The Gypsy Look

by Richard Connell

 

“MARTIN look at the moonlight.”

“And he looked at me, just as if I was some strange animal in a cage, and he said, 'Poor fellow ... poor fellow.'”

By Richard Connell

Illustrations by Raeburn Van Buren

But Martin Draycott was too tired to look at the moonlight. He had been painting the new barn all day, painting it red. He turned his face away from the moonlight, and was soon asleep beside Elsa in their old brass bed, the one he had picked up cheap at an auction when they were first married. It was still good enough, though the quoits on it were loose, and jingled. Martin was always saying he would fix them when he got around to it.

Elsa was tired, too, spent by her day in the hot, little kitchen, putting up string beans; but she did not go to sleep. She lay there beside him, watching the moonlight as it stole across the faded roses on the wall-paper of the cheerless bed-room. Outside the winddow she could see a corner of the barn, the new red barn Martin was so proud of. Its shadow fell across the counterpane. Gently Elsa slipped from the bed. Her bare feet made no sound on the matting-covered floor. Martin was deep in sleep now, and he would lie like that, unmoving, his face a sun-browned patch on the silvered pillow, till dawn called him to another day of work on the farm. No ordinary sound would disturb him. Yet Elsa, when she moved to the window, moved stealthily.

She stood at the window in her nightgown; it fitted her slender body badly, because she had made it hastily from a remnant left over from a bolt of muslin Martin had bought at a bargain, for sheets. Before her eyes loomed the black bulk of the barn. It quite dwarfed the house.

“The biggest barn in Litchfield County,” Martin had said of it, proudly, at supper. “And the best.”

“Will you paint the house now?” Elsa had asked. “Nothing's been done to it for seven years. It needs paint badly.”

“The house can wait,” Martin had said.

Elsa stood gazing at the barn, staring hard as if it were some dark mirage, and she hoped her eyes could see through it to the apple orchard beyond. But she could not see the apple orchard. The barn was in the way, the solid barn, the biggest in the county, and the best. She wanted to see the orchard that night. She was thinking of another orchard, her father's, and of another night, moonlit, too, when Martin had kissed her for the first time. She leaned far out of the window, but she could not see the orchard, not even the tops of the trees. There was no sound in the night. She could hear Martin's breathing, faint, regular. She stared at the great barn.

“Eighteen years,” she whispered. “Eighteen years.”

She looked behind her quickly. No, he hadn't heard. She sighed and turned away from the window. She must get back to bed. She must have rest. There was work to do on the morrow, canning, the house work, the meals for the hired men and for Martin, endless work. Sleep would be sweet. It would bring dreams. She had learned to look forward to the quiet nights and the dreams that came. At her work next day she always tried to recapture them. Gently she slipped back into bed. The loose quoits jingled a little. She must fix them, some day, when she had a minute to spare. Martin would never get 'round to it. His farm, it kept him busy, always busy. She closed her eyes on the moonlight.

WHEN Martin Draycott drove his truck, for he saw no sense in keeping a pleasure car, into the village of Sharon, and, in the rough working clothes he habitually wore, went into the bank, Mr. Pond, the president himself, came out of his little office to shake Martin's hand. Behind nose-glasses, Mr. Pond's eyes were cordial.

A solid man, Martin Draycott. Too few farmers like him. A head on his shoulders. Honest. Reliable. That farm of his, the place old Forbes let go to seed, that's a nice piece of property for you. A hundred acres, and I'll bet they're all paying their way. Glad to put a mortgage on it. Not likely, though. Draycott too well fixed. Made it all himself, too. With his own hands, one might say. Wife helped, of course. Fine woman, Elsa Draycott. No nonsense about her. Most wives seem to think all they have to do is spend a husband's money as fast as he makes it. Must speak to Hattie about that dress-maker's bill. Bet Elsa Draycott makes her own clothes. They look it, anyway. It's better to be thrifty, though. Wife of Martin Draycott wouldn't dare to be anything else, I guess. Too bad about their son. Folly of youth. Only seventeen. He'll get over it, like as not, and settle down. A farm (Mr. Pond privately permitted himself a small joke) is no place for wild oats. Not that young Tom Draycott was a bad one. Couldn't be with two such parents. Just a young fool, that's all, running off like that and shipping on a tramp steamer and sailing off to Singapore (was it?) and Heaven knows where else. Wanted to be a seafaring man, Tom told Wilbur. A master mariner. Captain of a ship. Talked big about foreign ports—Shanghai, Batavia (thought that was in New York state), Rio, Capetown. Where did he fill his head with such notions? Books, like as not. Never had a glimpse of the sea in his life, any more than I've had. Well, he'll get his young belly full of seafaring, and come back, like the Prodigal Son, and ask his father to take him back on the farm, and become a substantial member of the community. He'll be lucky if the old man takes him back. Finest farm in the county. Hollow-tile silo, electric milker, tractor, up-to-date barn. Guess Martin would take him back. Only son. Mad at the boy now, of course. Don't blame him. Must hurt a father to see a young ingrate turn his back on such a good chance to make money. Martin never speaks about Tom. Only mentioned it once to me. “Can't understand it,” Martin said. Can't myself. Glad my boy has both feet on the ground. Making good as assistant-cashier. Gave up that college bug of his completely. Saw the sense of what I said. Young fellow learns more about life and business behind the window of a country bank than at all these colleges put together. Smart lad, Wilbur. Wouldn't surprise me if he got to be a millionaire. Young Tom Draycott wanted him to run away to sea, too. Not Wilbur. Knows what side his bread is buttered on. Horse-sense. Good son. Bet Martin Draycott sort of envies me. Nice deposit Martin made just now. Farm must be having a good year. A solid citizen, Martin Draycott, a solid citizen.

