JEAN CRAIGMILE'S RETURN
When at last Jean Craigmile returned, a glance at her face was quite
enough to convince Ellen that things had not gone well. She held her
peace, however, until her sister had had time to remove her bonnet and
her shawl and dress herself for the house, before she broke in upon
Jean's grim silence. Then she said:--
"Weel, Jean. I'm thinkin' ye'd better oot wi' it."
"Is Tillie no goin' to bring in the tea? It's past the hour. I see she
grows slack, wantin' me to look after her."
"Ring for it then, Jean. I'm no for leavin' my chair to ring for it."
So Jean pulled the cord and the tea was brought in due time, with hot
scones and the unwonted addition of a bowl of roses to grace the
tray.
"The posies are a greetin' to ye, Jean; I ordered them mysel'. Weel?
An' so ye ha'na' found him?"
"Oh, sister, my hairt's heavy an' sair. I canna' thole to tell ye."
"But ye maun do't, an' the sooner ye tell't the sooner ye'll ha'e it
over."
"He was na' there. Oh, Ellen, Ellen! He'd gone to America! I'm afraid
the Elder is right an' Hester has gone home to get her death blow. Why
were we so precipitate in lettin' her go?"
"Jean, tell me all aboot it, an' I'll pit my mind to it and help ye
think it oot. Don't ye leave oot a thing fra' the time ye left me till
the noo."
Slowly Jean poured her sister's tea and handed it to her. "Tak' yer
scones while they're hot, Ellen. I went to the place whaur he'd been
leevin'. I had the direction all right, but whan I called, I found
anither man in possession. The man was an Englishman, so I got on vera
weel for the speakin'. It's little I could do with they Frenchmen. He
was a dirty like man, an' he was daubin' away at a picture whan I
opened the door an' walked in. I said to him, 'Whaur's Richard'--no,
no, no. I said to him, calling Richard by the name he's been goin' by,
I said, 'Whaur's Robert Kater?' He jumped up an' began figitin' aboot
the room, settin' me a chair an' the like, an' I asked again, 'Is this
the pentin' room o' Robert Kater?' an' he said, 'It was his room,
yes.' Then he asked me was I any kin to him, an' I told him, did he
think I would come walkin' into his place the like o' that if I was no
kin to him? An' then he began tellin' me a string o' talk an' I could
na' mak' head nor tail o't, so I asked again, 'If ye're a friend o'
his, wull ye tell me whaur he's gone?' an' then he said it straight
oot, 'To Ameriky,' an' it fair broke my hairt."
For a minute Jean sat and sipped her tea, and wiped the tears from her
eyes; then she took up the thread of her story again.
"Then he seemed all at once to bethink himsel' o' something, an' he
ran to his coat that was hangin' behind the door on a nail, an' he
drew oot a letter fra the pocket, an' here it is.
"'Are ye Robert's Aunt Jean?' he asked, and I tell't him, an',
'Surely,' he said, 'an' I did na' think ye old enough to be his Aunt
Jean.' Then he began to excuse himsel' for forgettin' to mail that
letter. 'I promised him I would,' he said, 'but ye see, I have na'
been wearin' my best coat since he left, an' that's why. We gave him a
banket,' he says, 'an' I wore my best coat to the banket, an' he gave
me this an' told me to mail it after he was well away,' an' he says,
'I knew I ought not to put it in this coat pocket, for I'd forget
it,'--an' so he ran on; but it was no so good a coat, for the lining
was a' torn an' it was gray wi' dust, for I took it an' brushed it an'
mended it mysel' before I left Paris."
Again Jean paused, and taking out her neatly folded handkerchief wiped
away the falling tears, and sipped a moment at her tea in silence.
"Tak' ye a bit o' the scones, Jean. Ye'll no help matters by goin'
wi'oot eatin'. If the lad's done a shamefu' like thing, ye'll no help
him by greetin'. He maun fall. Ye've done yer best I doot, although
mistakenly to try to keep it fra me."
"He was sae bonny, Ellen, and that like his mither 'twould melt the
hairt oot o' ye to look on him."
"Ha'e ye no mair to tell me? Surely it never took ye these ten days to
find oot what ye ha'e tell't."
