TOM AND RENA AT THE WELL
In spite of her assertion that she could not take cold, Irene took one,
which, with the nervous shock, confined her to the house for a few days,
greatly to her annoyance and the discomfort of the family generally. She
was not the most amiable of invalids and was very exacting in her
demands upon Rena, who was kept going up and down stairs after things
Irene wanted or fancied she did. Every day inquiries for her had come
from the McPhersons, with flowers; and every day Tom had called in
person to ask after her, and to talk with Rena when she could be spared
from her office as nurse; and it was Tom who saw Irene first on the
piazza, looking a little pale from her recent illness. He had received a
letter from one of his clients which made it necessary for him to go
home for a week or so, and as he was to leave that night he had come to
say good-by to his cousins. I told him Rena had gone for a walk, adding
that I thought she was down in the pine-grove, by Nannie’s Well, as that
was her favorite resort.
“Gone to look in?” Tom asked, and I replied, “Possibly. I heard her say
she meant to try it sometime.”
“All right. I’ll find her and look in, too,” Tom answered. “But I must
see Irene first. Where is she?”
I told him, and he was soon with her, and saying:
“I am glad to see you in so good order. I didn’t know for a minute but
you were a goner when you went out of sight, and I began to think of all
the mean things I ever did and said to you, even to the angleworm I put
on your neck years ago. I really did, and if you had been drowned I
believe I should have worn crêpe. I should have jumped in after you if
Rex had not got ahead of me. He swims like a fish and the way he brought
you to land was beautiful to see. And, I say, that ducking improved your
looks, if they could be improved. The loss of your topknot was a good
thing.”
“What do you mean?” Irene asked, and Tom replied:
“I mean that you look better with that Eifel tower off your head. It
made you too tall.”
“Five feet nine, that’s all,” Irene answered, a little crisply.
“In reality, perhaps; but five ten in appearance—taller than Rex, and
that won’t do,” was Tom’s rejoinder, while Irene asked:
“Did he ever criticise my height?”
“Why, no; not exactly,” Tom replied, with a feeling that he was getting
into hot water. “He has said something about your being rather tall, but
with your hair as it is now, and that topknot half-way across the
Atlantic, as it must be by this time, you are all right, and I never saw
you look so well.”
Irene knew Tom meant all he said, and her face brightened a little, but
there was still a shadow on it as she said:
“Do please be serious and sensible for once, and tell me if Mr. Travers
saw the braid I lost?”
For a moment Tom hesitated; then he replied:
“Saw it? of course he did. How could he help it when he pulled it off
your head and thought he had a part of your scalp with it? You never saw
so distressed a fellow as he was holding it gingerly as if it were a
live thing, and he was so relieved when I told him it had never grown on
the top of your head, ‘the place where the wool ought to grow.’ You know
that medley.”
“O Tom! why will you worry me so?” Irene asked, and Tom replied:
“I’m not worrying you. I’m only telling you how badly Rex felt when he
thought he had torn off part of your head in trying to save you, and how
relieved he was when I set him right. You see he lost his mother when he
was a baby, and never had any sisters, or cousins, or aunts—was reared
by an old mammy, who was once a slave in the family, and he knows
nothing of girls’ little arts and make-ups, and supposed, of course,
that every hair of that steeple was natural. I think he is glad it was
not and that a part of it has gone to the mermaids. I am.”
Tom was sitting very close to Irene, with his hand on the arm of her
chair, and was talking to her as he did not often talk. His compliments
pleased her and she was thinking him not so bad a cousin, after all,
when he startled her by saying:
“I say, Irene, how long are we going to keep up this farce of deceiving
Rex?”
Irene bridled at once, and the chords in her neck began to show as they
did when she was getting angry, and little red spots came out on her
face.
“That’s for you and Rena to decide,” she said. “It was none of my
getting up. I should never have thought of it. I am simply Rena’s tool
and doing her bidding and you are as deep in it as I am, and deeper.”
“That’s so,” Tom answered, good-humoredly. “I got into it and could not
very well get out, but it seems to me it has gone far enough. I had
thought I’d wait till Rex told me of the will. This he does not seem
disposed to do, although I have tried to lead up to it a dozen times. He
always sheers off as if he hated to speak of it. I don’t believe he
takes to it kindly. I am going home to-night on business, and when I
come back I have concluded to tell Rex of his mistake and take every
whit of the blame myself. Don’t look so scared,” he continued, as he saw
how white Irene turned. “If Rex Travers cares for you he is not the man
to give you up because there is no money with you. And, Irene, pardon
me, my great friendship for Rex is my excuse for what I’m about to say.
If he does care for you, will you try your best to make him a good, true
wife?”
“What do you mean? What do you take me for? A good, true wife, indeed!
