Letters From Peking

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THE YEAR IS 1950, the month is September, and the day the twenty-fifth. The place? It is this valley in the mountains of Vermont, where I was born and where I lived my childhood through. I have crossed the seas, I made my love’s country my own. Then came war, and I was an alien in spite of love, and I returned again to the valley.

Half an hour ago I walked down our country road, under the arch of maples, red and gold, to meet the postman. He comes only three times a week to this remote spot in the mountains of Vermont, and three mornings a week I wake early and restless. There is always the chance that a letter will come from Peking, a letter from Gerald. For months no letter has come. But this morning there was a letter. The postman singled it out and gave it to me.

“Here’s what you’re waitin’ for,” he said.

I would not open it until he was gone. Then, alone in the lane, under the arching maple trees blazing with autumn fire, I opened the envelope. I knew, as I read, that I had been expecting this letter. No, rather, I knew that it could not surprise me. Nothing that Gerald does can surprise me, or shock me, or even hurt me. I have loved him. I do love him and shall always love him.

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