fiction and short story

[فانوس تنهایی]

سلام دوستان
امیدوارم دلتون پر باشه از خدا
این تاپیک رو زدم که اگه داستان کوتاه انگلیسی با معنی داره اینجا بذاره
تا بیشتر بتونیم انگلیسی رو یاد بگیریم
بازم ممنون

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A group of frogs were traveling through the woods, and two of them fell into a deep pit When the other frogs saw how deep the pit was, they told the two frogs that they were as good as dead The two frogs ignored the comments and tried to jump up out of the pit with all their migh The other frogs kept telling them to stop, that they were as good as dead Finally, one of the frogs took heed to what the other frogs were saying and gave up. He fell down and died The other frog continued to jump as hard as he could. Once again, the crowd of frogs yelled at him to stop the pain and just die He jumped even harder and finally made it out When he got out, the other frogs said, "Did you not hear us?" The frog explained to them that he was deaf. He thought they were encouraging him the entire time.

This story teaches two lessons
There is power of life and death in the tongue An encouraging word to someone who is down can lift them up and help them make it through the day
A destructive word to someone who is down can be what it takes to kill them
So, be careful of what you say





گروهی از قورباغه ها از بیشه ای عبور می کردند . دو قورباغه از بین آنها درون گودال عمیقی افتادند. وقتی دیگر قورباغه ها دیدند که گودال چقدر عمیق است ،به دو قورباغه گفتند آنها دیگر می میرند. دو قورباغه نصایح آنها را نادیده گرفتند و سعی کردند با تمام توانشان از گودال بیرون بپرند. سرانجام یکی از آنها به آنچه دیگر قورباغه ها می گفتند، اعتنا کرد و دست از تلاش برداشت. به زمین افتاد و مرد. قورباغه دیگر به تلاش ادامه داد تا جایی که توان داشت. بار دیگر قورباغه ها سرش فریاد کشیدند که دست از رنج کشیدن بردارد و بمیرد. او سخت تر شروع به پریدن کرد و سرانجام بیرون آمد. وقتی او از آنجا خارج شد. قورباغه های دیگر به او گفتند :آیا صدای ما را نشنیدی؟ قورباغه به آنها توضیح داد که او ناشنوا است.او فکر کرد که قورباغه ها، تمام مدت او را تشویق می کردند.

این داستان دو درس به ما می آموزد:
1- قدرت زندگی و مرگ در زبان است. یک واژه دلگرم کننده به کسی که غمگین است می تواند باعث پیشرفت او شود و کمک کند در طول روز سرزنده باشند.
2- یک واژه مخرب به کسی که غمگین است می تواند موجب مرگ او شود.
پس مراقب آنجه می گویی باش.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Mr Robinson never went to a dentist, because he was afraid:'

but then his teeth began hurting a lot, and he went to a dentist. The dentist did a lot of work in his mouth for a long time. On the last day Mr Robinson said to him, 'How much is all this work going to cost?' The dentist said, 'Twenty-five pounds,' but he did not ask him for the money.

After a month Mr Robinson phoned the dentist and said, 'You haven't asked me for any money for your work last month.'

'Oh,' the dentist answered, 'I never ask a gentleman for money.'

'Then how do you live?' Mr Robinson asked.

'Most gentlemen pay me quickly,' the dentist said, 'but some don't. I wait for my money for two months, and then I say, "That man isn't a gentleman," and then I ask him for my money.





آقاي رابينسون هرگز به دندان‌پزشكي نرفته بود، براي اينكه مي‌ترسيد.
اما بعد دندانش شروع به درد كرد، و به دندان‌پزشكي رفت. دندان‌پزشك بر روي دهان او وقت زيادي گذاشت و كلي كار كرد. در آخرين روز دكتر رابينسون به او گفت: هزينه‌ي تمام اين كارها چقدر مي‌شود؟ دندان‌پزشك گفت: بيست و پنج پوند. اما از او درخواست پول نكرد.

بعد از يك ماه آقاي رابينسون به دندان‌پزشك زنگ زد و گفت: ماه گذشته شما از من تقاضاي هيچ پولي براي كارتان نكرديد.

دندان‌پزشك پاسخ داد: آه، من هرگز از انسان‌هاي نجيب تقاضاي پول نمي‌كنم.

آقاي رابينسون پرسيد: پس چگونه‌ زندگي مي‌كنيد.

دندان‌پزشك گفت: بيشتر انسان‌هاي شريف به سرعت پول مرا مي‌دهند، اما بعضي‌ها نه. من براي پولم دو ماه صبر مي‌كنم، و بعد مي‌گويم «وي مرد شريفي نيست» و بعد از وي پولم را مي‌خواهم.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Mrs Harris lives in a small village. Her husband is dead, but she has one son. He is twenty-one,
and his name is Geoff. He worked in the shop in the village and lived with his mother, but then he got work in a town and went and lived there. Its name was Greensea. It was quite a long way from his mother's village, and she was not happy about this, but Geoff said, 'There isn't any good work for me in the country, Mother, and I can get a lot of money in Greensea and send you some every week.'

Mrs Harris was very angry last Sunday. She got in a train and went to her son's house in Grcensea. Then she said to him, 'Geoff, why do you never phone me?'

Geoff laughed. 'But, Mother,' he said, 'you haven't got a phone.'

'No,' she answered, 'I haven't, but you've got one!'






خانم هريس در روستاي كوچكي زندگي مي‌كند. شوهرش مرده است، اما يك پسر دارد. او (پسرش) بيست و يك ساله است و نامش جف است. او در يك فروشگاه در داخل روستا كار و با مادرش زندگي مي‌كرد، اما پس از آن در شهر كاري به دست آورد و رفت و در آنجا زندگي مي‌كرد. نام آن (شهر) گرين‌سي بود. آنجا كاملا از روستاي مادرش دور بود. و او (مادرش) از اين وضع خوشحال نبود، اما جف مي‌گفت: مادر، در روستا كار خوبي براي من وجود ندارد، و من مي‌توانم پول خوبي در گرين‌سي به دست بياورم و مقداري از آن را هر هفته براي شما بفرستم.

يكشنبه‌ي قبل خانم هريس خيلي عصباني بود. او سوار قطار شد و به سمت خانه‌ي پسرش در گرين‌سي رفت. سپس به او گفت: جف، چرا تو هرگز به من زنگ نمي‌زني؟

جف خنديد و گفت: اما مادر، شما كه تلفن نداريد.

او (مادرش) پاسخ داد: نه، من ندارم، اما تو كه داري!.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Love Story

Where do i begin
To tell the story
Of how great ful love can be
The sweet love story
That is older than the sea
That sings the truth
about the love she brings to me
Where do i start
With the first hello
She gave the meaning
To this empty world of mine
That never did
Another love another time
She came into my life
And made a living fine
She fills my heart
With very special things
With angel songs
With wild imaginings
She fills my soul
With so much love
That anywhere i go
Im never lonely
With her along
who could be lonely
I reach for her hand
Its always there
How long does it last
Can love be measured
by the hours in a day
I have no answers no
But this much i can say
I know ill need her
till this love song burn away
And she;ll be there
How long does it last
Can love be measured
by the hours in a day
I have no answers no
But this much i can say
I know ill need her
till this love song burn away
And she'll be there




از کجا آغاز کنم
برای تعریف این داستان
که یک عشق تا چه حد می تواند عظیم باشد
داستان شیرین عشق
که از دریا نیز قدیمی تر است
که ترانه حقیقت را می خواند
آنچه که او از عشق برایم می آورد
از کجا شروع کنم
با اولین سلام
او منظورش را به من فهماند
در این دنیای پوچ من
تا کنون نبوده ام
درعشقی دیگر و باری دیگر
او به سوی زندگی من آمد
و زندگی خوبی برایم فراهم نمود
او قلبم را فرا می گیرد
با چیزهای بسیار مخصوص خود
با ترانه یک فرشته
با تصوراتی سراسر شوق
او وجودم را فرا می گیرد
با عشقی فراوان
به حدی که به هرجا که می روم
هرگز تنها نیستم
کسی که با او باشد
چگونه می تواند تنها باشد
دستانش را لمس می کنم
هیمشه اینجاست
چه زمانی لازم است
تا بتوان عشقی را اندازه گرفت
با ساعات روز
پاسخی ندارم ، نه
اما بیش از این نمی توانم بگویم
می دانم که به او نیاز خواهم داشت
تا این داستان عشق به سوختنش ادامه می دهد
و او در انجا خواهد بود …
چه زمانی لازم است
تا بتوان عشقی را اندازه گرفت
با ساعات روز
پاسخی ندارم ، نه
اما بیش از این نمی توانم بگویم
می دانم که به او نیاز خواهم داشت
تا این داستان عشق به سوختنش ادامه می دهد
و او در انجا خواهد بود …

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A 45 year old woman had a heart attack and was taken to the hospital. While on the operating table she had a near death experience. Seeing God she asked "Is my time up?" God said, "No, you have another 43 years, 2 months and 8 days to live.
"Upon recovery, the woman decided to stay in the hospital and have a Face-lift, liposuction, breast implants and a tummy tuck. She even had someone come in and change her hair colour and brighten her teeth!
Since she had so much more time to live, she figured she might as well make the most of it. After her last operation, she was released from the hospital.
While crossing the street on her way home, she was killed by an ambulance. Arriving in front of God, she demanded, "I thought you said I had another 43 years? Why didn't you pull me from out of the path of the ambulance?"
God replied: "I didn't recognize you .




یک خانم 45 ساله که یک حملهء قلبی داشت و در بیمارستان بستری بود . در اتاق جراحی که کم مونده بود مرگ را تجربه کند خدا رو دید و پرسید آیا وقت من تمام است؟ خدا گفت:نه شما 43 سال و 2 ماه و 8 روز دیگه عمر می کنید.
در وقت مرخصی خانم تصمیم گرفت در بیمارستان بماند و عملهای زیر را انجام دهد کشیدن پوست صورت-تخلیهء چربیها(لیپو ساکشن)-عمل سینه هاو جمع و جور کردن شکم . او حالا کسی رو نداشت که بیاد و موهاشو رنگ کنه و دندوناشو سفید کنه !!.
از اونجايي كه او زمان بيشتري براي زندگي داشت از اين رو او تصميم گرفت كه بتواند بيشترين استفاده را از اين موقعيت (زندگي) ببرد.بعد از آخرين عملش او از بيمارستان مرخص شد
در وقت گذشتن از خیابان در راه منزل بوسیلهء یک آمبولانس کشته شد . وقتی با خدا روبرو شد او پرسید:: من فکر کردم شما فرمودید من 43 سال دیگه فرصت دارم چرا شما مرا از زیر آمبولانس بیرون نکشیدید؟
خدا جواب داد :من شمارو تشخیص ندادم!!!"

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A 45 year old woman had a heart attack and was taken to the hospital. While on the operating table she had a near death experience. Seeing God she asked "Is my time up?" God said, "No, you have another 43 years, 2 months and 8 days to live.
"Upon recovery, the woman decided to stay in the hospital and have a Face-lift, liposuction, breast implants and a tummy tuck. She even had someone come in and change her hair colour and brighten her teeth!
Since she had so much more time to live, she figured she might as well make the most of it. After her last operation, she was released from the hospital.
While crossing the street on her way home, she was killed by an ambulance. Arriving in front of God, she demanded, "I thought you said I had another 43 years? Why didn't you pull me from out of the path of the ambulance?"
God replied: "I didn't recognize you .




یک خانم 45 ساله که یک حملهء قلبی داشت و در بیمارستان بستری بود . در اتاق جراحی که کم مونده بود مرگ را تجربه کند خدا رو دید و پرسید آیا وقت من تمام است؟ خدا گفت:نه شما 43 سال و 2 ماه و 8 روز دیگه عمر می کنید.
در وقت مرخصی خانم تصمیم گرفت در بیمارستان بماند و عملهای زیر را انجام دهد کشیدن پوست صورت-تخلیهء چربیها(لیپو ساکشن)-عمل سینه هاو جمع و جور کردن شکم . او حالا کسی رو نداشت که بیاد و موهاشو رنگ کنه و دندوناشو سفید کنه !!.
از اونجايي كه او زمان بيشتري براي زندگي داشت از اين رو او تصميم گرفت كه بتواند بيشترين استفاده را از اين موقعيت (زندگي) ببرد.بعد از آخرين عملش او از بيمارستان مرخص شد
در وقت گذشتن از خیابان در راه منزل بوسیلهء یک آمبولانس کشته شد . وقتی با خدا روبرو شد او پرسید:: من فکر کردم شما فرمودید من 43 سال دیگه فرصت دارم چرا شما مرا از زیر آمبولانس بیرون نکشیدید؟
خدا جواب داد :من شمارو تشخیص ندادم!!!"

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Two soldiers were in camp. The first one's name was George, and the second one's name was Bill. George said, 'Have you got a piece of paper and an envelope, Bill?'

Bill said, 'Yes, I have,' and he gave them to him.

Then George said, 'Now I haven't got a pen.' Bill gave him his, and George wrote his letter. Then he put it in the envelope and said, 'Have you got a stamp, Bill?' Bill gave him one.

Then Bill got up and went to the door, so George said to him, 'Are you going out?

Bill said, 'Yes, I am,' and he opened the door.

George said, 'Please put my letter in the box in the office, and ... ' He stopped.

'What do you want now?' Bill said to him.

George looked at the envelope of his letter and answered, 'What's your girl-friend's address?'






دو سرباز در يك پادگان بودند. نام اولي جرج بود، و نام دومي بيل بود. جرج گفت: بيل، يك تيكه كاغذ و يك پاكت نامه داري؟

بيل گفت: بله دارم. و آن‌ها را به وي داد.

سپس جرج گفت: حالا من خودكار ندارم. بيل به وي خودكارش را داد، و جرج نامه‌اش را نوشت. سپس آن را در پاكت گذاشت و گفت: بيل، آيا تمبر داري؟. بيل يك تمبر به او داد.

در آن هنگام بيل بلند شد و به سمت در رفت، بنابراين جرج به او گفت: آيا بيرون مي‌روي؟.

بيل گفت: بله، مي‌روم. و در را باز كرد.

جرج گفت: لطفا نامه‌ي مرا در صندوق پست بياندازيد، و ... . او مكث كرد.

بيل به وي گفت: ديگه چي مي‌خواهي؟

جرج به پاكت نامه‌اش نگاه كرد و گفت: آدرس دوست دخترت چيه؟.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Then the butterfly stopped striving. It seemed that she was exhausted and couldn’t go on trying. The man decided to help the poor creature. He widened the crack by scissors. The butterfly came out of cocoon easily, but her body was tiny and her wings were wrinkled. The ma continued watching the butterfly. He expected to see her wings become expanded to protect her body. But it didn’t happen! As a matter of fact, the butterfly had to crawl on the ground for the rest of her life, for she could never fly. The kind man didn’t realize that God had arranged the limitation of cocoon and also the struggle for butterfly to get out of it, so that a certain fluid could be discharged from her body to enable her to fly afterward. Sometimes struggling is the only thing we need to do. If God had provided us with an easy to live without any difficulties then we become paralyzed, couldn’t become strong and could not fly.


