and last Saturday she was to the post-office, and up the river-road all
the afternoon in that old phaeton with young Marsh."
Rosemary's heart paused for a moment, then resumed its beat.
"She's a play-actin' person, he says, or at any rate she looks like one,
which amounts to the same thing. She's brought four trunks with her--one
respectable trunk, same as anybody might have, one big square trunk that
looks like a dog-house, and another big trunk that a person could move
into if there wasn't no other house handy, and another trunk that was
packed so full that it had bulged out on all sides but one, and when Jim
and Dick took it up into the attic there wasn't but one side they could
set it on. And whiles they was findin' a place to set it, she and young
Marsh was laughin' down in the hall."
[Sidenote: Servant's Gossip]
"Who is she?" demanded Grandmother. "Where did she come from? How long
is she goin' to stay? Where'd Mis' Marsh get to know her?"
"The milkman's wife was over last Monday," Matilda continued, "to help
with the washin', and she says she never see such clothes in all her
born days nor so many of 'em. They was mostly lace, and she had two
white petticoats in the wash. The stocking was all silk, and she said
she never see such nightgowns. They was fine enough for best summer
dresses, and all lace, and one of 'em had a blue satin bow on it, and
what was strangest of all was that there wa'n't no place to get into
'em. They was made just like stockin's with no feet to 'em, and if she
wore 'em, she'd have to crawl in, either at the bottom or the top. She
said she never see the beat of those nightgowns."
"Do tell!" ejaculated Grandmother.
"And her hair looks as if she ain't never combed it since the day she
was born. The milkman says it looks about like a hen's nest and is
pretty much the same colour. He see her on the porch for a minute, and
all he could look at was that hair. And when he passed 'em on the
river-road after they come from the post-office, he couldn't see her
hair at all, cause she had on a big hat tied on with some thin light
blue stuff. He reckoned maybe her hair was a wig."
[Sidenote: Discussing the Stranger]
"I'd know whether 'twas a wig or not, if I saw it once," Grandmother
muttered. "There ain't nobody that can fool me about false hair."
"I guess you ain't likely to see it," retorted Matilda, viciously. "All
we'll ever hear about her'll be from the milk folks."
"Maybe I could see her," ventured Rosemary, cautiously. "I could put on
my best white dress and go to see Mrs. Marsh, to-morrow or next day,
after I get the work done up. I could find out who she was and all about
her, and come back and tell you."
For an instant the stillness was intense, then both women turned to her.
"You!" they said, scornfully, in the same breath.
"Yes," said Grandmother, after an impressive pause, "I reckon you'll be
puttin' on your best dress and goin' up to Marshs' to see a play-actin'
woman."
"You'd have lots to do," continued Aunt Matilda, "goin' to see a woman
what ain't seen fit to return a call your Aunt made on her more'n five
years ago."
"Humph!" Grandmother snorted.
"The very idea," exclaimed Aunt Matilda.
What had seemed to Rosemary like an open path had merely led to an
insurmountable stone wall. She shrugged her shoulders good-humouredly.
"Very well," she said, "I'm sure I don't care. Suit yourselves."
[Sidenote: One Step Forward]
She began to clear away the supper dishes, for, though the others had
eaten little, they had apparently finished. Out in the kitchen, she sang
as she worked, and only a close observer would have detected a tremor in
the sweet, untrained soprano. "Anyway," thought Rosemary, "I'll put on
the flat-irons."
The fire she had built would not go out for some hours. She had used
coal ruinously in order to heat the oven for a special sort of
tea-biscuit of which Grandmother was very fond. While the fire was going
out, it would heat the irons, and then----
"One step forward whenever there is a foothold," she said to herself,
"and trust to God for the next."
That night, as fortune would have it, Grandmother and Aunt Matilda
elected to sit up late, solving a puzzle in _The Household Guardian_ for
which a Mission rocker was offered as a prize. It was long past ten
o'clock when they gave it up.
"I dunno," yawned Aunt Matilda, "as I'm partial to rockers."
"Leastways," continued Grandmother, rising to put her spectacles on the
mantel, "to the kind they give missionaries. I've seen the things they
send missionaries more'n once, in my time."
[Sidenote: More than One Way]
By eleven, the household slept, except Rosemary. As silently as a ghost,
she made her way to the attic, brought down the clean white muslin, and,
with irons scarcely hot enough, pressed it into some semblance of
freshness. She hung it in her closet, under the brown alpaca of two
seasons past, and went to sleep, peacefully.
