Angel Island

"Then came the betrothal, the marriages, and suddenly all that wonderful

starlight and firelight life ended. For a while, the men seemed to drift

away from each other. For a while, we - the 'devoted five,' as our

people called us - seemed to drift away from each other. It was as

though they took back something they had freely given each other to give

to us. It was as though we took back something we had freely given each

other to give to them.

"Then, just as suddenly, they began to drift away from us and back to

each other. Some of the high, worshiping quality in their attitude

toward us disappeared. It was as though we had become less beautiful,

less interesting, less desirable - as if possession had killed some

precious, perishable quality."

"What that quality is I do not know. We are not dumb like stones or

plants, we women. We are not dull like birds or beasts. We do not fade

in a day like flowers. We do not stop like music. We do not go out like

light. What it was that went, or when or how, I do not know. But it was

something that thrilled and enchanted them. It went - and it went

forever."

"It was as though we were toys - new toys - with a secret spring. And if

one found and pressed that spring, something unexpected and something

unbelievably wonderful would happen. They hunted for that spring

untiringly - hunted - and hunted - and hunted. At last they found it.

And after they found it, we no longer interested them. The mystery and

fascination had gone. After all, a toy is only a toy."

"Then came our great trouble - that terrible time of the illicit

hunting. Every man of them making love to some one of you. Every woman

of you making love to some one of them. That was a year of despair for

me. I could see no way out. It seemed to me that you were all drifting

to destruction and that I could not stay you. And then I began to

realize that the root of evil was only one thing idleness. Idle men!

Idle women! And as I wondered what we should do next, Nature took the

matter in her hands. She gave all you women work to do."

Julia paused. Her still gray eyes fixed on faraway things.

"Honey-Boy was born, then Peterkin, then Angela, then Honey-Bunch. And

suddenly everything was right again. But, somehow, the men seemed soon

to exhaust the mystery and fascination of fatherhood just as they had

exhausted the mystery and fascination of husbandhood. They became

restless and irritable. It seemed to me that another danger beset us -

vague, monstrous, looming - but I did not know what. You see they have

the souls of discoverers and explorers and conquerors, these earth-men.

They are creators. Their souls are filled with an eternal unrest. Always

they must attempt one thing more; ever they seek something beyond. They

would stop the sun and the moon in their courses; they would harness the

hurricane; they would chain the everlasting stars. Sea, earth, sky are

but their playgrounds; past, present, future their servants; they lust

to conquer the unexplored areas of space and time. It came to me that

what they needed was work of another kind. One night, when I was lying

awake thinking it over, the idea of the New Camp burst on my mind. Do

you remember how delighted they were when I suggested it to them, how

delighted you were, how gay and jubilant we all were, how, for days and

days, we talked of nothing else? And we were as happy over the idea as

they. For a long time, we thought that we were going to help.