THE PORTRAIT OF CICELY
If Janet had needed any further clue to Anthony Crawford's character,
she would have had it in the sudden trembling terror of his little
son. She was shaking herself, yet she mustered an outward appearance
of courage for a moment, as she turned to face him squarely and to
hear his biting words:
"First the brother, peering over the wall, then the sister, rummaging
through my house. Did Jasper Peyton send you here to find where I kept
the picture of Cicely Hallowell that he was so reluctant to give up to
me?"
"I didn't know it was Cicely Hallowell," returned Janet, trying to
speak steadily. "I didn't even know that she was a real person; I
thought she was just some one in a story."
Then as Crawford stepped nearer, as little Martin gave a sudden squeak
of alarm, blind panic took possession of her. She ran toward the
stairs and, though the man put out his arm to intercept her, she
dodged under it with undignified agility and plunged down the steps.
They were of the broad, shallow kind that made her feel, for all her
speed, that she would never reach the bottom, yet she came at last
into the hall below and out upon the stoop. She fled past Mrs.
Crawford, sitting with the sleeping baby across her lap and looking up
anxiously, with good cause for misgiving since she had heard her
husband go up the stair.
It was only when she was safely outside the gate that Janet stopped to
draw breath, to realize how her knees were trembling and how her heart
was pounding. Yet it stopped suddenly and seemed to miss a beat when
she realized something further, that she still held in her hand the
miniature of Cicely Hallowell.
"Can I go back?" she wondered desperately, but knew instantly that she
could never find courage to do so. She went on, hurrying and stumbling
as she made her way down the lane. Only once she ventured to look over
her shoulder and saw Anthony Crawford standing on the doorstep staring
after her while the scarecrow that was so vaguely like him seemed to
be lifting its straw-filled arm in a mocking gesture of farewell.
Janet and Oliver held an anxious conference that evening as they sat
on the terrace, for until that moment they had not been alone
together. She brought out the miniature and told of the astonishing
and disturbing manner in which it had come into her possession, while
Oliver wondered, in frank dismay, how it was to be restored to its
owner.
"I can't think how I came to carry it away with me," wailed Janet. "Of
course it was clutched tight in my hand and I was so frightened that I
didn't think of anything but getting away. I thought of putting it
down on the grass by the gate, but it is too valuable to risk being
lost like that. And that man will say I stole it. I don't know what to
do."
"We shall have to give it back to him," said Oliver firmly. "To-morrow
we will----" but he stopped in the middle of his sentence, unable,
even in imagination, to contemplate facing Anthony Crawford and giving
him the miniature.
"Shall we tell Cousin Jasper?" Janet suggested, but Oliver declared
against it.
"Anthony Crawford will be quite ready to say that Cousin Jasper sent
you to get it from him. The miniature and the pictures seem to be part
of the trouble, though I don't understand why. So if that man comes
here with such an accusation, it would be better for Cousin Jasper to
be able to say he knew nothing about it."
"Yes," assented Janet. "I believe, if he knew, Cousin Jasper would try
to shield us and Anthony Crawford would use it as one more thing to
hold over him. I am beginning to understand both of them better.
We--we have overlooked a good many things about Cousin Jasper."
It was only a few minutes later that Cousin Jasper joined them, nor
had he yet sat down in the long wicker chair that Oliver placed for
him, before Hotchkiss came out with a message.
"John Massey is in the kitchen, sir, and he says to tell you that he
would like to see you about something important."
"Bring him out here," Cousin Jasper directed, and, when the somewhat
embarrassed visitor in his worn best clothes appeared upon the terrace
he got up with as elaborate courtesy as he would have accorded the
most distinguished guest.
"What is it, John?" he asked, for the sunburned farmer was evidently
an old acquaintance. The other burst out with his news and his errand
at once.
"I've been turned off, sir," he said. "Told to leave the farm, with no
notice at all and my crops all in the ground. I'll admit I'm a little
behind on my rent, but not many landlords around here collect as
closely as Mr. Crawford does; they get all their money at the end of
the season and don't haggle over it month by month when the farmer has
nothing coming in. And what can you do on land that's never improved?
He lets the place run down and then turns me out because I can't make
a fortune for him on it. I--I was wondering if you couldn't do
something for me, sir."
"Do something for you?" echoed Jasper Peyton. "I can't use any
influence with Anthony Crawford, if that is what you wish."
"I don't understand it," the man persisted. "Three years ago you were
my landlord and none of us ever had dealings with Anthony Crawford
except that we used to know him when he was a boy. The whole bottom
land along the river was yours and all your tenants were farming it
for a fair rent and every one was satisfied. But then--he comes, and
the upper half is his, we hear, and it is bad luck for us, as we soon
know. Everything runs down, no one is treated fairly, and here I am,
turned off at a word, and all his doing. Couldn't you make room for me
farther down the river somewhere, sir, where the land is yours?"
