CHAPTER VII
EARLY the following afternoon Anna Miller made her way to the parsonage.
She announced the fact immediately that she couldn’t stay long to-day. For already the clever girl had, as she put it, ‘sized up’ the lady of the parsonage and knew better than to wait until later and then ‘spring’ the unwelcome fact upon her.
“O Anna, with all the long week, counting Sunday, and with a long forenoon on Saturday, it seems as if you might spare me Saturday afternoon,” protested the invalid.
“I can usually, Mrs. Langley, but you see I am going away Monday morning early and there’s my packing and ever so many things to attend to besides going over home, as I always do on Saturday, to see if ma’s clothes and pa’s ties and shirts and the boys’ are in Sunday-go-to-meeting shape,” Anna explained.
She waited for Mrs. Langley to ask where she was going or to evince some interest in her journey. Not that she was the sort of person to crave such attention. But the more she saw of Mrs. Langley, the more she realized how self-centered her life had made her. In a certain sense, it wasn’t her fault. But for the sake of Mr. Langley, his wife must somehow beinduced to think of other folk or other concerns than herself, her dead baby, and the baby’s tombstone. And in that the only person she really had anything to do with was Anna it would have been encouraging to have her show some faint interest in her comings and goings when they did not lead to the parsonage, or the cemetery on yonder hillside.
But Mrs. Langley’s only concern was for her precious Saturday.
“But you will surely be back before the end of the week, Anna?” she asked.
“I suppose I shall,” said Anna soberly. “But I may not be able to come here for a fortnight. I shall have a lot of studying to do to make up my work at school.”
“Isn’t Mr. Langley on the school committee?” demanded his wife.
Wondering at her acquaintance with even so little of current history, Anna told her that he was chairman.
“Very well. Then he can arrange so that you needn’t make up the time and you can come here just the same.”
“O Mrs. Langley, I don’t think he could or would do that, and anyhow I wouldn’t have him,” Anna protested. “For after all, I’m really crazy about school. I believe I like it all the better for knowing the world a bit. As a matter of fact, you know, I could give Mr. Phillips points. And I couldn’tnotmake up certain things. For example, there’s the PeloponnesianWar. The plague began yesterday and,—O dear, like as not when I get back I shall find the whole bunch stark dead. And then there are those poor Helvetians all packed up and ready to hike with their babies and cattle and pups and duds and all,—and those blooming Roman soldiers ready to drive ’em straight back. I’ve simplygotto see what happened to them. They had pluck—and yet, I can’t for the life of me understand how they had the heart to burn down their houses and their fields of grain. I dare say it showed their faith in God, but they might have wanted to show their grandchildren years afterwards where they had lived.”
“I don’t remember ever hearing about them. Are they in the Bible, Anna?” Mrs. Langley asked, and before Anna could answer, bade her tell their tale.
Surprised and delighted, the girl complied. Not at all a scholar, Anna Miller nevertheless gleaned all sorts of riches from text books that are desert wastes to the majority of young folk. And now, relating the history of the Helvetians so far as she had followed it, in the graphic account Julius Caesar gives of the unhappy impulse towards migration of these people pent up in an inland island, she made it as interesting as a fairy tale to a child. Mrs. Langley listened spell-bound. And though Anna was disappointed to have her hark back to her usual subject, even the momentary interest in something foreign to it counted for something.
“It must have been hardest of all for them to leavetheir graveyards behind them,” she murmured, “for mothers to leave their babies’ graves.”
“And widows their husbands’,” Anna added. “And yet, Mrs. Langley, there’s worse than that. Now my friend that I am going back to the city to see lost her husband in the summer and now she’s sick herself, and there’s her baby. If she should—well, it must be no end harder for one to think of dying and leaving one’s baby alone in the world than to move away from somewhere and leave the grave of a baby whose soul is all safe.”
“Your friend must be older than you, Anna,” Mrs. Langley observed irrelevantly.
“Two years, but we were the best of friends. She was at the ribbons with me at Mason and Martin’s and Joe was at the soda fountain. He was the nicest boy—and the thinnest! My goodness! Matches would seem as big as the pillars of the Squire Bennet place at Wenham compared with his legs. He and Bessy were married and went to housekeeping in two rooms and were happy as kings. Joe was sick after a while and Bessy came back to work beside me. Then the baby came and Joe went back to work before he was able. He looked so bum they wouldn’t have him at the soda fountain but put him in the stock-room where his poor phiz, that looked for all the world like an interrogation point, wouldn’t queer the whole concern. It must have been awfully hard for him there, but he stuck it out until last August when hedied. And now poor Bessy thinks she’s dying and wants to see me.”
“I hate to have you go,” said the invalid with some warmth, and even thought to ask who was going with her.
“O, I’m going by my lone. I’m good for it. But I think I will put up my hair so as to look more responsible.”
