Free At Fault by Kate Chopin Page B

vehicles was pushing on towards the park at the
moderate speed which the law required. On both sides the wide
boulevard tasteful dwellings, many completed, but most of them in
course of construction, were in constant view. Hosmer noted every
thing, but absently; and yet he was not pre-occupied with thought. He
felt himself to be hurrying away from something that was fast
overtaking him, and his faculties for the moment were centered in the
mere act of motion. It is said that motion is pleasurable to man. No
doubt, in connection with a healthy body and free mind, movement
brings to the normal human being a certain degree of enjoyment. But
where the healthful conditions are only physical, rapid motion changes
from a source of pleasure to one of mere expediency.
    So long as Hosmer could walk he kept a certain pressing consciousness
at bay. He would have liked to run if he had dared. Since he had
entered the park there were constant trains of cars speeding somewhere
overhead; he could hear them at near intervals clashing over the stone
bridge. And there was not a train which passed that he did not long to
be at the front of it to measure and let out its speed. What a mad
flight he would have given it, to make men hold their breath with
terror! How he would have driven it till its end was death and
chaos!—so much the better.
    There suddenly formed in Hosmer's mind a sentence—sharp and distinct.
We are all conscious of such quick mental visions whether of words or
pictures, coming sometimes from a hidden and untraceable source,
making us quiver with awe at this mysterious power of mind manifesting
itself with the vividness of visible matter.
    "It was the act of a coward."
    Those were the words which checked him, and forbade him to go farther:
which compelled him to turn about and face the reality of his
convictions.
    It is no unusual sight, that of a man lying full length in the soft
tender grass of some retired spot of Forest park—with his face hidden
in his folded arms. To the few who may see him, if they speculate at
all about him he sleeps or he rests his body after a day's fatigue.
"Am I never to be the brave man?" thought Hosmer, "always the coward,
flying even from my own thoughts?"
    How hard to him was this unaccustomed task of dealing with moral
difficulties, which all through his life before, however lightly they
had come, he had shirked and avoided! He realized now, that there was
to be no more of that. If he did not wish his life to end in
disgraceful shipwreck, he must take command and direction of it upon
himself.
    He had felt himself capable of stolid endurance since love had
declared itself his guide and helper. But now—only to-day—something
beside had crept into his heart. Not something to be endured, but a
thing to be strangled and thrust away. It was the demon of hate; so
new, so awful, so loathsome, he doubted that he could look it in the
face and live.
    Here was the problem of his new existence.
    The woman who had formerly made his life colorless and empty he had
quietly turned his back upon, carrying with him a pity that was not
untender. But the woman who had unwittingly robbed him of all
possibility of earthly happiness—he hated her. The woman who for the
remainder of a life-time was to be in all the world the nearest thing
to him, he hated her. He hated this woman of whom he must be careful,
to whom he must be tender, and loyal and generous. And to give no sign
or word but of kindness; to do no action that was not considerate, was
the task which destiny had thrust upon his honor.
    He did not ask himself if it were possible of accomplishment. He had
flung hesitancy away, to make room for the all-powerful "Must be."
    He walked slowly back to his home. There was no need to run now;
nothing pursued him. Should he quicken his pace or drag himself ever
so slowly, it could henceforth make no difference. The burden from
which he had fled was now banded upon him and not to be loosed, unless
he fling