"Twenty _after_ eleven? Twenty after _eleven_! Oh, my goodness! I
didn't have any idea it was so late. It seemed as though we were only
out there a couple of minutes!"
"It did to me, too," admitted Leslie.
The lateness of the hour, however, appeared to exert no immediate
influence upon either his recognition of the wisdom of departure or
hers of withdrawal to bed. Leslie swung back and forth, clinging to a
slender birch tree which grew quite close to the cottage. Its silver
leaves crashed gently together, as though a breeze were thrusting its
way through.
"I could simply sit out here all night!" Hilda declared.
Leslie admitted he could too. Presently he did sit down. He sat down
beside Hilda, but, as before, one step below her. It was certainly a
lovely night. His head somehow found her knee; then Eros could hardly
contain himself! Hilda ran her fingers very lightly through his hair.
They did not bother to talk much.
At length he asked: "Shall we go out after raspberries tomorrow? Would
you like to?"
"Oh, Les--that would be lots of fun!"
"All right."
"Shall we take a lunch so we won't have to hurry?"
"Good idea."
"What time will you come, Les?"
"What time do you want me?"
"Oh--I don't know."
"Right after breakfast?"
"Oh, yes!" Her answer to this question held no slightest inflection of
doubt.
"What time do you have breakfast?"
"Never later than eight o'clock, and it only takes me a minute to eat!"
Leslie appeared to have forgotten all about going back to the city,
after all....
There was another warm silence. The boy had no idea of starting for his
own cottage, nor had Hilda any idea of going to bed. It didn't, for
some strange reason, occur to either that the parent Needhams might be
waiting up in there, and that the minister, harassed over dim prospects
of ruin perceived in the relationship of his daughter and the man who
handled the Western interests, was attaining an attitude of really
appalling austerity. No, they didn't bother their spoony young heads
about any of these things, until all at once the cottage door opened,
letting out upon them a flood of light from the living room.
"Hello, papa!" cried Hilda, guiltily and very affectionately. She
jumped up.
The Rev. Needham did not say much out on the porch; but when Leslie
had crept off, after hurriedly squeezing the girl's hand, and Hilda
had been marshalled within, the law was laid down with unusual vigour.
Mrs. Needham took it all rather more quietly, primarily because she
did not share, in its full poignancy, her husband's alarm over Louise.
Of course she was concerned. But the poise of climax was beginning to
assert itself. No doubt tomorrow, if a reign of chaos really did set
in, Mrs. Needham would rule over the turmoil like a very judge. She
would become dominant, as when she went to rescue her daughter from the
Potomac. It was perhaps her only complex.
Hilda had just been sent up to bed, rather subdued, but in her heart
immensely radiant, when Marjory arrived home. O'Donnell wanted to hang
around awhile, but she wouldn't let him. No, she positively refused
to linger any longer in the moonlight. She reproved herself a little.
She reproved him a little, too. They had already been quite romantic
enough for one night. And she hustled him off with a lack of ceremony
which went with her years and her temperament. All the same, he managed
to steal a glancing kiss. And Eros--who I forgot to say had remained in
hiding out there--Eros told himself that this was infinitely better for
his purposes than a mere handshake!
When he had gone, she sat down on the steps alone, for a moment. It was
so wonderful--life was--and the night. She watched the moon declining
over a just-troubled sea. Then abruptly she became conscious of voices
in the cottage living room.
"Now, your sister!"
"Well, Alf?"
"_She's still out!_"
"Oh, Marjory knows the way."
"But at such an hour!"
"It's only a quarter to twelve, Alf."
"I know how the Point will be talking tomorrow!"
"Alf, I--"
"Oh--I've nothing to say. No, Anna, I realize she's your sister. But
I must tell you what I think." And he was back once more on the topic
that so turbulently absorbed him. "I think Marjory has been led into
an unfortunate way of living. She's always run so free and never cared
what people thought or said. I really don't know how the Point is going
to take her." And after a moment's pause, during which the minister
could be heard pacing up and down: "Anna, what do we know about the
nature of her life in Tahulamaji? Has she told you anything definitely
about that? No. But she's hinted...." He paced on, and presently added:
"Now here she is, just back; and the very first thing she does is walk
all over with a man's arm round her!"
