She went down the passage and opened the big double doors and fastened them back. Her head was screwed on right. Not many women would have remembered to fasten back the doors! Then she went back to the loose box where Launceton was. When she opened the door he made no attempt to come out. She stood waiting; then clapped her hands and said “Shoo!” to him, as to a fowl. He stood looking out at her, a gleam of what seemed to be amusement in his great liquid eyes. She repeated the word and clapped her hands with all her might but he would not move.
In a fury, she took a long-handled brush that was leaning against the wall and struck his flank, then darted out of the way. He only gave her a reproachful look and walked slowly out into the passage.
“Get along, you brute!” she cried. “Shoo! Shoo!” She drove him down the passage and out of the door.
He stepped delicately through it and stood silhouetted against the snow. She threw down the brush and stood in the doorway, regarding him. He looked at her. Then he trotted in a leisurely gait into the open. He gave a whinny of delight. He had not been out of the stable all day.
Suddenly, as though galvanized, he raced along the path. He galloped as though the goal of goals was in sight, his mane and tail flying, no bit in his mouth, no rider to check him. Mrs. Stroud ran after him, eager to see which way he would go. She forgot all fear. All other feelings were swallowed up in her triumph.
He flew past the orchard. The thought came to her that she might open the gate at the end of the field and let him out into the road. But now he threw himself on his back in a snowdrift and joyously rolled, his hooves in the air like a flourish of iron weapons. She toiled along the path after him.
He made as though to rise. Then sank back. He floundered, his hooves in the air. Then sank back and was still. She ran to him, as though solicitously.
He raised his eyes searchingly to hers.
Why — what was wrong? What could have hurt him — for she was sure he was terribly hurt — why could he not get to his feet? A shudder ran through him. With a deep sigh that seemed to come from the innermost part of his being, he settled himself into the snowdrift. She ploughed through the deep snow to his side. She squatted there, looking into his face. He was dying…. In a moment, he was dead….
Scotchmere found him in the morning.
He ran, as he had not run for years, along the snowy path leading to the house. It was barely light. He knocked loudly on the kitchen door. Rags opened it, in shirt and trousers.
“I’ve got to see the boss!” gasped Scotchmere.
“What’s the matter?”
“The horse is dead! Launceton.”
“Dead! What are ye givin’ us?”
Scotchmere pushed him aside and came into the kitchen.
“’Ere, you can’t go up now. W’at killed ’im?”
“I don’t know. But he’s dead. Out in the snow. I’ve got to tell the boss.” He hurried up the basement stairs. Rags followed him. In the hall he managed to push past him. It was he who knocked on Renny’s door, then opened it.
Renny lay on his back, one arm across his forehead, like a man warding off a blow. They stood, one on each side of the bed.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“It’s Launceton, sir. He’s dead.”
Renny looked up at them, dazed. He tried to wake. He threw out his arm and moved his head sharply on the pillow. But the two men did not disappear. They were still there, looking down at him. Rags said:
“I got the scare of my life, sir. Scotchmere came pounding at the door and I leaped up. My missus said —”
Scotchmere interrupted — “He’d got out of the stable, sir. He’s lying in the deep snow. He’s ruptured hisself!”
Renny’s lips were pale. He sprang out of bed and looked about the room, still dazed. Rags began to hand him his clothes. He pulled the garments on, one after the other. He said:
“Are you sure he’s dead?”
“I know a dead horse when I see one,” answered Scotchmere bitterly.
Nicholas appeared in the doorway.
“Launceton’s dead,” Renny told him. “Scotchmere found him in the snow. How did you say he got out?”
“God only knows! The stable doors were fastened back. Some fiend has done this to us, sir.” He began to cry.
“But this is awful,” said Nicholas. “Why, I can’t believe it!”
“I had the scare of my life, sir,” said Rags. “My missus —”
Ernest, Meg, and the boys were coming out of their rooms. Renny hurried past them and ran down the stairs.