شکاف کوچکی بر روی پیله کرم ابریشمی ظلاهر شد. مردی ساعت ها با دقت به تلاش پروانه برای خارج شدن از پیله نگاه کرد. پروانه دست از تلاش برداشت. به نظر می رسید خسته شده و نمی تواند به تلاش هایش ادامه دهد. او تصمیم گرفت به این مخلوق کوچک کمک کند. با استفاده از قیچی شکاف را پهن تر کرد. پروانه به راحتی از پیله خارج شد ، اما بدنش کوچک و بال هایش چروکیده بود.مرد به پروانه همچنان زل زده بود . انتظار داشت پروانه برای محافظت از بدنش بال هایش را باز کند. اما این طور نشد. در حقیقت پروانه مجبور بود باقی عمرش را روی زمین بخزد، و نمی توانست پرواز کند. مرد مهربان پی نبرد که خدا محدودیت را برای پیله و تلاش برای خروج را برای پروانه بوجود آورده. به این صورت که مایع خاصی از بدنش ترشح می شود که او را قادر به پرواز می کند.بعضی اوقات تلاش و کوشش تنها چیزی است که باید انجام دهیم. اگر خدا آسودگی بدون هیچگونه سختی را برای ما مهیا کرده بود در این صورت فلج می شدیم و نمی توانستیم نیرومند شویم و پرواز کنیم.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A young man who had been raised as an atheist was training to be an Olympic diver. The only religious influence in his life came from his outspoken Christian friend. The young diver never really paid much attention to his friend’s sermons, but he heard them often. One night the diver went to the indoor pool at the college he attended. The lights were all off, but as the pool had big skylights and the moon was bright, there was plenty of light to practice. by The young man climbed up to the highest diving board and as he turned his back to the pool on the edge of the board and extended his arms out, he saw his shadow on the wall. The shadow of his body was in the shape of a cross. Instead of diving, he knelt down and asked God to come into his life. As the young man stood, a maintenance man walked in and turned the lights on. The pool had been drained for repairs



مرد جوانی که بی دین و ملحد تربیت شده بود برای قهرمانی شیرجه المپیک تمرین می کرد. تنها از راه صحبت های دوست مسیحی پرحرفش تحت تاثیر دین بود و هیچ وقت به موعظه هایش گوش نمی داد ولی اغلب آنها را می شنید. در شبی مهتابی به استخر سر پوشیده کالجی که در آن تحصیل می کرد رفت.همه چراغ ها خاموش بودند. اما به خاطر اینکه استخر نور گیر خوبی داشت و در آن شب هم ماه می درخشید نور کافی برای تمرین وجود داشت. مرد جوان به بالا ترین قسمت تخته شیرجه رفت در لبه تخته پشت به استخر ایستاد و دست هایش را باز کرد، سایه اش را بر روی دیوار دید که به شکل صلیب بود. به جای شیرجه زدن، زانو زد و دعا کرد که خدا بخشی از وجودش شود و به اوکمک کند.مرد جوان وقتی برای شیرجه زدن ایستاد، نگهبانی وارد شد و چراغ ها را روشن کرد. استخر برای تعمیرات آبی نداشت.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A young man asked Socrates the secret of success. Socrates told the young man to meet him near the river the next morning. They met. Socrates asked the young man to walk with him into the river. When the water got up to their neck, Socrates took the young man by surprise and swiftly ducked him into the water.
The boy struggled to get out but Socrates was strong and kept him there until the boy started turning blue. Socrates pulled the boy’s head out of the water and the first thing the young man did was to gasp and take a deep breath of air.
Socrates asked him, “what did you want the most when you were there?” The boy replied, “Air”. Socrates said, “That is the secret of success! When you want success as badly as you wanted the air, then you will get it!” There is no other secret


موفقیت و سقراط
مرد جوانی از سقراط رمز موفقیت را پرسید که چیست. سقراط به مرد جوان گفت که صبح روز بعد به نزدیکی رودخانه بیاید. هر دو حاضر شدند. سقراط از مرد جوان خواست که همراه او وارد رودخانه شود. وقتی وارد رودخانه شدند و آب به زیر گردنشان رسید سقراط با زیر آب بردن سر مرد جوان، او را شگفت زده کرد.
مرد تلاش می کرد تا خود را رها کند اما سقراط قوی تر بود و او را تا زمانی که رنگ صورتش کبود شد محکم نگاه داشت. سقراط سر مرد جوان را از آب خارج کرد و اولین کاری که مرد جوان انجام داد کشیدن یک نفس عمیق بود.
سقراط از او پرسید، ” در آن وضعیت تنها چیزی که می خواستی چه بود؟” پسر جواب داد: “هوا”
سقراط گفت:” این راز موفقیت است! اگر همانطور که هوا را می خواستی در جستجوی موفقیت هم باشی بدستش خواهی آورد” رمز دیگری وجود ندارد.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Prescription

Prescription

A woman accompanied her husband to the doctor's office. After the check-up, the doctor took the wife aside and said, "If you don't do the following, your husband will surely die."
"1-Each morning, makes him a healthy breakfast and sends him off to work in a good mood."
"2-At lunchtime, make him a warm, nutritious meal and put him in a good form of mind before he goes back to work."
"3-For dinner, make an especially nice meal and don't burden him with household chores."
At home, the husband asked his wife what the doctor had told her. "You're going to die." She replied.


نسخه

خانمی شوهرش را به مطب دکتر برد. بعد از معاینه؛ دکتر، خانم را به طرفی برد و گفت: اگر شما این کارها را انجام ندهید، به طور حتم شوهرتان خواهد مرد.
1- هر صبح، برایش یک صبحانه ی مقوی درست کنید و با روحیه ی خوب او را به سرکار بفرستید.
2- هنگام ناهار، غذای مغذی و گرم درست کنید و قبل از اینکه به سرکار برود او را در یک محیط خوب مورد توجه قرار بدهید.
3- برای شام، یک غذای خوب و مخصوص درست کنید و او در کارهای خانه كمك نکند.
در خانه، شوهر از همسرش پرسید دکتر به او چه گفت: او (خانم) گفت: شما خواهید مرد.

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

An older gentleman was playing a round of golf. Suddenly his ball sliced and landed in a shallow pond. As he was attempting to retrieve the ball he discovered a frog that, to his great surprise, started to speak! "Kiss me, and I will change into a beautiful princess, and I will be yours for a week." He picked up the frog and placed it in his pocket.

As he continued to play golf, the frog repeated its message. "Kiss me, and I will change into a beautiful princess, and I will be yours for a whole month!" The man continued to play his golf game and once again the frog spoke out. "Kiss me, and I will change into a beautiful princess, and I will be yours for a whole year!" Finally, the old man turned to the frog and exclaimed, "At my age, I’d rather have a talking frog!"



پيرمردي، در حال بازي كردن گلف بود. ناگهان توپش به خارج از زمين و داخل بركه‌ي كم‌آبي رفت. همانطور كه در حال براي پيدا كردن مجدد توپ تلاش مي‌كرد با نهايت تعجب متوجه شد كه يك قورباغه شروع به حرف زدن كرد: مرا ببوس، و من به شاهزاده‌ي زيبا تبديل شوم، و براي يك هفته براي شما خواهم بود. او قورباغه را برداشت و در جيبش گذاشت.

همانطور كه داشت به بازي گلف ادامه مي‌داد، قورباغه همين پيغام را تكرار كرد «مرا ببوس، و من به شاهزاده‌ي زيبا تبديل شوم، و براي يك ماه براي شما خواهم بود». آن مرد همچنان به بازي گلفش ادامه داد و يك بار ديگر قورباغه گفت: مرا ببوس، و من به شاهزاده‌ي زيبا تبديل شوم، و براي يك سال براي شما خواهم بود. سرانجام، پيرمرد رو به قورباغه كرد و بانگ زد:‌ با اين سن، ترجیح مي‌دم يه قورباغه سخنگو داشته باشم.
__________________

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

Destiny

During a momentous battle, a Japanese general decided to attack even though his army was greatly outnumbered. He was confident they would win, but his men were filled with doubt.

On the way to the battle, they stopped at a religious shrine. After praying with the men, the general took out a coin and said, "I shall now toss this coin. If it is heads, we shall win. If it is tails we shall lose."

"Destiny will now reveal itself."

He threw the coin into the air and all watched intently as it landed. It was heads. The soldiers were so overjoyed and filled with confidence that they vigorously attacked the enemy and were victorious.

After the battle. a lieutenant remarked to the general, "No one can change destiny."

"Quite right," the general replied as he showed the lieutenant the coin, which had heads on both sides.





سرنوشت

در طول نبردی مهم و سرنوشت ساز ژنرالی ژاپنی تصمیم گرفت با وجود سربازان بسیار زیادش حمله کند. مطمئن بود که پیروز می شوند اما سربازانش تردید داشتندو دودل بودند.

در مسیر میدان نبرد در معبدی مقدس توقف کردند. بعد از فریضه دعا که همراه سربازانش انجام شد ژنرال سکه ای در آورد و گفت:" سکه را به هوا پرتاب خواهم کرد اگر رو آمد، می بریم اما اگر شیر بیاید شکست خواهیم خورد".

"سرنوشت خود مشخص خواهد کرد".

سکه را به هوا پرتاب کرد و همگی مشتاقانه تماشا کردند تا وقتی که بر روی زمین افتاد. رو بود. سربازان از فرط شادی از خود بی خود شدند و کاملا اطمینان پیدا کردند و با قدرت به دشمن حمله کردند و پیروز شدند.

بعد از جنگ ستوانی به ژنرال گفت: "سرنوشت را نتوان تغییر داد(انتخاب کرد با یک سکه)"

ژنرال در حالی که سکه ای که دو طرف آن رو بود را به ستوان نشان می داد جواب داد:" کاملا حق با شماست".

 

[فانوس تنهایی]

A man called home to his wife and said, "Honey I have been asked to go fishing up in Canada with my boss & several of his Friends.
We'll be gone for a week. This is a good opportunity for me to get that Promotion I'v been wanting, so could you please pack enough Clothes for a week and set out
my rod and fishing box, we're Leaving From the office & I will swing by the house to pick my things up" "Oh! Please pack my new blue silk pajamas."
The wife thinks this sounds a bit fishy but being the good wife she is, did exactly what her husband asked.
The following Weekend he came home a little tired but otherwise looking good.
The wife welcomed him home and asked if he caught many fish?
He said, "Yes! Lots of Salmon, some Bluegill, and a few Swordfish. But why didn't you pack my new blue silk pajamas like I asked you to Do?"
You'll love the answer...
The wife replied, "I did. They're in your fishing box....."





مردی باهمسرش در خانه تماس گرفت و گفت:"عزیزم ازمن خواسته شده که با رئیس و چند تا از دوستانش برای ماهیگیری به کانادابرویم"
ما به مدت یک هفته آنجا خواهیم بود.این فرصت خوبی است تا ارتقائ شغلی که منتظرش بودم بگیرم بنابراین لطفا لباس های کافی برای یک هفته برایم بردار و وسایل ماهیگیری مرا هم آماده کن
ما از اداره حرکت خواهیم کرد و من سر راه وسایلم را از خانه برخواهم داشت ، راستی اون لباس های راحتی ابریشمی آبی رنگم را هم بردار
زن با خودش فکر کرد که این مساله یک کمی غیرطبیعی است اما بخاطر این که نشان دهد همسر خوبی است دقیقا کارهایی را که همسرش خواسته بود انجام داد..
هفته بعد مرد به خانه آمد ، یک کمی خسته به نظر می رسید اما ظاهرش خوب ومرتب بود.
همسرش به او خوش آمد گفت و از او پرسید که آیا او ماهی گرفته است یا نه؟
مرد گفت :"بله تعداد زیادی ماهی قزل آلا،چند تایی ماهی فلس آبی و چند تا هم اره ماهی گرفتیم . اما چرا اون لباس راحتی هایی که گفته بودم برایم نگذاشتی؟"
جواب زن خیلی جالب بود...
زن جواب داد: لباس های راحتی رو توی جعبه وسایل ماهیگیریت گذاشته بودم.

 

[azadeh_arch _eng]

they tell me if u see an slave sleeping dont wake him up let he be dreaming of freedom
itell them if u see a slave sleeping wake up him and explain to him freedom
به من ميگويند اگر برده اي را خفته ديدي بيدارش نكن مبادا در خواب ازادي باشد
به ان ها ميگويم اگر برده اي را خفته ديديد بيدارش كنيد و ازادي را برايش تعريف كنيد

 

[*زهره*]

A Secret for Two by Quentin Reynolds

A Secret for Two by Quentin Reynolds

Montreal is a very large city. Like all large cities, it has small streets. Streets, for example, Like Prince Edward Street-only four blocks long. No one knew Prince Edward Street as well as Pierre Dupin. He had delivered milk to the families on the street for thirty years. For the past fifteen years. a large white horse pulled his milk wagon. In Montreal, especially in the French part of the city, animals and children are often given the names of saints. Pierre's horse had no name when it first came to the milk company. Pierre was told he could use the horse. He moved his hand gently and lovingly across the horse's neck and sides. He looked into the animal's eyes.
"This is a gentle horse," Pierre said. "I can see a beautiful spirit shining out of its eyes. I will name him after Saint Joseph, who also was a gentle and beautiful spirit."

After about a year, the horse, Joseph, got to know every house that received milk, and every house that did not. Every morning at five, Pierre arrived at the milk company's stables to find his wagon already filled with bottles of milk and Joseph waiting for him, Pierre would call, "Bonjour, my old friend," as he climbed into his seat, while Joseph turned his head toward the driver.

The other drivers would smile. They said that the horse smiled at Pierre. Then Pierre would softly call to Joseph, "Avance, mon ami." And the two would go proudly down the street. Without any order from Pierre, the wagon would roll down three streets. Then it turned right for two streets, before turning left to Saint Catherine Street. The horse finally stopped at the first house on Prince Edward Street. There, Joseph would wait perhaps thirty seconds for Pierre to get down off his seat and put a bottle of milk at the front door. Then the horse walked past the next two houses and stopped at the third. And without being told, Joseph would turn around and come back along the other side. Ah yes, Joseph was a smart horse.

Pierre would talk about Joseph. "I never touch the reins. He knows just where to stop. Why, a blind man could deliver my milk with Joseph pulling the wagon."

And so it went on for years-always the same. Pierre and Joseph slowly grew old together. Pierre's huge walrus mustache was white now and Joseph didn't lift his knees so high or raise his head quite so much. Jacques, the bossman of the stables, never noticed that they both were getting old until Pierre appeared one morning carrying a heavy walking stick.

"Hey, Pierre," Jacques laughed. "Maybe you got the gout, hey?"
"Mais oui, Jacques," Pierre said. "One grows old. One's legs get tired."
"Well, you should teach that horse to carry the milk to the front door for you," Jacques told him. "He does everything else."

The horse knew every one of the forty families that got milk on Prince Edward Street. The cooks knew that Pierre could not read or write; so, instead of leaving orders in an empty milk bottle, they simply sang out if they needed an extra bottle. "Bring an extra bottle this morning, Pierre," they often sang when they heard Pierre's wagon rumble over the street.
"So you have visitors for dinner tonight," Pierre would happily answer.
Pierre also had a wonderful memory. When he arrived at the stable he always remembered to tell Jacques, "The Pacquins took an extra bottle this morning; the Lemoines bought a pint of cream..." Most of the drivers had to make out the weekly bills and collect the money, but Jacques, liking Pierre, never asked him to do this. All Pierre had to do was arrive at five in the morning, walk to his wagon, which always was in the same place, and deliver his milk. He returned about two hours later, got down from his seat, called a cheery "Au revoir" to Jacques, then walked slowly down the street.

One day the president of the milk company came to inspect the early morning milk deliveries. Jacques pointed to Pierre and said, "Watch how he talks to that horse. See how the horse listens and how he turns his head toward Pierre? See the look in that horse's eyes? You know, I think those two share a secret. I have often felt it. It's as though they both sometimes laugh at us as they go off Pierre...Pierre is a good man, Monsieur President, but he is getting old. Maybe he ought to be given a rest, and a small pension."
"Oh but of course," the president laughed. 'I know Pierre's work. He has been on this job now for thirty years. All who know him, love him. Tell him it is time he rested. He'll get his pay every week as before."
But Pierre refused to leave his job. He said his life would be nothing if he could not drive Joseph every day. "We are two old men," he said to Jacques. "Let us wear out together. When Joseph is ready to leave, then I too will do so."

There was something about Pierre and his horse that made a man smile tenderly. Each seemed to get some hidden strength from the other. As Pierre sat in his seat, with Joseph tied to the wagon, neither seemed old. But when they finished their work-then Pierre walked lamely down the street, seeming very old indeed, and the horse's head dropped and he walked slowly to his stall.

Then one cold morning Jacques had terrible news for Pierre. It was still dark. The air was like ice. Snow had fallen during the night. Jacques said, "Pierre, your horse, Joseph, didn't wake up. He was very old, Pierre. He was twenty-five and that is like being seventy-five for a man."
"Yes," Pierre said slowly. "Yes. I am seventy-five. And I cannot see Joseph again."
"Oh, of course you can," Jacques said softly. "He is over in his stall, looking very peaceful. Go over and see him."
Pierre took one step forward, then turned. "No... no ... you don't understand, Jacques."

