Domesday Book Part 11

But to the last was nervous, tense, high keyed.

And then her mind failed totally, she died At eighty-seven here.

Now I could take Some certain symbols A and a, and show Out of the laws that Mendel found for us, What chances Elenor Murray had to live Free of the madness, clear or in dilute, Diminished or made over, which came down From this old woman to her. It's enough To see in Elenor Murray certain traits, Pa.s.sions and powers, ecstasies and sorrows.

And from them life's misfortunes, and to see They tally, take the color of the soul Of this old woman, back of her. Even to see In Elenor Murray's mother states of soul, And states of nerves, pa.s.sed on to Elenor Murray Directly by her mother.

But you say, Since many say so, here's a woman's soul Most beautiful and serviceable in the world And she confutes you, in your logic chopping, Materialistic program, who would give The marriage counter power to pick the corn seed For future planting:

No, I say to this.

What does it come to? She had will enough, And aspiration, struck out for herself, Learned for herself, did service in the war, As many did, and died--all very good.

But not so good that we could quite afford To take the chances on some other things Which might have come from her. Well, to begin Putting aside an autopsy, she died Because this neural weakness, so derived, Caught in such stress of life proved far too much For one so organized; a stress of life Which others could live through, and have lived through.

The world had Elenor Murray, and she died Before she was a cost.--But just suppose No war had been to aureole her life-- And she had lived here and gone mad at last Become a charge upon the state? Or yet, As she was love-mad, by the common word, And as she had neurotic tendencies, Would seek neurotic types therefore, suppose She had with some neurotic made a marriage, And brought upon us types worse than themselves; Given us the symbol double A instead Of big and little a, where are you then?

You have some suicides, or murders maybe, Some crimes in s.e.x, some madness on your hands, For which to tax the strong to raise, and raise Some millions every year.

Are we so mad For beauty, sacrifice and heroism, So hungry for the stimulus of these That we cannot discern and fairly appraise What Elenor Murray was, what to the world She brought, for which we overlook the harm She might have done the world? Not if we think!

And if we think, she will not seem G.o.d's flower Made spotted, pale or streaked by cross of breed, A wonder and a richness in the world; But she will seem a blossom which to these Added a novel poison with the power To spread her poison! And we may dispense With what she did and what she tried to do, No longer sentimentalists, to keep The chances growing in the world to bring A better race of men.

Then Doctor Burke Left off philosophy and asked: "How many Of you who hear me, know that Elenor Murray Was distant cousin to this necrophile, This Taylor boy, I call him boy, though twenty, Who got the rope for that detested murder Of a young girl--Oh yes, let's save the seed Of stock like this!"

But only David Borrow Knew Elenor was cousin to this boy.

And Merival spoke up: "What is to-day?

It's Thursday, it's to-morrow that he hangs.

I'll go now to the jail to see this boy."

"He hangs at nine o'clock," said Dr. Burke.

And Merival got up to go. The party Broke up, departed. At the jail he saw The wretched creature doomed to die. And turned Half sick from seeing how he tossed and looked With gla.s.sy eyes. The sheriff had gone out.

And Merival could see him, get the case.

Next afternoon they met, the sheriff told This story to the coroner.

CHARLES WARREN, THE SHERIFF

I have seen twenty men hanged, hung myself Two in this jail, with whom I talked the night Before they had the rope, knotted behind The ear to break the neck. These two I hanged, One guilty and defiant, taking chops, Four cups of coffee just an hour before We swung him off; the other trembling, pale, Protesting innocence, but guilty too-- Both wore the same look in the middle watch.

I tell you what it is: You take a steer, And windla.s.s him to where the butcher stands With hammer ready for the blow and knife To slit the throat after the hammer falls, Well, there's a moment when the steer is standing Head, neck strained side-ways, eyes rolled side-ways too, Fixed, bright seen this way, but another way A film seems spreading on them. That's the look.

