Theodore Dreiser Jennie Gerhardt; a novel

 
 

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CHAPTER LVII 
In the meantime Jennie was going her way, settling herself in the markedly 
different world in which henceforth she was to move. It seemed a terrible 
thing at first—this life without Lester. Despite her own strong individuality, 
her ways had become so involved with his that there seemed to be no 
possibility of disentangling them. Constantly she was with him in thought 
and action, just as though they had never separated. Where was he now? 
What was he doing? What was he saying? How was he looking? In the 
mornings when she woke it was with the sense that he must be beside her. 
At night as if she could not go to bed alone. He would come after a while 
surely—ah, no, of course he would not come. Dear heaven, think of that! 
Never any more. And she wanted him so. 
Again there were so many little trying things to adjust, for a change of this 
nature is too radical to be passed over lightly. The explanation she had to 
make to Vesta was of all the most important. This little girl, who was old 
enough now to see and think for herself, was not without her surmises and 
misgivings. Vesta recalled that her mother had been accused of not being 
married to her father when she was born. She had seen the article about 
Jennie and Lester in the Sunday paper at the time it had appeared—it had 
been shown to her at school—but she had had sense enough to say nothing 
about it, feeling somehow that Jennie would not like it. Lester's 
disappearance was a complete surprise; but she had learned in the last two 
or three years that her mother was very sensitive, and that she could hurt 
her in unexpected ways. Jennie was finally compelled to tell Vesta that 
Lester's fortune had been dependent on his leaving her, solely because she 
was not of his station. Vesta listened soberly and half suspected the truth. 
She felt terribly sorry for her mother, and, because of Jennie's obvious 
distress, she was trebly gay and courageous. She refused outright the 
suggestion of going to a boarding-school and kept as close to her mother as 
she could. She found interesting books to read with her, insisted that they 
go to see plays together, played to her on the piano, and asked for her 
mother's criticisms on her drawing and modeling. She found a few friends in 
the excellent Sand wood school, and brought them home of an evening to 
add lightness and gaiety to the cottage life. Jennie, through her growing 
appreciation of Vesta's fine character, became more and more drawn toward 
her. Lester was gone, but at least she had Vesta. That prop would probably 
sustain her in the face of a waning existence. 
There was also her history to account for to the residents of Sandwood. In 
many cases where one is content to lead a secluded life it is not necessary to 
say much of one's past, but as a rule something must be said. People have 
the habit of inquiring—if they are no more than butchers and bakers. By 
degrees one must account for this and that fact, and it was so here. She 

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could not say that her husband was dead. Lester might come back. She had 
to say that she had left him—to give the impression that it would be she, if 
any one, who would permit him to return. This put her in an interesting and 
sympathetic light in the neighborhood. It was the most sensible thing to do. 
She then settled down to a quiet routine of existence, waiting what 
dénouement to her life she could not guess. 
Sandwood life was not without its charms for a lover of nature, and this, 
with the devotion of Vesta, offered some slight solace. There was the beauty 
of the lake, which, with its passing boats, was a never-ending source of joy, 
and there were many charming drives in the surrounding country. Jennie 
had her own horse and carryall—one of the horses of the pair they had used 
in Hyde Park. Other household pets appeared in due course of time, 
including a collie, that Vesta named Rats; she had brought him from 
Chicago as a puppy, and he had grown to be a sterling watch-dog, sensible 
and affectionate. There was also a cat, Jimmy Woods, so called after a boy 
Vesta knew, and to whom she insisted the cat bore a marked resemblance. 
There was a singing thrush, guarded carefully against a roving desire for 
bird-food on the part of Jimmy Woods, and a jar of goldfish. So this little 
household drifted along quietly and dreamily indeed, but always with the 
undercurrent of feeling which ran so still because it was so deep. 
There was no word from Lester for the first few weeks following his 
departure; he was too busy following up the threads of his new commercial 
connections and too considerate to wish to keep Jennie in a state of mental 
turmoil over communications which, under the present circumstances, 
could mean nothing. He preferred to let matters rest for the time being; then 
a little later he would write her sanely and calmly of how things were going. 
He did this after the silence of a month, saying that he had been pretty well 
pressed by commercial affairs, that he had been in and out of the city 
frequently (which was the truth), and that he would probably be away from 
Chicago a large part of the time in the future. He inquired after Vesta and 
the condition of affairs generally at Sandwood. "I may get up there one of 
these days," he suggested, but he really did not mean to come, and Jennie 
knew that he did not. 
Another month passed, and then there was a second letter from him, not so 
long as the first one. Jennie had written him frankly and fully, telling him 
just how things stood with her. She concealed entirely her own feelings in 
the matter, saying that she liked the life very much, and that she was glad 
to be at Sand wood. She expressed the hope that now everything was 
coming out for the best for him, and tried to show him that she was really 
glad matters had been settled. "You mustn't think of me as being unhappy," 
she said in one place, "for I'm not. I am sure it ought to be just as it is, and I 
wouldn't be happy if it were any other way. Lay out your life so as to give 

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yourself the greatest happiness, Lester," she added. "You deserve it. 
Whatever you do will be just right for me. I won't mind." She had Mrs. 
Gerald in mind, and he suspected as much, but he felt that her generosity 
must be tinged greatly with self-sacrifice and secret unhappiness. It was the 
one thing which made him hesitate about taking that final step. 
The written word and the hidden thought—how they conflict! After six 
months the correspondence was more or less perfunctory on his part, and at 
eight it had ceased temporarily. 
One morning, as she was glancing over the daily paper, she saw among the 
society notes the following item: 
The engagement of Mrs. Malcolm Gerald, of 4044 Drexel Boulevard, to 
Lester Kane, second son of the late Archibald Kane, of Cincinnati, was 
formally announced at a party given by the prospective bride on Tuesday to 
a circle of her immediate friends. The wedding will take place in April. 
The paper fell from her hands. For a few minutes she sat perfectly still, 
looking straight ahead of her. Could this thing be so? she asked herself. Had 
it really come at last? She had known that it must come, and yet—and yet 
she had always hoped that it would not. Why had she hoped? Had not she 
herself sent him away? Had not she herself suggested this very thing in a 
roundabout way? It had come now. What must she do? Stay here as a 
pensioner? The idea was objectionable to her. And yet he had set aside a 
goodly sum to be hers absolutely. In the hands of a trust company in La 
Salle Street were railway certificates aggregating seventy-five thousand 
dollars, which yielded four thousand five hundred annually, the income 
being paid to her direct. Could she refuse to receive this money? There was 
Vesta to be considered. 
Jennie felt hurt through and through by this denouement, and yet as she 
sat there she realized that it was foolish to be angry. Life was always doing 
this sort of a thing to her. It would go on doing so. She was sure of it. If she 
went out in the world and earned her own living what difference would it 
make to him? What difference would it make to Mrs. Gerald? Here she was 
walled in this little place, leading an obscure existence, and there was he 
out in the great world enjoying life in its fullest and freest sense. It was too 
bad. But why cry? Why? 
Her eyes indeed were dry, but her very soul seemed to be torn in pieces 
within her. She rose carefully, hid the newspaper at the bottom of a trunk, 
and turned the key upon it.