As if I’d be anything else!” Irene answered, hotly, and Tom replied:
“I’ve put my foot in it and I may as well be plain. We never agreed very
well. I know you thoroughly. You have your good points. You are very
clever and handsome. Yes, the handsomest woman I ever saw.” Irene’s face
began to soften, but clouded again as Tom went on: “You can be an angel
when you feel like it, and something else when you don’t. You are not
open as the day, and it would hurt Rex cruelly to find you in any little
underhand tricks such as you practice. You know you do. You study every
act with a view to the result. Rex never told a lie in his life, nor
acted one, and could scarcely forgive his wife if he caught her in one.
Then you are pretty peppery, and Rex hasn’t a bit of that condiment in
his makeup, and your voice, which can be like a turtle-dove when you
choose, would frighten him if he heard it as croaky as I have heard it.”
Tom was saying pretty hard things, and Irene was thoroughly angry for a
moment, and there was not much of the turtle-dove in her voice as she
said:
“Tom Giles, you are insulting me!”
“I believe my soul I am,” Tom answered, “and I beg your pardon, and I
don’t know why I have been so plain, except that I want Rex to be
happy.”
Irene knew that Tom could help or hinder her cause, and with a great
effort she controlled herself and said:
“It is not probable that Mr. Travers will ever ask me to be his wife. If
he does I shall accept him and try to be to him all even you could wish
me to be, and—Tom—” she hesitated, while the tears began to fill her
eyes—“and, Tom, don’t throw obstacles in my way. You will get Rena and
be happy. She does not want Mr. Travers. If she did I believe she could
get him. She wants you. Take her and let me be happy, too. I have not
much that is pleasant in my home life. You know I haven’t.”
She was a good deal agitated, and Tom was not proof against the pathetic
look in her eyes.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I shall let Rex paddle his own canoe after he
knows which canoe he is in, but I shall tell him the truth when I come
back. And now I must be going. It is getting toward noon, and I must
find Rena.”
Bidding her good-by, he walked rapidly away in the direction of the
pine-grove, where he found Rena with the mirror in her hand.
“Upon my word,” he thought, “I believe she is going to look in the well.
I wish I could hide and steal up behind her.”
He couldn’t do this, for Rena saw him nearly as soon as he saw her and
involuntarily dropped the mirror as she went forward to meet him.
“I’ve caught you,” he said, passing his arm around her. “You were about
to look into the well. Go ahead, and if you see anybody or don’t, I’ll
take a hand after you.”
“O Tom!” Rena cried, trying to extricate herself from him. “I was going
to take a peep in the well, the day is so fine, and the sun so bright.
Just for fun, you know. I don’t believe a thing in it. And now you’ve
spoiled everything.”
“No, I haven’t,” Tom answered. “I tell you go ahead, and when you are
through I’ll try my luck. Hurry up! You’ve only a minute before noon,
and you ought to be there now working yourself into a proper frame of
mind to receive the spectre. Be sure you don’t fall in.”
He had released her, and was holding his watch in one hand, while with
the other he picked up the mirror, wiped a speck of dirt from it, and
handed it to her. She took it rather reluctantly and said:
“Do you think you ought to be here?”
“Certainly,” he answered. “Wouldn’t it be rather uncanny for you to be
alone when a man’s face comes staring at you in the mirror—Rex’s, for
instance.”
“Tom!” was Rena’s only answer, as she stepped upon the stone projecting
over the well.
“See that you don’t fall when he comes,” Tom said. “You have just ten
seconds before he ought to be starting. Shall I count?”
He began counting very deliberately and loudly, while Rena held her
breath wishing he would stop. He did stop just as the village bell began
to strike the hour of noon.
“Now for it,” he said. “Look close; don’t miss him. Do you see him yet?
I believe I hear a rustling in the air.”
Rena did not reply, and after a moment Tom called again. “Time he was
there unless you are to be an old maid.”
“Tom Giles, will you stop!” Rena exclaimed, “How can I keep in a proper
frame of mind if you go on like that?”
For half a minute Tom was silent; then he called again:
“Has he come?”
“No, and never will with you here bothering me so,” was the answer,
while Tom drew stealthily nearer to her, and with a quick movement threw
his arm around her and put his head down until his face touched hers and
was reflected in the mirror beside her.
“Do you see him now?” he asked. “I do!”
There was a little scream and Rena fell back, pale and trembling.
“How dare you frighten me so and spoil it all!” she said. “Just for a
moment when the shadow of a great bushy head began to come in sight I
thought somebody was really coming, and it was only you, after all.”
This was not very reassuring, but Tom didn’t mind. He knew Rena, and
keeping his arm around her he led her to the seat under the pines, where
he sat with her the first night of their visit to the well and she
picked the needles from his sleeve and neck.
