Anna reached home worn and fatigued on that Saturday afternoon only to
learn that Alice Lorraine was still absent. Without the knowledge of
anyone, she slipped out and returned to the lane. It was she whom Alice
heard pounding on the kitchen door.
Recognizing Anna, Alice clasped her in a hysterical embrace.
“I thought it was--mother!” she sobbed.
“Good heavens! is her mother such an ogre as all that!” Anna said to
herself. Aloud she said lightly: “What, with my bobbed hair? I like
that. No, Alice my child, your mother is waiting for you to join her
at supper, and we must hike. Don’t cry any more and they won’t know.
They’ll think it’s from running--for we’d better run.”
Something in her brave, tired voice went to Alice’s heart. She kissed
her warmly.
“I’ll run, Anna dear, but you take your time,” she bade her. But Anna
stood firm. And though they did not run, they walked fast and were not
long in reaching the Hollow. Just before they came to Miss Penny’s,
Alice spoke with effort.
“Anna, I want awfully to get down to the cottage to-morrow. Do you
suppose I can?”
“It won’t be so easy, being Sunday. Could you possibly wait until
Monday?” Anna asked in troubled tone.
“O Anna, not possibly!” cried the other girl vehemently, remembering
her parting with John Converse. For they had been interrupted in the
midst of what was virtually a quarrel. Alice felt as if she could not
possibly let a day go by without seeing him and straightening it out.
Besides, if he didn’t see her to-morrow he might feel that she was
offended, or that it had been her mother and she had forbidden her to
come near again.
“All right. We’ll fix it somehow,” Anna assured her, and asked Alice if
she wished her to go in with her.
“O Anna, if you would!” cried Alice, throwing her arm about her and
embracing her warmly.
Thereafter for many days Anna Miller had an additional burden upon her
shoulders--the burden of Alice Lorraine’s mystery. The change in Alice
which was inexplicable to Anna but which seemed painfully obvious, she
tried to keep from the knowledge of others as she endeavored to cover
up her secret visits to the cottage she and her mother had occupied.
She did this cheerfully and willingly, but her heart was heavy. For
Alice did not seem happy at all. She seemed nervous and apprehensive,
so that Anna feared the secret she was helping her to conceal was
anything but a pleasant one.
But for this, Anna would have been serene. For Mrs. Langley’s
unexpected behaviour in respect to the baby troubled her less and
less as the days passed. She still expected to hand the child over to
the household at the parsonage on some fine day, but she was ready
to wait. Indeed, but for the fact that the care of little Joe during
school hours fell upon her mother, she would have been glad to wait
indefinitely.
And as it was, the girl had never been so happy with anyone or anything
as she was with this forlorn baby orphan. No one shared her enthusiasm
in any considerable measure. Alice Lorraine went into ecstasies over
little Joe by fits and starts and then forgot all about him. Mrs.
Lorraine was becoming attached to him, and Anna’s father and the boys
took kindly to him. But Mrs. Miller disapproved thoroughly of the whole
affair,--the only instance of her disapproval Anna had known since her
return home. And she remained unresigned to her part of minding little
Joe when Anna was at school, though he slept a good part of the time
and for the rest was, she had to own, as little trouble as a child
could be. She even confessed, when pressed, that he was hardly more
bother than a kitten.
This was not exaggeration. Joe, Junior, occasioned little trouble. On
the other hand, he paid as little in the coin of babyhood for such
trouble as he gave as could any human being at his interesting age.
Not only was he not irresistible but he was quite negligible, unless,
indeed, he aroused vague irritation in the mind of the beholder because
of his utter want of attractiveness. He was thin and scrawny and
sallow; his head was too big for his emaciated little body, and his
pale-coloured eyes too big for his mite of an old man’s face. His feet
and hands were ugly claws, his legs mere sticks--one would as quickly
have looked for dimples in the living skeleton of the circus. He had a
mere wisp of tow-coloured hair and never showed the teeth he possessed.
He never smiled, never, indeed, looked other than woe-begone. Though
he never cried out and seldom whined or whimpered, he always seemed to
want sadly something that was never by any chance what was proffered
him.
But he clung to Anna, and though he was never other than mournful
even with her, he was passively content. And Anna adored him. It was
no task for her to hurry home from school to relieve her mother--she
could scarcely wait to get at the baby after any absence. He slept in
an old cradle (salvaged from Miss Penny’s garret) by the side of her
bed, and the girl was ready to get up at any hour of the night for milk
or water, and sang to him by the hour in her sweet young voice. She
spent nearly all the money she had saved in a year in the purchase of
a wardrobe for the baby, who was the best-dressed child of his age, or
perhaps of any age, in the two villages. She took pride and pleasure in
ironing the frills and laces of his little frocks and petticoats and
in keeping him immaculately tidy,--the latter being easy, as the baby
never played, and if he was placed on the floor never moved from the
spot. She brushed the scanty hair on top of his head, longing for the
time when there should be enough to make a curl.
