A REVELATION
It was but a few days later that Nancy came in with the local paper
and, with pale cheeks, pointed tragically to an item which read: "As a
fitting conclusion to his studies at college, Mr. Terrence Wirt, lately
visited his sister, Mrs. Lindsay, at Heathworth, will travel abroad. He
sails from New York to-morrow on the _St. Paul_."
"He has gone!" quavered Nancy. "Gone without a word!"
Mrs. Loomis laid down the paper with a troubled look, but presently
her habit of taking the easiest way out, asserted itself. "Oh, well,
Nancy," she said, "I wouldn't take it to heart. There are as good fish
in the sea as ever yet were caught. You are very young and there are
plenty of nice young men in the world."
"Not for me," responded Nancy, gloomily.
"Of course you think so now; that is perfectly natural. Every girl
feels so at first, till some one else comes along. Of course I haven't
a word against Terrence, and his people are all right, but for my own
part I'd much rather see you settled in this neighborhood, than to see
you married to some one who would take you away off to New York or some
other big city. There are a number of nice boys whose families have
lived here for generations; there's Patterson Lippett, for instance."
"Pat Lippett!" exclaimed Nancy with fine disdain. "He is no more to be
compared to Terrence than an earth worm is to a jewelled humming-bird;
besides, I have known him all my life."
"I don't see why that isn't so much the better. I am sure Pat has
been to college, and so have several of the other boys you know. The
Lippetts are a good old family, so are the Carters and the Gordons.
Don't look so tragic, dear. I declare when those big eyes of yours get
that expression you fairly frighten me. Why I had had half a dozen
affairs before I met Mr. Loomis and I am sure no one could have been
happier than we were. There is no more beautiful memory to me than
our honeymoon in Cuba and Mexico. Everyone has said they never knew
anything more romantic." She sighed a little.
"That is why you love Spanish, isn't it mamma?" said Nancy. "I wish I
had studied it."
"It is not too late now," returned Mrs. Loomis. "I could help you. Why
don't you take it up this summer, Nancy? It would occupy your time and
perhaps take your mind away from this affair."
"It might help," returned Nancy, in a melancholy tone, "but nothing
could make me forget."
"Not at once, of course, but you might gain quite a good knowledge in
a year's time and then we might make a visit to Cuba."
This prospect appealed to Nancy, and she showed enough interest in the
proposition to say: "Mademoiselle said I had a gift for languages."
"Naturally," responded Mrs. Loomis, with a thoughtful look.
"Do you think that I inherited the gift from you or from my father?"
Mrs. Loomis started. "From your father," she said, and immediately
changed the subject.
Nancy took the paper she had brought in, meaning to preserve the notice
of Terrence Wirt's departure. So did she mean to preserve any word of
him. She found an ancient vellum-bound album in a pile of books packed
away in the attic, appropriated it and dedicated it to her lost lover
with a queer ceremony of her own invention, in which a dead rose,
broken heart and a dying candle figured. No consolatory words of Mrs.
Loomis's availed to change her conviction that the separation was
final, and for the first time in her life she turned a shrinking front
toward the future.
The summer days dragged on monotonously. The gallants who rode that
way rode off again, for Nancy would have none of their invitations to
picnics, dances or tournaments. She always had a flimsy excuse: she
was tired; she didn't care for picnics; she was busy; her mother might
need her, and so the offended young squires finally turned their
attentions to more complaisant maidens. The Loomis homestead stood a
couple of miles out of the small town, upon an unfrequented road, so
that visitors were rather rare, even at best, and it might be said that
they were not encouraged, if one judged by the infrequency of Mrs.
Loomis's calls upon her neighbors. She was naturally indolent, and in
the past few years had been warned by her doctor not to exert herself
unnecessarily, so she was quite content to sit on the porch with a book
or with fancy work, while Nancy wandered about at will, or spent her
time poring over some old volume of poetry. Many of the more prosperous
neighbors, the Lindsays among them, had gone to the Springs to enjoy
greater gayeties, so there were few young persons left, and these Nancy
declared she did not miss.
It grew hotter and hotter. Nancy's pallor increased day by day, and at
last Mrs. Loomis noticed it and looked at the girl with concern.
"I wish I felt able to make the journey to the North," she said. "This
excessive heat is pulling us both down. I feel as limp as a rag and
you look as if you had been drawn through a knot-hole. I hope you
haven't been poring over those Spanish books too steadily. Perhaps we'd
better stop the lessons till it grows cooler. Would you like to join
the Lippetts at Greenbriar, Nancy?" she inquired with a half hope of
bringing Nancy into the daily society of Patterson.
"I shouldn't care a rap about it," returned Nancy, quickly nipping
the hope in the bud. "I would much rather stay alone with you than be
thrust into a little hot room and have to dress half a dozen times a
day, and for what purpose?" she added sighing.