Jacques patted him on he shoulder. "We'll find another horse just as good as Joseph. Why, in a month you'll teach him to know all the homes as well as Joseph did. We'll...." The look in Pierre's eyes stopped him. For years Pierre had worn a large heavy cap that came down low over his eyes. It kept out the bitter cold wind. Now, Jacques looked into Pierre’s eyes and he saw something that shocked him. He saw a dead, Lifeless look in them.
"Take the day off, Pierre," Jacques said But Pierre was gone limping down the street. Pierre walked to the comer and stepped into the street. There was a warning shout from the driver of a big truck. There was the screech of rubber tires as the truck tried to stop. But Pierre... Pierre heard nothing.
Five minutes later a doctor said, "He's dead... kilted instantly."
"I couldn't help it," the truck driver said, "He walked in front of my truck. He ... he never saw it, I guess. Why, he walked as though he were blind."
The doctor bent down. "Blind? Of course the man was blind. See those growths? This man has been blind for five years." He turned to Jacques, "You say he worked for you? Didn't you know he was blind?"
"No ... no .. ." Jacques said softly. "None of us knew. Only one... only one knew--a friend of his, named Joseph ... It was... it was a secret, I think, just between those two."
​

 

[*زهره*]

A Day's Wait by Ernest Hemingway

A Day's Wait by Ernest Hemingway

He came into the room to shut the windows while we were still in bed and I saw he looked ill. He was shivering, his face was white, and he walked slowly as though it ached to move.
'What's the matter, Schatz?'
'I've got a headache.'
'You better go back to bed.'
'No, I'm all right.'
'You go to bed. I'll see you when I'm dressed.'
But when I came downstairs he was dressed, sitting by the fire, looking a very sick and miserable boy of nine years. When I put my hand on his forehead I knew he had a fever.
'You go up to bed,' I said, 'you're sick.'
'I'm all right,' he said.
When the doctor came he took the boy's temperature.
'What is it?' I asked him.
'One hundred and two.'
Downstairs, the doctor left three different medicines in different colored capsules with instructions for giving them. One was to bring down the fever, another a purgative, the third to overcome an acid condition. The germs of influenza can only exist in an acid condition, he explained. He seemed to know all about influenza and said there was nothing to worry about if the fever did not go above one hundred and four degrees. This was a light epidemic of flu and there was no danger if you avoided pneumonia.
Back in the room I wrote the boy's temperature down and made a note of the time to give the various capsules.
'Do you want me to read to you?'
'All right. If you want to,' said the boy. His face was very white and there were dark areas under his eyes. He lay still in bed and seemed very detached from what was going on.
I read aloud from Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates; but I could see he was not following what I was reading.
'How do you feel, Schatz?' I asked him.
'Just the same, so far,' he said.
I sat at the foot of the bed and read to myself while I waited for it to be time to give another capsule. It would have been natural for him to go to sleep, but when I looked up he was looking at the foot of the bed, looking very strangely.
'Why don't you try to go to sleep? I'll wake you up for the medicine.'
'I'd rather stay awake.'
After a while he said to me, 'You don't have to stay here with me, Papa, if it bothers you.'
'It doesn't bother me.'
'No, I mean you don't have to stay if it's going to bother you.'
I thought perhaps he was a little light-headed and after giving him the prescribed capsule at eleven o'clock I went out for a while.
It was a bright, cold day, the ground covered with a sleet that had frozen so that it seemed as if all the bare trees, the bushes, the cut brush and all the grass and the bare ground had been varnished with ice. I took the young Irish setter for a little walk up the road and along a frozen creek, but it was difficult to stand or walk on the glassy surface and the red dog slipped and slithered and fell twice, hard, once dropping my gun and having it slide over the ice.
We flushed a covey of quail under a high clay bank with overhanging brush and killed two as they went out of sight over the top of the bank. Some of the covey lit the trees, but most of them scattered into brush piles and it was necessary to jump on the ice-coated mounds of brush several times before they would flush. Coming out while you were poised unsteadily on the icy, springy brush they made difficult shooting and killed two, missed five, and started back pleased to have found a covey close to the house and happy there were so many left to find on another day.
At the house they said the boy had refused to let anyone come into the room.
'You can't come in,' he said. 'You mustn't get what I have.'
I went up to him and found him in exactly the position I had left him, white-faced, but with the tops of his cheeks flushed by the fever, staring still, as he had stared, at the foot of the bed.
I took his temperature.
'What is it?'
'Something like a hundred,' I said. It was one hundred and two and four tenth.
'It was a hundred and two,' he said.
'Who said so?'
'The doctor.'
'Your temperature is all right,' I said. It's nothing to worry about.'
'I don't worry,' he said, 'but I can't keep from thinking.'
'Don't think,' I said. 'Just take it easy.'
'I'm taking it easy,' he said and looked straight ahead. He was evidently holding tight onto himself about something.
'Take this with water.'
'Do you think it will do any good?'
'Of course it will.'
I sat down and opened the Pirate book and commenced to read, but I could see he was not following, so I stopped.
'About what time do you think I'm going to die?' he asked.
'What?'
'About how long will it be before I die?'
'You aren't going to die. What's the matter with you?'
Oh, yes, I am. I heard him say a hundred and two.'
'People don't die with a fever of one hundred and two. That's a silly way to talk.'
'I know they do. At school in France the boys told me you can't live with forty-four degrees. I've got a hundred and two.'
He had been waiting to die all day, ever since nine o'clock in the morning.
'You poor Schatz,' I said. 'Poor old Schatz. It's like miles and kilometers. You aren't going to die. That's a different thermometer. On that thermometer thirty-seven is normal. On this kind it's ninety-eight.'
'Are you sure?'
'Absolutely,' I said. 'It's like miles and kilometers. You know, like how many kilometers we make when we do seventy in the car?'
'Oh,' he said.
But his gaze at the foot of his bed relaxed slowly. The hold over himself relaxed too, finally, and the next day it was very slack and he cried very easily at little things that were of no importance.
​

 

[*زهره*]

Hills Like White Elephants By Ernest Hemingway

Hills Like White Elephants By Ernest Hemingway

The hills across the valley of the Ebro were long and white. On this siode there was no shade and no trees and the station was between two lines of rails in the sun. Close against the side of the station there was the warm shadow of the building and a curtain, made of strings of bamboo beads, hung across the open door into the bar, to keep out flies. The American and the girl with him sat at a table in the shade, outside the building. It was very hot and the express from Barcelona would come in forty minutes. It stopped at this junction for two minutes and went to Madrid.'What should we drink?' the girl asked. She had taken off her hat and put it on the table.

'It's pretty hot,' the man said.
'Let's drink beer.'
'Dos cervezas,' the man said into the curtain.
'Big ones?' a woman asked from the doorway.
'Yes. Two big ones.'
The woman brought two glasses of beer and two felt pads. She put the felt pads and the beer glass on the table and looked at the man and the girl. The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in the sun and the country was brown and dry.
'They look like white elephants,' she said.
'I've never seen one,' the man drank his beer.
'No, you wouldn't have.'
'I might have,' the man said. 'Just because you say I wouldn't have doesn't prove anything.'
The girl looked at the bead curtain. 'They've painted something on it,' she said. 'What does it say?'
'Anis del Toro. It's a drink.'
'Could we try it?'
The man called 'Listen' through the curtain. The woman came out from the bar.
'Four reales.' 'We want two Anis del Toro.'
'With water?'
'Do you want it with water?'
'I don't know,' the girl said. 'Is it good with water?'
'It's all right.'
'You want them with water?' asked the woman.
'Yes, with water.'
'It tastes like liquorice,' the girl said and put the glass down.
'That's the way with everything.'
'Yes,' said the girl. 'Everything tastes of liquorice. Especially all the things you've waited so long for, like absinthe.'
'Oh, cut it out.'
'You started it,' the girl said. 'I was being amused. I was having a fine time.'
'Well, let's try and have a fine time.'
'All right. I was trying. I said the mountains looked like white elephants. Wasn't that bright?'
'That was bright.'
'I wanted to try this new drink. That's all we do, isn't it - look at things and try new drinks?'
'I guess so.'
The girl looked across at the hills.
'They're lovely hills,' she said. 'They don't really look like white elephants. I just meant the colouring of their skin through the trees.'
'Should we have another drink?'
'All right.'
The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.
'The beer's nice and cool,' the man said.
'It's lovely,' the girl said.
'It's really an awfully simple operation, Jig,' the man said. 'It's not really an operation at all.'
The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.
'I know you wouldn't mind it, Jig. It's really not anything. It's just to let the air in.'
The girl did not say anything.
'I'll go with you and I'll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in and then it's all perfectly natural.'
'Then what will we do afterwards?'
'We'll be fine afterwards. Just like we were before.'
'What makes you think so?'
'That's the only thing that bothers us. It's the only thing that's made us unhappy.'
The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of two of the strings of beads.
'And you think then we'll be all right and be happy.'
'I know we will. Yon don't have to be afraid. I've known lots of people that have done it.'
'So have I,' said the girl. 'And afterwards they were all so happy.'
'Well,' the man said, 'if you don't want to you don't have to. I wouldn't have you do it if you didn't want to. But I know it's perfectly simple.'
'And you really want to?'
'I think it's the best thing to do. But I don't want you to do it if you don't really want to.'
'And if I do it you'll be happy and things will be like they were and you'll love me?'
'I love you now. You know I love you.'
'I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you'll like it?'
'I'll love it. I love it now but I just can't think about it. You know how I get when I worry.'
'If I do it you won't ever worry?'
'I won't worry about that because it's perfectly simple.'
'Then I'll do it. Because I don't care about me.'
'What do you mean?'
'I don't care about me.'
'Well, I care about you.'
'Oh, yes. But I don't care about me. And I'll do it and then everything will be fine.'
'I don't want you to do it if you feel that way.'
The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station. Across, on the other side, were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains. The shadow of a cloud moved across the field of grain and she saw the river through the trees.
'And we could have all this,' she said. 'And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible.'
'What did you say?'
'I said we could have everything.'
'No, we can't.'
'We can have the whole world.'
'No, we can't.'
'We can go everywhere.'
'No, we can't. It isn't ours any more.'
'It's ours.'
'No, it isn't. And once they take it away, you never get it back.'
'But they haven't taken it away.'
'We'll wait and see.'
'Come on back in the shade,' he said. 'You mustn't feel that way.'
'I don't feel any way,' the girl said. 'I just know things.'
'I don't want you to do anything that you don't want to do -'
'Nor that isn't good for me,' she said. 'I know. Could we have another beer?'
'All right. But you've got to realize - '
'I realize,' the girl said. 'Can't we maybe stop talking?'
They sat down at the table and the girl looked across at the hills on the dry side of the valley and the man looked at her and at the table.
'You've got to realize,' he said, ' that I don't want you to do it if you don't want to. I'm perfectly willing to go through with it if it means anything to you.'
'Doesn't it mean anything to you? We could get along.'
'Of course it does. But I don't want anybody but you. I don't want anyone else. And I know it's perfectly simple.'
'Yes, you know it's perfectly simple.'
'It's all right for you to say that, but I do know it.'
'Would you do something for me now?'
'I'd do anything for you.'
'Would you please please please please please please please stop talking?'
He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had spent nights.
'But I don't want you to,' he said, 'I don't care anything about it.'
'I'll scream,' the girl siad.
The woman came out through the curtains with two glasses of beer and put them down on the damp felt pads. 'The train comes in five minutes,' she said.
'What did she say?' asked the girl.
'That the train is coming in five minutes.'
The girl smiled brightly at the woman, to thank her.
'I'd better take the bags over to the other side of the station,' the man said. She smiled at him.
'All right. Then come back and we'll finish the beer.'
He picked up the two heavy bags and carried them around the station to the other tracks. He looked up the tracks but could not see the train. Coming back, he walked through the bar-room, where people waiting for the train were drinking. He drank an Anis at the bar and looked at the people. They were all waiting reasonably for the train. He went out through the bead curtain. She was sitting at the table and smiled at him.
'Do you feel better?' he asked.
'I feel fine,' she said. 'There's nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.' ​

 

[*زهره*]

The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane

The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane

The great Pullman was whirling onward with such dignity of motion that a glance from the window seemed simply to prove that the plains of Texas were pouring eastward. Vast flats of green grass, dull-hued spaces of mesquite and cactus, little groups of frame houses, woods of light and tender trees, all were sweeping into the east, sweeping over the horizon, a precipice.
A newly married pair had boarded this coach at San Antonio. The man's face was reddened from many days in the wind and sun, and a direct result of his new black clothes was that his brick-colored hands were constantly performing in a most conscious fashion. From time to time he looked down respectfully at his attire. He sat with a hand on each knee, like a man waiting in a barber's shop. The glances he devoted to other passengers were furtive and shy.
The bride was not pretty, nor was she very young. She wore a dress of blue cashmere, with small reservations of velvet here and there and with steel buttons abounding. She continually twisted her head to regard her puff sleeves, very stiff, straight, and high. They embarrassed her. It was quite apparent that she had cooked, and that she expected to cook, dutifully. The blushes caused by the careless scrutiny of some passengers as she had entered the car were strange to see upon this plain, under-class countenance, which was drawn in placid, almost emotionless lines.
.
"No," she answered, "I never was. It's fine, ain't it?"
"Great! And then after a while we'll go forward to the diner and get a big layout. Finest meal in the world. Charge a dollar."
"Oh, do they?" cried the bride. "Charge a dollar? Why, that's too much -- for us -- ain't it, Jack?"
"Not this trip, anyhow," he answered bravely. "We're going to go the whole thing."
Later, he explained to her about the trains. "You see, it's a thousand miles from one end of Texas to the other, and this train runs right across it and never stops but four times." He had the pride of an owner. He pointed out to her the dazzling fittings of the coach, and in truth her eyes opened wider as she contemplated the sea-green figured velvet, the shining brass, silver, and glass, the wood that gleamed as darkly brilliant as the surface of a pool of oil. At one end a bronze figure sturdily held a support for a separated chamber, and at convenient places on the ceiling were frescoes in olive and silver.
To the minds of the pair, their surroundings reflected the glory of their marriage that morning in San Antonio. This was the environment of their new estate, and the man's face in particular beamed with an elation that made him appear ridiculous to the negro porter. This individual at times surveyed them from afar with an amused and superior grin. On other occasions he bullied them with skill in ways that did not make it exactly plain to them that they were being bullied. He subtly used all the manners of the most unconquerable kind of snobbery. He oppressed them, but of this oppression they had small knowledge, and they speedily forgot that infrequently a number of travelers covered them with stares of derisive enjoyment. Historically there was supposed to be something infinitely humorous in their situation.
.
"We are due in Yellow Sky at 3:42," he said, looking tenderly into her eyes.
"Oh, are we?" she said, as if she had not been aware of it. To evince surprise at her husband's statement was part of her wifely amiability. She took from a pocket a little silver watch, and as she held it before her and stared at it with a frown of attention, the new husband's face shone.
"I bought it in San Anton' from a friend of mine," he told her gleefully.
"It's seventeen minutes past twelve," she said, looking up at him with a kind of shy and clumsy coquetry. A passenger, noting this play, grew excessively sardonic, and winked at himself in one of the numerous mirrors.
At last they went to the dining-car. Two rows of negro waiters, in glowing white suits, surveyed their entrance with the interest and also the equanimity of men who had been forewarned. The pair fell to the lot of a waiter who happened to feel pleasure in steering them through their meal. He viewed them with the manner of a fatherly pilot, his countenance radiant with benevolence. The patronage, entwined with the ordinary deference, was not plain to them. And yet, as they returned to their coach, they showed in their faces a sense of escape.
To the left, miles down a long purple slope, was a little ribbon of mist where moved the keening Rio Grande. The train was approaching it at an angle, and the apex was Yellow Sky. Presently it was apparent that, as the distance from Yellow Sky grew shorter, the husband became commensurately restless. His brick-red hands were more insistent in their prominence. Occasionally he was even rather absent-minded and far-away when the bride leaned forward and addressed him.
As a matter of truth, Jack Potter was beginning to find the shadow of a deed weigh upon him like a leaden slab. He, the town marshal of Yellow Sky, a man known, liked, and feared in his corner, a prominent person, had gone to San Antonio to meet a girl he believed he loved, and there, after the usual prayers, had actually induced her to marry him, without consulting Yellow Sky for any part of the transaction. He was now bringing his bride before an innocent and unsuspecting community.
Of course, people in Yellow Sky married as it pleased them, in accordance with a general custom; but such was Potter's thought of his duty to his friends, or of their idea of his duty, or of an unspoken form which does not control men in these matters, that he felt he was heinous. He had committed an extraordinary crime. Face to face with this girl in San Antonio, and spurred by his sharp impulse, he had gone headlong over all the social hedges. At San Antonio he was like a man hidden in the dark. A knife to sever any friendly duty, any form, was easy to his hand in that remote city. But the hour of Yellow Sky, the hour of daylight, was approaching.
He knew full well that his marriage was an important thing to his town. It could only be exceeded by the burning of the new hotel. His friends could not forgive him. Frequently he had reflected on the advisability of telling them by telegraph, but a new cowardice had been upon him.
He feared to do it. And now the train was hurrying him toward a scene of amazement, glee, and reproach. He glanced out of the window at the line of haze swinging slowly in towards the train.
Yellow Sky had a kind of brass band, which played painfully, to the delight of the populace. He laughed without heart as he thought of it. If the citizens could dream of his prospective arrival with his bride, they would parade the band at the station and escort them, amid cheers and laughing congratulations, to his adobe home.
He resolved that he would use all the devices of speed and plains-craft in making the journey from the station to his house. Once within that safe citadel he could issue some sort of a vocal bulletin, and then not go among the citizens until they had time to wear off a little of their enthusiasm.
The bride looked anxiously at him. "What's worrying you, Jack?"
He laughed again. "I'm not worrying, girl. I'm only thinking of Yellow Sky."
She flushed in comprehension.
A sense of mutual guilt invaded their minds and developed a finer tenderness. They looked at each other with eyes softly aglow. But Potter often laughed the same nervous laugh. The flush upon the bride's face seemed quite permanent.
The traitor to the feelings of Yellow Sky narrowly watched the speeding landscape. "We're nearly there," he said.
Presently the porter came and announced the proximity of Potter's home. He held a brush in his hand and, with all his airy superiority gone, he brushed Potter's new clothes as the latter slowly turned this way and that way. Potter fumbled out a coin and gave it to the porter, as he had seen others do. It was a heavy and muscle-bound business, as that of a man shoeing his first horse.
The porter took their bag, and as the train began to slow they moved forward to the hooded platform of the car. Presently the two engines and their long string of coaches rushed into the station of Yellow Sky.
"They have to take water here," said Potter, from a constricted throat and in mournful cadence, as one announcing death. Before the train stopped, his eye had swept the length of the platform, and he was glad and astonished to see there was none upon it but the station-agent, who, with a slightly hurried and anxious air, was walking toward the water-tanks. When the train had halted, the porter alighted first and placed in position a little temporary step.
"Come on, girl," said Potter hoarsely. As he helped her down they each laughed on a false note. He took the bag from the negro, and bade his wife cling to his arm. As they slunk rapidly away, his hang-dog glance perceived that they were unloading the two trunks, and also that the station-agent far ahead near the baggage-car had turned and was running toward him, making gestures. He laughed, and groaned as he laughed, when he noted the first effect of his marital bliss upon Yellow Sky. He gripped his wife's arm firmly to his side, and they fled. Behind them the porter stood chuckling fatuously.
II
THE California Express on the Southern Railway was due at Yellow Sky in twenty-one minutes. There were six men at the bar of the "Weary Gentleman" saloon. One was a drummer who talked a great deal and rapidly; three were Texans who did not care to talk at that time; and two were Mexican sheep-herders who did not talk as a general practice in the "Weary Gentleman" saloon. The barkeeper's dog lay on the board walk that crossed in front of the door. His head was on his paws, and he glanced drowsily here and there with the constant vigilance of a dog that is kicked on occasion. Across the sandy street were some vivid green grass plots, so wonderful in appearance amid the sands that burned near them in a blazing sun that they caused a doubt in the mind. They exactly resembled the grass mats used to represent lawns on the stage. At the cooler end of the railway station a man without a coat sat in a tilted chair and smoked his pipe. The fresh-cut bank of the Rio Grande circled near the town, and there could be seen beyond it a great, plum-colored plain of mesquite.
Save for the busy drummer and his companions in the saloon, Yellow Sky was dozing. The new-comer leaned gracefully upon the bar, and recited many tales with the confidence of a bard who has come upon a new field.
" -- and at the moment that the old man fell down stairs with the bureau in his arms, the old woman was coming up with two scuttles of coal, and, of course -- "
The drummer's tale was interrupted by a young man who suddenly appeared in the open door. He cried: "Scratchy Wilson's drunk, and has turned loose with both hands." The two Mexicans at once set down their glasses and faded out of the rear entrance of the saloon.
The drummer, innocent and jocular, answered: "All right, old man. S'pose he has. Come in and have a drink, anyhow."
But the information had made such an obvious cleft in every skull in the room that the drummer was obliged to see its importance. All had become instantly solemn. "Say," said he, mystified, "what is this?" His three companions made the introductory gesture of eloquent speech, but the young man at the door forestalled them.
"It means, my friend," he answered, as he came into the saloon, "that for the next two hours this town won't be a health resort."
The barkeeper went to the door and locked and barred it. Reaching out of the window, he pulled in heavy wooden shutters and barred them. Immediately a solemn, chapel-like gloom was upon the place. The drummer was looking from one to another.
"But, say," he cried, "what is this, anyhow? You don't mean there is going to be a gun-fight?"
"Don't know whether there'll be a fight or not," answered one man grimly. "But there'll be some shootin' -- some good shootin'."