But one day as she did this, it came to the girl that when that time
should come, in all likelihood Joe, Junior, wouldn’t be with her. Her
heart sank. And it was borne in upon her that if she was to give the
baby away, it must happen very soon. A little later, and it would be
utterly impossible. Even now, she wouldn’t have been able even to
contemplate the idea if it had been anyone but Mr. Langley who was to
benefit thereby.
Mr. Langley had been in to see little Joe and had taken to him more
warmly than anyone else had done, unless one counted Alice in one mood.
He had held the baby all the while he stayed and hadn’t seemed to know
how to get away. He hadn’t seemed to feel any want in him; he had
admired him apparently as much as Anna herself. He needed him more than
she did, of course, but O, he didn’t _want_ him more!
He didn’t know that he wanted him, for he did not dream that there was
any chance of having him. Mrs. Langley kept it dark--trust her!--and
Anna didn’t feel like saying anything until she was ready to receive
the child. Miss Penny was the only other person who knew, and she,
though she couldn’t keep a secret of her own, was quite safe with that
of another. But he should know as soon as it was prudent, and that,
Anna decided, must be very soon. She said to herself it was up to her
to make what Caesar calls a forced march.
[Illustration: Anna took pride and pleasure in ironing the frills and
laces of his little frocks.]
Already she had talked to Mrs. Langley of the baby for half an hour at
a time, and had repeated her request to be allowed to bring him to the
parsonage. Mrs. Langley always declared that it would break her heart
to see him but Anna felt that one glimpse of him would settle the whole
matter. Wherefore on the next Saturday she announced that she meant to
bring Joe, Junior, with her that day-week.
For an instant the invalid’s eyes brightened. Then she sighed deeply.
“O no, Anna, I couldn’t bear the sight of a baby. It would break my
heart,” she declared. And her emotion was unfeigned.
“But it isn’t the same, Mrs. Langley, Joe, Junior, being a boy,” Anna
protested. “If he made you think of anyone it wouldn’t be Ella May, it
would be of that little lamb.”
“O, is his hair curly?” asked the invalid eagerly.
“Well, no, not yet,” Anna admitted regretfully. “But he has such a
sober, meek little face, young, and yet sort of sedate and oldish, too,
you know, that he makes me think of the little lamb.”
“Dear me, you are like a pretty lamb yourself, Anna, with your fuzzy
yellow hair. I believe I really like you better with it cut so,”
declared Mrs. Langley with sudden enthusiasm.
“You’d better take a good look at it then, for it will be longer before
you see it again,” Anna suggested mischievously. “I shan’t be hiking
down to the parsonage for some time, you see. I can’t come any more
unless you let me bring Joe, Junior.”
Mrs. Langley clasped her thin hands. “O Anna, don’t speak so even in
fun,” she begged. “Of course you will come next Saturday--or sooner if
you have a chance. Only please don’t mention that baby to me again. It
stirs me all up.”
“I won’t,” the girl assented meekly, adding: “for I sha’n’t be here to
mention him or anything else. Honest and true, I can’t come any more
without him. Whenever I am not in school, my place is with that blessed
little monkey, Mrs. Langley. It’s mighty good of ma to mind him as much
as she does since she doesn’t take to him, but I don’t mean to put it
over with her unless I have to. And now it’s cold weather, the boys
want to skate Saturday afternoons--and before long there’ll be sliding.”
“There’s that Alice Lorraine. How about her?” demanded Mrs. Langley.
Anna opened her eyes very wide. Extremely vague in general, unaware
apparently of the existence of anyone outside her own four walls,
sometimes, when her own interests were concerned, the woman was
uncannily acute.
“O Mrs. Langley, I wouldn’t go off and leave that precious child with
Alice Lorraine. She’s dear, but she’s absent-minded and I should be on
pins and needles all the while for fear he was being drowned or scalded
or kidnapped,” she declared.
“There’s that neighbor of Miss Penny’s, Mrs. Phelps,” Mrs. Langley
persisted.
“For the love of Mike!” cried the girl in utter amazement. “Why, I
should as soon think of asking the Lord Mayor of London to run over
every Saturday afternoon.”
“Well, there must be someone who lives near,” Mrs. Langley murmured
with unusual meekness.
