CHAPTER XXIVPROUD MISS PIDDIWIT
Whenthe “party” broke up Jerry deliberately walked up the hill with Richard, and suggested, in the tone of the perfect hostess, that as this would be their last evening together for some time they might draw up chairs and sit under the spell of “Da” and “Waga.”
“Tell me about your new work,” she suggested. It was as an elderly lady might ask a very recent freshman about his studies in the new college. Nevertheless, he told her.
Somehow he felt himself on the defensive. The champion of egoism was about to shift square about and become altruist; for he made no attempt to conceal that his interest in taking up the complicated affairs of big business was prompted not by the wish of making a large fortune larger, but solely because of the conviction growing upon him that his responsibilities to others overshadowed the desires of self.
“Suddenly my need of others and their need of me has been made clear to me,” he explained quietly. “I can no longer fare alone.... I used to be completely self-sustaining; I had no desires that I could not supply, for I was careful to keep my wants within my powers to satisfy them; I had need for no one, and therefore I never felt the call of co-operation. Butthe moment that a man finds his happiness gripped by another——” he hesitated, for it was a difficult matter to phrase—“the moment the needs of his spirit call to the spirit of another, then he sees how all are bound together, dependent one upon another.... I express the thought badly; I doubt if I can truly reason out the change that has come over me, but its results are clear—I go to my appointed task, a little late, to be sure, but at last with clear vision of what that appointed task is.... My caterpillar-views,” he laughed softly, “look very odd now; perhaps I have broken my predestined chrysalis ... or perhaps it is the American father speaking in me at last. At any rate, my wander-years are over. I have been an English aristocrat, I find, in spite of my poverty—they are the greatest of natural loafers; ‘barbarians,’ somebody called them, and rightly. The English are most excellent loafers, exquisites at it. The American in me, I feel, is going to be no loafer; I can sense him pulling at me and driving me at service.... And I am still consistent with myself,” he talked to fill in the empty spaces; she did not seem inclined to help much; “for I am still honest, and, you know, I never agreed to be more than that.”
The night was pleasantly mild. A misshapen moon rose slowly over the Lake and began to light up hill and valley. No hint of the freakish weather of the afternoon was suggested by this warm summer evening; the old earth hummed with its crickets and frogs, and rustled its leaves lazily as if pretending that it had never been unruly in its life. It was too fine to go indoors, the two young persons agreed.
Topics of conversation grew uncomfortably scarce until Richard remembered Phœbe. What had shemeant by her attitude towards Walter? Surely she did not intend to marry the boy, yet if ever mortal man was encouraged by woman that chap was Walter. And if she did not intend seriously to live up to her implied promise, wouldn’t it be dangerous to lead him on?
Jerry sprang eagerly into the welcome topic. “I haven’t had such a shock since——” she could not think of a concrete comparison, at least none that she cared to mention in this company—“well, since ever so long. Isn’t it unbelievable?”
“I think it is splendid!” he spoke warmly. “If she cares for him in the right way—and I have faith that she does—it will be one of the best arrangements that could be made.”
“Cares for him?” repeated Jerry. “How could she!”
“It is just one more beautiful mystery,” he said quietly. “Why do you insist upon thinking your own view-point is the whole truth?”
There was not the slightest suggestion of offence in his question. He seemed to be addressing not Jerry in particular, but the whole human species.
“But she doesn’t really care for him,” Jerry protested, “in the—the—way you mean, you know.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Oh, she was very frank to me. She said she believed she was too strong-minded ever to be enslaved by a man. She made delicious fun of—of—love, and all that sort of nonsense. She said that what she wanted was devotion, deference—like du Barry and Madame Maintenon. She claims that if a woman wants nothing from a man she’ll get everything she wants. Walter, she said, is the only man whom she can guarantee to stay devoted for life. Oh, she was veryfrank, and also very droll. I tried my best to be serious, but she had me laughing half the time.”
“And so she fooled you, did she?” he asked.
Jerry protested, but he insisted that Phœbe was choosing her mate and that all her clever chatter was disguise.