​

continued below

​

 

[*زهره*]

The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane

The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky by Stephen Crane

The young man who had warned them waved his hand. "Oh, there'll be a fight fast enough if anyone wants it. Anybody can get a fight out there in the street. There's a fight just waiting."
The drummer seemed to be swayed between the interest of a foreigner and a perception of personal danger.
"What did you say his name was?" he asked.
"Scratchy Wilson," they answered in chorus.
"And will he kill anybody? What are you going to do? Does this happen often? Does he rampage around like this once a week or so? Can he break in that door?"
"No, he can't break down that door," replied the barkeeper. "He's tried it three times. But when he comes you'd better lay down on the floor, stranger. He's dead sure to shoot at it, and a bullet may come through."
Thereafter the drummer kept a strict eye upon the door. The time had not yet been called for him to hug the floor, but, as a minor precaution, he sidled near to the wall. "Will he kill anybody?" he said again.
The men laughed low and scornfully at the question.
"He's out to shoot, and he's out for trouble. Don't see any good in experimentin' with him."
"But what do you do in a case like this? What do you do?"
A man responded: "Why, he and Jack Potter -- "
"But," in chorus, the other men interrupted, "Jack Potter's in San Anton'."
"Well, who is he? What's he got to do with it?"
"Oh, he's the town marshal. He goes out and fights Scratchy when he gets on one of these tears."
"Wow," said the drummer, mopping his brow. "Nice job he's got
The voices had toned away to mere whisperings. The drummer wished to ask further questions which were born of an increasing anxiety and bewilderment; but when he attempted them, the men merely looked at him in irritation and motioned him to remain silent. A tense waiting hush was upon them. In the deep shadows of the room their eyes shone as they listened for sounds from the street. One man made three gestures at the barkeeper, and the latter, moving like a ghost, handed him a glass and a bottle. The man poured a full glass of whisky, and set down the bottle noiselessly. He gulped the whisky in a swallow, and turned again toward the door in immovable silence. The drummer saw that the barkeeper, without a sound, had taken a Winchester from beneath the bar. Later he saw this individual beckoning to him, so he tiptoed across the room.
"You better come with me back of the bar."
"No, thanks," said the drummer, perspiring. "I'd rather be where I can make a break for the back door."
Whereupon the man of bottles made a kindly but peremptory gesture. The drummer obeyed it, and finding himself seated on a box with his head below the level of the bar, balm was laid upon his soul at sight of various zinc and copper fittings that bore a resemblance to armor-plate. The barkeeper took a seat comfortably upon an adjacent box.
"You see," he whispered, "this here Scratchy Wilson is a wonder with a gun -- a perfect wonder -- and when he goes on the war trail, we hunt our holes -- naturally. He's about the last one of the old gang that used to hang out along the river here. He's a terror when he's drunk. When he's sober he's all right -- kind of simple -- wouldn't hurt a fly -- nicest fellow in town. But when he's drunk -- whoo!"
There were periods of stillness. "I wish Jack Potter was back from San Anton'," said the barkeeper. "He shot Wilson up once -- in the leg -- and he would sail in and pull out the kinks in this thing."
Presently they heard from a distance the sound of a shot, followed by three wild yowls. It instantly removed a bond from the men in the darkened saloon. There was a shuffling of feet. They looked at each other. "Here he comes," they said.
III
A MAN in a maroon-colored flannel shirt, which had been purchased for purposes of decoration and made, principally, by some Jewish women on the east side of New York, rounded a corner and walked into the middle of the main street of Yellow Sky. In either hand the man held a long, heavy, blue-black revolver. Often he yelled, and these cries rang through a semblance of a deserted village, shrilly flying over the roofs in a volume that seemed to have no relation to the ordinary vocal strength of a man. It was as if the surrounding stillness formed the arch of a tomb over him. These cries of ferocious challenge rang against walls of silence. And his boots had red tops with gilded imprints, of the kind beloved in winter by little sledding boys on the hillsides of New England.
The man's face flamed in a rage begot of whisky. His eyes, rolling and yet keen for ambush, hunted the still doorways and windows. He walked with the creeping movement of the midnight cat. As it occurred to him, he roared menacing information. The long revolvers in his hands were as easy as straws; they were moved with an electric swiftness. The little fingers of each hand played sometimes in a musician's way. Plain from the low collar of the shirt, the cords of his neck straightened and sank, straightened and sank, as passion moved him. The only sounds were his terrible invitations. The calm adobes preserved their demeanor at the passing of this small thing in the middle of the street.
There was no offer of fight; no offer of fight. The man called to the sky. There were no attractions. He bellowed and fumed and swayed his revolvers here and everywhere.
The dog of the barkeeper of the "Weary Gentleman" saloon had not appreciated the advance of events. He yet lay dozing in front of his master's door. At sight of the dog, the man paused and raised his revolver humorously. At sight of the man, the dog sprang up and walked diagonally away, with a sullen head, and growling. The man yelled, and the dog broke into a gallop. As it was about to enter an alley, there was a loud noise, a whistling, and something spat the ground directly before it. The dog screamed, and, wheeling in terror, galloped headlong in a new direction. Again there was a noise, a whistling, and sand was kicked viciously before it. Fear-stricken, the dog turned and flurried like an animal in a pen. The man stood laughing, his weapons at his hips.
Ultimately the man was attracted by the closed door of the "Weary Gentleman" saloon. He went to it, and hammering with a revolver, demanded drink.
The door remaining imperturbable, he picked a bit of paper from the walk and nailed it to the framework with a knife. He then turned his back contemptuously upon this popular resort, and walking to the opposite side of the street, and spinning there on his heel quickly and lithely, fired at the bit of paper. He missed it by a half inch. He swore at himself, and went away. Later, he comfortably fusilladed the windows of his most intimate friend. The man was playing with this town. It was a toy for him.
But still there was no offer of fight. The name of Jack Potter, his ancient antagonist, entered his mind, and he concluded that it would be a glad thing if he should go to Potter's house and by bombardment induce him to come out and fight. He moved in the direction of his desire, chanting Apache scalp-music.
When he arrived at it, Potter's house presented the same still front as had the other adobes. Taking up a strategic position, the man howled a challenge. But this house regarded him as might a great stone god. It gave no sign. After a decent wait, the man howled further challenges, mingling with them wonderful epithets.
Presently there came the spectacle of a man churning himself into deepest rage over the immobility of a house. He fumed at it as the winter wind attacks a prairie cabin in the North. To the distance there should have gone the sound of a tumult like the fighting of 200 Mexicans. As necessity bade him, he paused for breath or to reload his revolvers.
IV
POTTER and his bride walked sheepishly and with speed. Sometimes they laughed together shamefacedly and low.
"Next corner, dear," he said finally.
They put forth the efforts of a pair walking bowed against a strong wind. Potter was about to raise a finger to point the first appearance of the new home when, as they circled the corner, they came face to face with a man in a maroon-colored shirt who was feverishly pushing cartridges into a large revolver. Upon the instant the man dropped his revolver to the ground, and, like lightning, whipped another from its holster. The second weapon was aimed at the bridegroom's chest.
There was silence. Potter's mouth seemed to be merely a grave for his tongue. He exhibited an instinct to at once loosen his arm from the woman's grip, and he dropped the bag to the sand. As for the bride, her face had gone as yellow as old cloth. She was a slave to hideous rites gazing at the apparitional snake.
The two men faced each other at a distance of three paces. He of the revolver smiled with a new and quiet ferocity.
"Tried to sneak up on me," he said. "Tried to sneak up on me!" His eyes grew more baleful. As Potter made a slight movement, the man thrust his revolver venomously forward. "No, don't you do it, Jack Potter. Don't you move a finger toward a gun just yet. Don't you move an eyelash. The time has come for me to settle with you, and I'm goin' to do it my own way and loaf along with no interferin'. So if you don't want a gun bent on you, just mind what I tell you."
Potter looked at his enemy. "I ain't got a gun on me, Scratchy," he said. "Honest, I ain't." He was stiffening and steadying, but yet somewhere at the back of his mind a vision of the Pullman floated, the sea-green figured velvet, the shining brass, silver, and glass, the wood that gleamed as darkly brilliant as the surface of a pool of oil -- all the glory of the marriage, the environment of the new estate. "You know I fight when it comes to fighting, Scratchy Wilson, but I ain't got a gun on me. You'll have to do all the shootin' yourself."
His enemy's face went livid. He stepped forward and lashed his weapon to and fro before Potter's chest. "Don't you tell me you ain't got no gun on you, you whelp. Don't tell me no lie like that. There ain't a man in Texas ever seen you without no gun. Don't take me for no kid." His eyes blazed with light, and his throat worked like a pump.
"I ain't takin' you for no kid," answered Potter. His heels had not moved an inch backward. "I'm takin' you for a -- -- -- fool. I tell you I ain't got a gun, and I ain't. If you're goin' to shoot me up, you better begin now. You'll never get a chance like this again."
So much enforced reasoning had told on Wilson's rage. He was calmer. "If you ain't got a gun, why ain't you got a gun?" he sneered. "Been to Sunday-school?"
"I ain't got a gun because I've just come from San Anton' with my wife. I'm married," said Potter. "And if I'd thought there was going to be any galoots like you prowling around when I brought my wife home, I'd had a gun, and don't you forget it."
"Married!" said Scratchy, not at all comprehending.
"Yes, married. I'm married," said Potter distinctly.
"Married?" said Scratchy. Seemingly for the first time he saw the drooping, drowning woman at the other man's side. "No!" he said. He was like a creature allowed a glimpse of another world. He moved a pace backward, and his arm with the revolver dropped to his side. "Is this the lady?" he asked.
"Yes, this is the lady," answered Potter.
There was another period of silence.
"Well," said Wilson at last, slowly, "I s'pose it's all off now."
"It's all off if you say so, Scratchy. You know I didn't make the trouble." Potter lifted his valise.

"Well, I 'low it's off, Jack," said Wilson. He was looking at the ground. "Married!" He was not a student of chivalry; it was merely that in the presence of this foreign condition he was a simple child of the earlier plains. He picked up his starboard revolver, and placing both weapons in their holsters, he went away. His feet made funnel-shaped tracks in the heavy sand​

 

[*زهره*]

