Page 10 of Sylvia's Marriage

the "woman-problem." She had thought at first that it was going to

  prove a helpful talk--he had been in a fairer mood than she was

  usually able to induce. "He evaded some of my questions," she

  explained, "but I don't think it was deliberate; it is simply the

  evasive attitude of mind which the whole world takes. He says he

  does not think that women are inferior to men, only that they are

  different; the mistake is for them to try to become _like_ men. It

  is the old proposition of 'charm,' you see. I put that to him, and

  he admitted that he did like to be 'charmed.'

  "I said, 'You wouldn't, if you knew as much about the process as I

  do.'

  "'Why not?' he asked.

  "'Because, it's not an honest process. It's not a straight way for

  one sex to deal with the other.'

  "He asked what I meant by that; but then, remembering the cautions

  of my great-aunt, I laughed. 'If you are going to compel me to use

  the process, you can hardly expect me to tell you the secret of it.'

  "'Then there's no use trying to talk,' he said.

  "'Ah, but there is!' I exclaimed. 'You admit that I have

  'charm'--dozens of other men admitted it. And so it ought to count

  for something if I declare that I know it's not an honest

  thing--that it depends upon trickery, and appeals to the worst

  qualities in a man. For instance, his vanity. "Flatter him," Lady

  Dee used to say. "He'll swallow it." And he will--I never knew a man

  to refuse a compliment in my life. His love of domination. "If you

  want anything, make him think that _he_ wants it!" His egotism. She

  had a bitter saying--I can hear the very tones of her voice: "When

  in doubt, talk about HIM." That is what is called "charm"!'

  "'I don't seem to feel it,' he said.

  "' No, because now you are behind the scenes. But when you were in

  front, you felt it, you can't deny. And you would feel it again, any

  time I chose to use it. But I want to know if there is not some

  honest way a woman can interest a man. The question really comes to

  this--Can a man love a woman for what she really is?'

  "'I should say,' he said, 'that it depends upon the woman.'

  "I admitted this was a plausible answer. 'But you loved me, when I

  made myself a mystery to you. But now that I am honest with you, you

  have made it clear that you don't like it, that you won't have it.

  And that is the problem that women have to face. It is a fact that

  the women of our family have always ruled the men; but they've done

  it by indirection--nobody ever thought seriously of "women's rights"

  in Castleman County. But you see, women _have_ rights; and somehow

  or other they will fool the men, or else the men must give up the

  idea that they are the superior sex, and have the right, or the

  ability, to rule women.'

  "Then I saw how little he had followed me. 'There has to be a head

  to the family,' he said.

  "I answered, 'There have been cases in history of a king and queen

  ruling together, and getting along very well. Why not the same thing

  in a family?'

  "'That's all right, so far as the things of the family are

  concerned. But such affairs as business and politics are in the

  sphere of men; and women cannot meddle in them without losing their

  best qualities as women.'

  "And so there we were. I won't repeat his arguments, for doubtless

  you have read enough anti-suffrage literature. The thing I noticed

  was that if I was very tactful and patient, I could apparently carry

  him along with me; but when the matter came up again, I would

  discover that he was back where he had been before. A woman must

  accept the guidance of a man; she must take the man's word for the

  things that he understands. 'But suppose the man is _wrong?_' I

  said; and there we stopped--there we shall stop always, I begin to

  fear. I agree with him that woman should obey man--so long as man is

  right!"

  4. Her letters did not all deal with this problem. In spite of the

  sewing, she found time to read a number of books, and we argued

  about these. Then, too, she had been probing her young doctor, and

  had made interesting discoveries about him. For one thing, he was

  full of awe and admiration for her; and her awakening mind found

  material for speculation in this.

  "Here is this young man; he thinks he is a scientist, he rather

  prides himself upon being cold-blooded; yet a cunning woman could

  twist him round her finger. He had an unhappy love-affair when he

  was young, so he confided to me; and now, in his need and

  loneliness, a beautiful woman is transformed into something

  supernatural in his imagination--she is like a shimmering

  soap-bubble, that he blows with his own breath. I know that I could

  never get him to see the real truth about me; I might tell him that

  I have let myself be tied up in a golden net--but he would only

  marvel at my spirituality. Oh, the women I have seen trading upon

  the credulity of men! And when I think how I did this myself! If men

  were wise, they would give us the vote, and a share in the world's

  work--anything that would bring us out into the light of day, and

  break the spell of mystery that hangs round us!

  "By the way," she wrote in another letter, "there will be trouble if

  you come down here. I was telling Dr. Perrin about you, and your

  ideas about fasting, and mental healing, and the rest of your fads.

  He got very much excited. It seems that he takes his diploma

  seriously, and he's not willing to be taught by amateur experiments.

  He wanted me to take some pills, and I refused, and I think now he

  blames you for it. He has found a bond of sympathy with my husband,

  who proves his respect for authority by taking whatever he is told

  to take. Dr. Perrin got his medical training here in the South, and

  I imagine he's ten or twenty years behind the rest of the medical

  world. Douglas picked him out because he'd met him socially. It

  makes no difference to me--because I don't mean to have any

  doctoring done to me!"