Everything was in dim tones of grey and white. Launceton lay dark on the snow. Some had fallen during the night, had first melted against his warmth, then outlived it. His dark mane was whitened. There was snow in his still-open eyes. Renny knelt and kissed him between the eyes.
“Dear old man,” he said.
They found snowy footprints inside the stable. They were the footprints of a woman wearing high-heeled galoshes. They found the same footprints about Launceton where he lay. It was Dayborn who shouted:
“It was Mrs. Stroud! There isn’t the faintest doubt.”
“She gave me a murderous look when I showed her the door last night,” said Scotchmere.
“Was she here last night?” asked Dayborn.
“Yes,” answered Renny, “she was here. But she couldn’t have done it, Jim! No one, with a heart in their breast, could have done such a thing — let alone a woman.”
They were in Renny’s office. Chris came running in to them.
“It was Mrs. Stroud!” she cried. “There are two sets of footprints. You can trace her everywhere she went. Nothing would melt in this stable last night. We must telephone for the vet. Three of the horses and one of the ponies are shaking all over.”
“Telephone, then,” said Renny.
The three men stood watching as she telephoned in a steady voice. She hung up the receiver and said:
“He’s coming at once. The men are already making mashes. The horses are blanketed. God, what a fiend!”
“This time,” said Dayborn, “no one can stop me. If I’d had my way with her she’d never have lived to do this.”
He almost ran out of the office.
“I’ll come with you,” said Renny.
There was a ruddy streak in the east as they went through the snow. A little knot of men were standing by Launceton’s body. Renny averted his eyes. Dayborn kept repeating:
“All our hopes — everything — everything — all our hopes —”
Tears ran down his cheeks.
“Hang on to yourself, Jim. Let me do the talking.”
They reached Mrs. Stroud’s house.
As they stood on the doorsill, Dayborn was shaking with excitement. He gripped Renny’s arm to steady himself. Their two pairs of eyes were fixed on the spot where they expected Mrs. Stroud’s guilty face to appear. But she did not answer the door.
“She’s run away,” said Dayborn.
“No. There are her footprints going in. There are no others.”
He knocked again.
“I tell you she’s gone!”
They listened intently. There was no sound inside the house.
Dayborn turned the handle of the door and threw it violently open. There were snowy footprints in the hall. They went into the living room. It was cold and, at the first glance, appeared empty.
Then they saw Mrs. Stroud, sitting on a low chair in a dim corner. She wore coat and hat. She sat, with her hands clasped in her lap, as though waiting for them. She fixed her large grey eyes on Renny’s face with an expression of deep melancholy. Dayborn shouted at her:
“Do you know that you’ll go to the penitentiary for this? You’re a murderess — that’s what you are! I knew from the first that you —”
She interrupted, — “Mr. Whiteoak, will you tell him to go away. I want to see you alone.”
“I’ll not go,” said Dayborn. “This means as much to me as to him.”
Still keeping her eyes on Renny, she repeated, — “Tell him to go away.”
“If you think,” sneered Dayborn, “that you can get around him you’re mistaken. Do you know what ought to be done with you? You ought to be hanged from one of the rafters in Launceton’s stall! And left there dangling! By God, I’d like to do it!”
She smiled mournfully. “I don’t blame you…. But please go. I want to see Mr. Whiteoak alone…. Just for a few minutes…. I must see him alone.”
“Go outside, Jim,” said Renny.
He spoke so authoritatively that Dayborn flung out of the room without another word. He banged the front door behind him. But he did not go far. He placed himself before the house he had once occupied, staring at the windows of the room where he had left Renny and Mrs. Stroud.
She drew a deep sigh, then rose and stood facing Renny. She said, in a hoarse voice:
“I’ve killed Launceton.”
He took a step backward, as though he was afraid she might touch him. “Yes. You’ve killed him.”
“Would you like to see done to me — what Dayborn said?”
“You deserve it.”
“Do you know why I went to the stables last night?”
“To find me.”
