asked us to go with him to a monastery called Certosa, on the following
afternoon--“about to-morrow, I don’t know. But I don’t _believe_ I’ll
go this time. I saw a frock and a blouse in a shop on the Lungarno,
and I thought that, if I could make the woman listen to reason, I’d
take them both. She is asking about forty dollars in our money for the
frock, but I think she’ll come down. I’m positively in _rags_, and
I planned to go out about the time Mr. Wake wants us to start. I’m
awfully keen to get that frock--”
(She never did--something kept her from even wanting it--but of that,
later)
“Can’t you shop in the morning?” I asked.
“Hate to get up--” (She drew a larger ring) “Truly sorry; I’d really
like to but I’m obsessed by that blouse and frock. . . . The
frock’s blue, with silver and lavender embroidered, Japanese-looking
motifs. . . . Simply heavenly. . . _French_ in every line! . . . It’s
honestly worth far _more_ than she asks, but I expect to get her down a
few pegs. . . .”
“Sorry,” I said, and then I went on to Leslie’s room to ask her. I
found her wearing her chin strap and polishing her nails. “Hello,” she
said without changing her expression. (I knew then that she had on a
grease cream that is put on to remove wrinkles. Leslie hasn’t any, but
she says a great aunt whom she looks a lot like has _dozens_, and so
she means to stall them before they even think of coming!) “What do you
want?”
“Here,” I said, and held out Mr. Wake’s letter, which Leslie took,
held up to the light and looked through, and after murmuring, “Hand
made”--read.
“Can’t,” she stated, “I suppose you’ll think I’m crazy, but I asked
Miss Meek and Miss Bannister to go out to tea with me to-morrow
afternoon.”
“I think it’s fine of you,” I disagreed.
“Not at _all_,” she answered sharply. (She hated being thought
sentimental, and any mention of the kind things that she was coming to
do, more and more regularly, really embarrassed her) “Nothing ‘fine’
about it at all! Only Miss Meek had never been to Doney’s and I thought
she’d like it.”
“She will,” I said, and then I told her I was sorry she couldn’t go,
and went back to my own room, and sewed clean collars and cuffs in my
serge dress, and looked over some music which Signor Paggi wanted me
to read away from the piano and try to see and _feel_ in my mind. Then
I went to my window and opened it, to hang out and peer down in the
court. . . . It looked cold, and almost dreary, and I was glad to think
that spring would be along soon, and I hoped that it would be nice, but
I never dreamed, as I stood there, how nice it was to be, nor how many
changes and happy readjustments it was to back.
Gino came out, as I was looking down, but he didn’t whistle or sing--I
think that Italian whistling and singing is cranked by the bright
sun--and then he went in again. A cat pounced on a dried leaf that
fluttered across one of the brown paths. . . . A brilliant parrot that
hung in his cage outside of a window down the block a little way,
sung out shrilly, and I noticed a dark-skinned woman across the way
hanging clothes out on a line that was strung from her shutter to a
neighbor’s. . . . It was when I was seeing all these things that Beata
tapped, and came in bearing my second letter from home--oh, it was so
good to get them!--and one from Miss Sheila.
I read them both through several times, and then I slipped Mother’s
letter in the pocket of the dress I wore, and Miss Sheila’s letter into
the pocket of my suit coat, for in Miss Sheila’s letter was news that I
felt sure Mr. Wake would enjoy, and I meant to read it aloud to him on
the following day.
Certosa is a large and beautiful place that tops a hill, about three
miles outside of Florence, and I enjoyed going there, although it
made me feel sad. I suppose my feeling was silly, but the order is an
ancient one; they take in no new members, and all that are left to
rattle around in the very big place are a half dozen tottering old men,
whose hands shake as they unlock the heavy doors for you, and whose
breath grows short as they travel the long stairs that take one up to
the Capella Prima, which means the main chapel.
I noticed that the white-bearded, white-haired and white-robed monk who
took us around talked almost incessantly, and Sam told me why.
“Quiet almost all the time,” he said, “from some vow or other, and I
guess the poor old chaps feel like letting out when they can.”
I said I thought it was too bad, and that it was pleasanter to think
of men getting old with their families around them, and Sam thought so
too.
We were out in the Cloister of Certosa. Cloisters are open squares that
are surrounded by the buildings to which they belong, and they are in
all the churches and monasteries and are always most lovely. After
the sifted, gray light of a church, the sunlight and the beautiful
green growing things that fill these spaces are almost too lovely. And
usually a white or brown garbed monk--sometimes wearing no more than
sandals, on his feet--stands in some archway or wanders back and forth
in a loggia and this adds to the picture.
