have been attempting to reach when
death overtook her. Day was much like that day a
year ago, when the leaves were falling in the rain,
pouring steadily from the leaden sky, which held no glean
no promise. He had happened accidentally upon the package in
that remote nook of her desk, just as she herself
had done a year ago. He carried it to the
table and laid it down there, staring with puzzled eyes
at the message which confronted him. I leave this package
to the care of my husband, with perfect faith in
his loyalty and his love. I asked him to destroy
it unopened. She had made no mistake. Every line of
his face, no longer young, spoke loyalty and honesty, and
his eyes were as faithful as the dog's and his loving.
He was a tall, powerful man, standing there in the firelight,
with shoulders that stooped a little, and hair that was
growing somewhat thin and gray, and a face that was
distinguished and must have been handsome when he smiled. But
he was slow destroy it unopened. He re read half aloud,
But why unopened? He took the package again in his hands,
and turning it about and feeling it, discovered that it
was composed of many letters, tightly packed together. So here
were her letters, which was asked she was asking him
to destroy and open. She had never seemed in her
lifetime to have had a secret from him. He knew
her to have been cold and fashionless, but true and
watchful of his comfort in his happiness. Might he not
be holding in his hands the secret of some other
one which had been confided to her, and which she
had promised to guard. But no, she would have indicated
the fact by some additional line or word. The secret
was her own, something contained in these letters, and she
wanted it to die with her. If he could have
thought of her as on some distant, shadowy shore, waiting
for him throughout the years, with outstretched hands, to come
and join her again, he would not have hesitated with
hopeful confidence. He would have thought, in that blessed meeting time,
soul soul, she would tell me all till then I
can weight and trust. But he could not think of
her in any far off paradise awaiting him. He felt
that there was no smallest part of her anywhere in
the universe, more than there had been before she was
born into the world. But she had embodied herself with
terrible significance and an intangible wish, uttered when life still
coursed through her veins, knowing that would reach him when
the annihilation of death was between them, but uttered with
all confidence in its power and potency. He was moved
by the splendid daring, the magnificence of the act, which
at the same time exalted him and lifted him above
the head of common mortals. What secret, save one could
a woman choose to have die with her? As quickly
as the suggestion came to his mind, so swiftly did
the man instinctive possession creep into his blood. His fingers
cramped about the package in his hands, and he sank
into a chair beside the table. The agonizing suspicion that
perhaps another handshaired with him, her thoughts, her affection, her life,
deprived him. For a swift instant of honor and reason.
He thrust the end of his strong thumb beneath the string,
which with a single turn would have yielded with perfect
faith in your loyalty and your love. It was not.
The written characters addressing themselves to the eye was like
a voice speaking to his soul. With a tremor of
anguished he bowed his head down upon the letters. He
had once seen a clairvoyt hold a letter to his
forehead and purport in doing so to discover its contents.
He wondered for a while moment if such a gift
for force of wishing might come to him, But he
was only conscious of the smooth surface of the paper,
cold against his brow, like a touch of a dead
woman's hand. A half hour passed before he lifted his head.
An unspeakable conflict had raged within him, but his loyalty
in his love had conquered. His face was pale and deep,
blind with suffering, but there was no more hesitancy to
be seen there. He did not, for a moment think
of casting the thick package into the flames, to be
licked by the fiery tongue and charred and half revealed
to his eyes that was not what she meant. He arose, and,
taking a heavy bronze paper away from the table, bound
it securely to the package. He walked to the window,
looked out into the street below, darkness had come, and
it was still raining. He could hear the rain dashing
against the window panes, and could see it falling through
the dull, yellow rim of light cast by the lightest
street lamp. He prepared himself to go out, and, when
quite ready to leave the house, thrust the weighted package
into the deep pocket of his topcoat. He did not
hurry along the street, as most people were doing at
that hour, but walked with long, slow, deliberate steps, not
seeming to mind the penetrating chill and rain driving into
his face despite the shelter of his umbrella. His dwelling
was not far removed from the business section of the city,
and it was not a great whab before he found
himself at the entrance of the bridge that spanned the river,
the deep, broad, swift, black river dividing two states. He
walked on and out to the very center of the structure.
The wind was blowing fiercely and keenly. The darkness where
he stood was impenetrable. The cells and of lights in
the city he had left seemed like all the stars
of heavens massed together, sinking into some distant, mysterious horizon,
leaving him along in a black, boundless universe. He drew
the package from his pocket, and, leaning as far as
he could over the broad stonn rail of the bridge,
cast it from him into the river. It fell straight
and swiftly from his hand. He could not follow its
descent from the darkness, nor hear its dip into the
water far below, and vanished silently, seemingly into some inky,
unfathomable space. He felt as if he were flinging it
back to her in that unknown world whither she had gone.