Bright and early the next morning the Idea presented itself. Why not put
on the white gown with one of the brown ones over it and take off the
brown one when she got there? Mrs. Marsh would understand.
Rosemary laughed happily as she climbed out of bed. Surely there was
more than one way of cheating Fate! That afternoon, while the others
took their accustomed "forty winks," she brought down the faded pink
ribbon that had been her mother's. That night she discovered that
neither of the brown ginghams would go over the white muslin, as they
had shrunk when they were washed, but that the alpaca would. There was
not even a bit of white showing beneath the skirt, as she had discovered
by tilting her mirror perilously forward.
She was up early Saturday morning, and baked and swept and dusted to
such good purpose that, by three o'clock, there was nothing more that
anyone could think of for her to do until it was time to get supper. She
had put the white gown on under the alpaca when she dressed in the
morning, as it was the only opportunity of which she was at all sure.
[Sidenote: Hung in the Balance]
Grandmother and Aunt Matilda were nodding in their chairs. The kitchen
clock struck the half hour. Finally, Rosemary spoke.
"Is there anything either of you would like me to get at the store?"
"No," said Grandmother.
"No," echoed Aunt Matilda. Then she added: "Why? Were you thinkin' of
goin' out?"
"I thought I would," said Rosemary, with a yawn, "if there was nothing
more for me to do. It's such a nice day, and I'd like a breath of fresh
air."
For a moment, Fate hung in the balance, then Grandmother said,
generously: "Go on, Rosemary, and get all the fresh air you want. You've
worked better'n common to-day."
"I should think you'd be tired enough to stay home and rest," Aunt
Matilda commented, fretfully, but the door had closed on the last word,
and Rosemary was gone.
"But April's sun strikes down the glades to-day;
So shut your eyes upturned, and feel my kiss
Creep, as the Spring now thrills through every spray
Up your warm throat to your warm lips--"
[Sidenote: Rosemary Meets Edith]
The beautiful words sang themselves through her memory as she sped on.
She had forgotten about the guest for the moment, remembering with joy
that almost hurt, the one word "Mother," and the greater, probable joy
that overshadowed it. Of course he would be there! Why not, when he knew
she was coming to tea--and when they had a guest, too? The girl's heart
beat tumultuously as she neared the house, for through it, in great
tides, surged fear, and ecstasy--and love.
Madame herself opened the door. "Come in, dear!"
"Oh, Mrs. Marsh! Please, just a minute!"
"Mrs. Marsh again? I thought we were mother and daughter. Edith!" she
called. Then, in the next moment, Rosemary found herself in the
living-room, offering a rough, red hand to an exquisite creature who
seemed a blurred mass of pale green and burnished gold, redolent of
violets, and who murmured, in a beautifully modulated contralto: "How do
you do, Miss Starr! I am very glad to meet you."
The consciousness of the white gown underneath filled Rosemary's eyes
with tears of mortification, which Madame hastened to explain. "It's raw
and cold still," she said, "in spite of the calendar. These keen Spring
winds make one's eyes water. Here, my dear, have a cup of tea."
[Sidenote: An Uncomfortable Afternoon]
Rosemary took the cup with hands that trembled, and, while she sipped
the amber fragrance of it, struggled hard for self-possession. Madame
ignored her for the moment and chatted pleasantly with Edith. Then Alden
came in and shook hands kindly with Rosemary, though he had been
secretly annoyed when he learned she was coming. Afterward, he had a bad
quarter of an hour with himself while he endeavoured to find out why. At
last he had shifted the blame to Edith, deciding that she would think
Rosemary awkward and countrified, and that it would not be pleasant for
him to stand by and see it.
However, the most carping critic could have found no fault with Edith's
manner. If she felt any superiority, she did not show it. She accorded
to Rosemary the same perfect courtesy she showed Madame, and,
apparently, failed to notice that the girl had not spoken since the
moment of introduction.
She confined the conversation wholly to things Rosemary must have been
familiar with--the country, the cool winds that sometimes came when one
thought it was almost Summer, the perfect blend of Madame's tea, the
quaint Chinese pot, and the bad manners of the canary, who seemed to
take a fiendish delight in scattering the seed that was given him to
eat.
