Теодор Драйзер - Jennie Gerhardt

Jennie watched all this with wondering eyes. Never in her life had she been inside a Catholic church. The gloom, the beauty of the windows, the whiteness of the altar, the golden flames of the candles impressed her. She was suffused with a sense of sorrow, loss, beauty, and mystery. Life in all its vagueness and uncertainty seemed typified by this scene.

As the bell tolled there came from the sacristy a procession of altar–boys. The smallest, an angelic youth of eleven, came first, bearing aloft a magnificent silver cross. In the hands of each subsequent pair of servitors was held a tall, lighted candle. The priest, in black cloth and lace, attended by an acolyte on either hand, followed. The procession passed out the entrance into the vestibule of the church, and was not seen again until the choir began a mournful, responsive chant, the Latin supplication for mercy and peace.

Then, at this sound the solemn procession made its reappearance. There came the silver cross, the candles, the dark–faced priest, reading dramatically to himself as he walked, and the body of Lester in a great black coffin, with silver handles, carried by the pall–bearers, who kept an even pace. Jennie stiffened perceptibly, her nerves responding as though to a shock from an electric current. She did not know any of these men. She did not know Robert. She had never seen Mr. Midgely. Of the long company of notables who followed two by two she recognized only three, whom Lester had pointed out to her in times past. Mrs. Kane she saw, of course, for she was directly behind the coffin, leaning on the arm of a stranger; behind her walked Mr. Watson, solemn, gracious. He gave a quick glance to either side, evidently expecting to see her somewhere; but not finding her, he turned his eyes gravely forward and walked on. Jennie looked with all her eyes, her heart gripped by pain. She seemed so much a part of this solemn ritual, and yet infinitely removed from it all.

The procession reached the altar rail, and the coffin was put down. A white shroud bearing the insignia of suffering, a black cross, was put over it, and the great candles were set beside it. There were the chanted invocations and responses, the sprinkling of the coffin with holy water, the lighting and swinging of the censer and then the mumbled responses of the auditors to the Lord's Prayer and to its Catholic addition, the invocation to the Blessed Virgin. Jennie was overawed and amazed, but no show of form colorful, impression imperial, could take away the sting of death, the sense of infinite loss. To Jennie the candles, the incense, the holy song were beautiful. They touched the deep chord of melancholy in her, and made it vibrate through the depths of her being. She was as a house filled with mournful melody and the presence of death. She cried and cried. She could see, curiously, that Mrs. Kane was sobbing convulsively also.

When it was all over the carriages were entered and the body was borne to the station. All the guests and strangers departed, and finally, when all was silent, she arose. Now she would go to the depot also, for she was hopeful of seeing his body put on the train. They would have to bring it out on the platform, just as they did in Vesta's case. She took a car, and a little later she entered the waiting–room of the depot. She lingered about, first in the concourse, where the great iron fence separated the passengers from the tracks, and then in the waiting–room, hoping to discover the order of proceedings. She finally observed the group of immediate relatives waiting—Mrs. Kane, Robert, Mrs. Midgely, Louise, Amy, Imogene, and the others. She actually succeeded in identifying most of them, though it was not knowledge in this case, but pure instinct and intuition.

No one had noticed it in the stress of excitement, but it was Thanksgiving Eve. Throughout the great railroad station there was a hum of anticipation, that curious ebullition of fancy which springs from the thought of pleasures to come. People were going away for the holiday. Carriages were at the station entries. Announcers were calling in stentorian voices the destination of each new train as the time of its departure drew near. Jennie heard with a desperate ache the description of a route which she and Lester had taken more than once, slowly and melodiously emphasized. "Detroit, Toledo, Cleveland, Buffalo, and New York." There were cries of trains for "Fort Wayne, Columbus, Pittsburg, Philadelphia, and points East," and then finally for "Indianapolis, Louisville, Columbus, Cincinnati, and points South." The hour had struck.

Several times Jennie had gone to the concourse between the waiting–room and the tracks to see if through the iron grating which separated her from her beloved she could get one last look at the coffin, or the great wooden box which held it, before it was put on the train. Now she saw it coming. There was a baggage porter pushing a truck into position near the place where the baggage car would stop. On it was Lester, that last shadow of his substance, incased in the honors of wood, and cloth, and silver. There was no thought on the part of the porter of the agony of loss which was represented here. He could not see how wealth and position in this hour were typified to her mind as a great fence, a wall, which divided her eternally from her beloved. Had it not always been so? Was not her life a patchwork of conditions made and affected by these things which she saw—wealth and force—which had found her unfit? She had evidently been born to yield, not seek. This panoply of power had been paraded before her since childhood. What could she do now but stare vaguely after it as it marched triumphantly by? Lester had been of it. Him it respected. Of her it knew nothing. She looked through the grating, and once more there came the cry of "Indianapolis, Louisville, Columbus, Cincinnati, and points South." A long red train, brilliantly lighted, composed of baggage cars, day coaches, a dining–car, set with white linen and silver, and a half dozen comfortable Pullmans, rolled in and stopped. A great black engine, puffing and glowing, had it all safely in tow.

As the baggage car drew near the waiting truck a train–hand in blue, looking out of the car, called to some one within.

"Hey, Jack! Give us a hand here. There's a stiff outside!"

Jennie could not hear.

All she could see was the great box that was so soon to disappear. All she could feel was that this train would start presently, and then it would all be over. The gates opened, the passengers poured out. There were Robert, and Amy, and Louise, and Midgely—all making for the Pullman cars in the rear. They had said their farewells to their friends. No need to repeat them. A trio of assistants "gave a hand" at getting the great wooden case into the car. Jennie saw it disappear with an acute physical wrench at her heart.

There were many trunks to be put aboard, and then the door of the baggage car half closed, but not before the warning bell of the engine sounded. There was the insistent calling of "all aboard" from this quarter and that; then slowly the great locomotive began to move. Its bell was ringing, its steam hissing, its smoke–stack throwing aloft a great black plume of smoke that fell back over the cars like a pall. The fireman, conscious of the heavy load behind, flung open a flaming furnace door to throw in coal. Its light glowed like a golden eye.

Jennie stood rigid, staring into the wonder of this picture, her face white, her eyes wide, her hands unconsciously clasped, but one thought in her mind—they were taking his body away. A leaden November sky was ahead, almost dark. She looked, and looked until the last glimmer of the red lamp on the receding sleeper disappeared in the maze of smoke and haze overhanging the tracks of the far–stretching yard.

"Yes," said the voice of a passing stranger, gay with the anticipation of coming pleasures. "We're going to have a great time down there. Remember Annie? Uncle Jim is coming and Aunt Ella."