Angel Island Part 25

Lulu's face had changed--almost horribly. Her eyes glittered between narrowed lids. Her lips had pulled away from each other, baring her teeth. "You tell Ralph he's mistaken about my son," she ground out.

"That's what I told him," Peachy went on in a breaking voice. "But he said you wouldn't have anything to do or say about it. He said that Honey-Boy would be trained in these matters by his father, not by his mother. I said that you would fight them both. He asked me what chance you would have against your husband and your son. He--he--he always spoke as if Honey-Boy were more Honey's child than yours, and as though Angela were more his child than mine. He said that he had talked this question over with the other men when Angela's wings first began to grow. He said that they made up their minds then that her wings must be cut when she became a woman. I besought him not to do it--I begged, I entreated, I pleaded. He said that nothing I could say would change him.

I said that you would all stand by me in this, and he asked me what we five could do against them. He, called us five tottering females. Oh, it grew dreadful. I shrieked at him, finally. As he left, he said, 'Remember your first day in the Clubhouse, my dear! That's my answer.'"

She turned to Clara. "Clara, you are going to bear a child in the spring. It may be a girl. Would you let son of mine or any of these women clip her wings? Will you suffer Peterkin to clip Angela's wings?"

Clara's whole aspect had fired. Flame seemed burst from her gray-green eyes, sparks to shoot to from her tawny head. "I would strike him dead first."

Peachy turned to Chiquita. The color had poured into Chiquita's face until her full brown eyes glared from a purple mask. "You, too, Chiquita. You may bear girl-children. Oh, will you help me?"

"I'll help you," Chiquita said steadily. She added after a pause, "I cannot believe that they'll dare, though."

"Oh, they'll dare anything," Peachy said bitterly. Earth-men are devils.

What shall we do, Julia? she asked wearily.

Julia had arisen. She stood upright. Curiously, she did not totter. And despite her shorn pinions, she seemed more than ever to tower like some Winged Victory of the air. Her face ace glowed with rage. As on that fateful day at the Clubhouse, it was as though a fire had been built in an alabaster vase. But as they looked at her, a rush of tears wiped the flame from her eyes. She sank back again on the couch. She put her hands over her face and sobbed. "At last," she said strangely. "At last! At last! At last!"

"What shall we do, Julia?" Peachy asked stonily.

"Rebel!" answered Julia.

"But how?"

"Refuse to let them cut Angela's wings."

"Oh, I would not dare open the subject with Ralph," Peachy said in a terror-stricken voice. "In the mood he's in, he'd cut her wings tonight."

"I don't mean to tell him anything about it," Julia replied. "Rebel in secret. I mean--they overcame us once by strategy. We must beat them now by superior strategy."

"You don't really mean anything secret, do you, Julia?" Lulu remonstrated. "That wouldn't be quite fair, would it?"

And curiously enough, Julia answered in the exact words that Honey had used once. "Anything's fair in love or war--and this is both. We can't be fair. We can't trust them. We trusted them once. Once is enough for me."

"But how, Julia?" Peachy asked. Her voice had now a note of querulousness in it. "How are we going to rebel?"

Julia started to speak. Then she paused. "There's something I must ask you first. Tell me, all of you, what did you do with your wings when the men cut them off?"

The rage faded out of the four faces. A strange reticence seemed to blot out expression. The reticence changed to reminiscence, to a deep sadness.

Lulu spoke first. "I thought I was going to keep my wings as long as I lived. I always thought of them as something wonderful, left over from a happier time. I put them away, done up in silk. And at first I used to look at them every day. But I was always sad afterwards--and--and gradually, I stopped doing it. Honey hates to come home and find me sad.

Months went by--I only looked at them occasionally. And after a while, I did not look at them at all. Then, one day, after Honey built the fireplace for me, I saw that we needed something--to--to--to sweep the hearth with. I tried all kinds of things, but nothing was right. Then, suddenly, I remembered my wings. It had been two years since I'd looked at them. And after that long time, I found that I didn't care so much.

And so--and so--one day I got them out and cut them into little brooms for the hearth. Honey never said anything about it--but I knew he knew.