When he had finished his business at the bank, Martin Draycott hurried back to his farm. From far down the road he could see his new red barn, standing out, huge and impressive, against the blue of the day. He smiled.

A barn any man could be proud of. It's mine. In a sense, it's me. Built by my own effort. Solid. Honest. Prosperous. Soon it will be bulging with hay. Glad I bought that tedder. Loader works like a charm, too. Months it took me to save the money for it. Worth it, though, just to see the smooth, easy way it does its job. Don't believe any farmer in the county, maybe the state, has a better haying outfit. Holsteins doing well, too. A dozen beauties. Pays to get blooded stock. Ten per cent more milk since I installed that automatic waterer and salter. Musn't forget to oil the milker. Wish I'd bought it before Tom went away. He never liked to milk. I never minded it when I was a boy. Funny about Tom, going off like that. Wasn't the lazy kind, either. Glad he came and told me he was going. Rather he did that than sneak away without a word. A bad day it was for me. Never forget how he looked at me. Black eyes. Like his mother's. I told him he was making a fool of himself. Showed him the plans for the new barn. He just looked at me. Almost as if he pitied me. Maybe I shouldn't have lost my temper. Wonder where he is now? What was it Pond said about that new silo-blower they've put on the market? Better than mine? I'll have to look into it. If the corn and potatoes do well, maybe I could afford one next spring. Or maybe Atkins will come down in the price of that ten-acre lot. Can't do much with it himself, but knows I want it. Could use it for alfalfa. Tackle him again this winter when he's hard up. Ten more acres. A hundred and ten. Growing. Old Forbes would open his eyes if he were alive to see what I've made out of his place. Nothing on it but the house when I took it over. House never any good. Must put running water in it sometime. Year after next, perhaps, if things go right. But a new manure conveyor, first. They say you can tell about a farmer by his manure pile. Well, let them look at mine. Straight sides, it has. Nice field of rutabagas. Pond said there are gypsies in the neighborhood. He saw them. Notified the constable. Shiftless, thieving lot. Never stole anything from me; better not try. What a life—roaming around in rags. No roof over your head. No money in the bank. No place in the world. My barn certainly looks great in the sunlight—

Elsa Draycott, standing in her worn cotton dress, in her kitchen, twisted with reddened hands the tops on jars of string beans. Mr. Pond, in his little office in the bank, peered through nose-glasses at a mortgage. Wilbur Pond in his cage behind the grilled window, muttered to himself, “Six times nine is fifty-four,” and made neat figures with a neat, white hand. The hired men hoed in the rutabaga patch. Raphael, the oldest gypsy, lay smoking beneath a tree, watching a spider spin its web. Tom Draycott stood in the bow of the tramper “San Marco,” felt the salt spray on his face, and saw the orange-yellow lights of Singapore etched on the velvet dusk of an Oriental night. Martin Draycott expertly steered his truck into the drive-way of his farm. His eyes were on the big red barn. The shabby little house he did not see at all.

AT supper, Elsa spoke to him. She came in from the kitchen where she had been feeding the hired men their pork and potatoes. Her hands held the edges of her apron. She did not speak easily.

“Martin?”

“Yes?”

“It's a long time since we've been away from the farm. Three years, nearly.”

“We've been to the village. I was there today.”

“It isn't to the village I want to go.”

“Where then?”

She twisted at the edges of her apron.

“New York.”

He stared at her.

“New York?”

“Yes.”

