HOW AUNT JEANNE GAVE A PARTY
It was on my return from my fourth voyage--in the brig _Sarnia_--that
things began to happen.
The voyage had been a disastrous one all through. We had bad weather right
across to the Indies, and had to patch up there as best we could. It was
when we were slowly making our way north that a hurricane, such as those
seas know, caught us among the Bahamas and brought us to a sudden end.
The ship had been badly strained already on the voyage out, and the repairs
had been none too well done. Our masts went like carrots and we were
rolling helplessly in the grip of the storm, pumping doggedly but without
hope against seams that gaped like a sieve, when the Providence that rules
even hurricanes flung us high on a sandy coast and left us there to help
ourselves.
Of our blind wanderings in that gruesome land of swamps and sand, which,
when we at last escaped from it, we learned was Florida, I must not write
here. It was months before such of us as were left crawled through into
civilisation, and it is not too much to say that every day of the time
after we parted from the wreck we carried our lives in our hands. It was
sixteen months almost to a day before I set foot once more on Peter Port
quay. For beggars cannot be choosers, and for the very clothes we stood in
we were indebted to the kind hearts who took pity on us in the American
States. We had had to wait at every point till means of forwarding us could
be found, and we were welcomed in Peter Port as men returned from the dead.
Within two hours I was scrambling up through the ferns and gorse above Port
à la Jument to the welcome that awaited me at home.
I peeped through the window before going in, and saw the table laid for
supper and my mother busy at the hearth. She turned when I entered,
supposing it was my grandfather and Krok, and then with a cry she was on my
neck.
Ah, how good it was to feel her there, and to find her unbroken by all the
terrible waiting! She had hoped and hoped, and refused to give up hoping
long after the others had done so. She told me, between smiles and tears,
that each time I went she had felt that she had probably seen me for the
last time. "But," she said quietly, "I left you in the good God's hands,
and I believed that however it was with you it would be well."
Then my grandfather and Krok came in, and my grandfather said very
fervently, "Now God be praised!" and wrung my right hand as if he could
never wring it enough, while Krok wrung the other, with eyes that stood out
of his head like marbles and yet were full of tears.
During supper I told them shortly what had befallen us, and I had so much
to tell, and they so much to hear, that we none of us supped over well, yet
none of us had probably ever enjoyed a supper like it.
Then in turn I was hungry for news, and began asking about this one and
that, intending so to come presently to Carette without baring my heart.
But my dear mother, guessing perhaps what was in me, gave me full measure.
"Jeanne Falla has a party to-night, my boy, and Carette is stopping with
her. You should go down and give them a surprise."
"I will go," I said, and jumped up at once to see if, among the things I
had left behind when I went away, I could find enough to rig myself out
suitably to the occasion.
My mother had a new blue guernsey just finished for me, a wonderful
guernsey, when you think of it. She had, I think, gone on working at it,
after the others had given me up, just to show her trust in Providence, and
her dear eyes shone when she saw me in it. Loans from my grandfather, whose
full stature I had now attained, and whose contribution was of importance,
and from Krok, who would have given me one of his eyes if I had needed it,
filled all my requirements, and I set off for Beaumanoir about nine o'clock
as glad a man as any in Sercq that night.
And oh, the sweetness of the night and all things in it. The solemn pulse
of the great sea in Saut de Juan; the voices of many waters in the Gouliot
Pass; the great dusky cushions of gorse studded with blooms that looked
white under the moon; the mingling in the soft salt air of the scent of
hedge-roses and honeysuckle, of dewy, trodden grass and the sweet breath of
cows--ay, even the smell of the pigsties was good that night, and mightily
refreshing after the dark Everglades of Florida.
Aunt Jeanne's hospitable door stood wide. She kept open house that night,
for the old observances were dear to her ever-young heart. I walked right
into her kitchen, and she met me with a cry of amazement and delight, and
every wrinkle in the weather-browned face creased into a smile.
"Why, Phil, mon gars! Is it possible?" she cried. "You are welcome as one
from the dead. Though, ma fé, I hoped all along, as your mother did. And,
my good! what a big fellow it is! And not bad-looking either! I used to
think you'd grow up square. You were the squarest boy I ever saw. But
foreign parts have drawn you out like a ship's mast."
She was dragging me by the hand all the time, and now halted me in front of
the great square fern-bed in the corner between the window and the hearth,
and stood looking up into my face with the air of an artist awaiting
approval of her latest masterpiece. A dear old face, sharp-featured,
clever, all alive with the brightness of that which was in her, and with
two bright dark eyes sparkling like a robin's under the black silk
sun-bonnet which the gossips said she wore day and night.