“Yes. I found you there — with that girl — and the horse. I wanted to do something that would hurt you both — terribly. So — I let Launceton out. I thought he might take a chill and not be fit to race. I’ll not keep back anything! I didn’t care if he died.”
“I could forgive you,” he said, “if you’d put a bullet into me. But — that horse — who’d never harmed anyone!”
“I’d bring him back if I could. I’ve no hate or jealousy left in me. I’m dead in here!” She clutched her coat above her breast. “Except — except — for my love — oh, I love you still!” She began to sob.
“What a liar you are!” he said bitterly. “You don’t love anyone but yourself. You don’t know what honest feeling is.”
She clasped her hands tightly on her breast. “I know I deserve everything you can say. But I wish I could tell you my life…. From the very beginning…. I think I could make you understand … and it wasn’t as though I were an ordinary woman…. Those years ... I wasn’t changed by them…. Something in me just smouldered and waited its chance…. Then the chance came and — it is you who have suffered.”
“Yes.” He turned away his eyes. He could not bear to look into her face.
“What are you going to do to me?” she whispered. “Have me arrested?”
He stood, with his hand to his mouth, his eyes averted. The jangle of sleigh bells came from the road. He stood silent so long that it seemed to her he was struck dumb. At last he spoke:
“No,” he said. “Not that. But you’re to go away from here. Never show your face again. Never as long as you live. Will you promise that?”
She answered in a strong voice — “I promise. I’ll go. Far away. You’re very kind…. You’re very, very kind….” Her voice took on a sort of singsong. “You’re kind … kind.”
He looked at her startled. He felt afraid of her.
“Very well,” he said. “Then — this is the end.”
Her eyes were closed. One hand moved gropingly toward him. “Don’t go,” she said hoarsely.
She opened her eyes. He was gone.
The red sun swam up into the clear sky. The snow was rosy where the sun touched it, deep blue in the shadow. Dayborn walked close to Renny. He never stopped talking. Renny strode through the snow, not hearing. When he tried to think of Mrs. Stroud or her act, he could make nothing out of the confusion in his head. All that was clear to him was that Launceton, so full of fire, so noble in his simplicity, was dead.
When they reached the stable the vet was there. The horses that had been chilled were being treated. None was in a dangerous state. Rags was there, imploring him to go to the house for breakfast. He refused and Rags brought a pot of tea to the stable. It was noon when he went to his office and sat down at his desk, his head in his hands.
He did not raise his head when Chris and Dayborn came in. They stood looking at him. Dayborn said:
“If you’d listened to me, this would never have happened. I told you what she was, long ago. But you always will do your own way. I don’t want to rub it in. But you’re a lot to blame.”
“Shut up, Jim,” said Chris.
“You’re to blame too,” continued Dayborn, in his hectoring voice. “You were always reminding me how kind she’d been to us. It’s damned hard that I, who saw through her, should have to suffer with the rest. That night when she —”
“Shut up!”
“Shut up yourself!”
The door opened. Scotchmere stuck in his grizzled head. “Will Mr. Dayborn please come. The vet wants to see him.” The groom’s eyes accused Dayborn of slacking.
Dayborn went, his shoulders sagging in weariness, the tail of his shirt dangling ludicrously outside his riding breeches.
Chris came to Renny and drew his head to her breast.
“Poor darling,” she whispered. “If only I could do something!”
He pressed her hands to his throbbing temples.
It was evening before Dayborn and Chris could persuade him to return to the house. He had eaten nothing but had drunk a great deal. Under a glittering new moon they steadied him, one on either hand, along the wide path shovelled by the men. The snow at the sides was waist-high. They were both so thin, so nearly of the same build, that he was not sure which was which. He patted both their backs.
Old Adeline, on her way to bed, heard him coming. He was singing at the top of his not very musical voice:
“D’ye ken John Peel, with his coat so gay?
D’ye ken John Peel, at the break of the day?