“O Anna, don’t do that. I wouldn’t have you do that for the world!” cried Mrs. Langley. “I like it just as it is. You see it is just the colour my baby’s would have been and I was in hopes hers would be curly, too. I should never have braided hers, though.”
Anna forgot that she ought to be on her way home and pulled her braid over her shoulder and looked at it admiringly.
“I wish you would undo it and let me see it all spread out,” Mrs. Langley said almost eagerly. And Anna was more than ready to gratify her curiosity.
Untying the bow at the end of the long, heavy, wavy plait, she loosed the strands and spread out the silky yellow mass until it enveloped her like a golden mantle. Mrs. Langley leaned towards her, gazing on the splendour in fascination, reaching out presently to stroke it with her lean witch’s fingers. And whenever Anna made a move to gather it in she uttered a cry of protest. And the vain girl yielded and forgot everything except to wish that there were a mirror in the room.
But when the clock struck five, she started, quiteaghast. Seizing her hat and jacket, she said an hasty farewell and fled, the cloud of her hair all about her.
As she went, people rushed to their windows to see the girl’s wonderful hair, gazing spell-bound until she was out of sight. Afterwards, when they got their breath, some said the other Miller girl had assurance to flaunt her single charm thus boldly. But no one so took the matter to heart as the Reverend Russell Langley, who met her as he returned from a call at the Hollow.
Anna hadn’t time even to pause, and Mr. Langley thought she was ashamed to do so. He took it for granted that the girl had set out from home with this almost immodest splendour of yellow tresses all about her simply to display it, and he felt bewildered and ashamed and grieved. He shook his head sadly. He had known that Anna was vain—everyone knew it. But her vanity had always seemed innocent and harmless, a part of her droll charm. The girl had seemed too unselfish, too eagerly active in behalf of others, to have leisure or desire for deliberate advertising of her own beauty. She was, he had to acknowledge now, quite different from Rusty. He began to understand why people referred to her as the other Miller girl.
Reaching home, he found, after much searching, a sermon on humility he had preached fifteen years before. Putting aside the sermon he had ready for the morrow, he began to revise this. Revision turned out to mean re-writing practically the whole discourse,and it was midnight before he rose from his desk. The new sermon was less severe and dogmatic than the one of the man of thirty which it replaced, but its tone was wholesome and effective. And though the preached hoped that Anna Miller would not realise that her vanity had been the occasion of it, he trusted that she would nevertheless take the precepts to heart.
As it was, Anna listened gravely, as she almost invariably did, to every word of the sermon. But she did not forget to flop her yellow braid over her shoulder and as the choir rose to sing, and her sweet, true voice rang out, the girl was not unaware that she was conspicuous for that as well as for her personal appearance.
But she had forgotten all that when she went in to see Mrs. Lorraine that afternoon to thank her for allowing Alice to make it possible for her to go to her friend. As a matter of fact, Mrs. Lorraine had been shocked when Alice came home Friday evening and told her of the offer she had made to take Anna’s place at Miss Penny’s while she was away. She declared that Alice should not do it. The bitterness which had seemed to disappear had come back, and Alice had been greatly disturbed. Mrs. Lorraine had finally yielded grudgingly, but she felt hurt and injured and there had been a perceptible coolness between mother and daughter since. They had never been close together, but of late they had been nearer to one another than ever before. The more Alice associated with Anna and Miss Penny, the more yearninglyher heart went out towards her mother, and this coldness that was almost estrangement hurt her keenly.
She was grateful that Anna did not feel any want of cordiality in her mother. Mrs. Lorraine received her thanks quietly and when Anna explained the situation listened intently and questioned her sympathetically. And she asked, almost impulsively, if Anna wasn’t tired out.
“It’s just that I seem pulled so many ways at once, Mrs. Lorraine,” Anna said. “Really, I ought not to be at Miss Penny’s. With Rusty at college, I ought to be at home. Ma and pa need a daughter there the worst way. I get over all I can, but they’re so glad to see me and so sorry to have me go just across the street that it breaks my heart. But someone has to be with Miss Penny. She was goodness itself to Rusty and to the whole family, and I love her as if she were my favorite aunt of all and just love to be with her. And now there’s Mrs. Langley. She’s queer. Dick’s hatband had nothing on her when it comes to being odd. And yet I take to her and would enjoy sort of mothering her if it didn’t take me away from Miss Penny and my own family. And then again, there’s Mr. Langley.”
On a sudden, tears filled the girl’s eyes. But she smiled through them.
“It’s rum to be so popular, isn’t it Alice?” she asked. “Wouldn’t you think I was Brother Atlas orFather Time? The fact is, I’m only the other Miller girl trying to pretend I’m Charley-on-the-spot.”