Miss Whitcom abandoned the wonderful night. When she entered, her
sister smiled and brightened generally. But her brother-in-law seemed
rather taken off his feet.
Marjory wanted to make the minister feel perfectly at home, so she sat
down and began rocking cosily.
"How snug you're fixed here!" she murmured. "How happy you ought to
be, Alfred, in your little nest! Ah, it's fine to be in the bosom of a
family again. You know, I feel somehow as though I'd come back from an
absence of nearly a lifetime. It's a curious feeling, to come back like
this. Like a sort of prodigal, Alfred--just fancy! But I _did_ have
to go away," she pleaded earnestly. "In the beginning, it was quite
necessary! You see there were such a lot of things I wanted to find
out, and I felt from the very first--Anna, you remember how I used to
talk to you about life, and all that?--well, I somehow felt I shouldn't
find out anything just sitting in the front parlour with a family album
spread open on my lap. You see, it wasn't what the others were like
that I wanted to be like, and it wasn't what all the others had done
that I wanted to do in the world. So I broke away. Yes, the prodigal
left, to roam far and wide. Now that we're chatting here all snug, I
may tell you, Alfred, that it's been pretty interesting and pretty
broadening."
"Marjie, dear--"
"Now, Anna, _don't_ let's go up to bed just yet. Not _just_ yet.
It is so cosy down here, and I'm much too excited to sleep. Just a
little while. I--I want to visit with Alfred a little about my life in
Tahulamaji." The atmosphere in the living room grew subtly electric.
The minister sat rigid. But the speaker went on in a cheery, simple
way: "Just think, just think! When you would be sitting down in your
nice house in Ohio, there I was...." She interrupted herself with a
laugh. "It does sound rather dreadful, now doesn't it? You in Ohio
and me.... Fancy my going way off there alone--for you know the
Tahulamajians were once cannibals!--all by myself, and--and _living_!
Gracious, how extraordinary it does sound!"
She rocked with folded arms and peeped at her brother-in-law out of the
wicked corners of her eyes.
"But it's such fun," she went on, a little solemnly, "keeping your
personal life all ship-shape--all ship-shape, Alfred--and yet really
feeling, as you go along, that you're not missing a single thing that's
worth while. No, not a single blessed thing, Alfred. When I went to
Tahulamaji I hadn't an awfully clear notion of what I was going to do
there. You see I thought I'd just have a look-around, as we say. Oh,
Alfred," she chatted, "such a lovely spot! So warm and tropical, with
music at night over the water.... Alfred, how you would love it there!"
He shifted uneasily, and she went on: "What I did, though--what my life
in Tahulamaji really turned out to be--wasn't after all very poetic,
or even essentially tropical, when it comes to that. Yes, I've often
thought I might have chosen a more harmonious vocation. But one must
grasp what one can and be content. The fact is, Alfred, I went into the
drygoods business."
"Drygoods!" cried her sister.
"Yes--just think of that--and after all the really exciting things
I've done in my life! But that's exactly what I did, Anna. Yes,
that's what my life was in Tahulamaji. And you've simply no idea how
the thing took! The natives, you see, were just beginning to wear
clothes--regular clothes, I mean, dear brother. And in a few months I
had an establishment--an _establishment_, I tell you, with departments
and counters and clerks.... It was perfectly beautiful to see them
skipping about, and the little cash boxes running on their tracks
overhead...."
"Marjie, _really_?"
"Yes, indeed. Of course that came just a little later on, after
electricity had been introduced. The arrangement was somewhat crude,
but it worked. Anna, you've no idea the things you can do if you really
set your heart on them! Yes, in time we even had cash boxes overhead,
and there was I, up in the cage where all the cash boxes went to,
making change and keeping the books! That's what makes me laugh so,
when I think of it: you living in your nice house in Ohio, and me up in
the little cage with the cash coming in by trolley!"