The cloister we looked on was centered by a well with a wrought iron
top that has been copied a great deal, and after Sam had spoken of it,
he--as he whittled at a stick--asked me whether I intended to marry. I
said I hoped so, but that with women a lot depended upon whether any
man asked them. That made him laugh, and he put his hand over mine.
“Some one’s bound to ask you,” he said, as he curled up my fingers in
my palm and then undid them again, to do it all over--sometimes Sam is
_very_ restless--“but, Jane, do tell me any old thing won’t do!”
“Oh, I’d have to _like_ him,” I said, for although I knew little about
love, I felt _certain_ of that. Then Mr. Wake appeared, and he frowned
on us terribly. “Look here, children,” he said, “you know you mustn’t
hold hands in a cloister--” (I laughed, but I got pink, for honestly,
I hadn’t realized I was doing that. It only seemed natural and nice,
and not anything about it made me conscious until that moment!) “You
know,” Mr. Wake went on, “one of these old boys will see you, and
wonder how the thing is done, and pop! some nice evening he’ll crawl
over the wall, and hike down to Florence, and try to find a sweetheart.
Then some jealous brother will see him come in late, and report, and
there’ll be no end of a row. You want to _think of these things_!”
I tried to free my hand, but Sam held it too tightly, because, I think,
he saw it teased me.
“Fra Lippo Lippi did that,” said Mr. Wake. “He used to skip over the
wall almost every evening after dark. Then he’d come in late, and
tiptoe through the corridors, carrying his shoes in his hands. Mr.
Browning made a good story about it. Tell you, when you get down to it,
there is _nothing_ new under the sun! . . . Jane, am I going to have
to speak _sharply_ to you, about your conduct?” (He pretended I was
holding Sam’s long hand)
“You’d better be nice to me,” I said, and I was really almost peevish,
“because I’ve always _tried_ to be nice to you, and I have a letter
from my Miss Sheila, that’s awfully nice--”
“It’s a _shame_,” said Sam quickly--and I think he was sorry he had
teased me; he is almost always very gentle with me--and he patted my
hand, and returned it to my lap with a great deal of funny ceremony.
Then I ordered him off, and he wandered across the cloister and stood
there smoking and watching us. And _then_ I read Mr. Wake the nice news.
“Well, what, dear child?” he asked, as I got out the letter.
“You _wait_,” I said.
“I am--small person--quite a letter, isn’t it?”
“Yes--the news is on the last page, I believe,” I answered. “She writes
from front to back, and then down across the middle one. . . . Here
’tis. ‘I have a secret to tell you,’ I read, ‘and one that you must
keep--’”
“Ah, Eve!” broke in Mr. Wake, as he smiled down at me until all the
little wrinkles stood out around his eyes.
“Well, you’re _different_,” I said. He swelled. “_Adam!_” I said, and
he told me I was a saucy minx, to go on, and I did.
“‘This spring,’ Miss Sheila wrote, ‘will see me in Florence, but I
don’t want Leslie to know I shall appear, for if she does I am sure
she’ll want to go back with me. I think this winter is doing her good,
and I want her to stick the entire time through.’
“Nice?” I said, as I folded up the letter which made crinkly, crackly
noises as it went into the envelope, because it was written on such
heavy paper. I had supposed Mr. Wake would think it _very_ nice, and
therefore I was surprised to look at him, and see him moisten his lips,
and then hear him say, “I don’t know--”
“But, Mr. _Wake_!” I said--I was a good deal disappointed--“I thought
you would _like_ meeting her--”
(He turned, walked away a few steps and then came back)
“I’m afraid,” said Mr. Wake, “that I am too old to meet a Fairy
Godmother. No doubt--” (he was trying to play, but his tone was a
little stiff) “she’d suggest picnicking in the moonlight--isn’t that
the hour when Fairy Rings are most popular?--and that might make
my shoulders stiff. Then--seriously, dear child--I am no good as a
cavalier; I falter. Children and old ladies are the age for me now, and
soon it will be middle-aged women, whom I shall think of as children.
So I am afraid I’d best refuse your alluring offer.”
“Well,” I said, and my voice was flat because I felt so, “you know you
don’t have to meet her; Florence is big--”
“And the world,” he stated, “is big, but sometimes, in spite of the
bigness, one can’t get away from--things--”
Well, I _didn’t_ understand him. All that winter he had asked me about
Miss Sheila, until whenever I saw him her name just naturally came out
and sat on the tip of my tongue, waiting for the word from him that
would make it jump off into space. It did seem very _queer_! I stuck
the letter deep in my pocket, and tried not to feel disappointed, I
knew that I shouldn’t, but--I _did_! Mr. Wake had been so dear to me,
and was so dear, that I wanted to make him happy, and I’d supposed I
could do so by having a party and asking him to meet Miss Sheila.
