Finch stared after him till he was lost to view, then stumbled toward the house. He felt suddenly tired and weak, and yet he could not go to the house as he had been bid. He saw a light in Alayne’s room. Poor Alayne! He shuddered as he thought of what Piers would do to Eden, and yet he had done right to tell this terrible thing. He could not have hidden such evil-doing in his heart, connived at their further sin. Still it was possible that his own evil imagination had magnified their act into heinousness. Perhaps even they were no worse than others. He had heard something about the loose morals of the younger generation. Well, Pheasant was only eighteen, Eden twenty-four; they were young, and perhaps no worse than others. What about Alayne herself? Was she good? Those long rides with Renny, her moving into a room by herself, away from Eden—Finch had heard a whispered reference to that between Meg and Aunt Augusta. Would he ever know right from wrong? Would he ever know peace? All he knew was that he was alone—very lonely, afraid— afraid now for Eden and Pheasant, while a few minutes ago he had thought only of crushing them in the midst of their wickedness.
He crossed the lawn and followed the path into the ravine. The stream, narrower here than where he had waded through it crossing the meadows, ran swiftly, still brimming from heavy spring rains. Luxuriant bushes, covered by starry white flowers, filled the night with their fragrance.
Renny was sitting on the strong wooden handrail of the little bridge, smoking and staring dreamily down into the water. Finch would have turned away, but Renny had heard his step on the bridge.
“That you, Piers?” he asked.
“No, it’s me—Finch.”
“Have you just come back from the rectory?”
“No, Renny, I’ve been—practising.”
He expected a rebuke, but none came. Renny scarcely seemed to hear him, seemed hardly aware of his presence. Finch moved closer, with a dim idea of absorbing some of his strength by mere proximity. In the shadow of that unique magnificence, he did not feel quite so frightened. He wished that he might touch Renny; hold on to his fingers, even his tweed sleeve, as he had when he was a little fellow.
Renny pointed down into the water. “Look there,” he said.
Looking, Finch saw a glossy wet back gliding across the silver shimmer of the stream. It was a large water rat out on some nocturnal business of its own, They watched it till it reached the opposite bank, where, instead of climbing out as they had expected, it nosed among the sedges for a moment and then moved into the stream again, slowly passing under the bridge. Renny went to the other side and peered after it.
“Here he comes,” he murmured.
“Wonder what he’s after,” said Finch, but he did not move. Down there in the dark brightness of the water he saw a picture—Eden lying dead, with Alayne wringing her hands above his body; and as the wavelets obliterated it, another took its place—Piers, purple-faced, struggling, kicking on a gallows. Icy sweat poured down Finch’s face. He put out a hand gropingly, and staggered from the bridge and up the path. On the ridge above the ravine he hesitated. Should he go back and pour out the whole terrible tale to Renny? Perhaps it was not too late, if they ran all the way, to prevent a disaster.
He stood, gnawing at his knuckle distractedly, the clinging wetness of his trouser legs making him shiver from head to foot. He seemed incapable of movement or even of thought now; but suddenly he was stirred to both by the sound of Eden’s laugh, near at hand, on the lawn. Then Pheasant’s voice came, speaking in a natural, unhurried tone. Piers had somehow missed them, and while he was crashing through the woods in pursuit, they were strolling about the lawn, as though they had been there all the while.
Finch moved out from the darkness and stood before them, Eden had just struck a match and was holding it to a cigarette. The flame danced in his eyes, which looked very large and bright, and gave an ironical twist to the faint smile that so often hovered about his lips.
Pheasant uttered an exclamation that was almost a cry.
“Don’t go in the house,” said Finch, heavily. “I mean—go away. I’ve told Piers about you. I heard you in the birch wood, and I ran back, and told Piers—”
Eden held the still flaring match near Finch’s’ face, as though it were some supernatural ray by which he could look into his very soul.
“Yes?” he said, steadily. “Go on.”
“He’s after you. He—he looked terrible. You’d better go away.”