"Marjory, Marjory!"
"The third year I had a dressmaker over from San Francisco, and the
business trebled at once. The poor dears had been trying to make their
own clothes, but of course they didn't know much about styles. I had
a circulating library of pattern books, but it was a great day, I
tell you, when the dressmaker arrived! They closed the schools, and a
reception was held. Even the Queen came down the line! I have a manager
now," she concluded, "running the business. I said I simply had to get
off for a rest. Alfred," she soared to her climax, "your sister has
worked herself weary and rich. How much will the new parish house cost?"
The Rev. Needham gasped. This is really not an exaggeration. He
gasped--and it was, this time, no merely inner gasping, either.
Marjory--the new parish house ...!
"Why, Marjory!" he cried, his heart deeply touched. There sounded again
here that former note of appeal or even pathos.
Nevertheless, long afterward, when the fine new parish house was all
finished, and the church could hold its own a little while longer in a
world which was changing so rapidly, a grim spectre stalked between
the minister and her magnificent donation. It was the spectre of the
Bishop whose bed she had seen made up. Did Marjory think _he_ would
sleep on two mattresses, like the Bishop? And buy an upper for his golf
sticks?
Miss Whitcom had risen to bid them good night. The indignant cottage
lamp had begun to sputter and fail. It had never before been kept
burning so late. But she lingered long enough to give them the full
benefit of one of her delightful and so characteristic shafts of
bluntness.
"O'Donnell," she said, "has stood by all these years. Think of it!
Think of its taking so long as that to be sure! Of course it wasn't
that I ever cared two straws for anybody else. O'Donnell's never had
any active competition, except from my overwhelming notions about
being free to work out my life. Well, I've had my freedom, and I've
worked it out. And now--well, he's asked me again--tonight. But what
do you think? I haven't given him a definite answer yet--not _yet_!
I'm going over to the Elmbrook Inn as soon as the sun's up, though. I
guess I'll stand down under his window and call out to him softly. And
when he comes to the window, I'll say: 'Barrett, I've had my fling!'
Alfred--you don't think I could find my way through tonight ...?"
"Marjory! Of course not! Tomorrow, if you must...."
But she chattered gaily and unquenchably on. "I don't know how it's
all going to turn out, I'm sure--about our future, I mean. You see, if
he'll come along to Tahulamaji, I'll sell him a half interest in the
business, and we could let the manager go. But I doubt if he'll do it.
It's so far, and then, you see, he's been with the Babbits so long. I
can fancy one's growing very much attached to the Babbits!"
"And if he doesn't want to go to Tahulamaji?" asked her sister.
"If he doesn't? If he doesn't? Well, then I'll have to follow _his_
lead."
The Rev. Needham had a sudden flash of wholly disorganizing
inspiration. "Marjory, you don't mean Babbit & Babbit?"
But it was just exactly what she did mean! "Yes, in that case I'll
travel for Babbit & Babbit. Must be doing something, I can tell you,
with all these parish houses to be built! And it won't be my first job
on the road, by any manner of means, either!"
Then she kissed her sister affectionately on the mouth and her
brother-in-law affectionately on the cheek. And then the cottage lamp
went out.
8
When Hilda went up to bed she thought Louise already asleep, for she
lay there with her eyes closed. Hilda undressed as stealthily as
possible, and crept in beside her sister. At first she felt so excited
that it seemed to her she must surely lie awake all night. But as a
matter of fact, her eyes drooped at once, and in five minutes she was
asleep.
Then it was that Louise stirred and opened her eyes. They were very
wide and very full of perplexity. She had not been sleeping, but had
feigned sleep because she dreaded the ordeal of talking. She wanted to
be alone, and she wanted to think--all night. A feverish zeal was upon
her.
Barry was abed too. His light had gone out and his room was quite
silent. Was he asleep? She wondered. Or was he, too, lying there in the
dark with eyes wide open, thinking?