Peel’s view-halloo would waken the dead
And the fox from his lair in the morning.”
She opened the door to him.
XXIV
CHRISTMAS
MEG AND HER grandmother were in the sitting room going through a box of decorations for the Christmas tree. It was a large box and some of its contents dated back to the time when Meg and Renny were children. One of these was a fat wax cherub, now grown rather dingy and with his nose gone, but dear to all the family. There were the gay-coloured cornucopias for the Christmas sweets. There were tinsel streamers some of them rather tarnished, though, when the candles were lit, they shone as brightly as the best. Not one in the family could see that box without a certain excitement. It meant that Christmas was at hand, the last rites were being performed.
Adeline was extricating a silver fish from a tangle of tinsel. Meg, with one corner of her handkerchief wetted by her tongue, was washing the cherub’s face. The air was heavy with the scent of the tree and of the spruce and hemlock boughs that had been placed above the pictures. A basket in the window was heaped with still unopened Christmas cards from the post.
“Thank goodness,” said Meg, “that Renny has got over the worst of his disappointment before Christmas. I think that, on the whole, he bore it pretty well, don’t you, Gran?”
“I do. He bore it like a soldier.”
“But he did get terribly drunk! It was a shock to me.”
Adeline threw up her hands. “And to me, too. Bless me, when I opened the door and he came feather-stitching along the hall, he reminded me so of my own father that I all but fainted! Before I could stop myself, I called him by my father’s name. I said, — ‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Renny Court.’”
“And what did he say, Gran?”
“He said, — ‘I wish I had been Renny Court, for I’d have been dead forty years. Better be dead,’ he said, ‘than live to see this day.’ Then he came and put his head on my shoulder and cried. And I said, — ‘Cry away, my dear, ’twill do you good.’ And what do you think he said then? He said, — ‘Oh, Gran, the War was terrible!’ His poor brain was completely moithered with all the trouble that was on him, as my old nurse used to say.”
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“Poor darling! It was wonderful the way you soothed him and the uncles got him to bed. It is strange how he never wants to speak of Launceton now. And, if anyone so much as mentions Mrs. Stroud’s name, he gives a black look and closes right up. I think it is good to talk over one’s troubles, don’t you, Gran?”
“Eh, Meg, but you’ve never wanted to talk over Maurice Vaughan, have you?”
Meg coloured deeply and bent her head over the box of decorations.
Her grandmother looked at her shrewdly. “I believe you still love him, Meg.”
Meg did not answer. There was silence except for the crackling of the fire and the rustle of their hands in the tinsel.
At last Adeline spoke. “I’m wondering what sort of Christmas that Mrs. Stroud will have.”
“Miserable enough, I should say, with such a dreadful thing on her conscience.”
“She ought to thank her stars that she’s not locked up.”
“Renny was too soft-hearted in letting her off so easily. But, as he said, no amount of punishment could bring Launceton back.”
“Well, she’s hid herself completely. No one seems to know where she’s gone. I wonder who will buy the house now. How well I remember when it was built! Little did old Mr. Pink guess such a queer woman would come to live in it. But bad as she was, she wasn’t made of the right stuff for a sinner.”
There were footsteps in the hall. Meg shook her head. “Sh, Gran. Renny is coming. We mustn’t be talking of her…. I think the snow has stopped, don’t you?”
Renny came in. She turned smiling to him while holding up the cherub for inspection.
“I’ve been washing his face, Renny. Does it look clean to you?”
He examined the waxen face critically. “It’s a bit smudgy but it’ll look clean in the candlelight.”
“I hope Wakefield won’t scream when he sees Uncle Nick as Santa Claus. He did last year.”
“He’ll not scream. I’ll hold him on my shoulder.”
“What do you think of Finch’s hanging up his stocking? Piers says he’s too old and that the tree is enough. But I can see that he wants to. I really think he still believes.”
Books 5-8: Whiteoak Heritage / Whiteoak Brothers / Jalna / Whiteoaks of Jalna Page 29
