And then he cursed awhile, and cursed the mothers who could bear such sons and grew merry at the expense of all who were not like himself and praised Yuan for working on the land so well, and then he laughed and Yuan laughed and they were friends.
From this robustness and from the cleanness of the earth Yuan went home again and to his bed, and he would not go out that night for any pleasure even, because he wanted nothing of any maid, and he desired to touch no maid at all, but only to do his work and learn his books, and so this night he slept. In this way the land healed him for a time.
Yet in him were the flames already lit. Another day or two and his mood changed itself again, and he was restless and he turned his head secretly one day to see if that maid were in the schoolroom, and she was, and between the heads of others their eyes met, and her eyes clung to his although he turned back quickly. But he could not forget her. In a day or two again he said in passing through the door, although he had not planned it, “Shall we walk together again today?” And she nodded, her deep eyes looking down.
That day she did not touch his hand and it seemed to him she walked farther from him than she used to do, and was more silent, and talk came harder than it did. And here was something contrary in Yuan, which surprised himself. He would have sworn he would be glad not to be touched and that he did not want her very near. And yet when they had walked awhile he wished that she had touched him. He would not even at parting put out his hand, and yet he watched and longed to see her hand come forth, so he must meet it. But it did not, and he went home defrauded somehow, and yet angry that he felt so, and he was ashamed and swore he would not walk with any maid, and that he was a man with work to do. And he astonished a certain mild old teacher that day with his bitter writing of how men ought to live alone and strive after learning and keep away from women, and that night he told himself a hundred times that he was glad he did not love this maid. Each day thereafter for a while he went dogged to his land and would not let himself remember that he wanted any touch.
Then one day, some three days after that, he had a letter written in a small square writing that he did not know. Now Yuan had not many letters, and only one sometimes from a comrade he had loved in the school of war who loved him still. And this letter was not the hasty writing of his friend. He opened it, and there within he found a page from the maid he did not love — a single page, very short, and saying these words clearly, “Have I done something to make you angry with me? I am a revolutionist, a modern woman. I have no need to hide myself as other women have. I love you. Can you then love me? I do not ask or care for marriage. Marriage is an ancient bondage. But if so be you need my love, you have it when you will.” And then, very small and cryptic, she twisted close together the shaping of her name.
So was love first offered to Yuan. Now must he think of love, sitting in his room alone, this letter in his hand, and he must wonder of all that love could mean. Here was a maid ready for his taking if he would take her. And many times his blood cried out that he might take her. He began to lose his childish youth in those few hours, and manhood grew in him in rushing heartbeats and in his ardent blood. His body was no more a lad’s body now …
In a few days the heats within him ripened him and he was full-grown and a man in his desires. But still he wrote no answer to the maid, and at the school he avoided every sight of her. Twice on different nights he sat down to write, and twice beneath his pen the words rose up, “I do not love you,” but yet those words he would not write because his curious body pressed him to let it know what it desired. So in this dark confusion of his blood and heart he wrote no answer and he waited for himself.
But he was sleepless and more nearly angry and full of impatience than he had ever been before, so that the lady, his mother, looked at him most thoughtfully, and Yuan felt her questioning. Yet he would say nothing, for how could he say that he was angry because he could not take a maid he did not love, and that he was angry because he could not love her since he wanted what she offered him? So he let the struggle wage itself in him and was as moody as his father ever was when any war was to be waged.
Now out of all this mingled life of Yuan’s, wherein he was caught a little in everything and in nothing wholly, the old Tiger suddenly forced a clarity, and this without knowing at all what he did. These many months since the lady had written him first the Tiger had not answered anything. He sat there in his distant halls, silent and sulky against his son, and no word came out of him. Once again the lady wrote, and yet again, without telling Yuan she did, and if Yuan asked sometimes why she had no answer from his father, she answered soothingly, “Let be. As long as he says nothing, there can be no ill news.” And indeed Yuan was very willing to let be, and every day his mind was more swallowed in his life, and at last he almost forgot that he had anything to fear at all from his father, or that he had run away from his father’s power, it seemed so much his life here.
Then one day in the later passing spring the Tiger put forth his power again upon his son. He came out of his silence and he wrote a letter not to the lady, but to his own son. This letter he did not bid a letter writer write for him, either. No, with his own brush which he had not for long used the Tiger put down a few words to his son, and though the letters were sharply, rudely made, the meaning of them was very plain. They said, “I have not changed my will. Come home and be wed. The day is set for the thirtieth of this moon.”
This letter Yuan found waiting for him in his room one night when he came in from an evening’s pleasure. He came in all languorous and roused with pleasure, so that almost, while he swayed to this music and to that, he had made up his mind that night to take the love the maid had offered to him. He came in filled with this excitement, that the next day perhaps, or the next day but one, he would go with her where she would and do as she was willing — or at least he played with the thought that so perhaps he would. Then his eye fell on the table, and there the letter was, and very well he knew the superscription, and who had written it. He seized it and tore the tough old-fashioned paper of its envelope, and drew the inner paper forth, and there the words were, plain as though he heard the Tiger’s shout. Yes, the words were like a shout to Yuan. When he had read them, the room seemed suddenly filled with silence as though after a great roar of noise. He folded the paper again and thrust it in the envelope again and sat down breathless in the silence.
What should he do? How answer this command his father laid upon him? The thirtieth? It was less than twenty days away. And then the old childhood fear fell on him. Despair crept up into his heart. After all, how could he withstand his father? When had he ever withstood his father? Always somehow in the end his father had his way, by fear or love, or some such equal force. The young never could escape the old. It came to Yuan weakly that perhaps it would be better if he did go back and yield to his father in this one thing. He could go back and wed the maid and stay a night or two and do his duty and come away and never go home again. Then might he by any law do as he pleased and it would not be counted to him for a sin. He could wed whom he pleased after he had obeyed his father. So thinking back and forth he lay down to sleep at last, and yet he could not sleep. All the warm flush of pleasure was gone clean out of him. When he thought of lending his body to his father, to the woman chosen now and waiting, he was as cold as though he lent a beast to breed.