She would take with her to the park a book or more often a newspaper but she seldom read. She was content to sit and watch children at play or gaze at friendly squirrels who so ludicrously sat rapidly revolving a nut disentombed from earthy caches in their little forepaws as they bit into its hard shell.
Even the sinking of a huge vessel like the Titanic after collision with an iceberg off the Canadian coast with great loss of life could not stir her. Nor could the hectic days of an election year stir her from her apathy. A former schoolteacher from New Jersey, a prominent member of Congress, a twice-defeated candidate for the Presidency, a fat, jovial and weak President, and a vigorous ex-President were scrambling madly for nominations, but so far as Mimi was concerned, they might just as well have been struggling for the rulership of an obscure island in the South Seas.
As the time of her ordeal approached she achieved a calmness of which she had never believed herself capable. Her hatred, her contempt for Carl had passed and in its stead had come a complete lack of feeling towards him. She saw him now in perspective more and more clearly as the weak individual he had proved himself to be. She wondered why she had not seen it sooner, why traits of his which now were revealed all too clearly had been invisible to her. His indecisiveness, his succumbing to indifference and easy vices when they had first parted on Hilda’s account, should have been a clear warning to her. She did not object to his drinking or other derelictions on moral grounds. As a matter of fact Carl’s association with the girl who was déclassée had not seemed to her as a thing to be condemned. Towards the girl Mimi had had a very kindly and sympathetic feeling and she had had no word of condemnation or scorn for her. Mimi now realized that she should have seen in these little strayings from which she had saved Carl at such a cost to herself the true measure of Carl’s character. But even as she saw now what might and should have been, she knew that at the time she had been so blinded by her love for Carl she could never have realized the full importance of the things then under her very eyes.
Her sense of contentment had its roots in a deep spiritual awareness which gave her great comfort. She seldom thought now of the condemnation she was doubtless receiving in Atlanta. Instead she was happy, very happy she had acted as she had. She and the baby would get along somehow and they would be very happy together. Lacking respect, despising Carl, she would never have been happy with him, and her religion would not have allowed her to divorce him. What though her money was disappearing so rapidly? By economy she would surely have enough to last her through her confinement and permit her to spend a few weeks in the country until she was strong again. Then she could easily get a job and she and the baby would be happy together.
She loved the restless stirring within her body, she was happy at the signs of creation. It was a sensation at times beautiful, at other times she was overwhelmed with the marvellousness of it all. She experienced little surges of exultant joy that within herself she too had spiritual reserves which kept her soul free and intact despite what the world might say. Gone was the sense of being a depraved, a disgraced, a low creature which had assailed her those last few days in Atlanta. She was free! Free! Free!
Round and round she twisted the wide gold band on her left hand. This she was ashamed of after a fashion. Mrs. Manning, with whom she lived, had glanced significantly one day at her left hand as she sought gently to induce Mimi to talk. To avoid suspicion Mimi had gone to a pawnshop on South Street into whose windows she often glanced as she passed, fascinated by the clusters of knives and revolvers and boxing-gloves and baseball-mitts. Subconsciously a small sign had impressed itself upon her memory. It read:
Large Assortment of Wedding Rings for Sale Cheap
She knew that the bearded Jew who sold her the ring guessed her secret, her guilt had made her so nervous. She had taken the first one that fitted her finger, paid him to his joy and amazement the first price he had named, and hurried from the shop. It was a cheap and awkward-looking affair but it was an orthodox wedding ring. Whenever she glanced at it or felt it on her finger a wave of guilt, a depressing sense of her dishonesty, swept over her, but she kept it on whenever she emerged from her room, for it saved her embarrassing questions and kept down talk. …
One question occupied her more than any other. What her future and that of the child might be did not worry her half so much as did the sex of this stranger from another world who soon would be with her. She wanted it to be a girl on some days, more often she eagerly wished for a boy. Marriage for herself was now obviously out of the question—a boy would be less trouble and there would be fewer people to demand of him the story of his parentage than would be the case with a girl. Day after day this speculation went on endlessly, and she always came back to the exact spot in her reasoning from which she had begun. …
It was a boy. A hot night in early July saw his entry