An hour or two later, he sat at his table
in the company of several men whom he had invited
that day to dine with him. A secret had settled
upon his spirit, a conviction assertatude that there could be
but one secret which a woman would choose to have
died with her. This one thought was possessing him and
occupied his brain, keeping it nimble and alert with suspicion.
It clutched his heart, making every breath of existence a
fresh moment of pain. The men about him were no
longer the friends of yesterday. In each one he discerned
a possible enemy. He tended absently to their talk. He
was remembering how she had conducted herself toward this one
and that one, striving to recall conversation, subtleties of facial
expressions that might admit what he did not suspect at
the moment, shades of meeting in words that seemed ordinary.
In a change of social amenities, he led the conversation
to the subject of women, probing those men for their
opinions and experiences there was not one, but claimed some
infallible power to command the affections of any woman whom
his fancy might select. He had heard the empty bows
before from the same group, and had always met it
with good humored contempt. But to night every flagrant, inane
utterance was charged with a new meaning, revealing possibilities that
he had hitherto never taken into account. He was glad
when they were gone. He was eager to be alone,
not from any desire or intention to sleep. He was impatient.
Who had gained her room that ruin which she had
lived a large portion of her life, and where he
had found these letters? There must surely be some of
them somewhere, he thought, some forgotten scrap, some written thought
or expression, lying unguarded by an invisible command. At the
hour when he usually retired for the night. He set
himself down before her writing desk and began the search
of drawers, slides, pigeon holes, nooks and corners. He did
not leave a scrap of anything unread. Many of the
letters which he found were old, some he had read before,
others were new to him. But in none did he
find the faintest evidence that his wife had not been
the true and loyal woman he had always believed her
to be. The night was nearly spent before the fruit
of search ended. The brief, troubled sleep which he slashed
before his hour for rising, was freighted with feverish, grotesque dreams,
though all of which he could hear and could see dimly,
the dark river rushing by, carrying away his heart, his ambitions,
his life. But it was not alone in letters that
women betrayed their emotions. He thought often he had known them,
especially when in love, to mark fugitive sentimental passages and
books of verse or prose, thus expressing and revealing their
own hidden thought. Might she not have done this? Then
began a second and far more exhausting and arduous quest
than the first, Turning page by page the volumes that
crowded her room, books of fiction, poetry, philosophy. She had
read them all. But nowhere, by the shadow of a sign,
could he find that the author had echoed the secrets
of her existence, the secret which he had held in
his hands and had cast into the river. He began
cautiously and gradually to question this one and that one,
striving to learn by indirect ways which each had thought
of her. For the most he learned she had been
unsympathetic because of her coldness of manner. One had admired
her intellect, another her accomplishments. A third had thought her
beautiful before disease claimed her, regretting, however, that her beauty
had liked a warmth of color and expression. She was
praised by some for gentleness and kindness, and by others
for cleverness and tact. Oh, it was useless to try
to discover anything from men, he might have known. It
was women who would talk of what they knew. They
did talk unreservedly. Most of them had loved her. Those
who had not had held her in respect and esteem.
And yet, and yet there is but one secret which
a woman would choose to have die with her. Was
the thought which continued to haunt him and deprive him
of rest, days and nights of uncertainty, being slowly to
unnerve him and torture him. An assurance of the worst
that he dreaded would have offered him peace to most welcome,
even at the price of happiness. It seemed no longer
of any moment to him that men should come and
go and fall, or rise in the world, and wed
and die. He did not signify if money came to
him by a turn of chance or eluded him. Empty
and meaningly seemed to him all devices which the world
offers for men's entertainment, the food and the drinks that
before him had lost their flavor. He did not longer
know or care if the sun shone or the clouds
lowered him. A cruel hazard had struck him there where
he was weakest, shattering his whole being, leaving him with
but one wish in his soul, one gnawing desire to
know the mystery which he had held in his hands
and cast into the river. One night, when there was
no star shining, he wandered restlessly upon the streets. He
no longer sought to know from men or women wi
they dared not or could not tell him. Only the
river knew. He went and stood again upon the bridge,
where he had stood many an hour since that night,
when the darkness then had closed around him and engulfed
his manhood. Only the river knew. It babbled, and he
listened to it and told him nothing, But it promised all.
He could hear it, promising him with caressing voice, peace,
in sweet repose. He could hear the sweep, the song
of the water, inviting him a moment more. And he
had gone to seek her, and to join her and
her secret thought, and the immeasurable rest