They wear a corpse-like pallor, and their tongues Are loose, sprawl in their mouths, lie paralyzed Against their teeth, or fall back in their throats Which make them cough and stop for words and close Dry lips with little pops.

There's something else: Their minds are out of them, like a rubber band Stretched from the place it's pinned, about to break.

And all the time they try to draw it back, And give it utterance with that sprawling tongue, And lips too dry for words. They hold it tight As a woman giving birth holds to the sheet Tied to the bed's head, pulls the sheet to end The agony and the reluctance of the child That pauses, dreads to enter in this world.

So was it with Fred Taylor. But before The high Court shook his hope, he talked to me Freely and fully, saying many times What could the world expect of him beside Some violence or murder? He had borrowed The books his lawyers used to fight for him, And read for hours and days about heredity.

And in our talks he said: mix red and violet, You have the color purple. Strike two notes, You have a certain chord, and nature made me By rules as mathematical as they use In mixing drugs or gases. Then he'd say: Look at this table, and he'd show to me A diagram of chickens, how blue fowls Come from a cross of black with one of white With black splashed feathers. Look at the blues, he'd say.

They mate, and of four chickens, two are blue, And one is black and one is white. These blues Produce in that proportion. But the black And white have chickens white and black, you see In equal numbers. Don't you see that I Was caught in mathematics, jotted down Upon a slate before I came to earth?

They could have picked my forbears; on a slate Forecast my soul, its tendencies, if they Had been that devilish. And so he talked.

Well, then he heard that Elenor Murray died, And told me that her grandmother, that woman Known for her queerness and her lively soul To eighty years and more, was grandmother To his father, and this Elenor Murray cousin To his father. There you have it, he exclaimed, She killed herself, and I know why, he said She loved someone. This love is in our blood, And overflows, or spurts between the logs You dam it with, or fully stayed grows green With summer sc.u.m, breeds frogs and spotted snakes.

He was a study and I studied him.

I'd sit beside his cell and read some words From his confession, ask why did you this?

His crime was monstrous, but he won me over.

I wished to help the boy, for boy he was Just nineteen, and I pitied him. At last His story seemed as clear as when you see The truth behind poor words that say as much As words can say--you see, you get the truth And know it, even if you never pa.s.s The truth to others.

Lord! This girl he killed Knew not the power she played with. Why she sat Like a child upon the asp's nest picking flowers.

Or as a child will pet a mad dog. Look You come into my life, what do you bring?

Why, everything that made your life, all pains, All raptures, disappointments, wisdom learned You bring to me. But do you show them, no!

You hide them maybe, some of them, and leave Myself to learn you by the hardest means, And bing! A something in you, or in me, Out of a past explodes, or better still Extends a claw from out the b.u.t.toned coat And rips a face.

So this poor girl was killed, And by an innocent coquetry evoked The claw that tore her breast away.

One day As I pa.s.sed by his cell I stopped and sat.

What was the first thing entering in your mind From which you trace your act? And he said: "Well Almost from the beginning all my mind Was on her from the moment I awaked Until I slept, and often I awoke At two or three o'clock with thoughts of her.

And through the day I thought of nothing else; Sometimes I could not eat. At school my thought Stretched out of me to her, could not be pulled Back to the lesson. I could read a page As it were Greek, not understand a word.

But just the moment I was with her then My soul re-entered me, I was at peace, And happy, oh so happy! In the days When we were separated my unrest Took this form: that I must be with her, or If that could not be, then some other place Was better than the place I was--I strained, Lived in a constant strain, found no content With anything or place, could find no peace Except with her."

"Right from the first I had Two minds, two hearts concerning her, and one Was confidence, and one was doubt, one love, One hatred. And one purpose was to serve her, Guard her and care for her, one said destroy, Ruin or kill her. Sitting by her side, Except as I shall say I loved her, trusted her, Away from her, I doubted her and hated her.