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

And after all the weather was ideal. They could not have had a more perfect day for a garden-party if they had ordered it. Windless, warm, the sky without a cloud. Only the blue was veiled with a haze of light gold, as it is sometimes in early summer. The gardener had been up since dawn, mowing the lawns and sweeping them, until the grass and the dark flat rosettes where the daisy plants had been seemed to shine. As for the roses, you could not help feeling they understood that roses are the only flowers that impress people at garden- parties; the only flowers that everybody is certain of knowing. Hundreds, yes, literally hundreds, had come out in a single night; the green bushes bowed down as though they had been visited by archangels.
Breakfast was not yet over before the men came to put up the marquee.
"Where do you want the marquee put, mother?"
"My dear child, it's no use asking me. I'm determined to leave everything to you children this year. Forget I am your mother. Treat me as an honoured guest."
But Meg could not possibly go and supervise the men. She had washed her hair before breakfast, and she sat drinking her coffee in a green turban, with a dark wet curl stamped on each cheek. Jose, the butterfly, always came down in a silk petticoat and a kimono jacket.
"You'll have to go, Laura; you're the artistic one."
Away Laura flew, still holding her piece of bread-and-butter. It's so delicious to have an excuse for eating out of doors, and besides, she loved having to arrange things; she always felt she could do it so much better than anybody else.
Four men in their shirt-sleeves stood grouped together on the garden path. They carried staves covered with rolls of canvas, and they had big tool-bags slung on their backs. They looked impressive. Laura wished now that she had not got the bread-and-butter, but there was nowhere to put it, and she couldn't possibly throw it away. She blushed and tried to look severe and even a little bit short-sighted as she came up to them.
"Good morning," she said, copying her mother's voice. But that sounded so fearfully affected that she was ashamed, and stammered like a little girl, "Oh - er - have you come - is it about the marquee?"
"That's right, miss," said the tallest of the men, a lanky, freckled fellow, and he shifted his tool-bag, knocked back his straw hat and smiled down at her. "That's about it."
His smile was so easy, so friendly that Laura recovered. What nice eyes he had, small, but such a dark blue! And now she looked at the others, they were smiling too. "Cheer up, we won't bite," their smile seemed to say. How very nice workmen were! And what a beautiful morning! She mustn't mention the morning; she must be business-like. The marquee.
"Well, what about the lily-lawn? Would that do?"
And she pointed to the lily-lawn with the hand that didn't hold the bread-and- butter. They turned, they stared in the direction. A little fat chap thrust out his under-lip, and the tall fellow frowned.
"I don't fancy it," said he. "Not conspicuous enough. You see, with a thing like a marquee," and he turned to Laura in his easy way, "you want to put it somewhere where it'll give you a bang slap in the eye, if you follow me."
Laura's upbringing made her wonder for a moment whether it was quite respectful of a workman to talk to her of bangs slap in the eye. But she did quite follow him.
"A corner of the tennis-court," she suggested. "But the band's going to be in one corner."
"H'm, going to have a band, are you?" said another of the workmen. He was pale. He had a haggard look as his dark eyes scanned the tennis-court. What was he thinking?
"Only a very small band," said Laura gently. Perhaps he wouldn't mind so much if the band was quite small. But the tall fellow interrupted.
"Look here, miss, that's the place. Against those trees. Over there. That'll do fine."
Against the karakas. Then the karaka-trees would be hidden. And they were so lovely, with their broad, gleaming leaves, and their clusters of yellow fruit. They were like trees you imagined growing on a desert island, proud, solitary, lifting their leaves and fruits to the sun in a kind of silent splendour. Must they be hidden by a marquee?
They must. Already the men had shouldered their staves and were making for the place. Only the tall fellow was left. He bent down, pinched a sprig of lavender, put his thumb and forefinger to his nose and snuffed up the smell. When Laura saw that gesture she forgot all about the karakas in her wonder at him caring for things like that - caring for the smell of lavender. How many men that she knew would have done such a thing? Oh, how extraordinarily nice workmen were, she thought. Why couldn't she have workmen for her friends rather than the silly boys she danced with and who came to Sunday night supper? She would get on much better with men like these.
It's all the fault, she decided, as the tall fellow drew something on the back of an envelope, something that was to be looped up or left to hang, of these absurd class distinctions. Well, for her part, she didn't feel them. Not a bit, not an atom ... And now there came the chock-chock of wooden hammers. Some one whistled, some one sang out, "Are you right there, matey?" "Matey!" The friendliness of it, the - the - Just to prove how happy she was, just to show the tall fellow how at home she felt, and how she despised stupid conventions, Laura took a big bite of her bread-and-butter as she stared at the little drawing. She felt just like a work-girl.
"Laura, Laura, where are you? Telephone, Laura!" a voice cried from the house.
"Coming!" Away she skimmed, over the lawn, up the path, up the steps, across the veranda, and into the porch. In the hall her father and Laurie were brushing their hats ready to go to the office.
"I say, Laura," said Laurie very fast, "you might just give a squiz at my coat before this afternoon. See if it wants pressing."
"I will," said she. Suddenly she couldn't stop herself. She ran at Laurie and gave him a small, quick squeeze. "Oh, I do love parties, don't you?" gasped Laura.
"Ra-ther," said Laurie's warm, boyish voice, and he squeezed his sister too, and gave her a gentle push. "Dash off to the telephone, old girl."
The telephone. "Yes, yes; oh yes. Kitty? Good morning, dear. Come to lunch? Do, dear. Delighted of course. It will only be a very scratch meal - just the sandwich crusts and broken meringue-shells and what's left over. Yes, isn't it a perfect morning? Your white? Oh, I certainly should. One moment - hold the line. Mother's calling." And Laura sat back. "What, mother? Can't hear."
Mrs. Sheridan's voice floated down the stairs. "Tell her to wear that sweet hat she had on last Sunday."
"Mother says you're to wear that sweet hat you had on last Sunday. Good. One o'clock. Bye-bye."
Laura put back the receiver, flung her arms over her head, took a deep breath, stretched and let them fall. "Huh," she sighed, and the moment after the sigh she sat up quickly. She was still, listening. All the doors in the house seemed to be open. The house was alive with soft, quick steps and running voices. The green baize door that led to the kitchen regions swung open and shut with a muffled thud. And now there came a long, chuckling absurd sound. It was the heavy piano being moved on its stiff castors. But the air! If you stopped to notice, was the air always like this? Little faint winds were playing chase, in at the tops of the windows, out at the doors. And there were two tiny spots of sun, one on the inkpot, one on a silver photograph frame, playing too. Darling little spots. Especially the one on the inkpot lid. It was quite warm. A warm little silver star. She could have kissed it.
The front door bell pealed, and there sounded the rustle of Sadie's print skirt on the stairs. A man's voice murmured; Sadie answered, careless, "I'm sure I don't know. Wait. I'll ask Mrs Sheridan."
"What is it, Sadie?" Laura came into the hall.
"It's the florist, Miss Laura."
It was, indeed. There, just inside the door, stood a wide, shallow tray full of pots of pink lilies. No other kind. Nothing but lilies - canna lilies, big pink flowers, wide open, radiant, almost frighteningly alive on bright crimson stems.
"O-oh, Sadie!" said Laura, and the sound was like a little moan. She crouched down as if to warm herself at that blaze of lilies; she felt they were in her fingers, on her lips, growing in her breast.
"It's some mistake," she said faintly. "Nobody ever ordered so many. Sadie, go and find mother."
But at that moment Mrs. Sheridan joined them.
"It's quite right," she said calmly. "Yes, I ordered them. Aren't they lovely?" She pressed Laura's arm. "I was passing the shop yesterday, and I saw them in the window. And I suddenly thought for once in my life I shall have enough canna lilies. The garden-party will be a good excuse."
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[*زهره*]

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

But I thought you said you didn't mean to interfere," said Laura. Sadie had gone. The florist's man was still outside at his van. She put her arm round her mother's neck and gently, very gently, she bit her mother's ear.

"My darling child, you wouldn't like a logical mother, would you? Don't do that. Here's the man."

He carried more lilies still, another whole tray.

"Bank them up, just inside the door, on both sides of the porch, please," said Mrs. Sheridan. "Don't you agree, Laura?"

"Oh, I do, mother."

In the drawing-room Meg, Jose and good little Hans had at last succeeded in moving the piano.

"Now, if we put this chesterfield against the wall and move everything out of the room except the chairs, don't you think?"

"Quite."

"Hans, move these tables into the smoking-room, and bring a sweeper to take these marks off the carpet and - one moment, Hans - " Jose loved giving orders to the servants, and they loved obeying her. She always made them feel they were taking part in some drama. "Tell mother and Miss Laura to come here at once.

"Very good, Miss Jose."

She turned to Meg. "I want to hear what the piano sounds like, just in case I'm asked to sing this afternoon. Let's try over 'This life is Weary.'"

Pom! Ta-ta-ta Tee-ta! The piano burst out so passionately that Jose's face changed. She clasped her hands. She looked mournfully and enigmatically at her mother and Laura as they came in.

"This Life is Wee-ary, A Tear - a Sigh. A Love that Chan-ges, This Life is Wee-ary, A Tear - a Sigh. A Love that Chan-ges, And then ... Good-bye!"

But at the word "Good-bye," and although the piano sounded more desperate than ever, her face broke into a brilliant, dreadfully unsympathetic smile.

"Aren't I in good voice, mummy?" she beamed.

"This Life is Wee-ary, Hope comes to Die. A Dream - a Wa-kening."

But now Sadie interrupted them. "What is it, Sadie?"

"If you please, m'm, cook says have you got the flags for the sandwiches?"

"The flags for the sandwiches, Sadie?" echoed Mrs. Sheridan dreamily. And the children knew by her face that she hadn't got them. "Let me see." And she said to Sadie firmly, "Tell cook I'll let her have them in ten minutes.

Sadie went.

"Now, Laura," said her mother quickly, "come with me into the smoking-room. I've got the names somewhere on the back of an envelope. You'll have to write them out for me. Meg, go upstairs this minute and take that wet thing off your head. Jose, run and finish dressing this instant. Do you hear me, children, or shall I have to tell your father when he comes home to-night? And - and, Jose, pacify cook if you do go into the kitchen, will you? I'm terrified of her this morning."

The envelope was found at last behind the dining-room clock, though how it had got there Mrs. Sheridan could not imagine.

"One of you children must have stolen it out of my bag, because I remember vividly - cream cheese and lemon-curd. Have you done that?"

"Yes."

"Egg and--" Mrs. Sheridan held the envelope away from her. "It looks like mice. It can't be mice, can it?"

"Olive, pet," said Laura, looking over her shoulder.

"Yes, of course, olive. What a horrible combination it sounds. Egg and olive."

They were finished at last, and Laura took them off to the kitchen. She found Jose there pacifying the cook, who did not look at all terrifying.

"I have never seen such exquisite sandwiches," said Jose's rapturous voice. "How many kinds did you say there were, cook? Fifteen?"

"Fifteen, Miss Jose."

"Well, cook, I congratulate you."

Cook swept up crusts with the long sandwich knife, and smiled broadly.

"Godber's has come," announced Sadie, issuing out of the pantry. She had seen the man pass the window.

That meant the cream puffs had come. Godber's were famous for their cream puffs. Nobody ever thought of making them at home.

"Bring them in and put them on the table, my girl," ordered cook.

Sadie brought them in and went back to the door. Of course Laura and Jose were far too grown-up to really care about such things. All the same, they couldn't help agreeing that the puffs looked very attractive. Very. Cook began arranging them, shaking off the extra icing sugar.

"Don't they carry one back to all one's parties?" said Laura.

"I suppose they do," said practical Jose, who never liked to be carried back. "They look beautifully light and feathery, I must say."

"Have one each, my dears," said cook in her comfortable voice. "Yer ma won't know."

Oh, impossible. Fancy cream puffs so soon after breakfast. The very idea made one shudder. All the same, two minutes later Jose and Laura were licking their fingers with that absorbed inward look that only comes from whipped cream.

"Let's go into the garden, out by the back way," suggested Laura. "I want to see how the men are getting on with the marquee. They're such awfully nice men."

But the back door was blocked by cook, Sadie, Godber's man and Hans.

Something had happened.

"Tuk-tuk-tuk," clucked cook like an agitated hen. Sadie had her hand clapped to her cheek as though she had toothache. Hans's face was screwed up in the effort to understand. Only Godber's man seemed to be enjoying himself; it was his story.

"What's the matter? What's happened?"

"There's been a horrible accident," said Cook. "A man killed."

"A man killed! Where? How? When?"

But Godber's man wasn't going to have his story snatched from under his very nose.

"Know those little cottages just below here, miss?" Know them? Of course, she knew them. "Well, there's a young chap living there, name of Scott, a carter. His horse shied at a traction-engine, corner of Hawke Street this morning, and he was thrown out on the back of his head. Killed."

"Dead!" Laura stared at Godber's man.

"Dead when they picked him up," said Godber's man with relish. "They were taking the body home as I come up here." And he said to the cook, "He's left a wife and five little ones."

"Jose, come here." Laura caught hold of her sister's sleeve and dragged her through the kitchen to the other side of the green baize door. There she paused and leaned against it. "Jose!" she said, horrified, "however are we going to stop everything?"

"Stop everything, Laura!" cried Jose in astonishment. "What do you mean?"

"Stop the garden-party, of course." Why did Jose pretend?

But Jose was still more amazed. "Stop the garden-party? My dear Laura, don't be so absurd. Of course we can't do anything of the kind. Nobody expects us to. Don't be so extravagant."

"But we can't possibly have a garden-party with a man dead just outside the front gate."

That really was extravagant, for the little cottages were in a lane to themselves at the very bottom of a steep rise that led up to the house. A broad road ran between. True, they were far too near. They were the greatest possible eyesore, and they had no right to be in that neighbourhood at all. They were little mean dwellings painted a chocolate brown. In the garden patches there was nothing but cabbage stalks, sick hens and tomato cans. The very smoke coming out of their chimneys was poverty-stricken. Little rags and shreds of smoke, so unlike the great silvery plumes that uncurled from the Sheridans' chimneys. Washerwomen lived in the lane and sweeps and a cobbler, and a man whose house-front was studded all over with minute bird-cages. Children swarmed. When the Sheridans were little they were forbidden to set foot there because of the revolting language and of what they might catch. But since they were grown up, Laura and Laurie on their prowls sometimes walked through. It was disgusting and sordid. They came out with a shudder. But still one must go everywhere; one must see everything. So through they went.

"And just think of what the band would sound like to that poor woman," said Laura.

"Oh, Laura!" Jose began to be seriously annoyed. "If you're going to stop a band playing every time some one has an accident, you'll lead a very strenuous life. I'm every bit as sorry about it as you. I feel just as sympathetic." Her eyes hardened. She looked at her sister just as she used to when they were little and fighting together. "You won't bring a drunken workman back to life by being sentimental," she said softly.

"Drunk! Who said he was drunk?" Laura turned furiously on Jose. She said, just as they had used to say on those occasions, "I'm going straight up to tell mother."

"Do, dear," cooed Jose.

"Mother, can I come into your room?" Laura turned the big glass door-knob.

"Of course, child. Why, what's the matter? What's given you such a colour?" And Mrs. Sheridan turned round from her dressing-table. She was trying on a new hat.

"Mother, a man's been killed," began Laura.

"Not in the garden?" interrupted her mother.

"No, no!"

"Oh, what a fright you gave me!" Mrs. Sheridan sighed with relief, and took off the big hat and held it on her knees.

"But listen, mother," said Laura. Breathless, half-choking, she told the dreadful story. "Of course, we can't have our party, can we?" she pleaded. "The band and everybody arriving. They'd hear us, mother; they're nearly neighbours!"

To Laura's astonishment her mother behaved just like Jose; it was harder to bear because she seemed amused. She refused to take Laura seriously.
"But, my dear child, use your common sense. It's only by accident we've heard of it. If some one had died there normally - and I can't understand how they keep alive in those poky little holes - we should still be having our party, shouldn't we?"
Laura had to say "yes" to that, but she felt it was all wrong. She sat down on her mother's sofa and pinched the cushion frill.
"Mother, isn't it terribly heartless of us?" she asked.
"Darling!" Mrs. Sheridan got up and came over to her, carrying the hat. Before Laura could stop her she had popped it on. "My child!" said her mother, "the hat is yours. It's made for you. It's much too young for me. I have never seen you look such a picture. Look at yourself!" And she held up her hand- mirror.
"But, mother," Laura began again. She couldn't look at herself; she turned aside.​

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[*زهره*]