He frowned.

“Why should we go there?”

“Well, there are things we could buy,” Elsa said. And added, “Cheaper than here, and better.”

“Things? What things?”

“Well, hats.”

“He heard the soft sound of the front door being carefully opened. He heard steps. He did not turn.”

“We don't need hats.”

“No. Maybe not. We don't really need them. But I was thinking”.... Her voice trailed off. “You know what you said last year....”

“Yes, I know. Then I had the chance to get the electric milker cheap. It's saved us a lot of money, Elsa. If we'd gone to New York, we'd have thrown money away, and had nothing to show for it.”

“I suppose so. Nothing? No electric milker, anyway.”

“And there's the work,” Martin said. “How could we leave it?”

“For a day only. With the city only four hours away it seems too bad—”

“Every day is precious on a farm. You know that, Elsa.”

“Yes, I know it well.”

“Some day, perhaps—”

“It's always 'some day,' Martin.”

He put down his knife and fork.

“Well, we can't go now. Just can't. Why do you want to go now?”

“I don't really know. Just a feeling—”

“You've been working hard, Elsie,” he said. “Better get to bed early tonight. A good night's rest will fix you up.”

She sat down and began to eat silently.

“Maybe,” said Martin, “in the fall, we could spare a day, when things slack off.”

“They never seem to.”

“Else, you are strange today. Not yourself at all. It isn't like you to want to go gadding off when there's work to be done. Where would we be today if we went off to the city every time we felt like it, instead of staying here and working? We wouldn't own the finest farm in the state, I'll tell you that.”

Elsa spoke slowly.

“I was thinking last night,” she said, “do we really own the farm?”

“Of course we do. Every cent is paid up. No mortgages.”

“I didn't mean that way.”

“What way then?”

“I was just wondering”—she hesitated, found it hard to finish with his eyes on her, “if maybe the farm doesn't own us.”

His look was uncomprehending.

“That's a funny thing to say, Else. Of course, in a way a man's work does get a hold on him, if that's what you mean. But we were put in the world to work. Perhaps the farm is part of us, and we are part of the farm. I don't care. After all, that's what I've worked for.”

She did not speak for some minutes. Then,

“We can't go to the city—just for a day?”

“Not now,” said Martin Draycott. “Let me have another helping of the rice pudding, will you, Else?”

At noon he came in from the hayfield.

“I saw a band of gypsies pass along the road,” he said.

“Yes, I saw them, too.”

“Elsa?”

“What?”

“Did they stop here?”

“Why should they stop here?”

“That's not what I asked you. Did they stop here?”

“Yes. For a minute.”

“Take anything?”

“No.”

“Elsa, did you give them anything?”

She was busy serving the creamed potatoes. She did not answer him. He repeated,

“Did you give them anything, Elsa?”

“Nothing much.”

“What?”

“Skim milk—and some scraps of food left over from the hired-men's breakfast.”

He spoke sharply.

“Why did you do that?”

“They were hungry.”

“If they're hungry why don't they work, instead of begging from honest folks who do? Elsa, I don't like it one bit, your giving anything to them.”

“It wasn't much, Martin. Skim milk. The pigs have more than enough of it. Left-over food.”

“That doesn't matter. It isn't the food I mind; it's the idea. Here we are, you and I, working our fingers to the bone, day in and day out, to build up this farm, to save money, to be decent, respectable people, and along come a lot of wandering, ragged loafers and expect us to feed them. It isn't fair. I won't have it.”

“I'm sorry, Martin. It's too late now. I didn't see any harm in it. Skim milk. Left-over food.”

“I tell you it isn't the food I care about. I'm sick of this business of the soft people of the world leaning on the hard. It's you women that encourage them, too. There wouldn't be ne'er-do-wells wandering about, if it weren't for the easy marks.”

“They looked like harmless creatures.”

“Harmless. Idle people are never harmless. Which way did they go?”

Elsa pointed.

“Toward the wood lot?” he asked.

“Yes,”

“Elsa?”

“What?”

“Did you say they could camp there?”

Slowly she nodded.

“You know I don't want scum like that hanging around here,” Martin said.

“They'll go tomorrow, they said.”

“I don't want them on my land, not a minute.”

“Why? What harm—”

“Why? Why? Why?” he burst out. “What harm would it do? No harm to the property—maybe. But I just won't encourage shiftlessness. I hate gypsies and tramps.”

“Why?”

“Stop asking me, 'Why?' I hate them, that's all.”

“Martin, where are you going?”

“To tell them to move on.”

“Must you do that?”

“Else, what's got into you? First you feed them. Then you invite them to settle on our land.”