The walk back from the roast had been a very silent one. The day had
been crowded with emotion, and during the journey back to Beachcrest
the tenseness had seemed, curiously, to be eased a little. At least
there seemed a tacit understanding that, whatever the further
developments might be, tomorrow must do. Tomorrow, tomorrow! Tonight
all was hazed and half drowned in unshed, groping tears. Even emotion
itself, through sheer, blessed weariness, was subtly obscured. So the
walk had been silent, while somehow both had felt as though the air had
cleared a little. It was easier to breathe.
They had stood together a moment on the porch.
"Goodnight," she said huskily.
"Goodnight, Louise," he returned gravely, giving her hand just a frank,
brief pressure.
She wanted to throw herself at his feet. The impulse to do something
splendid and expiating swept over her almost irresistibly. She wanted
to implore his forgiveness--would that set their lives in order? If
this were to be the end, she felt there ought to be something at least
vaguely stupendous about it.
"Louise, dear--what is it?" he asked, quite tenderly and calmly, yet
with an intensity, too, which seemed like a hot, reproachful breath
against one's very soul.
She swayed a little, almost as though she might be about to fall in a
faint. He touched her arm gently.
The opportunity passed. "It's nothing," she murmured. "I'm tired,
that's all--so tired!" And she did not throw herself at his feet, or do
anything splendid at all.
It was true, she was very tired. She expected to drop at once into a
merciful drugged sleep. It had been like that after the affair with
Richard. But now, lo! she found herself more wide awake, it seemed,
than she had ever been. The weariness seemed all slipping from her,
and her mind grew quite vibrant, as with a slowly dawning purpose.
Ah, tomorrow!
Would the situation be as tragic then? Could it be otherwise than
tragic? But perhaps--perhaps they would see things more clearly....
"Yes," she thought, "I'll go to sleep now and let tomorrow bring what
it must."
Mañana, mañana!
But this was not to be. She closed her eyes. She tried to turn into a
snug and sleepy position. But she could not woo sleep; and every effort
merely sharpened her senses. Again she found herself lying in the dark
with wide eyes, and went on thinking, thinking.
What was the meaning of this strange commotion? Phantoms--of the
past--presaging phantoms endlessly to follow.... At dawn she had gone
out blithely enough to welcome her lover. He had come. And then.... But
even before his coming, that curious battle had set in. Not his hat or
the twist of his profile.... Phantoms. Phantoms rising up in her heart
like some sinister cloud of retribution. And their single adversary:
"You are mine, all mine...."
Now, in this sombre hour shunned by sleep, the conflict achieved
an effect of climax: she felt it to be that, obscurely yet with a
desperate poignancy--felt that an issue precious in the scheme of her
unfolding destiny faced decision. Legions of spent loves went by in
marshalled battle trim. With an inward cry she watched them as they
passed. Perfume still lingering in the house, though with the guest
departed. Ghosts of a many-vizaged passion, homing at length, for the
fulfilment of a barter Faust-like in its essence.
How lavish she had always been: how free! Shambles, now the glamour
was gone stale. A monstrous cheapening--a heart flung out to-let in
a public street. Yes, how easily and extravagantly she had spent
herself--a profligate spending, for what the moment could return. Here,
at last, was a love that demanded: "You must be mine, all mine--you
must belong to me forever!" Curious, that of them all--of all the
voices that had spoken of love before--it should be Lynndal's which, in
fancy, thus first framed a so momentous contract!
He had been always so modest; in the beginning, to be loved in return
had figured for him as a too, too generous conjecture. Gradually,
however, there had been a return. Their lives had drawn together.
The fact that this love had, from almost the very beginning, been
challenged to the bridging of such distance began to assume for Louise
a new and arresting significance. There had been something in it,
in its very fibre, rising above any mere convenience of contact: a
phenomenon unique, it struck her, in the long and turbulent history
of her heart interests. Those letters.... "That was just it," she
had groped when confronted by Aunt Marjie. Romancing appeared to
have carried her far, how far! Mirage. And yet, behind the mirage a
something deeper lurked. She sensed this now; but all the weary day
she had sensed it also, dimly. Lynndal. Hitherto, the man himself had
barely figured. Yet ever he had been there, too. He had come from
far in the west to put a ring on her finger, and had found her in a
panic of goblin doubt. That fancied voice in the shriek of steam:
"Mine--mine!" Then the kiss which exposed her dilemma. But _behind_
these things--the man; the man himself. And what was this that seemed
for so long, in a fine and utter silence, to have been building?
