NANCY'S CONFESSION
A thousand torments seemed to rack poor Nancy's tired soul and body.
For a long time she had lain, very still, across her bed. Then she
had, mechanically, made ready for the night. But sleep would not come.
Wider and wider-eyed she stared at the dim outline that was her open
window. After awhile she crossed to it and knelt down before it, her
bare arms folded on the sill.
A sense of remorse, which Nancy had been trying for some time past to
keep tucked back somewhere in a corner of her mind, now overwhelmed
her. She saw herself a cheat, an imposter. What would these good
people of Happy House say of her when they knew all of them, even Peter
Hyde--and little Nonie!
Her hands clenched tightly, Nancy faced what she called the reckoning.
Only a few days before she and Aunt Milly had had a long talk. Aunt
Milly had told her how, one afternoon, she had tried to walk--and had
failed.
"I'd been praying, my dear, that it might be possible. I thought,
perhaps, I felt so much better----. But the wonderful thing was
Nancy,--_I didn't care_! My life seems so full, now, of real things,
thanks to all you've done for me, that whether I can walk or not is
insignificant. And I shall always have you, anyway, Nancy!" Aunt
Milly had said with the yearning look in her eyes that Nancy knew so
well.
What would Aunt Milly say when she knew?
How had she, Nancy, betrayed Sabrina's trust?
Rapidly, as one can at such moments, Nancy's mind went over the weeks
of her stay at Happy House. She had let herself go so far; she had
taught these people she was deceiving to grow fond of her--to _need_
her!
And she had grown fond of them--that was her punishment. She had grown
fond of Happy House; she wanted to be the real Anne Leavitt and belong
to Happy House and its precious traditions, that she had mocked; she
wanted to have the right to rejoice, now, in the vindication of that
brother who had gone away, years before.
Poor little Nancy, shivering there in the chill and silence of the
night, her world, her girl's world, fell away from her. Like one
looking in from without, she saw her own life as though it was
another's--and what it might hold for her! She saw it stripped of the
little superficialities of youth; she saw clearly, with uncanny
preciseness, causes and effects, the havoc, too, of her own
thoughtlessness and weaknesses.
Something in the vision frightened her, but challenged the best in her,
too. One had only one life to live and each wasted day counted so
much--each wasted hour cost so dearly! In the striving for the far
goal one must not leave undone the little things that lay close at
hand, the little, worth-while, sometimes-hard things. She had gone a
long way down the wrong road, but she'd turn squarely! Her head went
high--she would make a clean breast of it all--to them all; Aunt
Sabrina, Aunt Milly--Peter Hyde.
Her face went down against her arms; she wanted to hide, even in the
darkness, the flush that mantled her cheeks. She could see his eyes as
they had seemed to caress her--out there in the orchard. Oh, why had
she not told him the truth, then and there; if she had he would have
despised her, but it would have killed forever the hope she had read in
his face.
Nancy, girlishly eager to struggle in life's tide, now, facing the
greatest thing in life, shrank back, afraid. She wanted, oh so much,
to be little again; there had always been someone, then, to whom to
turn when problems pressed--Daddy, even Mrs. Finnegan--the Seniors in
college, the Dean herself. Now--she felt alone.
Lighting her lamp, she pulled a chair to the table and spread out
sheets of paper. She wanted to tell it all, while her courage lasted.
She wrote furiously, her lips pressed in a straight line. She would
not spare herself one bit--Peter Hyde must know just what she had done.
But, at the end, she yielded to a longing too strong to resist.
"Please, _please_ don't think too badly of me. You see you don't know
Anne and how her heart was set on going to Russia, and she was sure
that if she told her relatives about going they'd stop her. And that
seemed, then, the only important thing--neither of us thought of the
wrong we'd be doing the people--here. It seemed, too, a very little
thing for me to do for her. But I just can't bear to have _you_ hate
me!" For a moment she held her pencil over the last words, then
hastily sealed the letter and addressed it.
The last paragraph stayed in her mind. "How _silly_ we were, Anne,"
she said aloud, mentally arraigning those two very young creatures of
college days.
Her confession made, a load rolled from Nancy's heart. "Anyway, he'll
know the truth," was her soothing thought as she crawled into bed. In
the morning she would tell Aunt Sabrina.
But Nancy's first waking thought--at a very late hour, for her
over-tired body had taken its due in sound sleep--was that she was
very, very unhappy. As she dressed, with trembling haste, she wondered
if she had not better plan to catch the afternoon train at North Hero.
She sought out Jonathan first and despatched him with her letter, then
walked slowly back into the house to face Aunt Sabrina.
On the newel post of the stairs were letters that Jonathan had just
brought up from the post-office. One was addressed to her in Anne's
familiar handwriting and was postmarked New York!
As though she had been struck, Nancy dropped down on the stairs.
Anne's valiant spirit of sacrifice and service had given way to
complaint.
"All these weeks cooped up in a little room in London waiting for
further orders, only to have them _dare_ to tell me--after all the
encouragement I'd had--that I was too young and inexperienced to go on
into Russia, and that I could be of greater service in organization
work back home. Think of it, Nancy! And then shipping me back as
though I was a little child. I have worn myself out with
disappointment, rage and disgust. I came here to your rooms and slept
last night in your bed (as much as any one could sleep with the
Finnegan baby cutting a tooth downstairs) and I shall stay here until I
can calm down enough to make some definite plans.