“But she fooled me, too,” he laughed. “She let me tell her all my theories about the reclamation of Walter. Jove! I thought climbing mastheads after fouled peak halyards was his trouble, but all the while it was a woman he was climbing after! A woman is his ‘primary,’ after all. Well! well! She is wonderful. I envy Walter.”
The topic was a good one. It had made Jerry forget her stilted hostess manner. And after she had once thawed it was difficult, with that moon mounting gloriously, to freeze up again.
Richard was quick to follow up with another helpful topic—Jawn as a sailor lad. He retailed the palaver that Jawn had kept going throughout the whole race. He had made limericks on every part of the ship’s tackle and on his rival yachtsmen, and he had punned almost to the limit of endurance. Some of the best ones Richard culled and repeated. They were too local to be of general interest, but that made their humour all the keener to a native. Again and again Jerry found herself limp with merriment, although deep within, something reproached her for unbending. But she was too weary to resist; she had spent a bad night and she had been tramping over the hills since sunrise.
Never mind! she told herself; let not the confident man before her plume himself on graciousness. A woman may smile and smile and be a—well, not exactly a villain, but as obstinate and unalterable as the bestof villains. On that point she had no misgivings; the long meditations on the hills with “Count” had cleared her mind of every doubt and told her what she had to do. It would be silly—now that it was all decided for ever—to stand aloof like proud Miss Piddiwit.
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.
What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
Miss Piddiwit was an unfortunate figure of speech. Some imp of her mind, perhaps, some mischievous Puck of that unknown subliminal region it was who hoisted that forgotten picture of the old “Mother Goose” book up out of the mental depths and let it strut before her. Miss Piddiwit bore her head aloft at a perilous angle, and her little heels clicked on the pavement in staccato rhythm with the couplet, which the aforesaid subliminal imp took delight in chanting.
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
“Proud Miss Piddiwit, there she goes.
What is she proud of? Nobody knows!”
“Let’s walk,” she started up suddenly. “This night is too wonderful.”
“Good!” he agreed.
They dropped down the lawn, passed the summer-house without seeming to notice it at all, and took the State Road which leads north to Penn Yan.
“You are your mother’s daughter,” he announced abruptly. He spoke as if it were the summing-up of a train of thinking.
“Naturally,” she said.
They walked on for several seconds without speaking.
“You do not ask why,” said Richard.
“Perhaps I know why.”
The “imp” had been forcing her to keep step with the Piddiwit jingle.
“But it would help the conversation if you would ask questions.”
“Is conversation necessary?”
“Ah!” he laughed. “What would distinguish us from the rest of the animal kingdom if we didn’t talk! Yes,” he went on, “conversation is necessary. Unless you run away I’m going to talk.... It may be our last conversation together—although I won’t believe that——”
“How can you be sure, Mr. Richard?”
Into this question she tried to throw a satiric imitation of his question to her on the night of his arrival in Penn Yan, the night when she had protested that she at least would never make eyes at him; but, man-like, he had not the mind to catch such subtleties. Still, the remark gave her a little elation and put her in good spirits. She would show this young man!
“As you know,” he replied, “I am sure of nothing. That discourages some people, but it makes me continually full of hope. Micawber, you know, was kept radiantly alive by it.... Yesterday I asked you to marry me——”
“Please!” she interrupted, and quickened her pace.
“Of course I won’t speak if it worries you,” he said contritely enough; “but it is a pity, I think, not to face every situation fairly. And I do so want to face this one.”
She slowed up and thought the matter over carefully. Why shouldn’t he talk if he cared to? The answer was, why, indeed!
“Very well,” she summoned her most casual tones; “face it; only—don’t expect me to help much.”
“Oh,” he broke in quickly, “I’m not so inexperienced as to believe anyone can argue away an emotion.Either you like me—in the way I mean, you know—or you don’t. That’s under neither your control nor mine. Words won’t mend anything there. But words may help to clear up misunderstanding.... You are sure this won’t worry you?”
“Why should it?”
“Quite so,” he agreed grimly; “why should it?... Very well....” But he said nothing more.
She looked up at him quickly.
“Well?” he looked down earnestly.