“There isn’t, and anyhow, I wouldn’t trust Junior with ’em!” cried
Anna. And suddenly she lost her temper,--something that was extremely
rare with the other Miller girl. “I simply can’t come again without the
baby and what’s more I won’t, so there! That’s all there is to it. Cash
down or no goods delivered!”
And she flung herself from the place like a small whirlwind.
She had passed the lane, when she recollected Alice Lorraine and
paused. She had agreed to meet her at the lane as near five as
possible, and strolling back she seated herself on the stone wall to
consider. On other occasions she had either just made the hour or had
been late, and she felt a certain hesitation about hanging around the
place for a matter of twenty minutes. She said to herself sadly that
it was just as if she suspected Alice of meeting someone there, though
she knew--she hoped with all her heart she knew--that Alice wouldn’t do
such a thing. But O, what was her secret? What was she doing, haunting
the lane and the cottage almost daily?
As she was pondering sadly, she heard a step, and looked up to see Mr.
Langley. Her heart sank. She supposed he would reproach her for leaving
Mrs. Langley so rudely. But apparently he knew nothing about it.
“O Anna, I wanted to speak to you and tried to get home before you
should leave,” he said. “Do you mind coming back to my study for a few
minutes?”
“What now?” the girl said to herself. But he was all kindness as he
led her back through the gate, helped her off with her jacket and
established her in the most comfortable chair in his study.
“I want to speak to you in regard to Miss Lorraine. You know her well,
I think, Anna?” he began at once.
“Why yes, Mr. Langley,” she faltered.
“And you like her? You--believe in her?”
“Of course.”
“I am glad to hear that. I like the girl so far as I know her and I
believe in her. But things look a bit odd and I want to talk a little
with you. People in the village are talking about Miss Lorraine.
Someone said to me that at least two persons have seen her walking at
dusk with a strange man.”
“O Mr. Langley, I don’t believe that. There must be some mistake!”
cried Anna.
“I hope so and think so. And yet, do you know, I thought myself I saw
her walking one night with a stranger. The other person disappeared and
she was alone when I met her. But I couldn’t shake off the impression.”
Anna stared at him helplessly.
“There’s still more,” he went on reluctantly. “There is, I fear, no
doubt but that there is a strange man hanging about the village--the
Farleigh end. More than two or three persons have declared they saw a
man peering in their windows. They connect this man with Miss Lorraine.
They say it is the same man she walks with, and--dear me, her father
being in prison, it is so easy for people to lose their common sense
and originate all sorts of rumors.”
“But Mr. Langley, surely you don’t believe that--about a man looking
into people’s windows?” Anna demanded.
“I don’t know what to think. The truth is, that before I heard any
rumors--it was last Sunday evening--I felt that there was someone
looking in at me through yonder window. I have always left the blind
up--until this week.”
“I feel stunned, Mr. Langley,” said Anna mournfully.
“Poor child! No wonder! I hated to bother you with this, but dear me--I
seem to be following the lead of others and bringing my burdens to lay
upon your youthful shoulders. However--we cannot let this go on. I am
convinced that there is a mistake and that Miss Lorraine can explain.
Shall I speak to her or would you rather, Anna?”
Anna considered. “Perhaps I’d better,” she said. “But--I guess I won’t
do anything until after to-morrow. I’d better think it over first.”
Mr. Langley begged to drive her home, but recollecting her promise to
Alice she made an excuse. And there was Alice waiting for her at the
lane.
To-night Alice was in high spirits. First she asked about the baby in a
pathetically perfunctory way, then she put a careless query in regard
to Reuben. Anna’s heart grew cold. What did it mean? Why was she asking
so many questions of late, particularly about Reuben?
Reaching Miss Penny’s she went in with Alice, understanding clearly
now that Alice wished her mother to think they had been together all
afternoon. Mrs. Lorraine looked up with troubled face.
“O Alice, I didn’t know you were going out this afternoon,” she said.
“We looked everywhere for you. I wanted you to go over to Wenham to the
bank to see Mr. Clarke. If we are to stay here until after Christmas, I
feel as if we ought to give up the cottage.”
Alice became very white. “We can’t give it up so suddenly,” she said
with a curious gasp. “You have to--give notice.”
“It’s different in our case,” said Mrs. Lorraine, paling herself. “But
never mind now. I will write a note and send it to-night. Miss Penny
says Mr. Phelps will take it.”
“Not to-night, mother,” the girl said quickly and with a certain
fierceness of determination. “Wait till--next Saturday perhaps. I
have--lost the key. I’ll go over to-morrow and see if I can find it.”