Pheasant made a little moaning sound like a rabbit caught in a trap. Eden dropped the match.
“What a worm you are, brother Finch!” he said. “I don’t know where we Whiteoaks ever got you.” He turned to Pheasant. “Don’t be frightened, darling. I will take care of you.”
“Oh, oh!” she cried. “What shall we do?”
“Hush.”
Finch said: “He’ll be back any minute,” and turned away.
He could not go into that house with its peacefully shining lights, where the others were still talking perhaps of the picnic, all unwitting of the thunderbolt that hung over them. He skulked around the house, through the kitchen garden, through the orchard, and out on the road that led to the churchyard.
The church steeple, rising from among the tapering cedars, pointed more sharply than they toward the sky. The church had gathered to itself the darkest shadows of tree and tomb, and drawn them like a cloak about its walls. The dead, lying beneath the dewy young grass, seemed to Finch to be watching him, as he climbed the steep steps from the road, out of hollow eye sockets in which no longer was boldness, or terror, or lust, but only resigned decay. They no longer were afraid of God. All was over. They had nothing to do but lie there till their bones were light as the pollen of a flower.
Ah, but he was afraid of God! Fear was his flesh, his marrow, his very essence. Why had the moon sunk and left him in this blackness alone? What had he done? He had ruined the lives of Piers and Eden and Pheasant and Alayne. Were Eden and Pheasant sinful? “Sin?” What a mad word! Could there be sin? All the mouldering bones under this grass— their sins were no more than the odours of spring growth, warm earth, sticky leaf-bud, blessed rain—sweetness. But there was that saying: “To the third and fourth generation.” Perhaps he was suffering tonight for the heady sin of some far-off Whiteoak. Perhaps that baby sister, over whose grave he stood, had given up her little ghost because of some shadowy bygone sin. He pictured her lying there, not horrible, not decayed, but fair and tender as the bud of an April flower, with little hands held out to him.
Hands held out to him— Oh, beautiful thought! That was what his lonely spirit yearned for—the comfort of outstretched hands. A sob of self-pity shook him; tears rushed to his eyes and poured down his cheeks. He cast himself on the ground among the graves, and lay there, his face against the grass. All the accumulated experience of the dead beneath him, passing into his body, became one with him. He lay there inert, exhausted, drinking in at every pore the bitter sweetness of the past. Hands stretched out to him, the hands of soldiers, gardeners, young mothers, infants, and One far different from the others. Hands from which emanated a strange white glow, not open-palmed, but holding something toward him—“the living Bread”—Christ’s hands.
He knelt among the mounds and held up his own hands, curved like petals, to receive. His thin boy’s body was torn by sobs as a sapling in a hailstorm. He put his hands to his mouth—he had received the Bread—he felt the sacred fire of it burn through his veins—scorch his soul—Christ in him.
Overcome, he sank beside his mother’s grave and threw his arm about it. Little white daisies shone out of the dark grass like tender, beaming eyes. He pressed closer, closer, drawing up his knees, curling his body like a little child’s, thrusting his breast against the grave, and cried: “Mother, oh mother—speak to me! I am Finch, your boy.”
XXIV
THE FLIGHT OF PHEASANT
MAURICE VAUGHAN was sitting alone in his dining room. When he and Piers had returned from Stead, he had brought the young fellow into the hous
e for a drink and some cold viands, which he had got himself from the pantry. If he had had his way, Piers would still be there, smoking, drinking, and talking with ever less clarity about fertilizers and spraying and the breeding of horses. But Piers had refused to stay for long. He had to rise early, and for some reason he could not get Pheasant out of his head. His thoughts kept flying back to her, to her little white face, her brown cropped hair. Her thin eager hands seemed to tug at his sleeve, drawing him home. He had been abstracted all the evening.