I knew she looked just all that, but no eyes or thought had I for Aunt
Jeanne or anyone else just then.
For here in front of me was the great green fern-bed, green no longer but
transformed into a radiant shrine of flowers. Nine feet long it was, and
not much less in width, and its solid oaken sides rose some two feet from
the floor. It was heaped indeed with the bronze-green fronds and
russet-gold stalks of fresh-cut bracken, but this was only the ordinary
workaday foundation, and was almost hidden beneath a coverlet of
roses--roses of every hue from damask-red to saffron-yellow and purest
white, heaped and strewn in richest profusion and filling the room with
perfume. From somewhere in the roof above, long sprays of creeping geranium
and half-opened honeysuckle and branches of tree fuchsia hung down to the
sides of the couch and formed a canopy, the most beautiful one could
imagine. For the flowers of the honeysuckle looked like tiny baby-fingers
reaching down for something below, and the red and purple fuchsias looked
like a rain of falling stars. And beneath it sat the Queen of the Revels
dressed all in white, her unbound hair rippling about her like a dark
sunset cloud, till it lost itself among the creamy many-coloured petals
below,--Carette, the loveliest flower of all.
She had shaken her hair over her face to veil her modesty at the very
outspoken admiration of some of the earlier comers, but I caught the
sparkle of her dark eyes as she looked up at me through the silken mesh,
and the sweet slim figure set the flowery canopy shaking with its
restrained eagerness. And my heart jumped within me at the lovely sight.
Disregardful of custom, I was stooping to speak to her, when Aunt Jeanne
dragged me away with a gratified laugh, and a quick "Nenni, nenni! She may
not speak till the time comes, or dear knows what will happen to us! Come
away, mon gars, and tell me where you have been and what you have been
doing," and she sat me down in a corner at the far end of the big dresser,
and herself beside me so that I should not get away, and made me talk, but
I could not take my eyes fora moment off the slim white figure on the
radiant bed of roses.
A most delightful place at all times was that great kitchen at Beaumanoir,
with its huge fireplace like a smaller room opening off the larger, and put
to many other uses besides simply that of cooking;--its black oak presses
and dressers and shelves all aglow with much polishing, and bright with
crockery and pewter; its great hanging rack under the ceiling, laden with
hams and sides of bacon and a hundred and one odds and ends of household
use; and the great table in the corner weighted now with piles of
currant-cake--Aunt Jeanne's gâche had a name in Sercq--and more substantial
faring still.
There were about a score of young men and girls there, with a sprinkling of
older folk, and every minute brought fresh arrivals to add to the talk and
laughter. Each new-comer on entering paid homage to the silent figure on
the green bed, and gave me boisterous welcome home as they came to receive
a word of greeting from the mistress of the house.
Everyone knew everyone else most intimately. Scarce one but was related to
half the people in the room. And all were in the gayest of spirits, for
there, in a far corner, old Nicholas Grut every now and again gave the
strings of his fiddle an impatient twang, as an intimation that all this
was sheer waste of time, and that the only proper business in life was
dancing. And presently they would begin, and they would dance until the sun
rose, and then--well, the new day had its own rites and ceremonies, and
eyes were bright and pulses leaping, and hearts were all a-flutter with
hopes and fears of what the day might bring.
"And who is this, Jeanne Falla?" I asked, as one came in whom I had never
seen before--a young man, dark and well-looking, and very handsomely
dressed compared with the rest of us. And he stood so long before the
green-bed, gazing at Carette, that there sprang up in me a sudden desire to
take him by the neck and drag him away, or, better still, to hurl him
through the open door into outer darkness.
"Tiens!" said Aunt Jeanne softly, "it is the young Torode--"
"Torode? I do not know him. Who is he?"
"C'est ça. It is since you left. His father has settled himself on Herm. He
is a great man in these parts nowadays. They do say--"
"They do say--?" I asked, as she stopped short.
"Bon dou! They say many strange things about M. Torode. But you know how
folks talk," she murmured.
"And what kind of things do they say, Aunt Jeanne?"
"Oh, all kinds of things. He's making a fine streak of fat--"
"So much the better for him."
"Maybe! But, mon dou, when a man gets along too quickly, the others will
talk, you know. They say he has the devil's own luck in all he undertakes.
