Towards sunset that afternoon, as Ann was returning from her
cotton-house, she came upon Virginia in a thicket on the roadside
picking up pieces of fallen tree-branches for fire-wood. Ann had
approached from the rear, and Virginia was unaware of her nearness. To
the old woman's surprise, the girl's eyes were red from weeping, and
there was a droop of utter despondency on her as she moved about, her
apron full of sticks, her glance on the ground. Ann hesitated for a
minute, and then stepped across the stunted grass and touched her on the
arm.
"What's the matter _now_, child?" she asked.
The girl turned suddenly and flushed to the roots of her hair, but she
made no response.
"What's gone wrong?" Ann pursued, anxiously. "Don't tell me your mother
has found out about--"
"Oh no, it's not that," Virginia said, wiping her eyes with her
disengaged hand. "It's not that. I'm just miserable, Mrs. Boyd, that's
all--thoroughly miserable. You mustn't think I'm like this all the time,
for I'm not. I've been cheerful at home all day--as cheerful as I could
be under the circumstances; but, being alone out here for the first
time, I got to thinking about my mother, and the sadness of it all was
too much for me."
"She hain't worse, is she?" Ann asked.
"Not that anybody could see, Mrs. Boyd," the girl replied; "but the
cancer must be worse. Two doctors from Springtown, who were riding by,
stopped to ask for a drink of water, and my uncle told them about
mother's trouble. It looked like they just wanted to see it out of
professional curiosity, for when they heard we had no money and were
deeply in debt they didn't offer any advice. But they looked very much
surprised when they made an examination, and it was plain that they
didn't think she had much chance. My mother was watching their faces,
and knew what they thought, and when they had gone away she fairly
collapsed. I never heard such pitiful moaning in all my life. She is
more afraid of death than any one I ever saw, and she just threw herself
on her bed and prayed for mercy. Oh, it was awful! awful! Then my uncle
came in and said the doctors had said the specialist in Atlanta could
really cure her, if she had the means to get the treatment, and that
made her more desperate. From praying she turned almost to cursing in
despair. My uncle is usually indifferent about most matters, but the
whole thing almost made him sick. He went out to the side of the house
to keep from hearing her cries. Some of his friends came along the road
and joked with him, but he never spoke to them. He told me there was a
young doctor at Darley who was willing to operate on her, but that he
would be doing it only as an experiment, and that nobody but the Atlanta
specialist would be safe in such a case."
"And the cost, if I understood right," said Ann--"the cost, first and
last, would foot up to about a hundred dollars."
"Yes, that's what it would take," Virginia sighed.
Ann's brow was furrowed; her eyes flashed reminiscently. "She ought to
have been laying by something all along," she said, "instead of making
it her life business to harass and pull down a person that never did her
no harm."
"Don't say anything against her!" Virginia flared up. "If you do, I
shall be sorry I said what I did this morning. You have been kind to me,
but not to her, and she is my mother, who is now lying at the point of
death begging for help that never will come."
Ann stared steadily, and then her lashes began to flicker. "I don't know
but I think more of you for giving me that whack, my girl," she said,
simply. "I deserve it. I've got no right on earth to abuse a mother to
her only child, much less a mother in the fix yours is in. No, I went
too far, my child. You are not in the fight between me and her."
"You ought to be ashamed to be in it, when she's down," said Virginia,
warmly.
"Well, I _am_," Ann admitted. "I _am_. Come on to my gate with me. I
want to talk to you. There is a lot of loose wood lying about up there,
and you are welcome to all you pick up; so you won't be losing time."
With her apron drawn close up under her shapely chin, her eyes still red
and her cheeks damp, Virginia obeyed. If she had been watching her
companion closely, she might have wondered over the strange expression
of Ann's face. Now and then, as she trudged along, kicking up the back
part of her heavy linsey skirt in her sturdy strides, a shudder would
pass over her and a weighty sigh of indecision escape her big chest.
"To think this would come to me!" she muttered once. "_Me!_ God knows it
looks like my work t'other night was far enough out of my regular track
without--huh!"
Reaching the gate, she told Virginia to wait a minute at the fence till
she went into the house. She was gone several minutes, during which time
the wondering girl heard her moving about within; then she appeared in
the doorway, almost pale, a frown on her strong face.
"Look here, child," she said, coming out and leaning her big, bare
elbows on the top rail of the fence, "I've thought this all over and
over till my head spins like a top, and I can see but one way for your
mother to get out of her trouble. I'm the greatest believer you ever run
across of every human being doing his or her _full_ duty in every case.
Now, strange as it may sound, I left my home last night and deliberately
made it my special business to step in between you and the only chance
of getting the money your mother stands in need of. I thought I was
doing what was right, and I still believe I was, as far as it went, but
I was on the point of making a botched job of it. I'd get mighty few
thanks, I reckon, for saving you from the clutches of that scamp if I
left your mother to die in torment of body and soul. So, as I say, there
ain't but one way out of it."
Ann paused; she was holding something tightly clasped in her hand, and
not looking at Virginia.
"I'm sure I don't know what you mean," the girl said, wonderingly. "If
you see any way out, it is more than I can."
"Well, your mother's got to go to Atlanta," Ann said, sheepishly; "and,
as I see it, there isn't but one person whose duty it is to put up the
cash for it, _and that person is me_."
"You? Oh no, Mrs. Boyd!"
"But I know better, child. The duty has come on me like a load of bricks
dumped from a wagon. The whole thing has driven me slap-dab in a corner.
I know when I'm whipped--that's one of the things that has helped me
along in a moneyed way in this life--it was always knowing when to let
up. I've got to wave the white flag in this battle till my enemy's on
her feet, then the war may go on. But"--Ann opened her hand and
displayed the bills she was holding--"take this money home with you."
"Oh, Mrs. Boyd, I couldn't think of--"
"Well, don't think about it; take it on, and don't argue with a woman
older than you are, and who knows better when and how a thing has to be
done."
Most reluctantly Virginia allowed Ann to press the money into her
unwilling hand. "But remember this," Ann said, firmly: "Jane Hemingway
must never know where you got it--never! Do you understand? It looks
like I can stand most anything better than letting that woman know I put
up money on this; besides, bad off as she is, she'd peg out before she'd
let me help her."
Virginia's face was now aflame with joy. "I tell you what I'll do," she
said. "I'll accept it as a loan, and I'll pay it back some day if I have
to work my hands to the bone."
"Well, you can do as you like about that," Ann said. "The only thing I
absolutely insist on is that she isn't told who sent it. It wouldn't be
hard to keep her in the dark; if you'll promise me right here, on your
word, not to tell, then you can say you gave your sacred promise to that
effect, and that would settle it."
"Well, I'll do that," Virginia finally agreed. "I know I can do that."
"All right," Ann said. "It may set the old thing to guessing powerful,
and she may bore you to tell, promise or no promise, but she'll never
suspicion _me_--never while the sun shines from the sky."
"No, she won't suspect you," Virginia admitted, and with a grateful,
backward look she moved away.
Ann stood leaning against the fence, her eyes on the receding figure as
the girl moved along the sunlit road towards the dun cottage in the
shadow of the mountain.
"I reckon I'm a born idiot," she said; "but there wasn't no other way
out of it--no other under the sun. I got my foot in it when I laid in
wait watching for the girl to walk into that trap. If I hadn't been so
eager for that, I could have left Jane Hemingway to her fate. Good Lord,
if this goes on, I'll soon be bowing and scraping at that old hag's
feet--_me!_ huh! when it's been _her_ all this time that has been at the
bottom of the devilment."