"The man was a kind sort o' a body, an' he took me oot to eat wi' him
at a cafy, an' he paid it himsel', but I'm thinkin' his purse was sair
empty whan he got through wi' it. I could na' help it. Men are vera
masterfu' bodies. I made it up to him though, for I bided a day or twa
at the hotel, an' went to the room,--the pentin' room whaur I found
him--there was whaur he stayed, for he was keepin' things as they
were, he said, for the one who was to come into they things--Robert
Kater had left there--ye'll find oot aboot them whan ye read the
letter--an' I made it as clean as ye'r han' before I left him. He made
a dour face whan he came in an' found me at it, but I'm thinkin' he
came to like it after a', for I heard him whustlin' to himsel' as I
went down the stair after tellin' him good-by.
"Gin ye had seen the dirt I took oot o' that room, Ellen, ye would a'
held up ye'r two han's in horror. There were crusts an' bones behind
the pictures standin' against the wa' that the rats an' mice had been
gnawin' there, an' there were bottles on a shelf, old an' empty an'
covered wi' cobwebs an' dust, an' the floor was so thick wi' dirt it
had to be scrapit, an' what wi' old papers an' rags I had a great
basket full taken awa--let be a bundle o' shirts that needed mendin'.
I took the shirts to the hotel, an' there I mended them until they
were guid enough to wear, an' sent them back. So there was as guid as
the price o' the denner he gave me, an' naethin said. Noo read the
letter an' ye'll see why I'm greetin'. Richard's gone to Ameriky to
perjure his soul. He says it was to gie himsel' up to the law, but
from the letter to Hester it's likely his courage failed him. There's
naethin' to mak' o't but that--an' he sae bonny an' sweet, like his
mither."
Jean Craigmile threw her apron over her head and rocked herself back
and forth, while Ellen set down her cup and reluctantly opened the
letter--many pages, in a long business envelope. She sighed as she
took them out.
"It's a waefu' thing how much trouble an' sorrow a man body brings
intil the world wi' him. Noo there's Richard, trailin' sorrow after
him whaurever he goes."
"But ye mind it came from Katherine first, marryin' wi' Larry Kildene
an' rinnin' awa' wi' him," replied Jean.
"It was Larry huntit her oot whaur she had been brought for safety."
They both sat in silence while Ellen read the letter to the very end.
At last, with a long, indrawn sigh, she spoke.
"It's no like a lad that could write sic a letter, to perjure his
soul. No won'er ye greet, Jean. He's gi'en ye everything he possesses,
wi' one o' the twa pictures in the Salon! Think o't! An' a' he got
fra' the ones he sold, except enough to take him to America. Ye canna'
tak' it."
"No. I ha'e gi'en them to the Englishman wha' has his room. I could
na' tak them." Jean continued to sway back and forth with her apron
over her head.
"Ye ha'e gi'en them awa'! All they pictures pented by yer ain niece's
son! An' twa' acceptit by the Salon! Child, child! I'd no think it o'
ye." Ellen leaned forward in her chair reprovingly, with the letter
crushed in her lap.
"I told him to keep them safe, as he was doin', an' if he got no word
fra' me after sax months,--he was to bide in the room wi' them--they
were his."
"Weel, ye're wiser than I thought ye."
For a long time they sat in silence, until at last Ellen took up the
letter to read it again, and began with the date at the head.
"Jean," she cried, holding it out to her sister and pointing to the
date with shaking finger. "Wull ye look at that noo! Are we both daft?
It's no possible for him to ha' gotten there before that letter was
written to Hester. Look ye, Jean! Look ye! Here 'tis the third day o'
June it was written by his own hand."
"Count it oot, Ellen, count it oot! Here's the calendar almanac. Noo
we'll ha'e it. It's twa weeks since Hester an' I left an' she got the
letter the day before that, an' that's fifteen days--"
"An' it takes twa weeks mair for a boat to cross the ocean, an' that
gives fourteen days mair before that letter to Hester was written, an'
three days fra' Liverpool here, pits it back to seventeen days,--an'
fifteen days--mak's thirty-two days,--an' here' it's nearin' the last
o' June--"
"Jean! Whan Hester's frien' was writin' that letter to Hester, Richard
was just sailin' fra France! Thank the Lord!"