Somehow--." A strange expression came into the face of the una.n.a.lytic Lulu. "I always have a feeling that Honey enjoys using my wings about the hearth."

Julia hesitated. "What did you do, Chiquita?"

"Oh, I had all Lulu's feeling at first, of course. But it died as hers did. You see this fan. You have often commented on how well I've kept it all these years--I've mended it from month to month with feathers from my own wings. The color is becoming to me--and Frank likes me to carry a fan. He says that it makes him think of a country called Spain that he always wanted to visit when he was a youth."

"And you, Clara?" Julia asked gently.

"Oh, I went through," Clara replied, "just what Lulu and Chiquita did.

Then, one day, I said to myself, 'What's the use of weeping over a dead thing?' I made my wings into wall-decorations. You're right about Honey, Lulu." For a moment there was a shade of conscious coquetry in Clara's voice. "I know that it gives Pete a feeling of satisfaction--I don't exactly know why (unless it's a sense of having conquered)--to see my wings tacked up on his bedroom walls."

Peachy did not wait for Julia to put the question to her. "As soon as I could move, after they freed us from the Clubhouse, I threw mine into the sea. I knew I should go mad if I kept them where I could see them every day. Just to look at them was like a sharp knife going through my heart. One night, while Ralph was asleep, I crawled out of the house on my hands and knees, dragging them after me. I crept down to the beach and threw them into the water. They did not sink--they floated. I stayed until they drifted out of sight. The moon was up. It shone on them.

Oh, the glorious blue of them--and the glitter--the--the--." But Peachy could not go on.

"What did you do with yours, Julia?" Lulu asked at last.

"I kept them until last night," Julia answered.

"Among the s.h.i.+p's stuff was a beautiful carved chest. It was packed with linen. Billy said it was some earth-girl's wedding outfit. I took everything out of the chest and put my wings in it. Folded carefully, they just fitted. I used to brood over them every night before I went to bed. Oh, they were wonderful in the dark--as if the chest were full of white fire. Many times I've waked up in the middle of the night and gone to look at them. I don't know why, but I had to do it. After a while, it hurt me so much that I made up my mind to lock the chest forever; for I always wept. I could not help it."

Julia wept now. The tears poured down her cheeks. But she went on.

"After yesterday's talk, I thought this situation over for a long time.

Then I went to the chest, took out my wings, brought them downstairs and--and--and--."

"What?" somebody whispered.

"Burned them!" Julia's deep voice swelled on the word "burned" as though she still felt the scorching agony of that moment.

For a long moment, n.o.body spoke.

Julia asked their question for them. "Do you want to know why I did it?"

And without waiting, she answered, "Because I wanted to mark in some way the end of my desire to fly. We must stop wanting to fly, we women. We must stop wasting our energy brooding over what's past. We must stop it at once. Not only that but--for Angela's sake and for the sake of all girl-children who will be born on this island--we must learn to walk."

"Learn to walk!" Peachy repeated. "Julia, have you gone mad? We have always held out against this degradation. We must continue to do so." Again came that proud lift of her shoulders, the vibrant stir of wing-stumps. "That would lower us to a level with men."

"But are we lowering ourselves?" Julia asked. "Are they really on a lower level? Isn't the earth as good as the air?"

"It's better, Julia," Lulu said unexpectedly. "The earth's a fine place.

It's warm and homelike. Things grow there. There's nothing in the air."

"There are the stars," murmured Peachy.

"Yes," said Julia with a soft tenderness, "but we never reached them."

"The air-life may not have been better or finer," Peachy continued, "but, somehow, it seemed clearer and purer. The earth's such a cluttered place. It's so full of things. You can hardly see it for the stuff that's on it. From above it seems beautiful, but near--."

"Yet, it is on the earth that we must live--and that Angela must live,"

Julia interpolated gently.

"But what is the use of our learning to walk?" Peachy demanded.

"To teach Angela how to walk and all the other girl-children that are coming to us."

"But I am afraid," Peachy said anxiously, "that if Angela learned to walk, she would forget how to fly."

"On the contrary," Julia declared, "she would fly better for knowing how to walk, and walk better for knowing how to fly."