[Sidenote: Looking into the Crystal Ball]
Rosemary merely sat in the corner, tried to smile, and said, as
required, "Yes," or "No." Alden, pitying her from the depths of his
heart and yet secretly ashamed, tried unsuccessfully, now and then, to
draw her into the conversation.
Edith drained her cup, affected disappointment at finding no stray
leaves by which she might divine the future, then went to Rosemary, and
took the empty cup which she sat holding with pathetic awkwardness.
"You have none, either, Miss Starr," she said, sweetly. "Suppose we try
the crystal ball? I've been wanting to do it ever since I came, but was
afraid to venture, alone."
Rosemary, her senses whirling, followed her over to the table, where the
ball lay on its bit of black velvet.
"How do you do it?" asked Edith, of Madame.
"Just get into a good light, shade your eyes, and look in."
"That's easy," Edith said. She bent over the table, shaded her eyes with
her white, beautifully-kept hands, and peered into the crystalline
depths. "There's nothing here," she continued, somewhat fretfully, to
Alden, "except you. By some trick of reflection, I could see you as
plainly as though it were a mirror. You try, Miss Starr."
Madame's heart contracted suddenly as she remembered the day she had
looked into the crystal ball, and had seen not only Alden, but a woman
with flaming red hair, clasped closely in his arms. "It's all nonsense,"
she tried to say, but her stiff lips would not move.
[Sidenote: A Black Cloud]
Rosemary left the table and went back to her corner. "What did you see?"
queried Edith. "Did you have any better luck than I did?"
"No," Rosemary answered, with a degree more of self-possession than she
had shown previously. "There was nothing there but a black cloud."
The task of keeping up the conversation fell to Edith and Alden, for
Madame had unconsciously withdrawn into herself as some small animals
shut themselves into their shells. All were relieved, though insensibly,
when Rosemary said she must go.
Alden went into the hall with her, to help her with her coat and hat,
and, as opportunity offered, to kiss her twice, shyly, on her cheek. He
wanted to go part way home with her, but Rosemary refused.
"You'd better not," she said, "but thank you just as much."
"Won't you even let me go to the corner with you?"
"No," said Rosemary, with trembling lips, "please don't."
So she went on alone, while Alden returned to the living-room. Edith
was saying to Madame: "Poor little brown mouse! How one longs to take a
girl like that and give her all the pretty things she needs!"
[Sidenote: Edith's Desire for Rosemary]
Madame took the crystal ball, wrapped it in its bit of velvet, and put
it on the highest shelf of the bookcase, rolling it back behind the
books, out of sight.
"Why do you do that, Mother?" asked Alden, curiously. "Because,"
returned Madame, grimly, "it's all nonsense. I won't have it around any
more."
Alden laughed, but Edith went on, thoughtfully: "I'd like to do her hair
for her, and see that all her under-things were right, and then put her
into a crepe gown of dull blue--a sort of Chinese blue, with a great
deal of deep-toned lace for trimming, and give her a topaz pendant set
in dull silver, and a big picture hat of ecru net, with a good deal of
the lace on it, and one long plume, a little lighter than the gown."
"I would, too," said Alden, smiling at Edith. He did not in the least
know what she was talking about, but he knew that she felt kindly toward
Rosemary, and was grateful for it.
Rosemary, at home, went about her duties mechanically. There was a
far-away look in her eyes which did not escape the notice of Grandmother
and Aunt Matilda, but they forebore to comment upon it as long as she
performed her tasks acceptably. At supper she ate very little, and that
little was as dust and ashes in her mouth.
[Sidenote: Heartburns]
Before her, continually, was a heart-breaking contrast. She, awkward,
ugly, ill at ease in brown alpaca made according to the fashion of ten
or fifteen years ago, and Mrs. Lee, beautiful, exquisite, dainty to her
finger-tips, richly dowered with every conceivable thing that she
herself lacked.
"Mother," said Rosemary, to herself. "Oh, Mother!" She did not mean Mrs.
Marsh, but the pretty, girlish mother who had died in giving birth to
her. She would have been like Mrs. Lee, or prettier, and she would have
understood.
Her heart smarted and burned and ached, but she got through the evening
somehow, and, at the appointed time, stumbled up to her own room.
Why should she care because another woman was prettier than she, knew
more, and had more? Were there not many such in the world, and had she
not Alden? Accidentally, Rosemary came upon the cause of her pain.