But at the dances when I saw her smile Up at another man, the storming blood Roared in my brain for wondering about The words they said. He might be holding her Too close to him; or as I watched I saw His knee indent her skirt between her knees, That might be when she smiled. Then going home I'd ask her what he said. She'd only smile And keep a silence that I could not open With any pry of questions."

"Well, we quarreled, About this boy she danced with. So I said: I'll leave her, never see her, I'll go find Another girl, forget her. Sunday next I saw her driving with this fellow. I Was walking in the road, they pa.s.sed me laughing, She turned about and waved her hand at me.

That night I lay awake and tossed and thought: Where are they now? What are they doing now?

He's kissing her upon the lips I've kissed, Or worse, perhaps, I have been fooled, she lies Within his arms and gives him what for love I never asked her, never dared to ask."

This brought Fred Taylor's story to the murder, In point of madness, anyway. Some business Broke in our visit here. Another time I sat with him and questioned him again About the night he killed her.

"Well," he said, "I told you that we quarreled. So I fought To free myself of thought of her--no use.

I tried another girl, it wouldn't work.

For at the dance I took this girl to, I Saw Gertrude with this fellow, and the madness Came over me in blackness, hurricanes, Until I found myself in front of her, Where she was seated, asking for a dance.

She smiled and rose and danced with me. And then As the dance ended, May I come to see you, I'm sorry for my words, came from my tongue, In spite of will. She laughed and said to me: 'If you'll behave yourself.'"

"I went to see her, But came away more wretched than I went.

She seemed to have sweet secrets, in her silence And eyes too calm the secrets hid themselves.

At first I could not summon up the strength To ask her questions, but at last I did.

And then she only shook her head and laughed, And spoke of something else. She had a way Of mixing up the subjects, till my mind Forgot the very thing I wished to know, Or dulled its edges so, if I remembered I could not ask it so to bring the answer I wished from her. I came away so weak I scarce could walk, fell into sleep at once, But woke at three o'clock, and could not sleep."

"Before this quarrel we had been engaged And at this evening's end I brought it up: 'What shall we do? Are you engaged to me?

Will you renew it?' And she said to me: 'We still are young, it's better to be free.

Let's play and dance. Be gay, for if you will I'll go with you, but when you're gloomy, dear, You are not company for a girl.'"

"Dear me!

Here was I five feet nine, and could have crushed Her little body with my giant arms.

And yet in strength that counts, the mind that moves The body, but much more can move itself, And other minds, she was a spirit power, And I but just a derrick slowly swung By an engine smaller, noisy with its chug, And cloudy with its smoke bituminous.

That night, however, she engaged to go To dance with me a week hence. But meanwhile The h.e.l.lish thing comes, on the morning after.

Thus chum of mine, who testified, John Luce Came to me with the story that this man That Gertrude danced with, told him--O my G.o.d-- That Gertrude hinted she would come across, Give him the final bliss. That was the proof They brought out in the trial, as you know.

The fellow said it, d.a.m.n him--whether she Made such a promise, who knows? Would to G.o.d I knew before you hang me. There I stood And heard this story, felt my arteries Lock as you'd let ca.n.a.l gates down, my heart Beat for deliverance from the bolted streams.

That night I could not sleep, but found a book, Just think of this for fate! Under my eyes There comes an ancient story out of Egypt: Thyamis fearing he would die and lose The lovely Chariclea, strikes her dead, Then kills himself, some thousands of years ago.

It's all forgotten now, I say to self, Who cares, what matters it, the thing was done And served its end. The story stuck with me.

But the next night and the next night I stole out To spy on Gertrude, by the path in the gra.s.s Lay for long hours. And on the third night saw At half-past eight or nine this fellow come And take her walking in the darkness--where?

I could have touched them as they walked the path, But could not follow for the moon which rose.

Besides I lost them."

"Well, the time approached Of the dance, and still I brooded, then resolved.