Mrs. Lorraine bent and kissed her. “You are a dear, absurd, unselfish child!” she cried warmly. “And if ever there’s anything Alice or I can do to help you out in any way, you must come straight to us. Mustn’t she, Alice?”
“Yes, indeed,” agreed Alice with shining eyes, and coming to her mother kissed her shyly.
Both girls would have thought that Mrs. Lorraine had unbent as far as possible. But she was to go yet further. On the afternoon of the first day Alice spent with her, Miss Penny had Frank Miller drive her over to Farleigh with the fat pony. She returned with Mrs. Lorraine, whom she had persuaded to visit her as long as Alice stayed. Mrs. Lorraine was as much surprised as her daughter, but somehow, there was no resisting Miss Penny.
She expected to spend the greater part of her time in her chamber, but she did no such thing though she was left free. The housework was inconsiderable. Alice, who took to it strangely, loved to help Miss Penny, who wasn’t willing to relinquish the whole. But Mrs. Lorraine found herself wishing to be near the centre of things in the kitchen or living-room and drifted thither before the first forenoon was over. It seemed to her that the very thing her sore heart and worn nerves had craved was to bask in the homely warmth of this simple, cosy household. For the first day she sat in an arm chair with Silvertoes, who hadbeen included in the invitation, in her lap. But on the second, she felt, after another wonderful night, so much alive that she wished to be active. She said to Miss Penny that she should like to learn to cook—to complete an education in domestic matters begun in her childhood and interrupted by the receipt of a large inheritance which drove her family off the farm. Wherefore, at Miss Penny’s suggestion, Alice was sent off nutting, and the two women had a long, happy morning together.
An inborn taste for the domestic and a really good foundation made Mrs. Lorraine a still readier pupil than her daughter had been. Miss Penny’s surprise at her skill drew forth a longer account of Mrs. Lorraine’s early life. Miss Penny spoke of her own girlhood and other forgotten details came back to her guest. And when Alice returned at noon of the second day, she could scarcely credit what she saw and felt. Her mother and Miss Penny appeared to be warm friends.
Anna had already taught Alice to love the out-of-doors, and though it was less pleasant alone, she took advantage of her opportunity and remained out all that she could, believing that her mother and Miss Penny’s friendship would progress the more rapidly in her absence. Mr. Langley called one day, and Mrs. Lorraine saw him and liked him. She told her daughter what he had said of Richard Cartwright, the man who had built their cottage, and expressed apprehension that he might find a bare-looking place whenhe should call. Whereupon it came to Alice that she might do something to make it look more attractive before they returned to it.
She went over next day. As she sauntered towards Farleigh, she thought of the man who had died before he had attained his heart’s desire. She did not think of him as Reuben’s father except to wish that everyone wouldn’t dwell so constantly upon the son as never to drop any hint to gratify her hungry, rather mournful curiosity concerning the father.
He and Mr. Langley had been intimate friends, so that Mr. Langley would be able to tell one all about him. Alice was pleased to reflect that since her mother had met and liked Mr. Langley there was no bar against her becoming more friendly with him. She wondered how long she must wait before she should feel free to question him concerning Richard Cartwright. The girl sighed as it came to her that he, too, would most likely insist upon talking about Reuben instead. She would probably hear the famous tale of the cat in the primeval pine tree again and other less familiar incidents connected with the model youth; but surely after he had exhausted the list—and she would be patience itself—he would be ready to speak of the older and more interesting Cartwright.
The outline of the cottage was charmingly picturesque. As Alice turned into the lane to-day it struck her afresh and more strongly than ever. As a matter of fact, it was the first time she had approachedit when her heart had not been burdened with the sense of her mother’s unhappiness. Relieved of that burden, dimly aware, indeed, of her mother’s very pleasant preoccupation and quite forgetting her father, who had always been a stranger to her, Alice saw with new eyes and sped on with a light step and a sense of well-being that she had never known before.
The little porch with settees built in invited the comer to pause to contemplate the outlook. Alice had never before had leisure to heed or even to feel the invitation, but to-day she accepted gratefully. Throwing herself down, she gazed happily out through a break in the wall of foliage bordering the lane to the distant hills. But very shortly, content changed to vague melancholy which became poignant. The lilac and blue of those lovely folded hills convinced her that Dick Cartwright had had even that in mind when he planned this cottage and this porch. And he must have sat here where she was sitting now on many a day at sunset and in the early dusk and under the evening stars thinking of the organ, which must have seemed to come nearer and nearer, and dreaming out melodies to play thereon.
The girl clasped her hands. How terribly sad his fate had been! He had lost everything and died and been forgotten. Perhaps if he had had the organ to comfort him, he wouldn’t have felt the death of his wife so desperately, and wouldn’t have taken to drink and met his death. If only someone had given it to him! There were so many people in the world towhom the cost of a pipe organ would have meant little or nothing. Why, once her own father could have given away any number of them easier than she and her mother could dispense coppers to-day. She could have done it herself.