“I didn't invite them. They asked. Just for a night.”

“You'd no right to let them.”

She sighed.

“They'll not hurt anything,” she said. “They must rest somewhere.”

“Rest? What should tire them? Do they work? No, we're the ones that work; they have the fun. Well, they're not going to camp on my land.”

He got up and stamped out, his lunch half-finished.

Martin Draycott did not see his wife again until supper-time.

“Well, I settled them,” he said.

“Oh, Martin, what did you do?”

“I went down to the wood-lot. There they were, acting as if they owned the place. Getting ready to pitch camp. A dirty lot—three or four women, some kids, a couple of able-bodied men, one old fellow, smoking, talking, laughing, under my trees. I went right up to the old fellow.

“'Get along out of here,' I said.

“He was a cool customer, that old gypsy. He looked at me, and said, 'But the lady said we could stay here.'

“'And I say you'd better move on,' I said to him, and do you know what he had the nerve to say to me, Else?”

“What, Martin?”

“He said, 'Why?' I got hot under the collar. 'I don't have to give reasons why I want a lot of vagabonds to get off my land,' I said. 'So beat it.' He looked at me in a funny way. 'So this is your land,' he said. 'Yes,' I said, 'earned and paid for.' 'And that is your barn—that big red one—and that is your house—that little paintless shack?' 'Yes,' I said, 'what of it?' 'You own them,' he said. 'You have lived here always. You will live here always.' 'Pack up,' I said, 'I can't waste time jawing with you.' Well, he said some gibberish to the others, and they packed up without any more argument. And then he did a queer thing.”

“What?”

“When the old fellow was off my land, he turned and looked at me, just looked at me, Else, and he wasn't mad. He was smiling a little. And he looked at me, just as if I was some strange animal in a cage, and he said, 'Poor fellow.' Just like that. 'Poor fellow.' It made me think of the way—”

He broke off shortly.

“Else,” he said. “Else, for God's sake, stop looking at me—”

MARTIN DRAYCOTT usually went to bed as soon after supper as he could. But not to-night. His big frame was sprawled in a chair in the plain dining room. A lighted lamp stood on the bare table. He sat there, not moving; but he was not asleep. His eyes were open. They were staring straight ahead. He was almost like a dead man, sitting there in the old rocker, a dead man struck lifeless in the midst of a bewildered moment.

She had gone. Elsa had gone. That morning when he woke she was not lying beside him. He thought she had gone down-stairs to get breakfast ready. He called to her but she did not answer. He went down to the kitchen. She was not there. He went out to the barn, calling her name. No reply came. He walked through the orchard. She was not there. Nor at the chicken house. He waited. She did not come. He waited, angrily. She did not come. He would not believe she had gone, he could not believe it, till he came back to the house and saw that her only good shoes, the ones she wore some Sundays, were gone. Even then he clutched at the hope that he was wrong, that she was somewhere about the farm. If the great, solid barn had vanished in the night, he could not have been more perplexed. Gradually he realized that Elsa really had gone. He set to work, feverishly, forcing himself. At supper-time she had not returned. He did not eat any supper. He sat down by the table, with its red cloth, and waited. First, Tom. Now, Elsa. He cursed the ticking clock. Dusk fell. Through the window he could see the barn, not red now, but black and formless. Tom, first. Now Elsa. The hours of the night crept by. He sat there. He heard the dim puffing of a distant train, winding its way up the valley. Tom, first. Now, Elsa.

He heard the soft sound of the front-door being carefully opened. He heard steps. He did not turn.

“Martin.”

Her voice was low, frightened. He looked. It was as if he were looking at a stranger. A stranger she seemed. A new hat. A gay new hat. A new dress. Silk. A stranger.

“I couldn't stay away, Martin.” Her voice faltered. He stared at her. She stood in the door-way, as if she did not dare come further. Her face was white, strained, afraid.

“I was in New York. I used my egg money—” She did not come near him. She was like a wild creature at bay.

Martin slowly got up from his chair and crossed to where she stood.

“Elsa,” he said, “let's have some supper. You must be hungry.”

That was all.

Her eyes were wide.

“But I went away. I let the work go. I went to New York. I spent money. I bought things—things I didn't really need.”

Awkwardly he put a hand, roughened by work, on her shoulder, on her new dress.

“It's a pretty dress,” he said. “It makes you look younger. You must have some more—”

“Martin—your hand—it's red—”

“Been painting all day,” he said.

“But you'd finished the barn.”

“Damn the barn,” he said. “I've been painting the house. We're going to have the finest house in the state, you and I.”