Ida Frickey speaks as a woman who arrived in Spoon River with nothing—hungry, penniless, and locked out of every respectable home. She fixes on the McNeely mansion, a guarded stone place upheld by law and local power, and in her hunger imagines a giant pair of scissors cutting it in two. That image of slicing property becomes wryly true when Wash McNeely’s son winks at her, and a breach-of-promise suit later gives her half the estate. At first Ida feels invisible and resentful, but by the end she sounds coldly vindicated, even triumphant. The mood is ironic and slightly grim, mixing longing, class anger, and a dark satisfaction that the house was always waiting for her.
Ida Frickey — Summary
Nothing in life is alien to you: I was a penniless girl from Summum Who stepped from the morning train in Spoon River. All the houses stood before me with closed doors And drawn shades—I was barred out; I had no place or part in any of them. And I walked past the old McNeely mansion, A castle of stone ’mid walks and gardens With workmen about the place on guard And the County and State upholding it For its lordly owner, full of pride. I was so hungry I had a vision: I saw a giant pair of scissors Dip from the sky, like the beam of a dredge, And cut the house in two like a curtain. But at the “Commercial” I saw a man Who winked at me as I asked for work— It was Wash McNeely’s son. He proved the link in the chain of title To half my ownership of the mansion, Through a breach of promise suit—the scissors. So, you see, the house, from the day I was born, Was only waiting for me.