“You have never been sulky with me,” she explained. “Jawn says you go for weeks without speaking to anyone, and Phœbe said you went perfectly dumb on her porch one afternoon. I was just wondering if it were my turn at last.”
“Oh, no! I don’t feel that way at all! That’s one of the signs that makes me sure that you—you are ... I can’t get hold of the right words, that’s all. And it isn’t that, either. I’ve got the right words, bundles of them! But I’m afraid if I start in to pour them forth at you—if I start to tell you how much I—I—care about you—you’ll take fright and also take this trolley home. So to make sure I’ll wait till it passes. Thank goodness they run only two cars on this line—or is it the same one going frantically back and forth?”
They stepped aside to avoid the lights of the car. Somehow, both felt the necessity of keeping clear of publicity.
“I won’t have you maligning the institutions of my country,” she replied, with a touch of the old-time cheeriness. “We are not a restless people moving to and fro over the face of the earth and in subways seeking whom we may devour. Let me inform you, Mr. Richard Richard, that in the busy summer seasonwe runbothcars. If you were a woman you would not make the mistake of thinking them only one, for then you would have noticed that while each conductor is handsome, one is light and the other dark.”
“Like beer,” he joked.
“In these parts you should say, like port and champagne,” she corrected. “This is a wine country, and we are famous for our champagne. But don’t you think we should turn back? That is the last car down, and, as you suggest, I ought to keep within running distance of home. But I interrupted your beautiful speech. I’m sorry.”
She was quite pleased with herself. At first she feared that she might not be able to carry off her part of the conversation without showing suspicious excitement; but here she was actually joking! She was proud of her control, was this Miss Piddiwit!
Lamely at first and then, as he ceased to pick his words, with surer touch Richard proceeded with his “beautiful speech.” No smart retorts came to her aid; no retorts at all, indeed, for the man was sweeping her off her secured moorings—had she not spent half the night and the whole of the morning in steeling her will to oppose just this?—and he was driving her into a horrid state of weak nervousness. Richard Richard had studied frankness and soul analysis like a research student, and his speech carried with it an ozonic atmosphere of truth. Suddenly he came to an end.
Instead of crushing him with any of the carefully selected phrases which she had rehearsed in her morning tramp with “Count” she filled in the silence with a question that was almost a cry.
“How do you know it will last?”
“I don’t know it at all,” he replied with amazingfrankness. “Every lover lies, of course, or is deceived, which amounts to the same thing. Affection usually does not last. The evidence of the world is before us; why not face it? How can I guarantee the future? I cannot. I know only my consuming faith that what has begun here so honestly and so free from taint is bound to have eternal meaning. Perhaps that is nature’s clever illusion; but I cannot believe it. It may not last, but what of that? Events are in the hands of the gods; yet what greater joy than staking all on the risks of life? Faith is the thing. And God knows I have faith—the faith that passeth understanding.”
She would have more specific reasons. He gave them to her. First, he talked!
“You say I never sulk with you,” he argued. “It isn’t really sulking at all. Of course, I know you were only joking; but it is worse than boorish petulance, it is an absolute dumbness, an inability to speak. In these past weeks I seem to have broken from my bonds, and I believe it is you who have set me free. They say that Lewis Carroll had the same sort of infirmity except in the presence of his beloved children, and I can well understand how he must have suffered and how he had to get used to faring it alone. For my shyness I have paid a great penalty; I have had no playfellows as a child—I never got really acquainted with my own mother. Governesses and tutors used to shirk their job and let me alone. If I hadn’t early learned to read and to like books, I suppose I should have grown up an ignoramus to boot! And you—why, look how I am talking!
“Now for reason number two. For the first time in my life I want to take my father’s money and use it. You’ve made me want to do that. You have filled mewith strange worldly ambitions. I want to take my place with other men and bear my share of the burden; and I want to buy you all sorts of things. I have a savage desire to clothe you and feed you and fix up your nest. And I have the wildest visions of a lot of kiddies——”
She almost shot ahead of him.
“Don’t run away,” he called, and caught up with her. “You’re a grown-up woman, and I’m so old that it frightens me. Why in the name of all the holy mysteries at once should we scare off at the thought of children? Woman, it is the most glorious thought in all creation! And they must be clothed,” he went on, “and sent to school and to college and taken to Europe and ‘brought out’ and given a bang-up start in life. And all that takes money, heaps of it. We’ve justgotto have money, woman; don’t you see that?”