"Thank the Lord!" ejaculated her sister, fervently. "Ellen, it's you
for havin' the head to think it oot, thank the Lord!" And now the dear
soul wept again for very gladness.
Ellen folded her hands in her lap complaisantly and nodded her head.
"Ye've a good head, yersel', Jean, but ye aye let yersel' get excitet.
Noo, it's only for us to bide in peace an' quiet an' know that the
earth is the Lord's an' the fullness thereof until we hear fra'
Hester."
"An' may the Lord pit it in her hairt to write soon!"
While the good Craigmiles of Aberdeen were composing themselves to the
hopeful view that Ellen's discovery of the date had given them, Larry
Kildene and Amalia were seated in a car, luxurious for that day,
speeding eastward over the desert across which Amalia and her father
and mother had fled in fear and privation so short a time before. She
gazed through the plate-glass windows and watched the quivering heat
waves rising from the burning sands. Well she knew those terrible
plains! She saw the bleaching bones of animals that had fallen by the
way, even as their own had fallen, and her eyes filled. She remembered
how Harry King had come to them one day, riding on his yellow
horse--riding out of the setting sun toward them, and how his
companionship had comforted them and his courage and help had saved
them more than once,--and how, had it not been for him, their bones,
too, might be lying there now, whitening in the heat. Oh, Harry, Harry
King! She who had once crossed those very plains behind a jaded team
now felt that the rushing train was crawling like a snail.
Larry Kildene, seated facing her and watching her, leaned forward and
touched her hand. "We're going at an awful pace," he said. "To think
of ever crossing these plains with the speed of the wind!"
She smiled a wan smile. "Yes, that is so. But it still is very slowly
we go when I measure with my thoughts the swiftness. In my thoughts we
should fly--fly!"
"It will be only three days to Chicago from here, and then one night
at a hotel to rest and clean up, and the next day we are there--in
Leauvite--think of it! We're an hour late by the schedule, so better
think of something else. We'll reach an eating station soon. Get
ready, for there will be a rush, and we'll not have a chance for a
good meal again for no one knows how long. Maybe you're not hungry,
but I could eat a mule. I like this, do you know, traveling in
comfort! To think of me--going home to save Peter's bank!" He chuckled
to himself a moment; then resumed: "And that's equivalent to saving
the man's life. Well, it's a poor way for a man to go through life,
able to see no way but his own way. It narrows his vision and shortens
his reach--for, see, let him find his way closed to him, and whoop!
he's at an end."
Again Larry sat and watched her, as he silently chuckled over his
present situation. Again he reached out and patted her hand, and again
she smiled at him, but he knew where her thoughts were. Harry King had
been gone but a short time when Madam Manovska, in spite of Amalia's
watchfulness, wandered away for the last time. On this occasion she
did not go toward the fall, but went along the trail toward the plains
below. It was nearly evening when she eluded Amalia and left the
cabin. Frantically they searched for her all night, riding through the
darkness, carrying torches and calling in all directions, as far as
they supposed her feet could have carried her, but did not find her
until early morning, lying peacefully under a little scrub pine, far
down the trail. By her side lay her husband's worn coat, with the
lining torn away, and a small heap of ashes and charred papers. She
had been destroying the documents he had guarded so long. She would
not leave them to witness against him. Tenderly they took her up and
carried her back to the cabin and laid her in her bunk, but she only
babbled of "Paul," telling happily that she had seen him, and that he
was coming up the trail after her, and that now they would live on the
mountain in peace and go no more to Poland--and quickly after that she
dropped to sleep again and never woke. She was with "Paul" at last.
Then Amalia dressed her in the black silk Larry had brought her, and
they carried her down the trail and laid her in a grave beside that of
her husband, and there Larry read the prayers of the English church
over the two lonely graves, while Amalia knelt at his side. When they
went down the trail to take the train, after receiving Betty's letter,
they marked the place with a cross which Larry had made.
Truth to tell, as they sat in the car, facing each other, Larry
himself was sad, although he tried to keep Amalia's thoughts cheerful.
