The next morning Timothy Bixby left on the early train going east.
Aunt Sadie came in and told Julie about it.
“Well,” she announced, “Little Bixby’s gone. He got his draft call last
night, an’ he left on Number Three this morning. He’ll go to Camp Lee
like all the men from this section. I saw him when he left. Mis’ Bixby
wasn’t up. I declare, if he didn’t have to get his own breakfast this
very last morning! I told him he ought to go in and bid you good-bye,
but he said he was late. He really had a plenty time; he was just
makin’ up an excuse, ’cause he’s so bashful. I reckon you’ll just have
to excuse him, Julie. It seems funny to me that they’d want a little
scary feller like him.”
“He’s not really so small,” Julie returned sharply. “He’s up to
standard height.”
“I know he is, but someway a person always thinks of him as sort of
undersized. But I came in, Julie, to tell you something else. I’m goin’
over to stay with Betty this afternoon.”
Betty was Mrs. Johnson’s daughter, who was married and living some
twenty miles away in the country.
“She’s sick, an’ the baby’s ailin’, an’ she can’t get any help over
there. I got a card in the morning’s mail asking me please to come, so
I’m going over there this evenin’. I wouldn’t be s’prised if I was away
for a couple of months. An’ Mis’ Bixby’s leavin’--”
“When does she go?” Julie demanded.
“She’s leavin’ on the night train. She’s going back to her home in
Lynchburg for a spell, and later maybe she’ll go to be near Camp Lee.
She says she’ll not go ’til they kind of get Mr. Bixby licked into
shape. She says she’ll be so ashamed of him at first. I think she’s
layin’ off to have a right good time. Ain’t that just like the woman?
But you’re goin’ to be all alone ’til I come back, Julie. You better
see to gettin’ somebody to stay with you.”
“Oh, I’ll be all right,” Julie evaded.
So the life that had informed Julie’s small establishment for the last
few weeks fell suddenly all to pieces. Mr. Bixby had gone. Aunt Sadie
left with her son-in-law in the afternoon, and Elizabeth took the
night train. She came in before she went to say good-bye to Julie. She
was dressed elaborately for her journey, and was in high spirits.
“My! But I’m glad to be out of this rotten little town,” she announced.
“There ain’t anything I can do for Tim,” she went on, “so I might just
as well fly ’round an’ enjoy myself.”
Here the car came which she had ordered to take her to the station, and
in the expansiveness of leave-taking she attempted to kiss Julie, but
Julie started back involuntarily.
“What’s the matter? Did you think I was goin’ to bite you?” Elizabeth
demanded.
“No, no--I--”
“Oh, all right. Goodness knows I don’t want to kiss a person that don’t
want to kiss me. Well, I’m gone.”
She went; and the next day Julie went also. She went in the early
morning when most of the people of the village were still asleep--when
lacy mists hung over the mountains, and all the flowers in her little
garden were drenched with summer dew. She went out of her side door,
locking it after her. In her garden she lingered a moment to pluck
a little nosegay of sweet peas and to touch the wet faces of the
other flowers with a caressing finger; then she went swiftly. She
went with no compunctions. “Ain’t I got a right to life?” she asked
herself fiercely. “Goodness knows we don’t owe folks anything. They
never did anything for us!” But though she went unhesitatingly she
could not bring herself to turn for a last look at the garden with
its row of sweet peas and nasturtiums, nor at the shop staring into
the street with its blank shuttered windows. Not for anything would
she have looked back at that side door. Somehow, as she went up the
street to the station, she visualized her mother’s figure standing
there following her with her eyes, as she had stood so often in life.
Julie knew she was not there; she knew she just imagined this vision;
yet not for worlds would she have turned to glance back. With her eyes
set steadily forward up the street, the picture of her mother standing
there in the doorway looking after her hung persistently in the back
of her mind. Her mother had worn very neat white aprons; they used to
stand out distinctly against the black of her dress when she stood in
the doorway, and sometimes the wind would flutter them a little. She
had a way of putting her hand up to shade her eyes as she looked and
looked after Julie. There was one point in the street where Julie had
been in the habit of turning to wave to her mother, and her mother used
to wave the hand that had been shading her eyes, and with that final
gesture turn back into the house. But Julie did not pause or turn at
this point to-day. Whispering defiantly, “Ain’t I got a right to my
life?” she went steadily on.
So the remembered vision of her mother did not turn away, but continued
to stand there in the door, watching her go, with the hand still
shading the eyes.