She saw that—better than he did, perhaps—but she could not trust herself to take up that point in the debate. Fortunately at this moment she caught through the trees a clear light shining far below in Phœbe Norris’s cottage.
“I wonder what Phœbe is doing up at this hour?” she turned the subject. “She usually goes to bed with her Orpingtons.”
“Suppose we find out?” he challenged her.
The returning trolley was grinding up the hill from Branchport and would soon expose them in the road. If the conductors, “Port” or “Champagne,” ever caught a good glimpse of her, the news would spread quickly over Yates county.
“All right,” she agreed, and they struck down the steep road just as the headlight from the car flashed up over the hill.
He talked eloquently all the way down, but while she listened she used the time to summon her scattered forces and get her mental house in order. It had been a wild delight to let him fight down her will, but she was the daughter of her mother and no weakling.
One thing she was sure of, and it made her glad beyond words to express: his offer of marriage had not been prompted by charity. He was in earnest, terribly in earnest; but also he was, as usual, selfish. She was hearing his point of view, but he showed with every word that he had no conception of hers.
The world would say, when its scandal-loving ear had taken in all the facts, that Geraldine Wells, bankrupt, who had been brazenly living for several years on the savings of negro servants, had deliberately forced herself upon a rich young man—a notoriously rich young man, at that—had inveigled him into her home and had trapped him into making an offer of marriage. A Wells would never permit a situation like that!
Proud Miss Piddiwit!
And how the newspapers would seize the theme! Their searchlight would flare into every nook; nothing would prevent their discovery of the incognito and the “romance”; the latter, she knew, would be a particularly tempting morsel. They make no distinction between the great and the notorious, but play each impartially to the tune of their scareheads. Reporters would come by special train; even George Alexander would be interviewed! Just because a father had had a genius for accumulation an innocent second generation must suffer publicity. If Richard Richard had only been a nobody! But he was not; he was by very birth notorious.
She conjured up headlines that even a hardenedcity editor would not have sanctioned. The cable would carry the “news” to Europe. Their engagement would be one long nightmare of publicity; the marriage would be a vulgarian’s holiday. And then she remembered the columnist and the cartoonist. The thought was revolting.
But she drifted, nevertheless, with the compelling events of the night. To-morrow with its harsh necessities would come in due time, and to-morrow and to-morrow.
She would do well to linger as long as possible in the exhilarating illusion of the moment. Even if it were all to be eventually cancelled and forgotten, it was delightfully thrilling to have this strong man by her side making most complimentary speeches. His earnestness was very soothing to her pride; one might as well steep as long as possible in the experience.
Meanwhile, out on the Lake, Walter had been struggling with his remnant of a soul, and had found some touch of that peace which comes to the Lake people, to all people who look out daily on vast stretches of water. It was peace, but it was tinged with tragic sorrow, and thereby, and only thereby, it was worthy and beyond price.
While Jerry and Richard were still strolling along the Penn Yan road, Walter was again at Phœbe’s door. She had prepared herself for bed when his knock came; so she slipped on a kimono and came to the door wondering. When she saw his stern face, she stepped back quickly, and called on her Saint Francis, as a child in great fear might cry to the mother.
“You needn’t be afraid of me any more, Phœbe,” he spoke huskily but firmly. “I’ve been thinkin’ thingsout.... You’re right.... It wouldn’t do.... It wouldn’t do—for you.... I guess ... I guess,” he faltered; “I guess this is where I get up or fall back again——”
“But you won’t, boy!” she exulted. “You won’t! You will stand up and fight for yourself, and you will fight for me, and be the man I’ll be proud of all my life. All my life, boy.... For me, boy.”
“Yes,” he choked, but stood even a shade more erect. “For you, Phœbe.”
And then he strode away in the moonlight.
And Phœbe watched him from the doorway, and cried little chirping words to herself; and a sweeping happiness seized her, touched with a vague regret; and some of it was for the victory she had won; and some of it was for the pity of it all; and some of it was for the long, empty years of her own life.