He looked so red and anxious and unhappy that Janet's heart was fairly
wrung for him. His wife was ailing, she knew, the season was backward,
and here he stood, facing the loss of all his work and the necessity
of beginning all over again. She waited eagerly to hear what offer
Cousin Jasper would make.
"I--I can't help you, John," he said at last, very slowly and heavily.
"Even if I made room for you on one of the lower farms, it would only
stir up trouble, and you might wake up some day to find that Anthony
Crawford was your landlord again, after all. I can give you the money
to pay your rent, if you wish to stay where you are, but that is all
that I can do. There are times when we are none of us free agents, or
masters of our own affairs."
"I don't care to stay on, sir," John Massey returned. "I've had too
many words with Anthony Crawford for things ever to go easy again.
I've been patching up the dike with my own spare time, and maybe the
farm has suffered by my doing it; anyway he says so and calls me a
fool. I thought perhaps you would help me, since I'd been your tenant
so long before _he_ came." His voice, dragging with disappointment,
trailed lower and lower. "I don't seem to know just where to turn.
Well, good night to you, sir." He turned and walked heavily away.
They sat very silent after he was gone. Oliver was leaning against the
terrace rail, Janet in her big chair was clenching her hands in her
lap, Cousin Jasper, with his hands on the railing, stood in absolute
quiet, staring out over the garden. The light of the house came
through the long windows, falling on his face that was so pale and
tired. He had seemed weary and unhappy for some time, but to-night he
looked desperate. The minutes passed, but still he stood in silence,
staring straight before him.
The sight of his distress seemed more than either of the two could
bear. Oliver could think of nothing to say, but stood dumbly helpless,
while Janet moved closer to their cousin and spoke with shy
hesitation:
"Couldn't we help you? Won't you tell us what you are thinking?"
"I was only thinking," Cousin Jasper answered very slowly, "I was
wondering, as I do sometimes lately, how strangely life can change and
twist itself and make things seem other than they should be. If you
have lived all your years following your own sense of honor, if you
have tried, in everything you do, to be fair and just, how can it be,
when the years have passed, that suddenly all the results of honest
dealing should be swept away? How can it be that a man who has
disgraced himself, whose ways are known to be everything that is
devious and unfair, how can he gain power over you, threaten to take
from you everything that is yours, even say that he can destroy your
good name? How can every effort you make toward a fair settlement only
render matters worse? Is there really something so wrong with the
world that a dishonest man can work more harm than a man of honor can
ever undo? Do _you_ think so?" he concluded, turning to regard them
from under his knitted brows as if he must, in his distress, find some
word of reassurance somewhere.
"No," said Oliver emphatically, finding his voice somewhat to his own
surprise. "I don't think so at all. I believe a man who does
dishonorable things can--can mix you up and make you miserable, but he
can't go on forever. His plans are bound to come to grief in the end."
His halting words carried the real earnestness of conviction. They
seemed to give Cousin Jasper some sort of comfort, for his face
relaxed, he moved from his tense attitude, and turned to walk up and
down the terrace through the patches of light and shadow that lay
between the windows. Janet thrust a friendly, affectionate hand under
his arm as she walked beside him. It was a hot night, at June's very
highest tide, with the garden at the summit of its beauty. The Madonna
lilies were in bloom, showing ghostly white through the dark, rows and
ranks and armies of them all up and down the walks and borders,
sending sudden ripples of sweetness upward to the terrace whenever the
faint breeze stirred. There was no moon yet, but the stars were thick
overhead, and the moving lanterns of the fireflies glimmered among the
trees, low down still as they always are in the first hours of the
dark. Janet was thinking that when the world was so beautiful, it was
difficult to believe that things could go entirely wrong in it, but
she did not find it possible to put her idea into words. It may have
been that Cousin Jasper was thinking the same thing as he stopped and
stood for a long time at the head of the brick-paved stair leading
down from the end of the terrace into the garden. At last he began to
descend slowly, unable to make out the steps in the dark, so that he
put his hand on her shoulder to steady himself. He spoke very
suddenly.
"It is not only in body but in spirit that the old must sometimes lean
upon the young," he said, and then, with his voice quite cheerful
again, began to talk of how well the flowers were doing this year.
Oliver had followed them to the top of the stair and stood above them,
listening, but not, apparently, to what Cousin Jasper was saying. His
head was bent and he was straining every nerve to hear some far-off
sound. His face looked troubled, then cleared suddenly as he came down
the steps.
"Cousin Jasper," he said, "didn't I tell you that the gardener wanted
you to know that the night-blooming cereus is open just now? Suppose
we walk out to the back of the garden and see it."
His cousin hesitated.
"It is rather late," he answered. "It will be open still to-morrow
night."
"Janet has never seen one," persisted Oliver, putting a firm arm
through Cousin Jasper's, "and it might rain or something to-morrow
night. She would be so disappointed and so would the gardener."
They went down the last steps together, into the sea of white lilies
and drifting fragrance, and disappeared into the darkness toward the
back of the garden.