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

The Garden Party BY Katherine Mansfield

This time Mrs. Sheridan lost patience just as Jose had done
"You are being very absurd, Laura," she said coldly. "People like that don't expect sacrifices from us. And it's not very sympathetic to spoil everybody's enjoyment as you're doing now."
"I don't understand," said Laura, and she walked quickly out of the room into her own bedroom. There, quite by chance, the first thing she saw was this charming girl in the mirror, in her black hat trimmed with gold daisies, and a long black velvet ribbon. Never had she imagined she could look like that. Is mother right? she thought. And now she hoped her mother was right. Am I being extravagant? Perhaps it was extravagant. Just for a moment she had another glimpse of that poor woman and those little children, and the body being carried into the house. But it all seemed blurred, unreal, like a picture in the newspaper. I'll remember it again after the party's over, she decided. And somehow that seemed quite the best plan ...
Lunch was over by half-past one. By half-past two they were all ready for the fray. The green-coated band had arrived and was established in a corner of the tennis-court.
"My dear!" trilled Kitty Maitland, "aren't they too like frogs for words? You ought to have arranged them round the pond with the conductor in the middle on a leaf."
Laurie arrived and hailed them on his way to dress. At the sight of him Laura remembered the accident again. She wanted to tell him. If Laurie agreed with the others, then it was bound to be all right. And she followed him into the hall.
"Laurie!"
"Hallo!" He was half-way upstairs, but when he turned round and saw Laura he suddenly puffed out his cheeks and goggled his eyes at her. "My word, Laura! You do look stunning," said Laurie. "What an absolutely topping hat!"
Laura said faintly "Is it?" and smiled up at Laurie, and didn't tell him after all.
Soon after that people began coming in streams. The band struck up; the hired waiters ran from the house to the marquee. Wherever you looked there were couples strolling, bending to the flowers, greeting, moving on over the lawn. They were like bright birds that had alighted in the Sheridans' garden for this one afternoon, on their way to - where? Ah, what happiness it is to be with people who all are happy, to press hands, press cheeks, smile into eyes.
"Darling Laura, how well you look!"
"What a becoming hat, child!"
"Laura, you look quite Spanish. I've never seen you look so striking."
And Laura, glowing, answered softly, "Have you had tea? Won't you have an ice? The passion-fruit ices really are rather special." She ran to her father and begged him. "Daddy darling, can't the band have something to drink?"
And the perfect afternoon slowly ripened, slowly faded, slowly its petals closed.
"Never a more delightful garden-party ... " "The greatest success ... " "Quite the most ... "
Laura helped her mother with the good-byes. They stood side by side in the porch till it was all over.
"All over, all over, thank heaven," said Mrs. Sheridan. "Round up the others, Laura. Let's go and have some fresh coffee. I'm exhausted. Yes, it's been very successful. But oh, these parties, these parties! Why will you children insist on giving parties!" And they all of them sat down in the deserted marquee.
"Have a sandwich, daddy dear. I wrote the flag."
"Thanks." Mr. Sheridan took a bite and the sandwich was gone. He took another. "I suppose you didn't hear of a beastly accident that happened to-day?" he said.
"My dear," said Mrs. Sheridan, holding up her hand, "we did. It nearly ruined the party. Laura insisted we should put it off."
"Oh, mother!" Laura didn't want to be teased about it.
"It was a horrible affair all the same," said Mr. Sheridan. "The chap was married too. Lived just below in the lane, and leaves a wife and half a dozen kiddies, so they say."
An awkward little silence fell. Mrs. Sheridan fidgeted with her cup. Really, it was very tactless of father ...
Suddenly she looked up. There on the table were all those sandwiches, cakes, puffs, all uneaten, all going to be wasted. She had one of her brilliant ideas.
"I know," she said. "Let's make up a basket. Let's send that poor creature some of this perfectly good food. At any rate, it will be the greatest treat for the children. Don't you agree? And she's sure to have neighbours calling in and so on. What a point to have it all ready prepared. Laura!" She jumped up. "Get me the big basket out of the stairs cupboard."
"But, mother, do you really think it's a good idea?" said Laura.
Again, how curious, she seemed to be different from them all. To take scraps from their party. Would the poor woman really like that?
"Of course! What's the matter with you to-day? An hour or two ago you were insisting on us being sympathetic, and now--"
Oh well! Laura ran for the basket. It was filled, it was heaped by her mother.
"Take it yourself, darling," said she. "Run down just as you are. No, wait, take the arum lilies too. People of that class are so impressed by arum lilies."
"The stems will ruin her lace frock," said practical Jose.
So they would. Just in time. "Only the basket, then. And, Laura!" - her mother followed her out of the marquee - "don't on any account--"
"What mother?"
No, better not put such ideas into the child's head! "Nothing! Run along."
It was just growing dusky as Laura shut their garden gates. A big dog ran by like a shadow. The road gleamed white, and down below in the hollow the little cottages were in deep shade. How quiet it seemed after the afternoon. Here she was going down the hill to somewhere where a man lay dead, and she couldn't realize it. Why couldn't she? She stopped a minute. And it seemed to her that kisses, voices, tinkling spoons, laughter, the smell of crushed grass were somehow inside her. She had no room for anything else. How strange! She looked up at the pale sky, and all she thought was, "Yes, it was the most successful party."
Now the broad road was crossed. The lane began, smoky and dark. Women in shawls and men's tweed caps hurried by. Men hung over the palings; the children played in the doorways. A low hum came from the mean little cottages. In some of them there was a flicker of light, and a shadow, crab-like, moved across the window. Laura bent her head and hurried on. She wished now she had put on a coat. How her frock shone! And the big hat with the velvet streamer - if only it was another hat! Were the people looking at her? They must be. It was a mistake to have come; she knew all along it was a mistake. Should she go back even now?
No, too late. This was the house. It must be. A dark knot of people stood outside. Beside the gate an old, old woman with a crutch sat in a chair, watching. She had her feet on a newspaper. The voices stopped as Laura drew near. The group parted. It was as though she was expected, as though they had known she was coming here.
Laura was terribly nervous. Tossing the velvet ribbon over her shoulder, she said to a woman standing by, "Is this Mrs. Scott's house?" and the woman, smiling queerly, said, "It is, my lass."
Oh, to be away from this! She actually said, "Help me, God," as she walked up the tiny path and knocked. To be away from those staring eyes, or to be covered up in anything, one of those women's shawls even. I'll just leave the basket and go, she decided. I shan't even wait for it to be emptied.
Then the door opened. A little woman in black showed in the gloom.
Laura said, "Are you Mrs. Scott?" But to her horror the woman answered, "Walk in please, miss," and she was shut in the passage.
"No," said Laura, "I don't want to come in. I only want to leave this basket. Mother sent--"
The little woman in the gloomy passage seemed not to have heard her. "Step this way, please, miss," she said in an oily voice, and Laura followed her.
She found herself in a wretched little low kitchen, lighted by a smoky lamp. There was a woman sitting before the fire.
"Em," said the little creature who had let her in. "Em! It's a young lady." She turned to Laura. She said meaningly, "I'm 'er sister, miss. You'll excuse 'er, won't you?"
"Oh, but of course!" said Laura. "Please, please don't disturb her. I - I only want to leave--"
But at that moment the woman at the fire turned round. Her face, puffed up, red, with swollen eyes and swollen lips, looked terrible. She seemed as though she couldn't understand why Laura was there. What did it mean? Why was this stranger standing in the kitchen with a basket? What was it all about? And the poor face puckered up again.
"All right, my dear," said the other. "I'll thenk the young lady."
And again she began, "You'll excuse her, miss, I'm sure," and her face, swollen too, tried an oily smile.
Laura only wanted to get out, to get away. She was back in the passage. The door opened. She walked straight through into the bedroom, where the dead man was lying.
"You'd like a look at 'im, wouldn't you?" said Em's sister, and she brushed past Laura over to the bed. "Don't be afraid, my lass," - and now her voice sounded fond and sly, and fondly she drew down the sheet--"'e looks a picture. There's nothing to show. Come along, my dear."
Laura came.
There lay a young man, fast asleep - sleeping so soundly, so deeply, that he was far, far away from them both. Oh, so remote, so peaceful. He was dreaming. Never wake him up again. His head was sunk in the pillow, his eyes were closed; they were blind under the closed eyelids. He was given up to his dream. What did garden-parties and baskets and lace frocks matter to him? He was far from all those things. He was wonderful, beautiful. While they were laughing and while the band was playing, this marvel had come to the lane. Happy ... happy ... All is well, said that sleeping face. This is just as it should be. I am content.
But all the same you had to cry, and she couldn't go out of the room without saying something to him. Laura gave a loud childish sob.
"Forgive my hat," she said.
And this time she didn't wait for Em's sister. She found her way out of the door, down the path, past all those dark people. At the corner of the lane she met Laurie.
He stepped out of the shadow. "Is that you, Laura?"
"Yes."
"Mother was getting anxious. Was it all right?"
"Yes, quite. Oh, Laurie!" She took his arm, she pressed up against him.
"I say, you're not crying, are you?" asked her brother.
Laura shook her head. She was.
Laurie put his arm round her shoulder. "Don't cry," he said in his warm, loving voice. "Was it awful?"
"No," sobbed Laura. "It was simply marvellous. But Laurie--" She stopped, she looked at her brother. "Isn't life," she stammered, "isn't life--" But what life was she couldn't explain. No matter. He quite understood.
"Isn't it, darling?" said Laurie.​

 

[*زهره*]

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

When Martha Hale opened the storm-door and got a cut of the north wind, she ran back for her big woolen scarf. As she hurriedly wound that round her head her eye made a scandalized sweep of her kitchen. It was no ordinary thing that called her away--it was probably further from ordinary than anything that had ever happened in Dickson County. But what her eye took in was that her kitchen was in no shape for leaving: her bread all ready for mixing, half the flour sifted and half unsifted.
She hated to see things half done; but she had been at that when the team from town stopped to get Mr. Hale, and then the sheriff came running in to say his wife wished Mrs. Hale would come too--adding, with a grin, that he guessed she was getting scary and wanted another woman along. So she had dropped everything right where it was.
"Martha!" now came her husband's impatient voice. "Don't keep folks waiting out here in the cold."
She again opened the storm-door, and this time joined the three men and the one woman waiting for her in the big two-seated buggy.
After she had the robes tucked around her she took another look at the woman who sat beside her on the back seat. She had met Mrs. Peters the year before at the county fair, and the thing she remembered about her was that she didn't seem like a sheriff's wife. She was small and thin and didn't have a strong voice. Mrs. Gorman, sheriff's wife before Gorman went out and Peters came in, had a voice that somehow seemed to be backing up the law with every word. But if Mrs. Peters didn't look like a sheriff's wife, Peters made it up in looking like a sheriff. He was to a dot the kind of man who could get himself elected sheriff--a heavy man with a big voice, who was particularly genial with the law-abiding, as if to make it plain that he knew the difference between criminals and non-criminals. And right there it came into Mrs. Hale's mind, with a stab, that this man who was so pleasant and lively with all of them was going to the Wrights' now as a sheriff.
"The country's not very pleasant this time of year," Mrs. Peters at last ventured, as if she felt they ought to be talking as well as the men.
Mrs. Hale scarcely finished her reply, for they had gone up a little hill and could see the Wright place now, and seeing it did not make her feel like talking. It looked very lonesome this cold March morning. It had always been a lonesome-looking place. It was down in a hollow, and the poplar trees around it were lonesome-looking trees. The men were looking at it and talking about what had happened. The county attorney was bending to one side of the buggy, and kept looking steadily at the place as they drew up to it.
"I'm glad you came with me," Mrs. Peters said nervously, as the two women were about to follow the men in through the kitchen door.
Even after she had her foot on the door-step, her hand on the knob, Martha Hale had a moment of feeling she could not cross that threshold. And the reason it seemed she couldn't cross it now was simply because she hadn't crossed it before. Time and time again it had been in her mind, "I ought to go over and see Minnie Foster"--she still thought of her as Minnie Foster, though for twenty years she had been Mrs. Wright. And then there was always something to do and Minnie Foster would go from her mind. But now she could come.
The men went over to the stove. The women stood close together by the door. Young Henderson, the county attorney, turned around and said, "Come up to the fire, ladies."
Mrs. Peters took a step forward, then stopped. "I'm not--cold," she said.
And so the two women stood by the door, at first not even so much as looking around the kitchen.
The men talked for a minute about what a good thing it was the sheriff had sent his deputy out that morning to make a fire for them, and then Sheriff Peters stepped back from the stove, unbuttoned his outer coat, and leaned his hands on the kitchen table in a way that seemed to mark the beginning of official business. "Now, Mr. Hale," he said in a sort of semi-official voice, "before we move things about, you tell Mr. Henderson just what it was you saw when you came here yesterday morning."
The county attorney was looking around the kitchen.
"By the way," he said, "has anything been moved?" He turned to the sheriff. "Are things just as you left them yesterday?"
Peters looked from cupboard to sink; from that to a small worn rocker a little to one side of the kitchen table.
"It's just the same."
"Somebody should have been left here yesterday," said the county attorney.
"Oh--yesterday," returned the sheriff, with a little gesture as of yesterday having been more than he could bear to think of. "When I had to send Frank to Morris Center for that man who went crazy--let me tell you. I had my hands full yesterday. I knew you could get back from Omaha by today, George, and as long as I went over everything here myself--"
"Well, Mr. Hale," said the county attorney, in a way of letting what was past and gone go, "tell just what happened when you came here yesterday morning."
Mrs. Hale, still leaning against the door, had that sinking feeling of the mother whose child is about to speak a piece. Lewis often wandered along and got things mixed up in a story. She hoped he would tell this straight and plain, and not say unnecessary things that would just make things harder for Minnie Foster. He didn't begin at once, and she noticed that he looked queer--as if standing in that kitchen and having to tell what he had seen there yesterday morning made him almost sick.
"Yes, Mr. Hale?" the county attorney reminded.
"Harry and I had started to town with a load of potatoes," Mrs. Hale's husband began.
Harry was Mrs. Hale's oldest boy. He wasn't with them now, for the very good reason that those potatoes never got to town yesterday and he was taking them this morning, so he hadn't been home when the sheriff stopped to say he wanted Mr. Hale to come over to the Wright place and tell the county attorney his story there, where he could point it all out. With all Mrs. Hale's other emotions came the fear now that maybe Harry wasn't dressed warm enough--they hadn't any of them realized how that north wind did bite.
"We come along this road," Hale was going on, with a motion of his hand to the road over which they had just come, "and as we got in sight of the house I says to Harry, 'I'm goin' to see if I can't get John Wright to take a telephone.' You see," he explained to Henderson, "unless I can get somebody to go in with me they won't come out this branch road except for a price I can't pay. I'd spoke to Wright about it once before; but he put me off, saying folks talked too much anyway, and all he asked was peace and quiet--guess you know about how much he talked himself. But I thought maybe if I went to the house and talked about it before his wife, and said all the women-folks liked the telephones, and that in this lonesome stretch of road it would be a good thing--well, I said to Harry that that was what I was going to say--though I said at the same time that I didn't know as what his wife wanted made much difference to John--"
Now there he was!--saying things he didn't need to say. Mrs. Hale tried to catch her husband's eye, but fortunately the county attorney interrupted with:
"Let's talk about that a little later, Mr. Hale. I do want to talk about that but, I'm anxious now to get along to just what happened when you got here."
When he began this time, it was very deliberately and carefully:
"I didn't see or hear anything. I knocked at the door. And still it was all quiet inside. I knew they must be up--it was past eight o'clock. So I knocked again, louder, and I thought I heard somebody say, 'Come in.' I wasn't sure--I'm not sure yet. But I opened the door--this door," jerking a hand toward the door by which the two women stood. "and there, in that rocker"--pointing to it--"sat Mrs. Wright."
Everyone in the kitchen looked at the rocker. It came into Mrs. Hale's mind that that rocker didn't look in the least like Minnie Foster--the Minnie Foster of twenty years before. It was a dingy red, with wooden rungs up the back, and the middle rung was gone, and the chair sagged to one side.
"How did she--look?" the county attorney was inquiring.
"Well," said Hale, "she looked--queer."
"How do you mean--queer?"
As he asked it he took out a note-book and pencil. Mrs. Hale did not like the sight of that pencil. She kept her eye fixed on her husband, as if to keep him from saying unnecessary things that would go into that note-book and make trouble.
Hale did speak guardedly, as if the pencil had affected him too.
"Well, as if she didn't know what she was going to do next. And kind of--done up."
"How did she seem to feel about your coming?"
"Why, I don't think she minded--one way or other. She didn't pay much attention. I said, 'Ho' do, Mrs. Wright? It's cold, ain't it?' And she said. 'Is it?'--and went on pleatin' at her apron.
"Well, I was surprised. She didn't ask me to come up to the stove, or to sit down, but just set there, not even lookin' at me. And so I said: 'I want to see John.'
"And then she--laughed. I guess you would call it a laugh.
"I thought of Harry and the team outside, so I said, a little sharp, 'Can I see John?' 'No,' says she--kind of dull like. 'Ain't he home?' says I. Then she looked at me. 'Yes,' says she, 'he's home.' 'Then why can't I see him?' I asked her, out of patience with her now. 'Cause he's dead' says she, just as quiet and dull--and fell to pleatin' her apron. 'Dead?' says, I, like you do when you can't take in what you've heard.
"She just nodded her head, not getting a bit excited, but rockin' back and forth.
"'Why--where is he?' says I, not knowing what to say.
"She just pointed upstairs--like this"--pointing to the room above.
"I got up, with the idea of going up there myself. By this time I--didn't know what to do. I walked from there to here; then I says: 'Why, what did he die of?'
"'He died of a rope around his neck,' says she; and just went on pleatin' at her apron."
Hale stopped speaking, and stood staring at the rocker, as if he were still seeing the woman who had sat there the morning before. Nobody spoke; it was as if every one were seeing the woman who had sat there the morning before.
"And what did you do then?" the county attorney at last broke the silence.
"I went out and called Harry. I thought I might--need help. I got Harry in, and we went upstairs." His voice fell almost to a whisper. "There he was--lying over the--"
"I think I'd rather have you go into that upstairs," the county attorney interrupted, "where you can point it all out. Just go on now with the rest of the story."
"Well, my first thought was to get that rope off. It looked--"
He stopped, his face twitching.
"But Harry, he went up to him, and he said. 'No, he's dead all right, and we'd better not touch anything.' So we went downstairs.
"She was still sitting that same way. 'Has anybody been notified?' I asked. 'No, says she, unconcerned.
"'Who did this, Mrs. Wright?' said Harry. He said it businesslike, and she stopped pleatin' at her apron. 'I don't know,' she says. 'You don't know?' says Harry. 'Weren't you sleepin' in the bed with him?' 'Yes,' says she, 'but I was on the inside. 'Somebody slipped a rope round his neck and strangled him, and you didn't wake up?' says Harry. 'I didn't wake up,' she said after him.
"We may have looked as if we didn't see how that could be, for after a minute she said, 'I sleep sound.'
​

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[*زهره*]

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

Harry was going to ask her more questions, but I said maybe that weren't our business; maybe we ought to let her tell her story first to the coroner or the sheriff. So Harry went fast as he could over to High Road--the Rivers' place, where there's a telephone."
"And what did she do when she knew you had gone for the coroner?" The attorney got his pencil in his hand all ready for writing.
"She moved from that chair to this one over here"--Hale pointed to a small chair in the corner--"and just sat there with her hands held together and lookin down. I got a feeling that I ought to make some conversation, so I said I had come in to see if John wanted to put in a telephone; and at that she started to laugh, and then she stopped and looked at me--scared."​

At the sound of a moving pencil the man who was telling the story looked up.
"I dunno--maybe it wasn't scared," he hastened: "I wouldn't like to say it was. Soon Harry got back, and then Dr. Lloyd came, and you, Mr. Peters, and so I guess that's all I know that you don't."
He said that last with relief, and moved a little, as if relaxing. Everyone moved a little. The county attorney walked toward the stair door.
"I guess we'll go upstairs first--then out to the barn and around there."
He paused and looked around the kitchen.
"You're convinced there was nothing important here?" he asked the sheriff. "Nothing that would--point to any motive?"

