The first part of Dart’s letter is a detailed account of Aunt Flora’s funeral day, culminating with this statement “We and Uncle Art’s brothers gathered at his house afterward, and late this afternoon, we left. How lonely he looked, standing on his front porch, without Aunt Flora who had been his wife and mother for so many years. The day was a perfect one for anything requiring the out-of-doors. It was a bright, sunny, warm, peaceful day. A fitting final contrast to the days of pain and hardship we’d all undergone with Aunt Flora’s final uncomfortable illness.”
Then Dart turns his attention to answering a recent disclosure by Dot that she’d had an accidental “Coke date” with a boy from one of her classes. It seems she and a housemate were walking in town when they met up with this boy. They all stood talking for a bit, and then found themselves in the local soda shop, having Cokes. During the get-together, the guy asked Dot if she’d have dinner with him. Flashing her ring at him, she explained that would be impossible since she was engaged. He acknowledged that he knew she was, but expressed surprise that Dot felt that meant she couldn’t date anyone! Dot felt somehow guilty about the whole thing and wanted to “confess” to Dart. She was sure it wouldn’t matter to him whether or not she told him, but she felt that she must.
Dart’s response was a bit surprising to me. He said it mattered greatly whether or not she told him such things, for in doing so, he felt even more strongly that he could trust her. He said she may as well know that jealousy was a big problem with him, and he was jealous of anyone who got to spend time with her, or even see her when he couldn’t. “I have struggled not to let it show, but my longing, my love for you is so deeply intense, that I feel anyone who speaks to you is cutting in on my time, is undermining my beautiful castle. It’s silly. I know you’re faithful to me,… but I’m still the possessive wisher. I try not to be.”
He proceeds to enumerate the times he has felt guilty, as though he was not being faithful to her. There were two dates he’d had at Treasure Island after that private party he’d liked so much. On the second date he began to feel so guilty that the girl noticed and asked him what was wrong. He told her that he was engaged, and shouldn’t be out with her (even though he would not become engaged for another 12 months.) Another time, when he was at Shoemaker and had spent the day working in a wine warehouse, he went to a party. “The homeliest girl in the place got her fangs in my flank and asked me to take her home. He took her to the bus, told her he’d had enough, that he didn’t approve of ‘designing women’, and went back to his room at the YMCA.
Then there was the time in Norfolk, the night he’d made Dot that first record. He and another guy had made the last records of the night and the disarmingly attractive girl in the shop asked if these two men, the “nicest she’d met all evening” would walk her home through the land of the big, bad wolves. They did, and at her front door, she took the soldier’s hand, placed it on her breast, and asked both of them inside. Dart left in a hurry and was joined a minute later by the soldier, who said she had asked him for money before they went any further. “I felt even more like a chiseler after that.”
Finally, there was the time a few weeks ago that he stopped by the Brown’s house at the invitation of Charlotte Monck. a high school classmate. “Charlotte’s a swell girl, had no ulterior motives, other than to renew some banter we used to sling four years ago. She’s sincere in wanting to meet you, Dot. She said what I already know – that you must be a peach of a girl, the finest ever created.”
He fears a ring on a girl’s hand is simply a challenge to a lot of guys, and that really burns him up. Why can’t everyone have the same standards as he and Dot, he wonders. He knows that being engaged means different things to most folks than it does to Dot and him. For many people, he knows it means that they can “act married.” One acquaintance of his, when hearing he was engaged, replied,”Well, how ’bout that! Peterson’s finally getting some!”
Dart writes, “It makes me so damned mad I can hardly think, when those ignorant, stupid, childish, self-loving imbeciles DARE to put my fiance on the same plane as their half-time harlots, or me with their degenerated selves!”
He goes on to say that, in spite of his rantings against Mather and Dixon for their drunken, sinful ways, they both respect what he and Dot have, as do Homer and Al. He’s grateful that there are some people who understand the value of his values.
“Oh Dot, I’m ever so glad we are engaged the way we are, the way our ideals tell us we should be. I feel so much better having written to you. It seems that there must be a pressure built up between us, which only confessions and communions can release. We’ve had them before, both by letters and our evenings of talking, and always we’ve come away with deeper love, understanding, and trust for each other. May it always be that way.”
How nice it would have been if he’d ended the letter there, but he still had two pages of diatribe to write about Dot’s housemates and all the other cheap and wanton young people who use college as an excuse to abandon their values and debase themselves. He suggests Dot write about her concerns to her mother, who may be able to offer sage advice about how Dot may find a way to get along better with he girls who have so disappointed her. He knows such a frank letter may cause her mother to worry, but he believes parents are generally grateful when their adult children confide in them over such serious matters.
“Good night, my Darling. I wish I could have said all that in fewer words, but there’ll never be enough words to express all my love for you, in all the varied and true and beautiful meanings of that word love.”
# # #
It is apparent from Dot’s letter that she’d had a telephone call from Dart the same evening he’d written the letter above. She is terribly sorry she ever wrote about the trivial incident in the soda shop because there was nothing to be gained from it, and it caused him such distress.
She loved his letter of Sunday night – another masterpiece in her mind. She cautions him against thinking she is a better Christian than he is. Yes, she can readily notice ways in which she must improve, but does she ever do anything to make those changes? No. She remains just as intolerant of Ellie now, even though this is a time when Ellie could use a true and faithful friend.
She likes to think about Dart going to church every Sunday. When she’s sitting in her pew, she likes to pretend they are sitting there together, shoulder to shoulder. How she’d like to meet his friends and drive home with him after church. She likes to imagine them doing all sorts of ordinary things together. “Guess it just boils down to the fact that I love you and everything about you.”
She proposes a thought she’s been entertaining for a couple of days. Instead of driving her and Phyll back to campus after the play on Friday night, would he be willing to just drive Phyll back and then he and Dot could have a longer time together. She’d be willing to take the bus home to Kent on Saturday night or Sunday, assuming she could get those days off work.
She tells him that Joyce spent the night with her recently, and when Dot awoke, she wished that the person in the bed next to her was Dart. “I’ve missed you more this week, and in a different way, than I have for a long time. I’ve had the kind of aching longing to see you that I used to get when you were far away and I hadn’t seen you for months.”
“I love you so very much, Dart. Thank you for being the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me.”