  Then, on top of these things, would come a cry from her soul. "Mary,

  what will you do if some day you get a letter from me confessing

  that I am not happy? I dare not say a word to my own people. I am

  supposed to be at the apex of human triumph, and I have to play that

  role to keep from hurting them. I know that if my dear old father

  got an inkling of the truth, it would kill him. My one real solid

  consolation is that I have helped him, that I have lifted a

  money-burden from his life; I have done that, I tell myself, over

  and over; but then I wonder, have I done anything but put the

  reckoning off? I have given all his other children a new excuse for

  extravagance, an impulse towards worldliness which they did not

  need.

  "There is my sister Celeste, for example. I don't think I have told

  you about her. She made her _d?but_ last fall, and was coming up to

  New York to stay with me this winter. She had it all arranged in her

  mind to make a rich marriage; I was to give her the _entr?e_--and

  no
w I have been selfish, and thought of my own desires, and gone

  away. Can I say to her, Be warned by me, I have made a great match,

  and it has not brought me happiness? She would not understand, she

  would say I was foolish. She would say, 'If I had your luck, _I_

  would be happy.' And the worst of it is, it would be true.

  "You see the position I am in with the rest of the children. I

  cannot say, 'You are spending too much of papa's money, it is wrong

  for you to sign cheques and trust to his carelessness.' I have had

  my share of the money, I have lined my own nest. All I can do is to

  buy dresses and hats for Celeste; and know that she will use these

  to fill her girl-friends with envy, and make scores of other

  families live beyond their means."

  5. Sylvia's pregnancy was moving to its appointed end. She wrote me

  beautifully about it, much more frankly and simply than she could

  have brought herself to talk. She recalled to me my own raptures,

  and also, my own heartbreak. "Mary! Mary! I felt the child to-day!

  Such a sensation, I could not have credited it if anyone had told

  me. I almost fainted. There is something in me that wants to turn

  back, that is afraid to go on with such experiences. I do not wish

  to be seized in spite of myself, and made to feel things beyond my

  control. I wander off down the beach, and hide myself, and cry and

  cry. I think I could almost pray again."

  And then again, "I am in ecstasy, because I am to bear a child, a

  child of my own! Oh, wonderful, wonderful! But suddenly my ecstasy

  is shot through with terror, because the father of this child is a

  man I do not love. There is no use trying to deceive myself--nor

  you! I must have one human soul with whom I can talk about it as it

  really is. I do not love him, I never did love him, I never shall

  love him!

  "Oh, how could they have all been so mistaken? Here is Aunt

  Varina--one of those who helped to persuade me into this marriage.

  She told me that love would come; it seemed to be her idea--my

  mother had it too--that you had only to submit yourself to a man, to

  follow and obey him, and love would take possession of your heart. I

  tried credulously, and it did not happen as they promised. And now,

  I am to bear him a child; and that will bind us together for ever!

  "Oh, the despair of it--I do not love the father of my child! I say,

  The child will be partly his, perhaps more his than mine. It will be

  like him--it will have this quality and that, the very qualities,

  perhaps, that are a source of distress to me in the father. So I

  shall have these things before me day and night, all the rest of my

  life; I shall have to see them growing and hardening; it will be a

  perpetual crucifixion of my mother-love. I seek to comfort myself by

  saying, The child can be trained differently, so that he will not

  have these qualities. But then I think, No, you cannot train him as

  you wish. Your husband will have rights to the child, rights

  superior to your own. Then I foresee the most dreadful strife

  between us.

  "A shrewd girl-friend once told me that I ought to be better or

  worse; I ought not to see people's faults as I do, or else I ought

  to love people less. And I can see that I ought to have been too

  good to make this marriage, or else not too good to make the best of

  it. I know that I might be happy as Mrs. Douglas van Tuiver, if I

  could think of the worldly advantages, and the fact that my child

  will inherit them. But instead, I see them as a trap, in which not

  only ourselves but the child is caught, and from which I cannot save

  us. Oh, what a mistake a woman makes when she marries a man with the

  idea that she is going to change him! He will not change, he will

  not have the need of change suggested to him. He wants _peace_ in

  his home--which means that he wants to be what he is.

  "Sometimes I can study the situation quite coolly, and as if it

  didn't concern me at all. He has required me to subject my mind to

  his. But he will not be content with a general capitulation; he must

  have a surrender from each individual soldier, from every rebel

  hidden in the hills. He tracks them out (my poor, straggling, feeble

  ideas) and either they take the oath of allegiance, or they are

  buried where they lie. The process is like the spoiling of a child,

  I find; the more you give him, the more he wants. And if any little

  thing is refused, then you see him set out upon a regular campaign

  to break you down and get it."

  A month or more later she wrote: "Poor Douglas is getting restless.

  He has caught every kind of fish there is to catch, and hunted every

  kind of animal and bird, in and out of season. Harley has gone home,

  and so have our other guests; it would be embarrassing to me to have

  company now. So Douglas has no one but the doctor and myself and my

  poor aunt. He has spoken several times of our going away; but I do

  not want to go, and I think I ought to consider my own health at

  this critical time. It is hot here, but I simply thrive in it--I

  never felt in better health. So I asked him to go up to New York, or

  visit somewhere for a while, and let me stay here until my baby is

  born. Does that seem so very unreasonable? It does not to me, but

  poor Aunt Varina is in agony about it--I am letting my husband drift

  away from me!