He has three of the fastest chasse-marées in the Islands, and they say he's
never lost a cargo yet. And they say he has dealings with the devil and
Bonaparte and all the big merchants in Havre and Cherbourg. But of late
he's gone in for privateering, and the streak's growing a fat one, I can
tell you. He's got the finest schooner in these waters, and, ma fé, broth
and soup are both alike to him, I trow! Oh yes, he can see through a fog,
can Monsieur Torode."
"And what does Peter Port say to it all?"
"Pergui! Peter Port didn't like having its bread taken out of its
mouth,--not that it's bread contents Monsieur Torode, not by a very long
way. Fine doings there are on Herm, they say, when they're all at home
there. But he's too big and bold a man to interfere with. He pays for the
island, they say, and a good price too. Some say he's a wealthy emigre
turning his talents to account. For myself--" and the black sun-bonnet
nodded knowingly.
"You don't care for him over much, Aunt Jeanne?" and I felt unreasonably
glad that it was so.
"Ma fé, I've never set eyes on the man and never wish to! But such luck is
not too natural, you understand. The devil's flour has a way of turning to
bran, and what comes with the flood goes out with the ebb sometimes."
"All the same you invite the young one here."
"The door of Beaumanoir is wide to-night, and everyone who chooses to come
is welcome. Though I wouldn't say but what some are more welcome than
others.... Brecqhou and Herm have dealings together, you understand," she
murmured presently. "That is how this youngster finds himself here--Bernel,
they call him. The old one is much away and the young one does his business
hereabouts. And see the airs he puts on! One would think the Island
belonged to him, and he hasn't had the grace to come and say how d'ye do to
me yet. For myself--"
"For yourself, Aunt Jeanne?"
"Eh b'en!" with a twinkle. "One likes one's own calves best, oui gia!" and
I felt like kissing the little old brown hand.
Young Torode had joined the others, and was laughing and joking with the
girls, though it seemed to me that the men received him somewhat coldly.
Then some remark among them directed his attention to Jeanne Falla and
myself in the corner behind the dresser, and he came over at once.
"Pardon, Mistress Falla!" he said,--I think I have said before that Aunt
Jeanne was more generally called by her maiden name of Falla than by her
married one of Le Marchant, and she preferred it so,--"I was wondering
where you were. You have given us a most charming surprise,"--with a nod
towards the flower-decked green-bed. "But why is the goddess condemned to
silence?"
"Because it's the rule. And, ma fé, it is good for a girl's tongue to be
tied at times." Then, in answer to the enquiring looks he was casting at
me, she said, "This is Phil Carré of Belfontaine, whom some folks thought
dead. But I never did, and he's come back to show I was right. This is M.
Bernel Torode of Herm, Phil, mon gars."
And young Torode and I looked into one another's eyes and knew that we were
not to be friends. What he saw amiss in me I do not know, but to me there
was about him something overmasterful which roused in me a keen desire to
master it, or thwart it.
"You are but just home, then, M. Carré?" he asked.
"This evening."
"From--?"
"From Florida last by way of New York."
"Ah! Many ships about?"
"Not many but our own."
"There will be no bones left to pick soon," he laughed, "and the appetite
grows. And what with the preventive men and their new powers it will soon
be difficult to pick up an honest living."
"From all accounts M. Torode manages it one way or another," I said.
"All the same it gets more difficult. It's a case of too many pots and not
enough lobsters."
And then Jeanne Falla, who had gone across to the others, suddenly clapped
her hands, and Nicholas Grut's hungry bow dashed into a quick step that set
feet dancing in spite of themselves.
And Carette sprang up from her seat and stepped out of her bower, and her
face, radiant at her release, had in it all the loveliness of all the
flowers from among which she came. The roses clung to her white gown as
though loth to let her go, and strewed the ground as she passed, and no
man's heart but must have jumped the quicker at sight of her coming towards
him with welcomes in her eyes and hands.
She came straight across to us, and the other girls watched eagerly to see
which of us she would speak to first--for Midsummer Eve is as full of signs
and omens as Aunt Jeanne's gâche of currants.
She gave a hand to each of us, the left to me and the right to young
Torode, and the left is nearer the heart, said I to myself.
"Phil, mon cher," she cried joyously. "It is good to see you alive and home
again. And some foolish ones said you were gone for good! And you are
bigger and browner than ever--" and she held me off at arm's length for
inspection. "And when did you arrive?"
"I reached home just in time for supper."