Of course she had Alden, for always--unless--then, once more,
reassurance came. "She's married," said Rosemary, smiling back at the
white, frightened face she saw in the mirror. "She's married!"
[Sidenote: The Comforting Thought]
The thought carried with it so much comfort that presently Rosemary
slept peacefully, exhausted, as she was, by the stress of the afternoon.
"She's married," was her last conscious thought, and a smile lingered
upon her lips as she slept. She had not enough worldly wisdom to know
that, other things being equal, a married woman may be a dangerous
rival, having the unholy charm of the unattainable, and the sanction of
another man's choice.
XI
The Hour of the Turning Night
[Sidenote: Awake in the Night]
The darkness was vibrant, keen, alive. It throbbed with consciousness,
with mysterious fibres of communication. There was no sense of a
presence in the room, nor even the possibility of a presence. It was
vague, abstract, yet curiously definite.
Edith woke from a troubled dream with a start. For a moment she lay
quietly and listened, not afraid, but interested, as though upon the
threshold of some new experience. The scurrying feet of mice made a
ghostly patter in the attic, above her room, and a vagrant wind, in
passing, tapped at her window with the fairy-like fingers of the vine
that clung to the wall.
Otherwise all was still, and yet the darkness trembled with expectancy.
Something hitherto unknown seemed to have entered her consciousness,
some thought, emotion, instinct, or what? Wide awake, staring into
space, she lay there, wondering, waiting, not in the least frightened,
but assured of shelter and of peace.
[Sidenote: Another Personality]
Gradually she had lost consciousness of her body. She had relaxed
completely and her mind soared, free. She moved one foot, cautiously, to
see whether her body was still there, and smiled when she was reassured
by the cool smoothness of the linen sheet, and the other warm little
foot she touched in moving.
Somewhere, in this same darkness, was another personality. Of so much
she eventually became sure. It was not in the room, perhaps not even in
the house, but for someone else, somewhere, was this same sense--of
communication? No, but rather the possibility of it.
Someone else had also lost consciousness of the body. Another mind,
released for the moment from its earthly prison, sought communion with
hers. Was this death, and had she wakened in another world? She moved
her foot again, pressed her hand to the warm softness of her breast,
felt her breath come and go, and even the steady beating of her heart.
Not death, then, only a pause, in which for once the body, clamorous and
imperious with its thousand needs, had given way to the soul.
The curious sense of another personality persisted. Was this other
person dead, and striving mutely for expression? No, surely not, for
this other mind was on the same plane as hers, subject to the same
conditions. Not disembodied entirely, but only relaxed, as she was,
this other personality had wakened and found itself gloriously free.
[Sidenote: A New Self]
A perception of fineness followed. Not everyone was capable of this, and
the conviction brought a pleasant sense of superiority. Above the sordid
world, in some higher realm of space and thought, they two had met, and
saluted one another.
For the first time Edith thought of her body as something separate from
herself, and in the light of a necessary--or unnecessary--evil. This new
self neither hungered nor thirsted nor grew weary; it knew neither cold
nor heat nor illness; pain, like a fourth dimension, was out of its
comprehension, it required neither clothes nor means of transportation,
it simply went, as the wind might, by its own power, when and where it
chose.
Whose mind was it? Was it someone she knew, or someone she was yet to
meet? And in what bodily semblance did it dwell, when it was housed in
its prison? Was it a woman, or a man? Not a woman--Edith instantly
dismissed the idea, for this sense of another personality carried with
it not the feeling of duality or likeness, but of difference, of divine
completion.
Some man she knew, or whom she was to know, freed for the moment from
his earthly environment, roamed celestial ways with her. She was
certain that it was not lasting, that, at the best, it could be of very
brief duration, and this fact of impermanence was the very essence of
its charm, like life itself.
[Sidenote: Who Was the Man?]
The clock down-stairs began to strike--one, two, three--four. It was the
hour of the night when life is at its lowest, the point on the flaming
arc of human existence where it touches the shadow of the unknown,
softening into death or brightening into life according to the swing of
the pendulum. Then, if ever, the mind and body would be apart, Edith
thought, for when the physical forces sink, the spirit must rise to keep
the balance true.
Who was the man? Her husband? No, for they were too far apart to meet
like this. She idly went over the list of her men acquaintances--old
schoolmates, friends of her husband's, husbands of her friends, as one
might call the roll of an assembly, expecting someone to rise and answer
"Here."