  "I speculate about my lot as a woman; I see the bitterness and the

  sorrow of my sex through the ages. I have become physically

  misshapen, so that I am no longer attractive to him. I am no longer

  active and free, I can no longer go about with him; on the contrary,

  I am a burden, and he is a man who never tolerated a burden before.

  What this means is that I have lost the magic hold of sex.

  "As a woman it was my business to exert all my energies to maintain

  it. And I know how I could restore it now; there is young Dr.

  Perrin! _He_ does not find me a burden, _he_ would tolerate any

  deficiencies! And I can see my husband on the alert in an instant,

  if I become too much absorbed in discussing your health-theories

  with my handsome young guardian!

  "This is one of the recognized methods of keeping your husband; I

  learned from Lady Dee all there is to know about it. But I would

  find the method impossible now, even if my happiness were dependent

  upon retaining my husband's love. I should think of the rights of my

  friend, the little doctor. That is one point to note for the 'new'

  woman, is it not? You may mention it in your next suffrage-speech!

  "There are other methods, of course. I have a mind, and I might turn

  its powers to entertaining him, instead of trying to solve the

  problems of the universe. But to do this, I should have to believe

  that it was the one thing in the world for me to do; and I have

  permitted a doubt of that to gain entrance to my brain! My poor

  aunt's exhortations inspire me to efforts to regain the faith of my

  mothers, but I simply cannot--I cannot! She sits by me with the

  terror of all the women of all the ages in her eyes. I am losing a

/>   man!

  "I don't know if you have ever set out to hold a man--deliberately,

  I mean. Probably you haven't. That bitter maxim of Lady Dee's is the

  literal truth of it--'When in doubt, talk about HIM!' If you will

  tactfully and shrewdly keep a man talking about himself, his tastes,

  his ideas, his work and the importance of it, there is never the

  least possibility of your boring him. You must not just tamely agree

  with him, of course; if you hint a difference now and then, and make

  him convince you, he will find that stimulating; or if you can

  manage not to be quite convinced, but sweetly open to conviction, he

  will surely call again. 'Keep him busy every minute,' Lady Dee used

  to say. 'Run away with him now and then--like a spirited horse!' And

  she would add, 'But don't let him drop the reins!'

  "You can have no idea how many women there are in the world

  deliberately playing such parts. Some of them admit it; others just

  do the thing that is easiest, and would die of horror if they were

  told what it is. It is the whole of the life of a successful society

  woman, young or old. Pleasing a man! Waiting upon his moods, piquing

  him, flattering him, feeding his vanity--'charming' him! That is

  what Aunt Varina wants me to do now; if I am not too crude in my

  description of the process, she has no hesitation in admitting the

  truth. It is what she tried to do, it is what almost every woman has

  done who has held a family together and made a home. I was reading

  _Jane Eyre_ the other day. _There_ is your woman's ideal of an

  imperious and impetuous lover! Listen to him, when his mood is on

  him!--

  "I am disposed to be gregarious and communicative to-night; and that

  is why I sent for you; the fire and the chandelier were not

  sufficient company for me; nor would Pilot have been, for none of

  these can talk. To-night I am resolved to be at ease; to dismiss

  what importunes, and recall what pleases. It would please me now to

  draw you out--to learn more of you--therefore speak!"

  6. It was now May, and Sylvia's time was little more than a month

  off. She had been urging me to come and visit her, but I had

  refused, knowing that my presence must necessarily be disturbing to

  both her husband and her aunt. But now she wrote that her husband

  was going back to New York. "He was staying out of a sense of duty

  to me," she said. "But his discontent was so apparent that I had to

  point out to him that he was doing harm to me as well as to himself.

  "I doubt if you will want to come here now. The last of the winter

  visitors have left. It is really hot, so hot that you cannot get

  cool by going into the water. Yet I am revelling in it; I wear

  almost nothing, and that white; and even the suspicious Dr. Perrin

  cannot but admit that I am thriving; his references to pills are

  purely formal.

  "Lately I have not permitted myself to think much about the

  situation between my husband and myself. I cannot blame him, and I

  cannot blame myself, and I am trying to keep my peace of mind till

  my baby is born. I have found myself following half-instinctively

  the procedure you told me about; I talk to my own subconscious mind,

  and to the baby--I command them to be well. I whisper to them things

  that are not so very far from praying; but I don't think my poor

  dear mamma would recognize it in its new scientific dress!

  "But sometimes I can't help thinking of the child and its future,

  and then all of a sudden my heart is ready to break with pity for

  the child's father! I have the consciousness that I do not love him,

  and that he has always known it--and that makes me remorseful. But I

  told him the truth before we married--he promised to be patient with

  me till I had learned to love him! Now I want to burst into tears

  and cry aloud, 'Oh, why did you do it? Why did I let myself be

  persuaded into this marriage?'

  "I tried to have a talk with him last night, after he had decided to