70
PARTISAN REVIEW
we kids were off at the brook, moving in single file along the bank
to our swimming place, a mile or more from the road.
"About four o'clock or half-past, you children came down
the street," Mother said. "I was sitting in the porch-swing, I hadn't
been able to do anything all day, and I was never so glad to see
anybody, never in my life, as I was to see you children."
"Mother, I remember," I said, and I did. I remembered
exactly, and could see Mother sitting there now, watching for us
through the vines.
"Rachel had a big armful of wild iris," Mother sa1d. "Flags,
you children called them-white ones and blue ones-and she said
she was mad at you boys because you wouldn't bring some home
too. I could have had the whole field of them, she said, if you had
only helped her."
"I remember, we wouldn't," I said, "I don't know why."
"Rachel was beautiful that day, son," Mother said. "She was
only fifteen then, but really she had begun to look like a woman,
almost. Maybe she only seemed more beautiful because of the
terrible day and what I had to tell her. You'll know what it's like
when your own children begin to grow up."
The old phrase-how many times I had heard it, and with
what impatience each time. But it was right, it was true, and I was
ashamed of my amused tolerance of my mother on many occasions
before. "What did you do," I said, to cover my embarrassment,
"-how did you tell her?"
"I simply told her," Mother said. "We went upstairs to her
bedroom and I asked her to sit down. We sat beside each other on
the bed. Rachel saw that my eyes were red from weeping and
suddenly she threw her arms about me and said, 'Who's been mak–
ing my mother cry!' Then I told her what Mrs. Kirtle had said–
what Mr. Brittain had said-but I didn't tell her who said these
things. I couldn't, though it was the first thing she asked, the very
first. 'Who told you,' she cried in rage, 'who said that!' I wouldn't
tell her, I didn't think I should."
"Oh, Mother," I said, "you should have, you should."
"Well, I didn't," Mother went on. "I never did, even to the
end, though she kept on asking me all summer, almost every day.
Anyway, then I said, 'Rachel, is this true, are you in trouble,' and
she almost shouted. 'No!' she cried, and I told her she'd have to
be more quiet on account of you boys, I didn't want you other