“You know,” he said, and I could see he was trying to get back to
normal, and to make me think he felt quite as usual, “an old person
like me, with a fat tummy, simply _can’t_ meet a fairy godmother--he
wouldn’t know how to act!”
“Your stomach’s _much_ better,” I answered bluntly, “you needn’t blame
it on _that_! If you don’t want to meet her, just _say_ so, but, I’ll
tell you, _you’ll miss it_! She’s lovely, and she’d be very kind to
you--she’s kind to every one--”
“Is she?” he broke in, and he smiled in a strange way.
“Yes,” I answered hotly, “she _is_.”
We were quiet a moment. Then Mr. Wake put his hand over mine. “Dear
child,” he said, “I’m _sorry_ to disappoint you--”
“What about examples _now_?” asked Sam, who came strolling up. Then
he saw that there was something straining in the air, and he quickly
changed the subject. “Found a bush all in bloom on the other side of
the court,” he said, “Come over and see it, Jane. Almost as pretty as
you are, back in a second, Signor Wake--”
“Long as you like,” said Mr. Wake with a wave, by which he meant we
might linger.
“What is it!” asked Sam, after we had wandered into the center of the
big space that was surrounded on all sides by the building. I told him,
and then I said, “It surprised me; he has talked about her--so much
that at first I thought he must have known her, but she wrote she’d
never known any one named Wake, and now--he doesn’t _want_ to know
her--”
“Match-maker?” asked Sam.
“No,” I answered, and a little sharply, because I was still
disappointed, “but I thought he’d _like_ it. And they are both so nice,
and Miss Sheila _is_ lonely--you can see it sometimes, although perhaps
she doesn’t know it--and I _did_ think that if they liked each other it
_would_ be nice--”
“I’ll tell you what,” said Sam, “I’ll let you make a match for me. I’ll
pick out the girl, and you’ll tell me how to get her--”
“All right,” I promised, and I felt more dismal than ever. I don’t know
why, but I did.
“That please you?” he asked.
“Not entirely,” I answered with candor, “I think you’ll _ruin_ your
career if you marry too early!”
“It doesn’t look as if I would,” he stated, and he sighed. And I felt
worse than ever.
“That’ll be the end of our friendship--” I prophesied, and I felt sad,
and my voice sounded it.
“Sometimes it is,” Sam answered, and then he laughed. I didn’t see how
he could. It was a pleasant day, and the court was full of sunshine,
and the grass and even some of the rose bushes were green--but
everything looked bleak to me--I felt _alone_, and _blue_.
“Anything wrong?” asked Sam, after we had strolled around a little
while, and looked at the well, and stolen some sprigs of herb from a
little plot that had a few early vegetables in it.
“There seems to be,” I answered.
“Why, Jane! . . . How can there be under the warmth of an Italian sun,
and in this lovely place, and with a--a troubadour who--who adores
you?” then he stopped, and I felt much better. I don’t remember when I
have felt so _much_ better.
“I’m all right now,” I said, and I smiled up at him, and then because
he looked a little different from usual, I thought we’d better go back
to Mr. Wake. I said so.
“Love him as much as I do,” said Sam, “the dickens with him! Look
here, dear, if there is any--any satisfaction in my liking you, you can
collect it any time, and what’s more--the darned stuff’s rolling up a
whacking big interest.”
I liked that; I said so. Then I said that we _must_ go back to Mr.
Wake, and I turned to go across the court, and Sam followed, saying
he’d like to shake me.
Going down to the car we drank the wine that the friars make and sell
in tiny little bottles. And Sam and I got silly and had lots of fun,
but Mr. Wake was unusually quiet. I think, perhaps, we had tired him.
It was late when I reached home, for we had stopped to hear the last
of a concert that was being given in the Piazza Vittorio Emanuele,
and that led to a little table with three chairs around it, and some
chocolate, and cakes.
Then Mr. Wake left us at the Piazza del Duomo, where he took the tram
to Fiesole, and Sam walked up to the Piazza Indipendenza with me; we
didn’t hurry--he told me about his new orders, and I told him how well
the twins were doing--and it seemed to take quite a little time. And it
was all of seven when we stood outside the pension door, on the third
floor, and shook hands.
“You’ll be late for dinner,” said Sam.
“It doesn’t matter,” I answered.