As Jerry and Richard neared the cottage they quieted their step and moved stealthily to the window at the side. Phœbe was stretched at length in a commodious leather chair. She was in a great blue kimono and her hands were clasped behind her neck, her bared arms extending languorously on either side. Her glorious red hair was smoothed back and it dropped in two long loose braids in front. Her big blue eyes were wide, and they focussed on some vast distance. She looked for all the world like some splendid fearless child.
As they gazed upon the picture the two eavesdroppers felt suddenly like culprits; so they walked noisily around the porch to the front and tapped on the door.
“Come in!” Phœbe called, but moved not an inch.
“Ah!” she chuckled wisely, and scrutinized them from her deep chair. “Gallivantin’, as usual, eh?”On her face was not the slightest trace of the experience of the night; and her voice suggested never a sorrow. To the end of her days Phœbe Norris, and all her kind, would practise concealment of their suffering and of their virtues, reserving full confession to one only, and that one must be a mate proved by fire!
Only Richard and Phœbe knew the full significance of the accusation of “gallivanting.” He remembered her etymology, “From ‘galli,’ ‘a woman,’ and ‘vantin’,’ ‘wantin’ ’em bad.’” So he nodded his head and confessed.
“Absolutely guilty in the highest degree,” he said.
“Oh,ho!” she exclaimed, and looked first at one and then at the other. “Oh,ho!” she repeated very sagely. “Is that the way the wind’s a-blowin’!”
She acted as if the idea had never struck her before, but she so charged the atmosphere with accusation that Richard grew crimson and Jerry stiffened into angry opposition.
“There’s no wind at all, Phœbe,” Jerry blurted. “Don’t be silly!”
“I’m not accusin’ myself of bein’ silly,” she remarked quietly. “Oh, well!” she saw that she was making them both self-conscious; “perhaps the breeze has died down temporarily. It does in these parts, Richard,” she turned to him learnedly. “The Keuka winds are that tricky, now! One minute they’re roarin’ as if the seven chained devils were loose an’ after ’em—as you might have noticed this afternoon—first blowin’ one way and then the other; an’ before you can pull your cap over your ears and button up the top button of your coat, they’re gone, and the Lake is as smooth as you see it to-night. But look out!” she cautioned, with a mischievous smile twinkling about her eyes, “lookout! There’s apt to be an ugly squall any minute. You never can be sure. Just look at that Lake now!” she pointed out of the long windows. The moon had lighted up its glassy surface; there was not a wrinkle on it. “Don’t it look innocent and child-like, now? An’ who would think that it could ever rise up and roil with passion?”
Her elaborate figure of speech—a very obvious parable—did not help matters. It was just clever enough to give Jerry a vivid picture of reality and to cause her to strengthen her obstinate resolution. But except for an extra look of firmness she disclosed nothing as she turned the subject.
“We peeked in the window as we passed by, Phœbe,” Jerry confessed. “You looked adorably contented. A penny for your thoughts.”
“H’m!” Phœbe gave a satisfied purr. “An’ why shouldn’t I be contented? It isn’t every lone widow that has two suitors in one day.”
“Two!”
They both spoke together.
“It isn’t very complimentary to show such astonishment,” remarked Phœbe. “I’ve me charms yet, I fancy. Yes, two. One comes along, a sea-farin’ man, and says, ‘Choose!’ says he; ‘choose between me and a quart of bad whisky,’ says he. It was a hard problem, savin’ your presence, Jerry; an’ I couldn’t decide as quickly as the sea-farin’ gentleman wished. Besides, I was confused by the attentions of the other gentleman, a movie actor, who had come along in the mornin’.”
“A movie actor!”
“An’ why not?” she demanded. “It’s gettin’ to be one of the hazardous callin’s, demandin’ courage and daring. He plagued me so with verses——”
“It was Jawn!” cried Richard.