At last she woke to the thought that it was only for her he maintained
that forced light-heartedness, and the realization came to her that he
also had cause for sorrow on leaving the spot where he had so long
lived in peace, to go to a friend in trouble. The thought helped her,
and she began to converse with Larry instead of sitting silently,
wrapped in her own griefs. Because her heart was with Harry
King,--filled with anxiety for him,--she talked mostly of him, and
that pleased Larry well; for he, too, had need to speak of Harry.
"Now there is a character for you, as fine and sweet as a woman and
strong, too! I've seen enough of men to know the best of them when I
find them. I saw it in him the moment I got him up to my cabin and
laid him in my bunk. He--he--minded me of one that's gone." His voice
dropped to the undertone of reminiscence. "Of one that's long
gone--long gone."
"Could you tell me about it, a little--just a very little?" Amalia
leaned toward him pleadingly. It was the first time she had ever asked
of Larry Kildene or Harry King a question that might seem like seeking
to know a thing purposely kept from her. But her intuitive nature told
her the time had now come when Larry longed to speak of himself, and
the loneliness of his soul pleaded for him.
"It's little indeed I can tell you, for it's little he ever told
me,--but it came to me--more than once--more than once--that he might
be my own son."
Amalia recoiled with a shock of surprise. She drew in her breath and
looked in his eyes eloquently. "Oh! Oh! And you never asked him? No?"
"Not in so many words, no. But I--I--came near enough to give him the
chance to tell the truth, if he would, but he had reasons of his own,
and he would not."
"Then--where we go now--to him--you have been to that place before?
Not?"
"I have."
"And he--he knows it? Not?"
"He knows it well. I told him it was there I left my son--my little
son--but he would say nothing. I was not even sure he knew the place
until these letters came to me. He has as yet written me no word, only
the message he sent me in his letter to you--that he will some time
write me." Then Larry took Betty's letter from his pocket and turned
it over and over, sadly. "This letter tells me more than all else, but
it sets me strangely adrift in my thoughts. It's not at all like what
I had thought it might be."
Amalia leaned forward eagerly. "Oh, tell me more--a little, what you
thought might be."
"This letter has added more to the heartache than all else that could
be. Either Harry King is my son--Richard Kildene--or he is the son of
the man who hated me and brought me sorrow. There you see the reason
he would tell me nothing. He could not."
"But how is it that you do not know your own son? It is so strange."
Larry's eyes filled as he looked off over the arid plains. "It's a
long story--that. I told it to him once to try to stir his heart
toward me, but it was of no use, and I'll not tell it now--but this.
I'd never looked on my boy since I held him in my arms--a heartbroken
man--until he came to me there--that is, if he were he. But if Harry
King is my son, then he is all the more a liar and a coward--if the
claim against him is true. I can't have it so."
"It is not so. He is no liar and no coward." Amalia spoke with
finality.
"I tell you if he is not my son, then he is the son of the man who
hated me--but even that man will not own him as his son. The little
girl who wrote this letter to me--she pleads with me to come on and
set them all right: but even she who loved him--who has loved him, can
urge no proof beyond her own consciousness, as to his identity; it is
beyond my understanding."
"The little girl--she--she has loved your son--she has loved
Harry--Harry King? Whom has she loved?" Amalia only breathed the
question.
"She has not said. I only read between the lines."
"How is it so--you read between lines? What is it you read?"
Larry saw he was making a mistake and resumed hurriedly: "I'll tell
you what little I know later, and we will go there and find out the
rest, but it may be more to my sorrow than my joy. Perhaps that's why
I'm taking you there--to be a help to me--I don't know. I have a
friend there who will take us both in, and who will understand as no
one else."
"I go to neither my joy nor my sorrow. They are of the world. I will
be no more of the world--but I will live only in love--to the Christ.
So may I find in my heart peace--as the sweet sisters who guarded me
in my childhood away from danger when that my father and mother were
in fear and sorrow living--they told me there only may one find peace
from sorrow. I will go to them--perhaps--perhaps--they will take
me--again--I do not know. But I will go first with you, Sir Kildene,
wherever you wish me to go. For you are my friend--now, as no one
else. But for you, I am on earth forever alone."