In spite of his insistence, Oliver did not seem so deeply interested
as the others in the plant that was slowly opening its pink flowers
that have so brief and beautiful a season. The gardener, hastily
summoned, came across the lawn to exhibit his favorite plant with the
greatest pride, but Oliver left the others to admire and ask questions
and, in ten minutes, came back alone. Coming upon the terrace again,
he saw Hotchkiss, just inside the long window, ushering out a visitor
who was talking in loud, easily recognizable tones.
"No, he doesn't seem to be here," Anthony Crawford was saying, "though
I didn't believe you, until you let me come in and see for myself. I
had something of great importance to say to him--and to the girl.
Well, I will come again to-morrow."
He passed down the room and must have come very close to the light,
for his shadow loomed suddenly, misshapen and bulky, all across the
library, even dropping its black length over the terrace outside. It
followed him, a striding giant, from window to window and then
dwindled suddenly again as Anthony Crawford himself stood under the
light in the doorway giving Hotchkiss final directions.
"Be sure to tell him that I shall be here to-morrow night and that I
shall expect him to be at home," he ordered, then climbed into the
creaking cart and drove away.
Hotchkiss stood peering into the dark after him, evidently sending no
good wishes to speed him homeward. Seeing Oliver coming up the steps
at the far end of the terrace, he walked down to speak to him.
"There was something more than usual wrong to-night," he said
anxiously. "He vowed that he must see Mr. Peyton and didn't want to
take my word for it that he was out. It was fortunate that he had gone
into the garden."
"Yes," responded Oliver, "I thought I heard that miserable rattletrap
turning in at the gate and I remembered, all of a sudden, that the
gardener told me yesterday about the night-blooming cereus. I--I
thought they ought to look at it at once."
Hotchkiss had been nervous and agitated during what must have been a
stormy interview, and he found this sudden relief too great for the
composure even of a butler. He burst into a great laugh of delight and
slapped his knee in ecstasy.
"That was the way to serve him!" he cried. "To think that prying
scoundrel found some one that was too clever for him, for once."
Oliver grinned broadly, but recovered himself in a moment.
"Hotchkiss," he said with great gravity, "you would never do for the
movies."
Janet was eating her breakfast very deliberately next morning,
lingering even after Cousin Jasper had left them and while Oliver sat
back in his chair fidgeting in frank impatience. When her brother
finally urged her to make haste she broke forth into an explanation
that was almost a wail.
"It is because I can't forget where we have to go to-day," she
declared. "Oh, why--why did I make such a terrible mistake and carry
that miserable picture away?"
Even Oliver looked none too cheerful at the prospect before them.
"We have to do it," he agreed, "but I think we will go over to the
Windy Hill first. I promised Polly's father I would tell him what I
saw from the boat. But after that there will be plenty of time and we
will go to Anthony Crawford's."
"I ought to go alone," Janet said, "for it was I who made the trouble.
And shall we tell the Beeman?"
"Not until afterward," replied Oliver. "If there is difficulty about
the picture it would be easier if no one were concerned but just
ourselves. And indeed you won't go alone! We are in this thing
together."
It had rained in the night so heavily that the clumps of larkspur and
more tender plants were beaten down and only the shower-loving lilies
lifted their wet, shining faces above the green. The sky was still
overcast, with threats of another downpour, yet the two put on their
raincoats and set forth undeterred.
"There is an old apple shed in the corner of the orchard where we can
leave the car," said Oliver. "Polly showed me, last time, where we
could drive in."
The highway was smooth and wet and the river was perceptibly higher
under the bridge. They pressed onward, up the grass-covered road,
drove through the gap in the orchard wall, and felt their way along
the open lane between the apple trees. The car was finally housed in
the shelter of the shed and Janet and Oliver raced up the hill, for
the first drops of a new shower were just beginning to fall, and
Polly, in the doorway of the cottage, was beckoning them to make
haste. The downpour was a sharp one that pattered on the roof, ran
streaming from the eaves, and blotted out the hills opposite. The
grass and the orchard, however, seemed to grow greener every moment
under the refreshing rain, and the clumps of pink hollyhocks that
crowded about the doorstep lifted their heads gratefully.
"We can't do much with the bees for an hour or two," observed the
Beeman, sitting down in the corner with his pipe. "Now tell me what
you saw on the river, Oliver. I noticed your sail and knew that you
were out."
Oliver made his report upon the scouring banks while the Beeman
listened and nodded gravely.
"That is something we must look into," he declared. "It is like
Anthony to have let things go. And now, if you have time to wait,
suppose we have a story."
They had ample time, they assured him, being only too glad to postpone
the errand that must come later. They were eager for another tale,
moreover, for they were beginning to realize that these were not mere
haphazard narratives, but stories with some definite bearing upon the
places and people about them.
"We have plenty of time," Oliver assured him. "We are in no hurry at
all. You might even make it a very long one."
The Beeman nodded assent with that queer smile that seemed to betray
an uncanny understanding of the whole situation.
"A long one it shall be," he agreed, "for I have a good deal to tell
you."