“I _hope_ it won’t be cold,” he said.
“I don’t care,” I responded. Then he said he was sorry, again, and he
hoped it wouldn’t be cold, again, and I told him it didn’t matter,
again, and then we reached the point we’d both been waiting for, which
was, his saying, “Well, when can I see you again?”
And after I told him--I said, “day after to-morrow,” because I didn’t
think it was nice to _rush_ things--I went in. I expected to hear
Mr. Hemmingway reminiscing in the dining room, but no sound came
from there; the place seemed strangely and unpleasantly still. I had
expected also to encounter Beata carrying in one of the later courses,
but when my eyes accommodated to the dim light I saw that Beata was
sitting by the table, with her head in her arms, crying.
“Beata,” I broke out quickly, “not _Pietro_?” for I was afraid that
something had come along to change the course of her plans, which
all led up to and centered around a wedding which was to be early in
February.
Beata looked up; “Signorina,” she said, “la cablegram--la Signorina
Harrees-Clarke--la poverina, la _poverina_!”
That was all I stopped to hear. I hurried down the corridor to Viola’s
room, and at that door I paused, for Leslie was sitting on the bed by
Viola, holding both of her hands in hers, and saying, as she stroked
them, “There, dear, _there_!”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHANGES
I found the cablegram that had come for Viola told her that her father
was dead; the father whom she had not written since her complaining,
begging letter of Christmas time.
It made me feel so sorry for her that I didn’t know what to do; for
I knew that the sorrow would be enough for her without acute regret
attached to it; and I knew that she was going to suffer from that too.
I stood in the doorway, that afternoon, for quite a few moments before
I could go in, and when I did and Viola saw me, she sat up. Her cheeks
were flushed and she didn’t look as if she had cried.
“Do you remember that letter?” she said.
I nodded. I couldn’t speak.
“What--can you remember _just_ what I said in it?” she asked. I evaded
as hard and convincingly as I could, but it did no good. She remembered
it, only she had to talk of it, and she did it through questioning me.
“I--I told him that Leslie’s clothes made me feel like a pauper--” she
stated in a hard, high voice, “that--that I’d had to struggle and
pinch--I told him--”
I broke in then. And I made her lie down, and I got Leslie started at
making tea, and then I helped Viola into bed, and tried to do what
I could to divert her through taking off her clothes and making her
comfortable and brushing her hair, and Leslie took the cue and stopped
saying, “Oh, my dear, how _can_ I help you?” which was not just what
Viola needed then.
Every one was dreadfully upset, and worried for Viola, and Miss Meek
came over with smelling salts, and Miss Bannister came tiptoeing to
the door to ask what she could do, and Mr. Hemmingway, whose eyes were
flooded in tears, told me of the death of his dear father--and he
remembered the date--and Miss Julianna, with tears on her pretty round
cheeks, came pattering in with offers of all sorts of strange things,
and a little shrine, which she set up by Viola’s bed.
“La Madre Santa,” she said--which meant “The Sainted Mother”--and
Leslie, who doesn’t seem to understand the people who differ from her
in their way of worship, asked Viola if it should stay.
“I can take it away, darling,” she said in an undertone, “when Miss
Julianna is gone.”
But Viola shook her head, and I was glad, for I liked its being there.
I felt a good deal of comfort through the picture of the pretty woman
who held the little baby so tightly in her arms and smiled at any one
who looked at her. We all needed comfort, and some one who could smile.
It was twelve before Viola slept, and after she did, I put out the
light, and tiptoed down to Leslie’s room.
I found Leslie sitting up by her table, writing, and I couldn’t help
seeing an envelope on it that was addressed to Ben Forbes.
She saw that I saw it, and she spoke.
“Jane,” she said, “I’ve been a perfect fool. . . . I’ve always hated
any one who belittled my importance or anything about me. . . . When
Viola did--you know how it was--” (She drew her pretty pink, quilted
dressing gown closer around her, and went on) “and I imagine the reason
I haven’t been wild over Aunt Sheila was because I felt she didn’t
_worship_. . . And you know I wanted to punish Ben Forbes--because he
told me _the truth_. . . . I’m writing him--” she shoved the sheet
of paper on which she had been writing toward me--“because, after he
had hurt me, _with truth_, I told him that what he said made _no_
difference to me, that I considered him rather uncouth, and that I
had written him _only_ from kindness, and the fact that I felt he was
rather shut off out there in the wilds--and--lots more! Well, to get
through with this, this afternoon and to-night some things have been
driven home to me by Viola’s losing her own father after she had hurt
him. . . . She’ll have to remember now--all her life--how she had hurt
him just before he died. They say”--Leslie groped for a handkerchief,
and mopped her tears frankly--“they say that all sorts of accidents
happen on--on r-_ranches_--”
And then she covered her face and sobbed.
