There came a day the following spring when Alexina, seeking her aunt,
wept.
Harriet gazed at her dismayed, at a loss. Heretofore Alexina had taken
her tears to Nelly or had kept them to herself.
"They are going away," she said, "King William and them; going in the
boat."
This, as a matter to cry about, was a mystery to Harriet. "Going
where?" she asked.
"To get the golden fleece," her weeping niece assured her.
"Well," said Harriet amused, "let us hope they may find it, but why
the tears?"
Alexina got up and carried her tears to her own room. It spoke her
infantile capacity to discriminate that she bore away no resentment;
there are things that the Aunt Harriets with the best wills in the
world need not be expected to understand.
King William's mother, telling her, had held her tight and rocked her;
King William's father, when he saw her lip trembling afterward, had
lifted her on his knee.
Going into the big, high room which was her own, Alexina shut the
door. Then she cast herself on the floor. A little hand, beating about
wildly, came upon Sally Ann, lying unregarded there. Gathering her in
fiercely, presently the sobs grew quieter. Later she wiped her eyes
upon her child and, kissing her tenderly, put her down and went over
to King William's; the time was short and she could have Sally Ann
afterward.
The next day the cottage was closed and the shutters made fast.
Alexina felt lonesome even to look over there, and Sally Anns are but
silent comforters.
But in a year the Leroys came back from St. Louis, between which city
and New Orleans the splendid new "King William" had been plying. The
judgment of Captain Leroy had been at fault, which is a sad thing when
a man is sixty. The day of the steamboat had passed, because that of
the railroad had come. The "King William" as a venture was a failure.
So, one morning, the cottage windows were open to the Virginia creeper
outside them. Nelly whispered the news to Alexina at breakfast, and
the child could not eat for hurry to be through and go over.
It was as if King William had been watching for her, for he came
running to the gate and took her hand to conduct her in. He was
taller and thinner, and looked different, and neither could find
anything to say on the way.
Charlotte was sitting in the parlour, her wraps half-removed. They had
only just arrived, and the stillness and closeness of a newly opened
house was about. "How does one pack furniture for moving, Willy?"
Charlotte began as he appeared.
But he was bringing Alexina. "Tell her about it, mother," he said, "so
she'll know."
Charlotte, brightening, held out her arms. Then, having lifted the
child to her lap and kissed her, her face grew wan again. "There was
no fleece for Jason, little Mab; there is no Land of Colchis, never
believe it. And those seeking, like Willy and me, are like to wander
until youth and hope and opportunity are gone."
She was crying against a little cropped head. King William stood
irresolute, then put an arm around her. "Not that way, mummy; don't
tell it that way."
But control had given way. "And there is nothing for little Jason. He
must go and fight with his bare hands like any poor churl's child--oh,
Willy, Willy, my little son--"
Alexina, in her lap, sat very still; King William was staring hard
into space.
Charlotte went on. "We are going away, little Mab, Willy and his
father and I; going away for good. Everything that ever was ours, this
cottage and all, is gone. We are going to a place in the South called
Aden, where there are a few acres that still are ours only because
they would not sell."
A moment they all were still. Then the little breast of Alexina began
to heave. The Leroys had never seen her this way. Sally Ann had, many
times, and Nelly once or twice. She threw herself upon Charlotte. "I
want to go, too; I want to go; I hate it--there," with a motion of
self toward the big, white house visible through the window. "I hate
it, and I want to go too."
They were all crying now. Suddenly King William stood forth in front
of the child. "When we get rich, I'll come for you," he said.
The practical Alexina looked through the arrested tears as she sat up.
"But if you don't get rich?" she questioned.
Charlotte laughed. She was half child herself. The laugh died. The
other half was woman. "Then he won't come; if he is the son of his
father, he won't come."