“Jawn it was,” agreed Phœbe. “He told me outright to my face—I like a man to speak the truth—that he had been disappointed in love some seventy or eighty times, but that now he had discovered that all his excitin’ past was just preliminary training to get him ready and fit for me. But he took me best of all by his main argument. He said that he had just finished a fine weddin’ hymn, an’ that it was a shame to waste it. To be sure, he admitted that he had writ it for a lady who had gone off with another fellow; but with a slight change here and there, which would not spoil the rhyme and metre at all, he found it would just do for me. An’ then he read it to me.... It wasveryseducin’ verse,veryseducin’!”
Phœbe was a natural actress. She had the one quality essential to all great players, the subtle voice tones which compel an audience to take the contagion of her mood. In one deft speech she had removed the awkwardness from the atmosphere and had substituted ease and friendliness. Jerry and Richard chatted and chaffed in total forgetfulness of their strained relationship. It was a wonderful dramatic achievement.
“Phœbe, you cannot mean to marry Walter?” Jerry asked abruptly. “The thing fills me with horror. Why, he is six years younger! We cannot let you sacrifice yourself like that. You are not really going to do it, are you?”
“No,” said Phœbe quietly. “I am not. I thought at first that I could do it. It’s no worse than nursing or school-teachering, and a woman must have some sort of occupation nowadays.” As she spoke she felt a momentary shame for her flippancy; but she went on, true to her instinct to hide the good in her, and even todeny it if too closely prodded. “The job was too much for Saint Phœbe.”
“But have you told Walter? Aren’t you afraid he’ll——”
“He’s all right. We’ve talked things out. There’s a man in charge of that boy——”
“What man?” Jerry looked toward Richard.
“A man named Walter, whom few of you seem to know much about. It’s himself I mean. He thinks he’s doing it for me; and I let him think so; but he’s really out of my hands now. And one of these days, when he gets a good, sure grip on himself, I’ll match-make him off so secretly that neither he nor she will ever know that I planned it all myself.”
“She? Why, who——”
“Well,” she mused, “I’m not sure. If he keeps on the way he’s goin’ it’ll be one of the Fernzie girls, the younger one, maybe. But if he improves a lot, I may pick out an Armstrong or a Sheppard!”
“Oh!” gasped Jerry. Only a native could understand the prodigiousness of that colossal joke.
The talk drifted here and there, always subject to Phœbe’s clever will; and when she made some joking remark about the use of her cottage as a public bathing pavilion, and in the same breath announced that whatever those two “gallivanters” intended to do the rest of the night, she was going to her bed, the moment was right for Richard to raise two fingers mutely, “Let’s go swimmin’,” and for Jerry to fling up the answer, “All right.”
It was an outlandish thing to do, but what water lover could resist? The night was warm, the Lake was waveless, and the lump of a moon lighted up the scene.
Richard was waiting on the dock for her. A light inPhœbe’s room went out, and still he waited. For a moment he feared that Jerry had changed her mind, or perhaps had played a trick on him and had gone out the rear door and had fled home. Then the light downstairs went out suddenly; he heard the front door close with a click, and out of the shadow of the house he discerned the lithe brown figure moving towards him.
Somehow they did not plunge off instantly, as had been their habit. Instead, they stood on the edge of the dock and talked. He spoke of the new life opening before him; and he told her of his father, of his life of pathetic isolation. The pity of it struck her, and she showed it in her voice and in her eyes. Her hand touched his arm in sympathy.
Then Richard, who was a man first and a swimmer after, succumbed to the enchantment of the brown being before him and began again the vehement avowals which had never been quite completed to his satisfaction in the summer-house.
“Say you will marry me, Jerry,” he persisted. “I want you and I will have you! I won’t let you go! Will you marry me, Jerry? Will you? Will you?” with much unoriginal repetition of the same sort.
“No!” she said. He persisted in asking; but she said, “No!” Nothing daunted, he began all over again and grew even a shade more insistent.
The world and its ugly sneer began to fade away, but she fought against her growing irresolution. It was folly, but it was her best instinct, too. Every right marriage has in its history somewhere the struggle that precedes surrender. And years of Virginia tradition had put the seal of necessity on this final struggle. A Wells would force the tribute of conquest and capture!
“No!” she said vehemently. “No!” He would not be answered and took a step nearer, but she put out a hand as if to ward him off. “No!” she cried, almost hysterically, plunged into the water and struck off into the Lake.