"... You've been a dear, Nancy, and I've been quite curious to know how
you've gotten on. I never dreamed you'd stay so long! And now I must
ask you to stay just a little longer, until I know what I want to do.
Under no circumstances let my aunt know the truth...."
Nancy read the letter three times--she could scarcely believe her eyes.
Poor Anne, her splendid dreams had come to nothing.
In her own desire to clean her soul by confession, she had forgotten
Anne! Of course she could not tell Aunt Sabrina--at least not now.
She must wait, as Anne had asked.
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive,"
Nancy repeated, bitterly, feeling as though the web she had made was
tying her hand and foot.
B'lindy, looking in from the kitchen, saw her. B'lindy's face was
strangely brightened; she gave a mysterious crook to her finger as she
beckoned to Nancy to come into the kitchen.
"I set some coffee by for you--I guessed you'd be tuckered out after
yesterday, ridin' round in that storm and then findin' the wallet was
'nough to tucker anybody." Before she poured the coffee she closed the
door leading into the front of the house. "Miss Nancy, there's been
more changes in Happy House even than findin' that wallet!"
"What do you mean, B'lindy?"
B'lindy leaned a radiant face over Nancy.
"It's Miss Sabriny--she's been just like she was born again! I guess
folks won't know her. And you'll never guess what we're goin' to have
up here. _A baby!_"
Nancy was frankly astonished. Then B'lindy told her what, in the
excitement of the afternoon before, she had not heard--of finding the
baby and Davy's note.
"I guess that little mite opened up somethin' that was all dried up in
Sabriny Leavitt's heart! Seems while we was all fussin' over the mess
in the settin' room Davy Hopworth come up after that baby lookin' like
he'd been scared to death. And then this mornin' Sabriny Leavitt comes
to me 'n asks me to go down to Timothy Hopkins with her while she asks
him for that baby back. Well, we went--she couldn't even wait for me
to pick up. And Timothy Hopkins refused her _flat_! You wouldn't have
believed your ears, Nancy, Sabriny Leavitt took most to cryin' and she
told him how lonesome it was up to Happy House and how her whole life
'd been wasted 'cause she'd never done for others and he'd be doin' a
kindness to an old woman to let her take the baby and do for it. But
it wa'n't until she'd promised that she'd just sort o' bring him up and
he could always go home and play with the nine others, and the nine o'
them could come to Happy House's often as they wanted that he'd as much
as listen. So we're goin' to have a baby!" B'lindy said it with
unconcealed triumph. "Cunnin' little thing--smart's can be. You
should a' seen it grab for the spoon when I was feedin' it!"
Nancy's eyes were shining. "Oh, that will be wonderful," she cried.
"Where is Aunt Sabrina?"
As though in answer to her question, Miss Sabrina's voice called her
from the front hall and at the same moment Miss Sabrina opened the
door. Yes, it was a transformed Sabrina Leavitt--her face was deeply
lined by all she had gone through, but there was a humility in her eyes
that softened them and brought a deeper glow as though, indeed, from
some new-born spirit within.
Impulsively, Nancy threw two strong arms about her neck and kissed her.
"Come into the sitting-room with me, Anne, I have a great deal I want
to say to you." She led Nancy through the hall into the sitting-room
and they sat down together upon the old horse-hair sofa. In Miss
Sabrina's tone there was a dignified tranquility that made Nancy look
at her with a little wonder. As though in answer to Nancy's thought
Miss Sabrina said, quietly:
"God alone knows what I've lived through--since yesterday afternoon.
Nancy, it is a terrible thing for an old woman to look back upon a life
she has wasted--through pride and prejudice. The storm and finding the
wallet--that was God's own way of opening my eyes! I have been a
wicked, proud, selfish woman. But I've hurt myself worst of all. For
here I am an old woman, and not a soul in the world really loves me----"
Nancy put out a protesting hand. Miss Sabrina patted it.
"I am right, my dear, I know it now. But if God will be good to me He
will give me a few more years to live, so that I may make up, in a
small way, for the wrong I have done--to others and to myself. Do you
know, Nancy, it was you who first brought home to me the truth--that
happiness comes as it is given. It was a fortunate thing for Happy
House when I brought you here, dear."
Nancy had to bite her lips to strangle the words of confession that
sprang to them. Aunt Sabrina went on:
"I cannot bring back the years or atone to my brother for the wrong I
did to him. I do not know how I can make up to your own father.
Perhaps, if you ask him to, he will forgive me, some day. But I shall,
as soon as I can see my lawyers in North Hero, make a new will, leaving
Happy House and my share of my father's fortune to you----"
"Good gracious----" thought Nancy; "she thinks Anne's father is still
living!" In dismay Nancy sprang to her feet. But Miss Sabrina paid no
heed to her agitation. She rose and went to the table and opened a
leather-bound book that lay there.
"I have brought down some papers and letters that belonged to your
grandfather--when he was a young man. Here is a picture of him. Come
and see it, my dear."
Unwillingly Nancy crossed to the table. Miss Sabrina reverently placed
the faded picture in her hand.
"My only brother," she whispered, brokenly. "Your grandfather."
"No, _Anne's_ grandfather," Nancy almost screamed.
She looked at the picture with intent interest. It portrayed a
strikingly handsome young man. She turned the card in her hand.
Across the back had been written the name. "Eugene Standbridge
Leavitt."
Astounded, Nancy cried out: "Why, that--_that is my father's name_!"