The sheriff too looked all around, as if to re-convince himself.​

"Nothing here but kitchen things," he said, with a little laugh for the insignificance of kitchen things. ​

The county attorney was looking at the cupboard--a peculiar, ungainly structure, half closet and half cupboard, the upper part of it being built in the wall, and the lower part just the old-fashioned kitchen cupboard. As if its queerness attracted him, he got a chair and opened the upper part and looked in. After a moment he drew his hand away sticky.​

"Here's a nice mess," he said resentfully.​

The two women had drawn nearer, and now the sheriff's wife spoke.​

"Oh--her fruit," she said, looking to Mrs. Hale for sympathetic understanding. ​

She turned back to the county attorney and explained: "She worried about that when it turned so cold last night. She said the fire would go out and her jars might burst."​

Mrs. Peters' husband broke into a laugh.​

"Well, can you beat the women! Held for murder, and worrying about her preserves!"​

The young attorney set his lips.​

"I guess before we're through with her she may have something more serious than preserves to worry about." ​

"Oh, well," said Mrs. Hale's husband, with good-natured superiority, "women are used to worrying over trifles." ​

The two women moved a little closer together. Neither of them spoke. The county attorney seemed suddenly to remember his manners--and think of his future.​

"And yet," said he, with the gallantry of a young politician. "for all their worries, what would we do without the ladies?" ​

The women did not speak, did not unbend. He went to the sink and began washing his hands. He turned to wipe them on the roller towel--whirled it for a cleaner place.​

"Dirty towelsl Not much of a housekeeper, would you say, ladies?"​

He kicked his foot against some dirty pans under the sink.​

"There's a great deal of work to be done on a farm," said Mrs. Hale stiffly. ​

"To be sure. And yet"--with a little bow to her--'I know there are some Dickson County farm-houses that do not have such roller towels." He gave it a pull to expose its full length again.​

"Those towels get dirty awful quick. Men's hands aren't always as clean as they might be.​

"Ah, loyal to your ***, I see," he laughed. He stopped and gave her a keen look, "But you and Mrs. Wright were neighbors. I suppose you were friends, too."​

Martha Hale shook her head.​

"I've seen little enough of her of late years. I've not been in this house--it's more than a year."​

"And why was that? You didn't like her?"​

"I liked her well enough," she replied with spirit. "Farmers' wives have their hands full, Mr. Henderson. And then--" She looked around the kitchen.​

"Yes?" he encouraged.​

"It never seemed a very cheerful place," said she, more to herself than to him.​

"No," he agreed; "I don't think anyone would call it cheerful. I shouldn't say she had the home-making instinct."​

"Well, I don't know as Wright had, either," she muttered.​

"You mean they didn't get on very well?" he was quick to ask.​

"No; I don't mean anything," she answered, with decision. As she turned a lit- tle away from him, she added: "But I don't think a place would be any the cheerfuller for John Wright's bein' in it."​

"I'd like to talk to you about that a little later, Mrs. Hale," he said. "I'm anxious to get the lay of things upstairs now."​

He moved toward the stair door, followed by the two men.​

"I suppose anything Mrs. Peters does'll be all right?" the sheriff inquired. "She was to take in some clothes for her, you know--and a few little things. We left in such a hurry yesterday."​

The county attorney looked at the two women they were leaving alone there among the kitchen things.​

"Yes--Mrs. Peters," he said, his glance resting on the woman who was not Mrs. Peters, the big farmer woman who stood behind the sheriff's wife. "Of course Mrs. Peters is one of us," he said, in a manner of entrusting responsibility. "And keep your eye out, Mrs. Peters, for anything that might be of use. No telling; you women might come upon a clue to the motive--and that's the thing we need."​

Mr. Hale rubbed his face after the fashion of a showman getting ready for a pleasantry.​

"But would the women know a clue if they did come upon it?" he said; and, having delivered himself of this, he followed the others through the stair door.​

The women stood motionless and silent, listening to the footsteps, first upon the stairs, then in the room above them.​

Then, as if releasing herself from something strange. Mrs. Hale began to arrange the dirty pans under the sink, which the county attorney's disdainful push of the foot had deranged.​

"I'd hate to have men comin' into my kitchen," she said testily--"snoopin' round and criticizin'."​

"Of course it's no more than their duty," said the sheriff's wife, in her manner of timid acquiescence.​

"Duty's all right," replied Mrs. Hale bluffly; "but I guess that deputy sheriff that come out to make the fire might have got a little of this on." She gave the roller towel a pull. 'Wish I'd thought of that sooner! Seems mean to talk about her for not having things slicked up, when she had to come away in such a hurry."​

She looked around the kitchen. Certainly it was not "slicked up." Her eye was held by a bucket of sugar on a low shelf. The cover was off the wooden bucket, and beside it was a paper bag--half full.​

Mrs. HaIe moved toward it.​

"She was putting this in there," she said to herself--slowly.​

She thought of the flour in her kitchen at home--half sifted, half not sifted. She had been interrupted, and had left things half done. What had interrupted Minnie Foster? Why had that work been left half done? She made a move as if to finish it,--unfinished things always bothered her,--and then she glanced around and saw that Mrs. Peters was watching her--and she didn't want Mrs. Peters to get that feeling she had got of work begun and then--for some reason--not finished.​

"It's a shame about her fruit," she said, and walked toward the cupboard that the county attorney had opened, and got on the chair, murmuring: "I wonder if it's all gone."​

It was a sorry enough looking sight, but "Here's one that's all right," she said at last. She held it toward the light. "This is cherries, too." She looked again. "I declare I believe that's the only one."​

With a sigh, she got down from the chair, went to the sink, and wiped off the bottle.​

"She'Il feel awful bad, after all her hard work in the hot weather. I remember the afternoon I put up my cherries last summer.​

She set the bottle on the table, and, with another sigh, started to sit down in the rocker. But she did not sit down. Something kept her from sitting down in that chair. She straightened--stepped back, and, half turned away, stood looking at it, seeing the woman who had sat there "pleatin' at her apron."​

The thin voice of the sheriff's wife broke in upon her: "I must be getting those things from the front-room closet." She opened the door into the other room, started in, stepped back. "You coming with me, Mrs. Hale?" she asked nervously. "You--you could help me get them."​

They were soon back--the stark coldness of that shut-up room was not a thing to linger in.​

"My!" said Mrs. Peters, dropping the things on the table and hurrying to the stove.​

continued below
​

 

[*زهره*]

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

Mrs. Hale stood examining the clothes the woman who was being detained in town had said she wanted.​

"Wright was close!" she exclaimed, holding up a shabby black skirt that bore the marks of much making over. "I think maybe that's why she kept so much to herself. I s'pose she felt she couldn't do her part; and then, you don't enjoy things when you feel shabby. She used to wear pretty clothes and be lively--when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls, singing in the choir. But that--oh, that was twenty years ago."​

With a carefulness in which there was something tender, she folded the shabby clothes and piled them at one corner of the table. She looked up at Mrs. Peters, and there was something in the other woman's look that irritated her.​

"She don't care," she said to herself. "Much difference it makes to her whether Minnie Foster had pretty clothes when she was a girl."​

Then she looked again, and she wasn't so sure; in fact, she hadn't at any time been perfectly sure about Mrs. Peters. She had that shrinking manner, and yet her eyes looked as if they could see a long way into things.​

"This all you was to take in?" asked Mrs. Hale.​

"No," said the sheriffs wife; "she said she wanted an apron. Funny thing to want, " she ventured in her nervous little way, "for there's not much to get you dirty in jail, goodness knows. But I suppose just to make her feel more natural. If you're used to wearing an apron--. She said they were in the bottom drawer of this cupboard. Yes--here they are. And then her little shawl that always hung on the stair door."​

She took the small gray shawl from behind the door leading upstairs, and stood a minute looking at it.​

Suddenly Mrs. Hale took a quick step toward the other woman, "Mrs. Peters!"​

"Yes, Mrs. Hale?"​

"Do you think she--did it?'​

A frightened look blurred the other thing in Mrs. Peters' eyes.​

"Oh, I don't know," she said, in a voice that seemed to shink away from the subject.​

"Well, I don't think she did," affirmed Mrs. Hale stoutly. "Asking for an apron, and her little shawl. Worryin' about her fruit."​

"Mr. Peters says--." Footsteps were heard in the room above; she stopped, looked up, then went on in a lowered voice: "Mr. Peters says--it looks bad for her. Mr. Henderson is awful sarcastic in a speech, and he's going to make fun of her saying she didn't--wake up."​

For a moment Mrs. Hale had no answer. Then, "Well, I guess John Wright didn't wake up--when they was slippin' that rope under his neck," she muttered.​

"No, it's strange," breathed Mrs. Peters. "They think it was such a--funny way to kill a man."​

She began to laugh; at sound of the laugh, abruptly stopped.​

"That's just what Mr. Hale said," said Mrs. Hale, in a resolutely natural voice. "There was a gun in the house. He says that's what he can't understand."​

"Mr. Henderson said, coming out, that what was needed for the case was a motive. Something to show anger--or sudden feeling."​

'Well, I don't see any signs of anger around here," said Mrs. Hale, "I don't--" She stopped. It was as if her mind tripped on something. Her eye was caught by a dish-towel in the middle of the kitchen table. Slowly she moved toward the table. One half of it was wiped clean, the other half messy. Her eyes made a slow, almost unwilling turn to the bucket of sugar and the half empty bag beside it. Things begun--and not finished.​

After a moment she stepped back, and said, in that manner of releasing herself:​

"Wonder how they're finding things upstairs? I hope she had it a little more red up up there. You know,"--she paused, and feeling gathered,--"it seems kind of sneaking: locking her up in town and coming out here to get her own house to turn against her!"​

"But, Mrs. Hale," said the sheriff's wife, "the law is the law."​

"I s'pose 'tis," answered Mrs. Hale shortly.​

She turned to the stove, saying something about that fire not being much to brag of. She worked with it a minute, and when she straightened up she said aggressively:​

"The law is the law--and a bad stove is a bad stove. How'd you like to cook on this?"--pointing with the poker to the broken lining. She opened the oven door and started to express her opinion of the oven; but she was swept into her own thoughts, thinking of what it would mean, year after year, to have that stove to wrestle with. The thought of Minnie Foster trying to bake in that oven--and the thought of her never going over to see Minnie Foster--.​

She was startled by hearing Mrs. Peters say: "A person gets discouraged--and loses heart."​

The sheriff's wife had looked from the stove to the sink--to the pail of water which had been carried in from outside. The two women stood there silent, above them the footsteps of the men who were looking for evidence against the woman who had worked in that kitchen. That look of seeing into things, of seeing through a thing to something else, was in the eyes of the sheriff's wife now. When Mrs. Hale next spoke to her, it was gently:​

"Better loosen up your things, Mrs. Peters. We'll not feel them when we go out." ​

Mrs. Peters went to the back of the room to hang up the fur tippet she was wearing. A moment later she exclaimed, "Why, she was piecing a quilt," and held up a large sewing basket piled high with quilt pieces.​

Mrs. Hale spread some of the blocks on the table.​

"It's log-cabin pattern," she said, putting several of them together, "Pretty, isn't it?" ​

They were so engaged with the quilt that they did not hear the footsteps on the stairs. Just as the stair door opened Mrs. Hale was saying:​

"Do you suppose she was going to quilt it or just knot it?"​

The sheriff threw up his hands.​

"They wonder whether she was going to quilt it or just knot it!"​

There was a laugh for the ways of women, a warming of hands over the stove, and then the county attorney said briskly:​

"Well, let's go right out to the barn and get that cleared up."​

"I don't see as there's anything so strange," Mrs. Hale said resentfully, after the outside door had closed on the three men--"our taking up our time with little things while we're waiting for them to get the evidence. I don't see as it's anything to laugh about."​

"Of course they've got awful important things on their minds," said the sheriff's wife apologetically.​

They returned to an inspection of the block for the quilt. Mrs. Hale was looking at the fine, even sewing, and preoccupied with thoughts of the woman who had done that sewing, when she heard the sheriff's wife say, in a queer tone:​

"Why, look at this one."​

She turned to take the block held out to her.​

"The sewing," said Mrs. Peters, in a troubled way, "All the rest of them have been so nice and even--but--this one. Why, it looks as if she didn't know what she was about!"​

Their eyes met--something flashed to life, passed between them; then, as if with an effort, they seemed to pull away from each other. A moment Mrs. Hale sat there, her hands folded over that sewing which was so unlike all the rest of the sewing. Then she had pulled a knot and drawn the threads.​

"Oh, what are you doing, Mrs. Hale?" asked the sheriff's wife, startled.​

"Just pulling out a stitch or two that's not sewed very good," said Mrs. Hale mildly.​

"I don't think we ought to touch things," Mrs. Peters said, a little helplessly.​

"I'll just finish up this end," answered Mrs. Hale, still in that mild, matter-of-fact fashion.​

She threaded a needle and started to replace bad sewing with good. For a little while she sewed in silence. Then, in that thin, timid voice, she heard:​

"Mrs. Hale!"​

"Yes, Mrs. Peters?"​

'What do you suppose she was so--nervous about?"​

"Oh, I don't know," said Mrs. Hale, as if dismissing a thing not important enough to spend much time on. "I don't know as she was--nervous. I sew awful queer sometimes when I'm just tired."​

She cut a thread, and out of the corner of her eye looked up at Mrs. Peters. The small, lean face of the sheriff's wife seemed to have tightened up. Her eyes had that look of peering into something. But next moment she moved, and said in her thin, indecisive way:​

'Well, I must get those clothes wrapped. They may be through sooner than we think. I wonder where I could find a piece of paper--and string."​

"In that cupboard, maybe," suggested to Mrs. Hale, after a glance around.​

One piece of the crazy sewing remained unripped. Mrs. Peter's back turned, Martha Hale now scrutinized that piece, compared it with the dainty, accurate sewing of the other blocks. The difference was startling. Holding this block made her feel queer, as if the distracted thoughts of the woman who had perhaps turned to it to try and quiet herself were communicating themselves to her.​

Mrs. Peters' voice roused her.​

"Here's a bird-cage," she said. "Did she have a bird, Mrs. Hale?"​

'Why, I don't know whether she did or not." She turned to look at the cage Mrs. Peters was holding up. "I've not been here in so long." She sighed. "There was a man round last year selling canaries cheap--but I don't know as she took one. Maybe she did. She used to sing real pretty herself."​

Mrs. Peters looked around the kitchen.​

"Seems kind of funny to think of a bird here." She half laughed--an attempt to put up a barrier. "But she must have had one--or why would she have a cage? I wonder what happened to it."​

"I suppose maybe the cat got it," suggested Mrs. Hale, resuming her sewing.​

"No; she didn't have a cat. She's got that feeling some people have about cats--being afraid of them. When they brought her to our house yesterday, my cat got in the room, and she was real upset and asked me to take it out."​

"My sister Bessie was like that," laughed Mrs. Hale.​

The sheriff's wife did not reply. The silence made Mrs. Hale turn round. Mrs. Peters was examining the bird-cage.​

"Look at this door," she said slowly. "It's broke. One hinge has been pulled apart."​

Mrs. Hale came nearer.​

"Looks as if someone must have been--rough with it."​

Again their eyes met--startled, questioning, apprehensive. For a moment neither spoke nor stirred. Then Mrs. Hale, turning away, said brusquely:​

"If they're going to find any evidence, I wish they'd be about it. I don't like this place."​

"But I'm awful glad you came with me, Mrs. Hale." Mrs. Peters put the bird-cage on the table and sat down. "It would be lonesome for me--sitting here alone."​

"Yes, it would, wouldn't it?" agreed Mrs. Hale, a certain determined naturalness in her voice. She had picked up the sewing, but now it dropped in her lap, and she murmured in a different voice: "But I tell you what I do wish, Mrs. Peters. I wish I had come over sometimes when she was here. I wish--I had."​

"But of course you were awful busy, Mrs. Hale. Your house--and your children."​

"
​

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[*زهره*]

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

I could've come," retorted Mrs. Hale shortly. "I stayed away because it weren't cheerful--and that's why I ought to have come. I"--she looked around--"I've never liked this place. Maybe because it's down in a hollow and you don't see the road. I don't know what it is, but it's a lonesome place, and always was. I wish I had come over to see Minnie Foster sometimes. I can see now--" She did not put it into words
Well, you mustn't reproach yourself," counseled Mrs. Peters. "Somehow, we just don't see how it is with other folks till--something comes up."​

"Not having children makes less work," mused Mrs. Hale, after a silence, "but it makes a quiet house--and Wright out to work all day--and no company when he did come in. Did you know John Wright, Mrs. Peters?"​

"Not to know him. I've seen him in town. They say he was a good man."​

"Yes--good," conceded John Wright's neighbor grimly. "He didn't drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess, and paid his debts. But he was a hard man, Mrs. Peters. Just to pass the time of day with him--." She stopped, shivered a little. "Like a raw wind that gets to the bone." Her eye fell upon the cage on the table before her, and she added, almost bitterly: "I should think she would've wanted a bird!"​

Suddenly she leaned forward, looking intently at the cage. "But what do you s'pose went wrong with it?"​

"I don't know," returned Mrs. Peters; "unless it got sick and died."​

But after she said it she reached over and swung the broken door. Both women watched it as if somehow held by it.​

"You didn't know--her?" Mrs. Hale asked, a gentler note in her voice.​

"Not till they brought her yesterday," said the sheriff's wife.​

"She--come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself. Real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and--fluttery. How--she--did--change."​

That held her for a long time. Finally, as if struck with a happy thought and relieved to get back to everyday things, she exclaimed:​

"Tell you what, Mrs. Peters, why don't you take the quilt in with you? It might take up her mind."​

"Why, I think that's a real nice idea, Mrs. Hale," agreed the sheriff's wife, as if she too were glad to come into the atmosphere of a simple kindness. "There couldn't possibly be any objection to that, could there? Now, just what will I take? I wonder if her patches are in here--and her things?"​