Mrs. Loomis laid her cheek against the girl's slim hand. "After all,"
she said, "I suppose one is more comfortable at home, and I must
confess I feel like undertaking anything but a journey, myself. Any
exertion makes me feel as if I should collapse utterly."
Nancy bent to kiss her. "Perhaps you need a tonic. Shall I call up Dr.
Turner and ask him to stop in?"
Mrs. Loomis shook her head. "No, it isn't worth while. I know exactly
what he would say. It is the same old trouble. He wouldn't give me
anything new. I am out of the drops he ordered the last time, but I
will send for them to-morrow."
"Mañana; that old mañana," returned Nancy, playfully. "Why not send at
once?"
"One more day will not make any difference," protested Mrs. Loomis.
"Iry is busy cutting the grass and I don't want to take him away from
his work."
"I could go."
"In this heat? No, indeed. I should be afraid of sunstroke, and should
be so worried every minute you were gone that it would do me twice the
harm it would to wait."
So Nancy yielded, but told herself that she would take an early morning
ride into the town and bring out the medicine before breakfast the next
morning.
But the dawning of the morning was not on this earth for Virginia
Loomis, for, while the world was yet in half light, old Parthy came to
Nancy's door, tears rolling down her dark cheeks. "De white hoss done
been hyar, honey," she said. "I been a-lookin' fo' him. Udder day a
li'l buhd fly into Miss Jinny's room, an' a dawg been howlin' uvver
night fo' a week."
Nancy, sitting up in bed, gazed at the woman with startled eyes. "What?
Who?" she began, but could not go on, feeling the weight of some
tragedy imminent.
"Las' night 'pears lak Miss Jinny skeerce kin drag huhse'f up stairs,"
Parthy went on, "an' dis mawnin' airly when de roosters a-crowin',
three o'clock, I reckons, I jes' kaint sleep, an' wakes up Iry an' says
ef dat dawg don' stop dat howlin' I los' my min', an' Iry gits up, too,
fo' I feels sumpin bleedged mek me go up an' see ef Miss Jinny want
nothin' I dunno de whys an' wharfores of dat but I feels lak I bleedged
ter go." She paused and Nancy, never moving, kept her eyes fixed in the
same startled gaze.
"Go on," she whispered. Faint light was creeping into the room. A
gentle breeze drifted in through the open windows, swaying the curtains
ever so gently. There were one or two twittering cheeps from newly
awakened birds. A wagon rattled clumsily along the stony road. "Go on,"
again whispered Nancy.
"I goes up an' knocks at Miss Jinny's do', but she ain' give no
'sponse, den I opens de do' an' goes in, an'--an'" Parthy broke off
short in her speech and, burying her face in her apron, she rocked back
and forth moaning.
Nancy slipped out of bed and crept toward her. "If mamma is ill, send
for the doctor at once," she said, in a strained voice.
"Iry done been, but 'tain' no use, 'tain' no use. Po' li'l chile. Po'
li'l chile," she wailed.
Nancy darted from the room to be met at her mother's door by the old
doctor. "Go back, my child," he said, tenderly. "Go back, you can be of
no use now. She is safe."
"Safe fo' evahmo'," chanted Parthy, who had followed Nancy. "She happy
an' safe. She done gone to meet Mars Jeems."
With one wild cry Nancy flung herself upon Parthy's broad breast, was
picked up in her strong arms and carried back to her room.
The days that followed passed for Nancy she scarce knew how. Kind
neighbors tried to comfort her; the good old doctor spared no pains to
ease her grief, telling her that if her mother had lived she would have
suffered greatly. "It was her heart, my child," the doctor said, "and
it is a merciful Providence who has allowed her to leave this world so
peacefully."
But Nancy would not be comforted. She felt that Heaven had dealt her a
double blow, that in her cup of bitterness had been mixed still more
bitter draughts till it overflowed.
It was not till the lean old lawyer, Silvanus Weed, came to consult
her about her mother's affairs that Nancy realized that she must rouse
herself and make an effort to understand what he was trying to say.
She met him in the library, a room seldom used, for Mrs. Loomis had
always preferred her own more cheerful sitting-room upstairs. On this
occasion Nancy felt that its memories were too tender, its associations
too dear to be desecrated by discussions such as she knew must take
place, so to the sombre library she went and established herself in
a stiff chair facing the table. She looked very wan, very young and
helpless, and Mr. Weed felt that seldom had a more difficult duty been
assigned to him.
He cleared his throat once or twice after he sat down and turned over
the papers he drew from his bag, then he said suddenly, "You know, Miss
Nancy, Mrs. Loomis had only a life interest in this estate in the event
of her dying without issue. Should such be the case the estate would
revert to the Loomis heirs, nieces and nephews of the late Mr. James
Loomis. Beyond this in her own right she had not a large income. This,
of course, is left by will to you. I cannot state the exact sum at this
moment, as there are some stocks which I have not looked into; they
might realize you more if well handled."