He followed quickly. She was aiming straight towards the farther shore, and going forward at a dangerous pace. Fear seized him. With terrific strokes he caught up to her and begged her to come back, but she shook her head wildly and went desperately on. He promised that he would never pester her again, but she was blind to persuasion. So he kept at her side, although it tested his powers, swimming in silence, and watching every stroke with the keenest anguish.
Shortly she slowed up, and later turned on her back and floated. He waited until he thought the rest had brought back her strength and then coaxed her to return. For answer she began swimming onward again, this time with her long easy sweep; and he followed without a word.
She was in no condition for a distance swim. The day had worn her down, and the night’s excitement had not helped; but she summoned her will and swung steadily on. On, on, on, they went while shore faded off and the great white moon filled the night.
Within a hundred yards of the shore she faltered. He reached quickly for her, but she cried out incoherently and struck at him. The last few yards was an agonizing attempt to reach the shallow water. She was threshing wildly, and calling on him blindly to “keep away!”—although he had not offered again to touch her—when her foot reached bottom; she tried to stand but could not, and fell upon her face. He picked her up, but she pushed him aside and stumbled on tothe shore, where she dropped prone upon the grass, thoroughly spent.
He did not know what to say, fearing that his words might do further damage, so he sat mutely beside her and listened to her hysteric weeping, and suffered torments.
While he was waiting, a light flared up in Phœbe’s cottage, and later he heard the clear rhythm of rowlocks. The distance straight across the Lake at this point was probably three-quarters of a mile, and, no doubt, in the stillness of the night the sound of every exclamation had floated over the flat water and had reverberated in Phœbe’s room. The old Indian tradition that each year Keuka will take her toll of five had been all too often verified; so the Lake dwellers were trained to listen keenly when unusual cries came over the water.
In the white moonlight every object was clear, clearer, it seemed, even than day. So Richard rose quietly, went to a knoll a few feet away, and stood and waved his arm. After a time he saw the boat change its course and knew that Phœbe had marked him. Then he went back and sat on guard over the prostrate swimmer.
She was quieter now and, save for occasional swift shudders, her breathing had become almost normal. Suddenly she started to her feet, and made for the Lake.
“You are not going to swim back?” he protested.
She made no answer, and stepped into the shallow water; but he stood before her and seized her boldly in his arms.
“I will not let you go!” he spoke firmly, and tightened his grasp. She struggled and cried out upon him and told him that he was hurting her, but he drew her to him and was thankful for his strength. And all the while he talked to her, telling her things that he hadtold her many times before, matters which he had given his solemn word would never be broached again; acting, indeed, like the most and the least intelligent of swains. He used phrases that have been iterated since the world began to swim in space; there was not a spark of originality in him!
For a minute or two she tried her little powers against him; then suddenly she gave in, sobbing like a very contented child. She reached her arms slowly up and put them about him, and clung to him and confessed her complete surrender.
Proud Miss Piddiwit had melted quite away.
And thus they stood when the boat grated on the shelving shore and Phœbe drew in the oars, and turned about and faced them. She was again in her blue kimono and her wonderful hair fell in its broad braids.
“The saints in heaven!” she ejaculated. “An’ have I got up out o’ me bed an’ rowed clear across the Lake only to spoil a pretty picnic party! An’ with the yellin’ and the splashin’ it’s drowned I thought ye were! What do you mean by disappointin’ me like that!”
Out of the boat leaped Phœbe, not caring at all for six inches of water, and swooped down upon Jerry.
“Angel-child!” she cried as she reached to draw the wet brown form to her. “Don’t let that big piggy haveallthe huggin’!” Jerry tottered into her wide-opened arms. “Dear-a-dear! Dear-a-dear!” Phœbe soothed as she rocked her precious burden to and fro. “An’ it’s cryin’ ye are!... An’ well ye may! An’ well ye may!... An’, by the cross of Saint Michael, it’s cryin’ myself I am!”
Printed in Great Britain by Richard Clay&Sons, Limited,PARIS GARDEN, STAMFORD ST., S.E. 1, AND BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.