In anticipation of Ethan and Mattie’s evening together during Zeena’s trip to Bettsbridge, Wharton has Ethan recall Mattie’s background and the details of how she came to live with the Fromes. If Mattie’s accomplishments such as making candy and trimming hats seem frivolous in the face of the hard work she is required to do for Zeena, these abilities represent a youthful and happy personality which is able to entertain itself with frivolity instead of moping in self-pity about imagined ills as Zeena does.
Mattie is in most ways the opposite of Zeena; Mattie is happy, healthy, pretty and young, while Zeena is unhappy, sickly, ugly, and seven years older than Ethan. In Mattie, Wharton creates a character who is naturally appealing while presenting Zeena as an unlikable and cold woman. Zeena is whining and petulant and her presence must be endured.
When describing Zeena sitting at the table, Wharton uses bleak and cold imagery. Zeena sits in “the pale light reflected from the banks of snow,” which makes “her face look more than usually drawn and bloodless,” and makes her other unattractive features more apparent.
Ethan’s first thought about Zeena’s trip is that such trips have cost him a lot of money in the past, and the remedies have not had a positive effect on Zeena’s illness. He disregards these unpleasant recollections when he realizes that he will be able to spend the night alone with Mattie. Ethan’s fears that Zeena may suspect his love for Mattie are allayed when he realizes that Zeena was indeed feeling ill the previous night. Ethan, who is normally rather honest, comes up with a story to tell Zeena about why he can’t drive her to the train station.
The story Ethan comes up with (going into town to be paid for lumber) is acceptable to Zeena. He realizes that it was not a good idea to let Zeena know that he has any money before she went on one of her expensive journeys to doctors. Such considerations are quickly put aside, as Ethan returns to thoughts about the evening with Mattie. The lie that he told Zeena will come back to haunt him because Zeena later justifies hiring a girl to replace Mattie based on the money Ethan was supposed to be getting.
After Zeena leaves with Jotham Powell, the kitchen seems more comfortable and inviting because Mattie and Ethan are alone. Ethan goes to town, his mind is busy conjuring up pictures of what the evening with Mattie will be like. It is important to note that Ethan visualizes nothing illicit or immoral; all he hopes for is an evening of companionship before the fire.
Ethan’s thoughts about the evening prompt him to think about the silence that has been part of his life since his college days. The theme of silence is discussed with reference to Ethan’s past. Some of the symptoms of the silence surrounding Ethan were his inability to communicate with Zeena and his halting efforts to say something significant to Mattie. The silence imposed by his marriage to Zeena is one of the causes of Ethan’s need for illusion. Illusion in turn reinforces the silence by helping Ethan avoid communication by fantasizing. Wharton reveals the background of Ethan’s marriage to Zeena is revealed so the evening with Mattie in which silence is partially conquered will be prepared for. Wharton reveals the depth of isolation that Ethan experiences in his mind as a result of living in a silent house with a silent woman.
Because Ethan couldn’t bear to be alone, he married Zeena (who had been living with him, caring for his mother). He now wonders whether or not he would have married Zeena if it had been spring instead of winter. Ethan realizes that his fear of loneliness rather than love for Zeena prompted their marriage. After the death of his father, Ethan had the responsibility of the farm and mill, leaving him little time for establishing relationships with villagers. When his mother stopped talking, Ethan felt as though the silence would drive him mad.
After delivering lumber to Andrew Hale and asking Hale for money (which Ethan is refused), Ethan drives home and passes the family cemetery where the family tombstone of Ethan and Endurance Frome proclaims that they shared fifty years of wedded bliss. The epitaph seems ironic to Ethan. Recently reminded of seven years’ endurance of Zeena, he wonders what people might someday say about the two of them. More important as a parallel to the previous night’s action (when he walked by the cemetery with Mattie), Ethan’s thoughts show that he now seriously does consider himself married to Zeena, and that he briefly realizes his thoughts of being buried in the cemetery with Mattie were fantasy. The headstone is also ironic because, in the end, it is Zeena who must forego her illnesses and prove herself in the role of “endurance” in anything but peaceful circumstances as she ministers for years to the two crippled victims of the sledding accident.