"But,--but,--" Nancy roused herself to say, "as I am the only child,
surely I inherit all. You meant that it--the place--my father's
property, would go to his family only in case there were no children,
wasn't that what you meant, Mr. Weed?" She fixed her great, mournful
eyes upon his face and his own gaze fell.
"I meant," he said hesitatingly, "that if there were no legal heirs,
all Mr. Loomis's property would go to his family. Yes, that is what I
meant." He fidgeted with the papers on the table and seemed unable to
go on although Nancy waited expectantly.
"I wished to say," he spoke again after what seemed an unnecessarily
long pause, "that Mrs. Weed, at least we both would feel gratified if
you would come to us until all these legal matters are settled. You
will scarcely wish to remain alone with servants, and we would be much
gratified to receive you under our roof till your plans are made."
"But, Oh, Mr. Weed, I would so much rather stay right here. It would
break my heart to go away so soon. I could get some one, some nice,
quiet, respectable person to stay with me, couldn't I?"
"No doubt, no doubt," Mr. Weed answered nervously. "I think perhaps,"
he added, "that the next thing to be done is to go over such papers of
Mrs. Loomis's as have not been entrusted to me. There may be matters
which need legal attention, and we would best see to such as soon as
possible. You have the keys, of course."
"Yes. At least I know where they are," Nancy replied in a disheartened
voice. Why all this red tape, this caution when it seemed a very simple
thing that she be allowed to retain what was hers, her inheritance by
right of descent? "I suppose there has to be something done about a
will," she said, "it has to be--probated, do they call it? Does it take
long?"
"Not so very, and an estate is usually settled up within the year."
"Oh, a year, then I need not hurry."
The lawyer gave his dry little cough as he began to gather up his
papers. He had an angular face, square forehead, blocked in nose, and
eyes which seemed like two triangles set beneath indefinite brows, but
his smile was kindly as he said: "Now, don't worry, Miss Nancy. There
will probably be no objection to your staying here as long as you wish,
though I wish to impress it upon you that our home is open to you at
any time that you may feel you would be ready to come to it."
"I do appreciate your saying so," returned Nancy earnestly, "but you
can understand that my own home must seem more of a refuge than any
other place just now. It is all so dear to me, hallowed by so many
precious memories. Parthy and Ira will take good care of me."
"I am sure of that," Mr. Weed replied in his stiff little manner. "So
then, Miss Nancy, we will leave the question open for the present and
in the meantime you can be looking over the papers. You can let me know
when you wish to consult me about them and I will advise you to the
best of my ability. I trust you will believe that I wish to spare you
all the trouble that I can, and that I will serve you as faithfully as
I would any of the family. We Weeds have attended to the Loomis's legal
matters for generations and I think we have never failed them yet. Now,
no matter what happens, you must not worry." He gave her shoulder a
wooden sort of pat and went out, leaving the girl to ponder over what
he had said, but, as he walked down the gravelled path he murmured to
himself. "I could not do it. Not yet, not yet. Let her find it out for
herself."
"Better get it over with," sighed Nancy, as she watched the lawyer's
stiff figure mount his buggy. "Ah, me, I wish mamma's sisters had not
died young. I wish I had a real live aunt or an older sister to help me
through all this terrible business. I must be brave," she told herself.
"I have to be," she repeated as she searched for the keys. In time she
found them and sat down before the old escritoire which was a familiar
object in Mrs. Loomis's sitting-room. "I cannot, oh, I cannot," she
whispered chokingly as she began to draw out papers from the various
pigeon-holes. The papers were thrust rather loosely into the most
convenient spot, or, unlabeled, were scattered about in a drawer. Most
of these she was able to sort without difficulty. A packet of letters,
tied with a black ribbon was marked "From my dear husband." These Nancy
put aside reverently, then removed a smaller packet which had lain
beneath them. There was nothing to indicate the correspondent, but some
were post-marked Havana, some New Orleans. There were not more than
half a dozen and, because they were so few, Nancy decided to read them.
As her eyes followed the lines of the first letter her breath was drawn
in sharply. She hastily glanced at the signature, José Beltrán. This
letter she flung aside and eagerly glanced through the remaining ones.
At last she started to her feet with a wild cry, staggered to the door,
still grasping the letter, and found her way gropingly to her own room.
"Not that! Not that!" she moaned, and sank in a heap on the floor.
There Parthy found her. "Po' little lamb! Po li'l lamb," she murmured
as she lifted her in her arms and laid her on the bed. "De good Lord
done stricken huh fo' sho. He done lay his han' heavy on huh." She
loosened the girl's clothing, then sent a call below for Iry. "Miss
Nancy done give out at las'," she said. "You bleedged to fetch de
doctah, Iry. She done come to de een' o' huh rope."