"Ah, how glad your mother would be! She and Aunt Jeanne and I were the only
ones who hoped still, I do believe."
"May I beg the first dance, mademoiselle?" broke in young Torode, for the
couples were whirling past us and he had waited impatiently while we
talked.
"I must go and tie up my hair first. It looks like a tangle of vraic," she
laughed, and slipped away by the sides of the room and disappeared through
the doorway. And young Torode immediately took up his post there to claim
his dance as soon as she returned.
I was vexed with myself for giving him first chance. But truly my thoughts
had not been on the dancing, but only on Carette herself, and I would have
been content to look at her and listen to her all the evening without a
thought of anything more.
Young Torode's visible intention of keeping to himself as much of her
company as possible put me on my mettle, however, and when he dropped her
into a seat after that dance, I immediately claimed the next.
I could dance as well, I think, as any man in Sercq at that time, but I
felt myself but a clumsy sailorman after watching young Torode. For his
easy grace and confidence put us all into the shade, and did not, I am
afraid, tend to goodwill and fellowship on our part.
The other men, I noticed, had but little to say to him or he to them. He
danced now and then with one or other of the girls, and they seemed to
regard it more as an honourable experience than as matter of great
enjoyment. And the man with whose special belle-amie he was dancing would
sit and eye the pair gloomily the while, and remain silent and sulky for a
time afterwards.
But, except for such little matters as that, we had a right merry time of
it. Aunt Jeanne saw to that as energetically as though the hospitality of
Beaumanoir had had doubts cast upon it, a thing that never could have
happened. But Aunt Jeanne was energetic in all things, and this was her own
special yearly feast. And, ma fé, one may surely do what one likes with
one's own, and though one cannot recover one's youth one can at all events
live young again with those who are young.
The lively spirits of the younger folk worked so upon their elders, that
Uncle Henry Vaudin, who was seventy if he was a day, actually caught hold
of Aunt Jeanne, as she was flitting to and fro, and tried to dance her into
the whirling circle. But the result was only many collisions and much
laughter, as the youngsters nearly galloped over them, and Aunt Jeanne and
her partner stood in the centre laughing, till that dance was over.
Then she immediately challenged him to the hat dance, as being less trying
to the legs and requiring more brain, and calling on Carette to make their
third, they danced between three caps laid on the floor, in a way that
earned a storm of applause.
Then two of the men danced the broom dance--each holding one end of the
broom and passing it neatly under their arms, and over their heads, and
under their legs, as they danced in quick step to the music.
And, in the intervals of such hard work, we ate--cold meats, cunningly
cooked, and of excellent quality because Aunt Jeanne had bred them herself;
and the best made bread and the sweetest butter in Sercq, and heaps of
spicy gâche, all of Aunt Jeanne's own making. And we drank cider of Aunt
Jeanne's own pressing, and equal to anything you could get in Guernsey. And
now and again the men-folk smoked in the doorway, and if the very excellent
tobacco she provided for them was not of her own growing, it was only
because she had not so far undertaken its cultivation, and because tobacco
could be got very cheap when you knew how to get it.
And then we danced again till the walls spun round quicker than ourselves,
and even Uncle Nico's seasoned arms began to feel the strain. And
still--"Faster! Faster!" cried the men, and the girls would not be beaten.
And the ropes of flowers above the green-bed swung as though in a summer
gale, and the roses leaped out and joined in the dance, till the smell of
them, as they were trampled by the flying feet, filled all the room.
Then, while we lay spent and panting, the men mopping themselves with their
kerchiefs, and the girls fanning themselves with theirs, Aunt Jeanne, who
had had time to recover from her unwonted exertions with Uncle Henry
Vaudin, recited some of the old-time poems, of which she managed to carry a
string in her head in addition to all the other odds and ends which it
contained.
She gave us "L' R'tou du Terre-Neuvi oprès San Prumi Viage"--
"Mais en es-tu bain seu, ma fille?
Not' Jean est-i don bain r'v'nu?
Tu dis qué nou l'a veu en ville,
I m'étonn' qu'i n'sait déjà v'nu"--
eighteen long verses, full of tender little touches telling of the
hysterical upsetting in the mother's heart at the safe return of her boy
from the perils of the sea.
And to me, who had just seen it all in my own mother's heart, it struck
right home, and came near to making me foolish in the matter of wet eyes.
