Elsa Wertman

The poem by Edgar Lee Masters tells the story of a German woman named Elsa Wertman, who has blond hair and blue eyes, and is working for a politician named Thomas Greene and his wife Frances Greene. When Thomas' wife is away, he seduces Elsa into sleeping with him. Although it describes that "neither of us seemed to know what happened" (878), Elsa says when Thomas came onto her "I turned my head". After reading this, I'm convinced Elsa was raped and had no desire to be with Thomas Greene. However, when Elsa's "secret began to grow" meaning she is pregnant, Mrs. Greene finds out about the affair and tells Elsa that she will take the baby and raise the child as her own, since Elsa is not married and can't support the baby. Mrs. Greene's behavior strikes me as very strange because I expected her to be angry, upset or even shocked, but she presents herself as very calm and understanding. Reading the lines "so she hid in the house and sent out rumors, as if it were going to happen to her", I'm not sure whether her intention is to cover up the affair from the public or if it was a planned event between Mr. and Mrs. Greene so they could have a child to pass on their name. At the end after Elsa has married another man and years have passed, Elsa sees her child again at a political rally and acknowledges Hamilton Greene as her own son, not with pride but with verification.