Well, there was nothing to do now except to make some atonement for the cruel fate that had come upon Richard Cartwright. It wasn’t her fault, but it might have been, and the least she could do would be to make whatever amends might be possible now. Being the daughter of a convict, she would of course never marry, and she would devote her life to the memory of this genius who had died betimes. She would fulfil her duty to her mother but all her leisure thought and time and money (she would earn some in a manner to be determined later) would go towards reviving his memory and keeping it green. She would build the organ just as he had planned and then—why not turn the cottage into a sort of museum—the Richard Cartwright Memorial? Or perhaps better than a museum, it might be a kind of musical centre where famous organists would give concerts in his memory to the people of the countryside who hadn’t appreciated him in life and where poor young men might come to practise and improvise.
Immensely cheered, Alice took the keys from the pocket of her jacket to enter the cottage and see if the whole lower floor could be made into one apartment. But in her eagerness, she put the wrong key in the lock. The second key, markedShopopeneda small separate building hidden in the shrubbery in the rear. There was a shop at Miss Penny’s too, and she had said every house had had one in her girlhood, and this one, which did not match the cottage, evidently belonged to an earlier dwelling. It occurred suddenly to Alice that she might find something there belonging to Dick Cartwright, some memorials to be put behind glass in a cabinet near the organ.
The sun had dropped below the horizon, but the girl felt she could make an hurried survey before dusk—indeed, she must. She ran quickly through the thicket to the door of the shop and succeeded in turning the key in the rusty lock. She stole softly in, awe rather than dread hushing her steps.
The first view was disappointing. The place was piled full of old boxes and crates and stacks of yellowed newspapers. But in the corner she caught glimpses of odd chairs and stands and bits of furniture which might prove of interest if one could ever get at them. A narrow stairway with ladder-like ascent told her what a more observant person would have implied from the window in the gable above the door—that there was a second storey.
Catching her skirts in her hand, Alice climbed up. Her spirits rose the moment her head cleared the railing above. She stepped directly into a little chamber which had not been converted into a store room or dumping ground and stood still to gaze about. It must have been left as it was when Dick Cartwright went away.
There was a long carpenter’s bench with an iron contrivance fastened at the end on one long side, and a smaller table opposite containing rusty tins with a swinging shelf above holding buckets that had once contained paint. A stand and a rocking chair stood near the window at the further end and a dark bench or couch was drawn into the shadow of the rafters. A secretary with drawers below the writing shelf and shelves above with glass doors stood near the other window which looked towards the house. A chair stood before it—how many years had it stood there?—and careless of dust, Alice seated herself in it.
The glass doors were open. A few old, mildewed books stood on the shelves. They might form a nucleus of the memorial library, but Alice Lorraine sighed. For the nonce she had forgotten that Dick Cartwright was dead. Half mechanically she pulled out one of the little drawers below. A pile of letters met her view. The uppermost bore a superscription. Either dusk or faded ink made it very faint, but the girl read it—Mr. Richard Cartwright, Farleigh. They seemed to her the saddest words she had ever read.
Forgetting everything else, the girl sat by the desk while the shadows in the corners increased, encroaching more and more upon her island of twilight. Then on a sudden, strange, nameless terror seized upon her. She felt as she had once or twice felt in the night upon awaking without apparent cause from sound sleep. Her hair seemed to rise from her head and cold drops stood out on her brow and lips.
There was someone else in the room! For some seconds the girl sat motionless, fearing to stir, to draw breath. Then she turned her head ever so slightly and cautiously to see how near she was to the stair. Two steps would bring her thither. She gazed as in fascination upon the space for some moments, then slowly, breathlessly turned her head in the opposite direction.
Nothing met her gaze and she grew bolder—or at least less fearful. Turning about in the chair, though noiselessly, she surveyed the room. There was nothing to be seen. She peered in every direction. The corners were dark but not suspiciously so. It seemed as if there were something odd about the look of the couch, but she could reach the stairway, rush down and be out of the door before anyone or anything could reach her thence. She rose softly to her feet.
For a little she stood still. Then she tiptoed quietly towards the dark bench or couch beneath the rafters, peering before her all the while. Suddenly she paused.
Her horror-stricken eyes made out the outlines of a dark figure on the couch, an human being, a man who looked to her frightened gaze of giant size. His eyes were closed. He was asleep—or dead?
Alice Lorraine stood still trying to think. If the man were asleep, he was a drunken tramp and she must flee. If he were dead—O, so much more must she fly! Not for the world would she be alone with a dead man, a corpse. She must——
On a sudden the figure moved. The man’s eyes opened wide.