And, besides, Aunt Jeanne would keep looking at me, as she reeled it off in
her sharp little voice, which was softer than I had ever heard it before,
and that made Carette and all the other girls look at me also, till I was
glad when she was done, I was getting so uncomfortable.
Then, when at last the poor sailor-boy in the story was so full that he
could not take another bite--not even a bite of pancake on which his mother
in her upsetting had sprinkled salt instead of sugar--that poem came to an
end, and by way of a change Aunt Jeanne plunged headlong into--
"Ma Tante est une mênagère
Coum je cré qu'i gn'y'en à pouit"--
hitting off in another twenty long verses the strong and weak points of an
old and very managing Auntie, not unlike herself in her good points, and
very unlike her in her bad ones. And we joyfully pointed them all back at
the managing Auntie in front of us, good and bad points alike, and laughed
ourselves almost black in the face at the most telling strokes; all except
young Torode, who laughed, indeed, but not heartily like the rest,--rather
as though he thought us an uncommonly childish set of people for our ages.
And so we were that night, and enjoyed ourselves mightily.
Then young Torode sang "Jean Graïn d'orge," in a fine big voice, and
Carette sang "Nico v'nait m' faire l'amour," in a very sweet one, and I was
sorely troubled that I had never learned to sing.
Then to dancing again, and it was only then, as I leaned against the
door-post watching Carette go round and round with young Torode, in a way
that I could not help but feel was smoother and neater than when my arm was
round her, that a chance word between two girls sitting near me startled me
into the knowledge that I had been guilty of another foolishness, and had
overlooked another most important matter that night. You see, I had been in
a flutter ever since I reached home, and one cannot think of everything.
"Oh, Father Guille has promised him his horse, and so--" said the girl,
between giggles and whispers, and it hit me like a stone to think how
stupid I had been. And after a moment's thought I slipped away and ran
quickly down the lane to La Vauroque, calling myself all manner of names
through my teeth, and thumped lustily on George Hamon's door.
He was in bed and fast asleep, and it took much thumping before I heard a
sleepy growl in the upper room, and at last the window rattled open and
Uncle George's towsled head came out with a rough--
"Eh b'en, below there? What's afire? Can't you let a man--"
"It's me, Uncle George--Phil Carré. I'm sorry--"
"Phil!... Bon dou! Phil come back alive!" in a tone of very great surprise.
And then very sternly--
"Tiens donc, you down there! You're not a ghost, are you?"
"Not a bit of a ghost, Uncle George. I got home this evening. I'm up at
Jeanne Falla's party at Beaumanoir, and I've only just remembered that I
haven't got a horse for to-morrow."
"Aw, then--a horse for to-morrow! Yes--of course!" and he began to gurgle
inside, though bits of it would come out--"A horse! Of course you want a
horse! And who--?"
"Can you let me have Black Boy--if you've got him yet?"
"I'll come down, mon gars. Wait you one minute;" and very soon the door
opened, and he dragged me in, gripping my hand as if it were a rudder in a
gale, so that it ached for an hour after.
"And you're all safe and sound, mon gars?--"
"As safe and sound as Sercq, Uncle George. Can you let me have Black Boy?"
"Pergui! But it's a happy woman your mother will be this night. She never
would give you up, Phil. It's just wonderful--"
"'Tis, sure! Can you spare me Black Boy?"
"Aw now, my dear, but I'm sorry! You see, I'd no idea of you coming, and
the young Torode came along this very afternoon and begged me to lend him
Black Boy, and I promised, not knowing--But there's Gray Robin. You can
have him. He's a bit heavy, maybe, but he's safe as a cart, and Black Boy's
got more than a bit of the devil in him still. Will you be crossing the
Coupée?"
"I suppose so."
"Well, take my advice, and get down and lead over. It's more than a bit
crumbly in places. I've made young Torode promise not to ride Black Boy
across."
"All right! When can I have Gray Robin?"
"Now if you like."
"I'll be back at four. May I have some of your roses, Uncle George?"
"All of them, if you like, mon gars. Bon dou, but I'm glad to see you home
again!"
"I'd like a few to trim Robin up with."
"I'll see to it. It's good to see you back, Phil. Your mother didn't say
much, but she was sore at heart, _I_ know, though she did put a bold face
on it."
"I know.... You won't mind my running away now, Uncle George? You see--"
"Aw, I know! Gallop away back, my boy. And--say, Phil, mon gars,--don't let
that young cub from Herm get ahead of you. He's been making fine play while
you've been away." And I waved my hand and sped back to the merrymaking.