Yet it was all in vain, though she felt herself on the right track and
approaching a definite solution. The darkness clung about her like a
living thing. It throbbed as the air may when a wireless instrument
answers another, leagues away; it was as eloquent of communication as a
network of telephone and telegraph wires, submerged in midnight, yet
laden with portent of life and death.
She sat up in bed, straining every nerve to the point where all senses
unite in one. "Who are you?" Her lips did not move, but the thought
seemed to have the sound of thunder in its imperious demand. Tangled
fibres of communication noiselessly wove themselves through the
darkness, and again all her soul merged itself into one question--"Who?
For God's sake, who?"
[Sidenote: The Answer]
Then, after a tense instant of waiting, the answer flashed upon her,
vivid as lightning: "Alden Marsh!"
And swiftly, as though in response to a call, a definite, conscious
thought from the other personality presented itself: "Yes? What would
you have of me?"
Edith lay back among her pillows, as the clock struck the half hour. The
body, as though resentful of denial, urged itself swiftly upon her now.
Her heart beat tumultuously, her hands shook, she thrilled from head to
foot with actual physical pain. The darkness no longer seemed alive, but
negative and dead, holding somewhere in its merciful depths the promise
of rest.
Utterly exhausted, she closed her eyes and slept, to be roused by a tap
at her door.
"Yes," she answered, drowsily, "come in!"
Madame came in, pulled up the shades and flooded the room with sunshine.
"I'm sorry if I've disturbed you, dear, but I was afraid you were ill.
I've been here twice before."
[Sidenote: Aroused from Sleep]
Edith sat up and rubbed her eyes. "What time is it?"
"Half-past nine."
"Oh, I'm so sorry! You mustn't spoil me this way, for I do want to get
up to breakfast. Why didn't you call me?"
Madame sat down on the side of the bed and patted Edith's outstretched
hand with affectionate reassurance. "You're to do just as you please,"
she said, "but I was beginning to worry a bit, for you've been the soul
of punctuality."
"Did--" Edith closed her lips firmly upon the instinctive question, "Did
he miss me?" She dismissed it as the mere vapouring of a vacant brain.
"Did what?" asked Madame, helpfully.
"Did you miss me?"
"Of course. Alden did too. The last thing he said before he went to
school was that he hoped you were not ill."
"That was nice of him." Edith put a small pink foot out of bed on the
other side and gazed at it pensively. Madame laughed.
"I don't believe you've grown up," she said. "You remind me of a small
child, who has just discovered her toes. Do you want your breakfast up
here?"
"No, I'll come down. Give me half an hour and I'll appear before you,
clothed and in my right mind, with as humble an apology for my sins as
I'm able to compose in the meantime."
[Sidenote: Call of the Wander-Lust]
She was as good as her word, appearing promptly at the time she had set,
and dressed for the street. After doing justice to a hearty breakfast,
she said that she was going out for a walk and probably would not be
back to luncheon.
"My dear!" exclaimed Madame. "You mustn't do that. I'll have luncheon
kept for you."
"No, please don't, for I really shan't want any. Didn't you observe my
breakfast? Even a piano-mover couldn't think of eating again before
seven, so let me go a-gypsying till sunset."
Madame nodded troubled acquiescence, and, with a laugh, Edith kissed her
good-bye. "I'm subject to the Wander-lust," she said, "and when the call
comes, I have to go. It's in my blood to-day, so farewell for the
present."
Madame watched her as she went down the street, the golden quill on her
green hat bidding jaunty defiance to the wind. As she had said, she felt
the call at times, and had to yield to its imperative summons, but
to-day it was her soul that craved the solace of the open spaces and the
wind-swept fields.
As she dressed, she had tried to dismiss last night's experience as a
mere fantasy of sleep, or, if not an actual dream, some vision hailing
from the borderland of consciousness, at the point where the senses
merge. Yet, even as she argued with herself, she felt the utter futility
of it, and knew her denials were vain in the face of truth.
[Sidenote: Roaming through the Village]
She dreaded the necessity of meeting Alden again, then made a wry face
at her own foolishness. "Ridiculous," she said to herself,
"preposterous, absurd!" No matter what her own nightmares might be, he
slept soundly--of course he did. How could healthy youth with a clear
conscience do otherwise?