I moved around the table to stand by her and put my arm around her, and
then she spoke.
“Read--it,” she said, with a big sob between the two words, and I did.
“DEAR BEN:” she had written.
“All my life I have been conceited; you must know it now. I
do--which is a miracle--and I’m writing to-night to say that
the truth you told me helped me and is helping me. I am working
hard; I hope I am less a fool.
“With gratitude,
“Your old neighbor and friend,
“LESLIE PARRISH.”
“Is it all right?” she asked, as I laid it down.
“Yes,” I answered, “but if he likes you, and you hurt him, you ought to
say you are sorry for that--”
She nodded quickly, and reached for her pen. “What would you say?” she
asked, as she looked down, uncertainly, at her lovely monogramed paper.
“If I liked him, _really_,” I said, “I would write a postscript. I’d
say something like, ‘Dear Ben, I like you, and I didn’t mean those
things I said when I was cross. I will be very grateful if you will
forgive me--’”
And she wrote just that.
“It doesn’t sound like me,” she commented in a voice that shook.
“It’s--it’s too nice.” And, again, she wiped away tears.
I leaned over, and folded the sheet, and stuck it in the envelope and
sealed it, as Leslie laughed in a funny, weak way.
“Where are your stamps?” I asked. She told me, and I licked one and
stuck it on. Then we kissed each other, and that was unusual. I never
was so very much for kissing everybody all the time, and I think when
girls do, too much, it’s silly, but it was different that night. Then I
went out and laid the letter on the table in the hall--we always left
them there for the first person who went out to take, and then I looked
in to see that Viola was still sleeping, and after that I went to bed.
That day began a new sort of life for us all. The tragedy that came to
Viola was like a stone that is thrown into the center of a still pool.
All sorts of widening circles grew from her trouble, and she, herself,
found through it a new depth. I don’t mean that everything changed in
a day, for things don’t change in that manner, but all the time Viola
was building up new habits in place of the old ones that were crumbling
away.
I saw the roots of a fine strong habit, on the day when she got the
first letter from home written after her father died.
I was with her when it came, and she looked up from the black-bordered
sheet to say--vacantly, and in a level, stupid-sounding sort of
tone--“He _was_ poor!” I was sewing clean cuffs and collars in my serge
dress and I stuck myself and made a spot of blood on one cuff. I was so
sorry for her that I really shook when anything new that was hard came
to her.
“Read it, Jane,” she said, and she held out the letter. I did, and
I couldn’t imagine that any one who had ever known or really loved
Viola’s father had written it. It was full of complaints and self-pity,
because the husband of the woman who had written it had died to leave
his widow with less money than she thought she should have. I didn’t
know what to say. Then I suppose I did a dreadful thing, but I did
it without meaning to do anything dreadful, and because I have been
brought up to speak the truth.
“Maybe,” I said, “he is happier dead.”
The tears stood out in Viola’s eyes.
“I only said that,” I explained miserably, “because I thought it might
make you feel better, for if your mother talked to him like that I--I
guess it worried you--” (I stammered terribly over it; it was so hard
to say anything that sounded even half right)
“I talked that way too,” said Viola. I couldn’t say anything to that.
So I began to sew in my collar.
“He hated the hyphenated name!” said Viola. I finished sewing in my
collar and began on my last cuff.
“I don’t mind the money, but I have to think of it--what shall I do?
I hate sponging. I will say I _always_ hated it! Mother can go visit
people--and she will--but I--I _can’t_!”
“Why don’t you work?” I asked.
She looked at me hard. “What would I do?” she asked after several
moments of scrutiny.
“Accompany,” I answered. “Even Devil Paggi” (I am ashamed to say that
we called him that sometimes) “says you can do that--”
“Yes--” Viola answered in a funny, low voice.
“He said he’d get any of us positions,” I went on, “and touring with a
great singer wouldn’t be bad--”
That captured her!
“Basses are always fat,” she said; “I hope to goodness it will be a
tenor!” Which was a whole lot like Viola, and a joke that I didn’t
appreciate then, for when Viola--who did learn to accompany really
beautifully--got her position, it was with a fat German contralto who
had five children, a fat poodle dog that Viola had to chaperon a great
deal of the time, and a temper that Viola had to suffer, or--leave!
I stood up a little time after that, and as I stepped into the corridor
I met Leslie, who was taking a letter out for Beata to mail.