Sanctuary!...
Her mind, as she lay here in the dark, became indeed a battleground
for this ultimate climax of struggle. An unimagined realm they made of
it. Her heart beat faster and her cheeks grew hot. To-let, in a public
street. "Richard! I have done what he would have done--what he did!
I am no better--no better!" She writhed, and the bitterness did not
leave her--carried her instead to a yet more awful conclusion: "I am no
better than a--than a--" The terrible word scorched across her heart,
leaving a scar behind. Sobs shook her body, and the tears were bitter
tears of hopelessness and regret.
But then, slowly, the bitterness eased a little; and, full of
amazement, she felt a shy presence of freshness stealing mysteriously
in, as from some empire where struggle is no citizen. A strange
and beautiful sense of disentanglement. In the previous moment of
unwithheld relentless purgatory, she had caught the rhythm of that
something--that something behind the mirage! So that, in time, as
she lay relaxed, with tears undried on her face, it came to her that
just one fact remained, of all the febrile facts which, out of a long
inglorious past, had attained the immortality of ghost-hood. Just
one--one "living" fact: Lynndal!
Until today he had but filled a niche--but carried on the pattern of
the many; now, however, the power to stem this ruinous tide revealed
itself as at hand, just waiting to be seized--the courage to give
herself completely, and to achieve a love as steadfast and unchanging
as his had proved to be.
The night wore on. The moon grew sleepy and drooped in the starry
western sky. But Louise did not sleep. There was high drama in her
heart, and she could not sleep till it was all played out.
She began laying plans. What would her life be like if she married
Lynndal? Dry-farming. But later he would run for Congress--perhaps he
would be Governor some day. And in the meantime, love--and there would
perhaps be children.... Security! Peace! An anchorage--something to
steady her and set her wayward heart at rest!
"I'm the kind of girl," she told herself, with a grimness which still
went hand in hand with the orgy of honesty and fearless insight that
had been making these dark hours so memorable, "--the kind that _must_
be married. I--I'm not safe otherwise--not to be trusted."
And then her mood lightened again a little and grew grimly whimsical:
"They say a minister's children are always the worst!"
She must have fallen into a little sleep; for she opened her eyes with
a start and gazed up at a slight abrasion in the shingle roof through
which morning blinked. For a moment she wondered why she had waked
so early. The July birds were all aflutter outside. It was a radiant
summer dawn.
Hilda lay beside her, sound asleep. The house was very still. It was
tomorrow!
Downstairs on the mantelpiece in the cottage living room the Dutch
clock was ticking in its wiry, indignant way. There came a whirr--_so_
like a wheeze of decrepitude. And then it struck: one, two, three,
four....
Very quietly Louise slipped out of bed. She did not want to waken
Hilda, but she had a sudden desire to be out under the sky.
Quickly putting on her clothes, she stole from the cottage. The morning
was very still and fresh. She felt as though she must shout the
gladness that was in her. Tomorrow! Who could possibly have foreseen
that it would be like this?
Louise climbed up out of the valley toward the little rustic
"tea-house" where Leslie had waited for her yesterday at dawn. She
thought she would sit there a long, long time, trying to realize her
great new contrite happiness. She reached the door. A figure stirred.
Lynndal was there. He had risen even before she was awake, for slumber
had not come to him at all. When he saw her face, he could not believe
the new happiness that seemed rushing upon him out of the dark chaos of
their yesterday.
She stretched out her hands to him. She snuggled up against him with a
brief, glad sigh. "I want to be yours, all yours, Lynndal," she said
softly and just a little humorously. "I want to be yours forever and
ever. I don't want to belong to any one but you!"