“Rena,” he began, and there was no banter in the tone of his voice,
which was low and earnest and made Rena’s heart beat faster than it did
when she first saw the shadow on the glass, “suppose I had not been here
and my great bushy head had appeared beside you just the same and you
had known it was I—old Tom you used to call me—would you have been more
ready to say yes to me than you are now that I am here in flesh and
blood, loving you with my whole soul, as I have done ever since you were
a little toddling girl whose hand I held to steady her walk? It was such
a little fat, dimpled hand, and the fingers clung to mine so confidingly
that I feel the touch yet. That hand is a woman’s now, and I want it for
my own. I said I would wait for years for your answer, if necessary, but
I can’t do it, and I ask you now to be my wife; but think first how the
matter stands. I have not much to offer you. With Rex you would get
fifty thousand dollars in your own right, and this, you know, you lose
if you marry me, who have very little beside my profession to depend
upon. You will be a poor man’s wife.”
“There’s that ten thousand I am to have of Sandy McPherson’s money, no
matter whom I marry; that’s something, besides what I already have. We
shall not starve,” came in a smothered voice from Tom’s bosom, against
which Rena’s face was pressed, and Tom knew the victory was won.
She had not said she would be his wife, but he was satisfied, and kissed
her passionately again and again, and might have gone on kissing her if
his Elysium had not been broken in upon by a shrill voice shouting,
“Miss Rena, Miss Rena! where be you? It’s half-past twelve, and dinner
is getting cold.”
It was Mrs. Parks calling as she had once called for Charlotte Anne.
Dinner was ready and Miss Bennett’s digester in danger of getting more
out of kilter by waiting than it already was. “I must go,” Rena said,
freeing herself from Tom and smoothing her rumpled hair and collar. Tom
did not try to detain her, but told her he was going to Newton that
night, and should tell Rex before he left of his engagement. Then they
parted and Rena hurried to the house, her cheeks like roses and her eyes
bright as stars, as she took her seat with us at the table and
apologized for being so late. Irene watched her curiously, and when they
were alone in their room she said, “Miss Bennett told Tom you had gone
to the well. Did you look in?”
“Yes,” Rena answered, “I looked in.”
“And you saw——?”
“Tom!” was Rena’s prompt reply.
“Really?” Irene exclaimed in astonishment.
“Yes, really; but a flesh-and-blood Tom, not a spirit,” Rena said,
repeating some of the incidents of her adventure, while Irene listened
with keen interest.
“And didn’t you hear him at all as he came up behind you?” she asked.
“No, not at all,” Rena replied. “The ground is soft, you know, and the
pine-needles so thick that his step made no sound. I half believe old
Sandy played that same trick on poor Nannie, though she would, of
course, have seen him a moment after and known he was there. He could do
it.”
“Yes,” Irene said, slowly and thoughtfully, “and was Tom’s face distinct
beside yours?”
“Not all of it, but enough for me to have known it was Tom if he had
vanished in air instead of seizing my arm.”
Irene was more interested in the well business than in Rena’s
engagement, the news of which she received with no surprise. She had
expected it, she said, and congratulated Rena and hoped she would be
happy. Then, saying she was tired and must rest, she shut the door of
her room and gave herself up to a train of thought, which she meant
should bear fruit. If she could bring Rex to a proposal before Tom came
back and spoiled everything, she believed he would keep faith with her,
especially as Rena was lost to him. With her quick intuition she always
felt that Rena attracted Rex more than she did, but that did not matter
now; Rena was engaged, and there was nothing in the way of her own
advancement. She could explain the deception into which she had been
persuaded so that Rex would not blame her, and she began to feel very
happy and confident.
Meanwhile Rex was in Tom’s room watching him as he packed his valise,
and telling him how sorry he was to have him go. Tom had told him of his
engagement, and like Irene he heard the news without much surprise.
“I fancied it was already settled,” he said, “and I congratulate you and
know you will be happy. How long will you be gone at the farthest?”
“A week anyway, perhaps two,” Tom replied.
“Make it one, if possible,” Rex answered. “I am nothing without
you—and—and—I may want to consult you about something when you get
back.”
“Why not consult me now?” Tom asked; and Rex replied, “It will take too
long and involves too much, and I must feel surer of myself than I do
now. The fact is this hot weather or something is affecting my head,
which feels at times as if there was a hornet’s nest in it, and I get so
hot and then so cold. I believe it is malarious here. Anyhow, I do not
feel like myself. I do not seem to have any courage or life left in me.”
Tom looked at him and saw what he had not before noticed, that he did
look very worn and tired.
“It’s that confounded will,” he thought, “and the sooner he gets it off
his mind the better. I’ll hurry back and have it out with him. There is
not time now.”
At this point Mr. McPherson was heard in the hall, asking if Rex were
going to the station with Tom, in which case he would order the
carriage; otherwise he would send Nixon with the buggy.
“I’m going, yes. The drive will do me good,” Rex answered; and Irene saw
the McPherson carriage go by with Tom and Rex in it, both lifting their
hats to Rena, who was upon the piazza, and Tom kissing his hand to her
as he looked back.
Half an hour later the carriage stopped at the gate while Rex alighted,
and, after saying a few words to Nixon, who nodded and drove on, he came
up the walk and rang the bell, asking for Miss Burdick.