They turned to the sewing basket.​

"Here's some red," said Mrs. Hale, bringing out a roll of cloth. Underneath that was a box. "Here, maybe her scissors are in here--and her things." She held it up. "What a pretty box! I'll warrant that was something she had a long time ago--when she was a girl."​

She held it in her hand a moment; then, with a little sigh, opened it.​

Instantly her hand went to her nose.​

"Why--!"​

Mrs. Peters drew nearer--then turned away.​

"There's something wrapped up in this piece of silk," faltered Mrs. Hale.​

"This isn't her scissors," said Mrs. Peters, in a shrinking voice.​

Her hand not steady, Mrs. Hale raised the piece of silk. "Oh, Mrs. Peters!" she cried. "It's--"​

Mrs. Peters bent closer.​

"It's the bird," she whispered.​

"But, Mrs. Peters!" cried Mrs. Hale. "Look at it! Its neck--look at its neck! It's all--other side to."​

She held the box away from her.​

The sheriff's wife again bent closer.​

"Somebody wrung its neck," said she, in a voice that was slow and deep.​

And then again the eyes of the two women met--this time clung together in a look of dawning comprehension, of growing horror. Mrs. Peters looked from the dead bird to the broken door of the cage. Again their eyes met. And just then there was a sound at the outside door. Mrs. Hale slipped the box under the quilt pieces in the basket, and sank into the chair before it. Mrs. Peters stood holding to the table. The county attorney and the sheriff came in from outside.​

"Well, ladies," said the county attorney, as one turning from serious things to little pleasantries, "have you decided whether she was going to quilt it or knot it?"​

"We think," began the sheriff's wife in a flurried voice, "that she was going to--knot it."​

He was too preoccupied to notice the change that came in her voice on that last.​

"Well, that's very interesting, I'm sure," he said tolerantly. He caught sight of the bird-cage. ​

"Has the bird flown?"​

"We think the cat got it," said Mrs. Hale in a voice curiously even.​

He was walking up and down, as if thinking something out.​

"Is there a cat?" he asked absently.​

Mrs. Hale shot a look up at the sheriff's wife.​

"Well, not now," said Mrs. Peters. "They're superstitious, you know; they Ieave."​

She sank into her chair.​

The county attorney did not heed her. "No sign at all of anyone having come in from the outside," he said to Peters, in the manner of continuing an interrupted conversation. "Their own rope. Now let's go upstairs again and go over it, picee by piece. It would have to have been someone who knew just the--"​

The stair door closed behind them and their voices were lost.​

The two women sat motionless, not looking at each other, but as if peering into something and at the same time holding back. When they spoke now it was as if they were afraid of what they were saying, but as if they could not help saying it.​

"She liked the bird," said Martha Hale, low and slowly. "She was going to bury it in that pretty box."​

When I was a girl," said Mrs. Peters, under her breath, "my kitten--there was a boy took a hatchet, and before my eyes--before I could get there--" She covered her face an instant. "If they hadn't held me back I would have"--she caught herself, looked upstairs where footsteps were heard, and finished weakly--"hurt him."​

Then they sat without speaking or moving.​

"I wonder how it would seem," Mrs. Hale at last began, as if feeling her way over strange ground--"never to have had any children around?" Her eyes made a slow sweep of the kitchen, as if seeing what that kitchen had meant through all the years "No, Wright wouldn't like the bird," she said after that--"a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that too." Her voice tightened.​

Mrs. Peters moved uneasily.​

"Of course we don't know who killed the bird."​

"I knew John Wright," was Mrs. Hale's answer.​

"It was an awful thing was done in this house that night, Mrs. Hale," said the sheriff's wife. "Killing a man while he slept--slipping a thing round his neck that choked the life out of him."​

Mrs. Hale's hand went out to the bird cage.​

"We don't know who killed him," whispered Mrs. Peters wildly. "We don't know." ​

Mrs. Hale had not moved. "If there had been years and years of--nothing, then a bird to sing to you, it would be awful--still--after the bird was still."​

It was as if something within her not herself had spoken, and it found in Mrs. Peters something she did not know as herself.​

"I know what stillness is," she said, in a queer, monotonous voice. "When we homesteaded in Dakota, and my first baby died--after he was two years old--and me with no other then--"​

Mrs. Hale stirred.​

"How soon do you suppose they'll be through looking for the evidence?"​

"I know what stillness is," repeated Mrs. Peters, in just that same way. Then she too pulled back. "The law has got to punish crime, Mrs. Hale," she said in her tight little way.​

"I wish you'd seen Minnie Foster," was the answer, "when she wore a white dress with blue ribbons, and stood up there in the choir and sang."​

The picture of that girl, the fact that she had lived neighbor to that girl for twenty years, and had let her die for lack of life, was suddenly more than she could bear.​

"Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while!" she cried. "That was a crime! Who's going to punish that?"​

"We mustn't take on," said Mrs. Peters, with a frightened look toward the stairs.​

"I might 'a' known she needed help! I tell you, it's queer, Mrs. Peters. We live close together, and we live far apart. We all go through the same things--it's all just a different kind of the same thing! If it weren't--why do you and I understand? Why do we know--what we know this minute?"​

She dashed her hand across her eyes. Then, seeing the jar of fruit on the table she reached for it and choked out:​

"If I was you I wouldn't tell her her fruit was gone! Tell her it ain't. Tell her it's all right--all of it. Here--take this in to prove it to her! She--she may never know whether it was broke or not."​

She turned away.​

Mrs. Peters reached out for the bottle of fruit as if she were glad to take it--as if touching a familiar thing, having something to do, could keep her from something else. She got up, looked about for something to wrap the fruit in, took a petticoat from the pile of clothes she had brought from the front room, and nervously started winding that round the bottle.​

"My!" she began, in a high, false voice, "it's a good thing the men couldn't hear us! Getting all stirred up over a little thing like a--dead canary." She hurried over that. "As if that could have anything to do with--with--My, wouldn't they laugh?"​

Footsteps were heard on the stairs.​

"Maybe they would," muttered Mrs. Hale--"maybe they wouldn't."​

"No, Peters," said the county attorney incisively; "it's all perfectly clear, except the reason for doing it. But you know juries when it comes to women. If there was some definite thing--something to show. Something to make a story about. A thing that would connect up with this clumsy way of doing it."​

In a covert way Mrs. Hale looked at Mrs. Peters. Mrs. Peters was looking at her. Quickly they looked away from each other. The outer door opened and Mr. Hale came in.​

"I've got the team round now," he said. "Pretty cold out there."​

"I'm going to stay here awhile by myself," the county attorney suddenly announced. "You can send Frank out for me, can't you?" he asked the sheriff. "I want to go over everything. I'm not satisfied we can't do better."​

Again, for one brief moment, the two women's eyes found one another.​

The sheriff came up to the table.​

"Did you want to see what Mrs. Peters was going to take in?"​

The county attorney picked up the apron. He laughed.​

"Oh, I guess they're not very dangerous things the ladies have picked out."​

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[*زهره*]

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell

Mrs. Hale's hand was on the sewing basket in which the box was concealed. She felt that she ought to take her hand off the basket. She did not seem able to. He picked up one of the quilt blocks which she had piled on to cover the box. Her eyes felt like fire. She had a feeling that if he took up the basket she would snatch it from him.​

But he did not take it up. With another little laugh, he turned away, saying:​

"No; Mrs. Peters doesn't need supervising. For that matter, a sheriff's wife is married to the law. Ever think of it that way, Mrs. Peters?"​

Mrs. Peters was standing beside the table. Mrs. Hale shot a look up at her; but she could not see her face. Mrs. Peters had turned away. When she spoke, her voice was muffled.​

"Not--just that way," she said.​

"Married to the law!" chuckled Mrs. Peters' husband. He moved toward the door into the front room, and said to the county attorney:​

"I just want you to come in here a minute, George. We ought to take a look at these windows."​

"Oh--windows," said the county attorney scoffingly.​

"We'll be right out, Mr. Hale," said the sheriff to the farmer, who was still waiting by the door.​

Hale went to look after the horses. The sheriff followed the county attorney into the other room. Again--for one final moment--the two women were alone in that kitchen.​

Martha Hale sprang up, her hands tight together, looking at that other woman, with whom it rested. At first she could not see her eyes, for the sheriff's wife had not turned back since she turned away at that suggestion of being married to the law. But now Mrs. Hale made her turn back. Her eyes made her turn back. Slowly, unwillingly, Mrs. Peters turned her head until her eyes met the eyes of the other woman. There was a moment when they held each other in a steady, burning look in which there was no evasion or flinching. Then Martha Hale's eyes pointed the way to the basket in which was hidden the thing that would make certain the conviction of the other woman--that woman who was not there and yet who had been there with them all through that hour.​

For a moment Mrs. Peters did not move. And then she did it. With a rush forward, she threw back the quilt pieces, got the box, tried to put it in her handbag. It was too big. Desperately she opened it, started to take the bird out. But there she broke--she could not touch the bird. She stood there helpless, foolish.​

There was the sound of a knob turning in the inner door. Martha Hale snatched the box from the sheriff's wife, and got it in the pocket of her big coat just as the sheriff and the county attorney came back into the kitchen.​

"Well, Henry," said the county attorney facetiously, "at least we found out that she was not going to quilt it. She was going to--what is it you call it, ladies?"​

Mrs. Hale's hand was against the pocket of her coat.​

"We call it--knot it, Mr. Henderson​

 

[*زهره*]

A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner

A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner

WHEN Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the men through a sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the women mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house, which no one save an old man-servant--a combined gardener and cook--had seen in at least ten years.
It was a big, squarish frame house that had once been white, decorated with cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome style of the seventies, set on what had once been our most select street. But garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the august names of that neighborhood; only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps-an eyesore among eyesores. And now Miss Emily had gone to join the representatives of those august names where they lay in the cedar-bemused cemetery among the ranked and anonymous graves of Union and Confederate soldiers who fell at the battle of Jefferson.
Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town, dating from that day in 1894 when Colonel Sartoris, the mayor--he who fathered the edict that no Negro woman should appear on the streets without an apron-remitted her taxes, the dispensation dating from the death of her father on into perpetuity. Not that Miss Emily would have accepted charity. Colonel Sartoris invented an involved tale to the effect that Miss Emily's father had loaned money to the town, which the town, as a matter of business, preferred this way of repaying. Only a man of Colonel Sartoris' generation and thought could have invented it, and only a woman could have believed it.
When the next generation, with its more modern ideas, became mayors and aldermen, this arrangement created some little dissatisfaction. On the first of the year they mailed her a tax notice. February came, and there was no reply. They wrote her a formal letter, asking her to call at the sheriff's office at her convenience. A week later the mayor wrote her himself, offering to call or to send his car for her, and received in reply a note on paper of an archaic shape, in a thin, flowing calligraphy in faded ink, to the effect that she no longer went out at all. The tax notice was also enclosed, without comment.
They called a special meeting of the Board of Aldermen. A deputation waited upon her, knocked at the door through which no visitor had passed since she ceased giving china-painting lessons eight or ten years earlier. They were admitted by the old Negro into a dim hall from which a stairway mounted into still more shadow. It smelled of dust and disuse--a close, dank smell. The Negro led them into the parlor. It was furnished in heavy, leather-covered furniture. When the Negro opened the blinds of one window, they could see that the leather was cracked; and when they sat down, a faint dust rose sluggishly about their thighs, spinning with slow motes in the single sun-ray. On a tarnished gilt easel before the fireplace stood a crayon portrait of Miss Emily's father.
They rose when she entered--a small, fat woman in black, with a thin gold chain descending to her waist and vanishing into her belt, leaning on an ebony cane with a tarnished gold head. Her skeleton was small and spare; perhaps that was why what would have been merely plumpness in another was obesity in her. She looked bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water, and of that pallid hue. Her eyes, lost in the fatty ridges of her face, looked like two small pieces of coal pressed into a lump of dough as they moved from one face to another while the visitors stated their errand.
She did not ask them to sit. She just stood in the door and listened quietly until the spokesman came to a stumbling halt. Then they could hear the invisible watch ticking at the end of the gold chain.
Her voice was dry and cold. "I have no taxes in Jefferson. Colonel Sartoris explained it to me. Perhaps one of you can gain access to the city records and satisfy yourselves."
"But we have. We are the city authorities, Miss Emily. Didn't you get a notice from the sheriff, signed by him?"
"I received a paper, yes," Miss Emily said. "Perhaps he considers himself the sheriff . . . I have no taxes in Jefferson."
"But there is nothing on the books to show that, you see We must go by the--"
"See Colonel Sartoris. I have no taxes in Jefferson."
"But, Miss Emily--"
"See Colonel Sartoris." (Colonel Sartoris had been dead almost ten years.) "I have no taxes in Jefferson. Tobe!" The Negro appeared. "Show these gentlemen out."

So SHE vanquished them, horse and foot, just as she had vanquished their fathers thirty years before about the smell.
That was two years after her father's death and a short time after her sweetheart--the one we believed would marry her --had deserted her. After her father's death she went out very little; after her sweetheart went away, people hardly saw her at all. A few of the ladies had the temerity to call, but were not received, and the only sign of life about the place was the Negro man--a young man then--going in and out with a market basket.
"Just as if a man--any man--could keep a kitchen properly, "the ladies said; so they were not surprised when the smell developed. It was another link between the gross, teeming world and the high and mighty Griersons.
A neighbor, a woman, complained to the mayor, Judge Stevens, eighty years old.
"But what will you have me do about it, madam?" he said.
"Why, send her word to stop it," the woman said. "Isn't there a law? "
"I'm sure that won't be necessary," Judge Stevens said. "It's probably just a snake or a rat that nigger of hers killed in the yard. I'll speak to him about it."
The next day he received two more complaints, one from a man who came in diffident deprecation. "We really must do something about it, Judge. I'd be the last one in the world to bother Miss Emily, but we've got to do something." That night the Board of Aldermen met--three graybeards and one younger man, a member of the rising generation.
"It's simple enough," he said. "Send her word to have her place cleaned up. Give her a certain time to do it in, and if she don't. .."
"Dammit, sir," Judge Stevens said, "will you accuse a lady to her face of smelling bad?"
So the next night, after midnight, four men crossed Miss Emily's lawn and slunk about the house like burglars, sniffing along the base of the brickwork and at the cellar openings while one of them performed a regular sowing motion with his hand out of a sack slung from his shoulder. They broke open the cellar door and sprinkled lime there, and in all the outbuildings. As they recrossed the lawn, a window that had been dark was lighted and Miss Emily sat in it, the light behind her, and her upright torso motionless as that of an idol. They crept quietly across the lawn and into the shadow of the locusts that lined the street. After a week or two the smell went away.
That was when people had begun to feel really sorry for her. People in our town, remembering how old lady Wyatt, her great-aunt, had gone completely crazy at last, believed that the Griersons held themselves a little too high for what they really were. None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such. We had long thought of them as a tableau, Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the back-flung front door. So when she got to be thirty and was still single, we were not pleased exactly, but vindicated; even with insanity in the family she wouldn't have turned down all of her chances if they had really materialized.
When her father died, it got about that the house was all that was left to her; and in a way, people were glad. At last they could pity Miss Emily. Being left alone, and a pauper, she had become humanized. Now she too would know the old thrill and the old despair of a penny more or less.
The day after his death all the ladies prepared to call at the house and offer condolence and aid, as is our custom Miss Emily met them at the door, dressed as usual and with no trace of grief on her face. She told them that her father was not dead. She did that for three days, with the ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of the body. Just as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke down, and they buried her father quickly.
We did not say she was crazy then. We believed she had to do that. We remembered all the young men her father had driven away, and we knew that with nothing left, she would have to cling to that which had robbed her, as people will.

SHE WAS SICK for a long time. When we saw her again, her hair was cut short, making her look like a girl, with a vague resemblance to those angels in colored church windows--sort of tragic and serene.
The town had just let the contracts for paving the sidewalks, and in the summer after her father's death they began the work. The construction company came with riggers and mules and machinery, and a foreman named Homer Barron, a Yankee--a big, dark, ready man, with a big voice and eyes lighter than his face. The little boys would follow in groups to hear him cuss the riggers, and the riggers singing in time to the rise and fall of picks. Pretty soon he knew everybody in town. Whenever you heard a lot of laughing anywhere about the square, Homer Barron would be in the center of the group. Presently we began to see him and Miss Emily on Sunday afternoons driving in the yellow-wheeled buggy and the matched team of bays from the livery stable.
At first we were glad that Miss Emily would have an interest, because the ladies all said, "Of course a Grierson would not think seriously of a Northerner, a day laborer." But there were still others, older people, who said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige- -
without calling it noblesse oblige. They just said, "Poor Emily. Her kinsfolk should come to her." She had some kin in Alabama; but years ago her father had fallen out with them over the estate of old lady Wyatt, the crazy woman, and there was no communication between the two families. They had not even been represented at the funeral.​

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