However, Maurice had scarcely noticed this. All he craved was company, the warmth of a human presence to pierce the chill loneliness of the house. When Piers was gone, he sat on and on, slowly, heavily drinking without enjoyment, slowly, heavily thinking in the same numbing circle which his mind, like the glassy-eyed steed of a roundabout, had traversed for twenty years.
He thought of Meg, tender and sedate, a noble young girl, as she was when they had become engaged. He thought of his old parents, their fond joy in him, their ambition, with which he was in accord, that he should become one of the most brilliant and influential men in the country. He pictured his marriage with Meggie, their life together, their family of lovely girls and boys. There were six of these children of his fancy. He had named them all—the boys with family names, the girls with romantic names from the poets he had once admired. From the eldest to the youngest, he knew every line of the six young faces and had a right to know them, for he had shaped them out of the shadows to satisfy the hunger of his heart. For them he had a love he had never given to Pheasant.
He thought of that affair with her mother, of their meetings in the twilight, of her clutching his knees and begging him to marry her when she found she was with child, of his tearing himself away. Then the basket with the baby, the note—here a feeling approaching nausea made him shift in his chair—the family consternation, the family conclaves, Meg’s throwing him over, his parents’ death, financial distresses, the end of ambition. And so on through the whole gloomy business of his life, in which the brightest spot was the War, where he had been able for a time to forget the past and ignore the future.
As he completed the circle, the room reeled a little with him; his chin sank on his breast, and the electric light brought out the increasing whiteness of the patches on his temples. He did not sleep, but consciousness was suspended. The sound of someone softly entering the room did not rouse him. With his heavy underlip dropped, his eyes staring into space, he sat motionless as a sullen rock buried in the heaviness of the sea.
Pheasant felt a pang of pity as she saw him sitting alone in the cold, unshaded, electric light. “He looks frightfully blue,” she thought, “and he’s getting round-shouldered.” Then her mind flew back to her own tragic situation, and she went to him and touched him on the arm.
“Maurice.”
He started, and then, seeing who it was, he said in a surly tone: “Well, what do you want?”
“Oh, Maurice,” she breathed, “be kind to me! Don’t let Piers into the house. I’m afraid he’ll kill me.”
He stared stupidly at her, and then growled: “Well, it’s what you deserve, isn’t it?”
“Yes, yes, I deserve it! But how did you know? Have you seen anyone?”
He considered a moment, staring at the decanter on the table.
“Yes, Piers was here.”
“Piers here? Oh, he was searching for me!” She wrung her hands frantically. “Oh, Maurice, please, please don’t let him in again! I’ve been wandering about in the dark for hours, and at last I thought I’d come to you, for after all I am your child. You’ve a right to protect me, no matter what I’ve done.”
He roused himself to say, “What have you done?”
“Didn’t Piers tell you anything?”
“No.”
“But he was searching for me?”
“No, he wasn’t.”
“Then how did you know something was wrong?”
“I didn’t.”
“But you said I deserve to be killed.”
“Well, don’t you?” he demanded, with drunken raillery.
“Maurice, you’re drunk. Oh, whatever shall I do?” She threw herself on his knees, clasping his neck. “Try to understand! Say that you’ll not let Piers kill me.” She broke into pitiful wails. “Oh, Maurice, I’ve had to run away from Piers, and I love him so!”
“He was here a bit ago,” said Vaughan, staring around as though he expected to find him in a corner. Then, noticing her head against his shoulder, he laid his hand on it in a rough caress, as a man might stroke a dog.
“Don’t cry, youngster. I’ll take care of you. Glad to have you back. Damned lonely.”
She caught his hand and pressed a dozen wild kisses on it.
“Oh, Maurice, how good you are! How good to me! And how good Piers was to me—and I didn’t deserve it. Hanging is too good for me!” And she added, melodramatically: “‘Twere better I had never been born!”
She rose then and wiped her eyes. She was a pitiful little figure. Her clothes were torn from running distractedly through a blackberry plantation. Her hands and even her pale face were bleeding from scratches. She had lost a shoe, and the stockinged foot was wet with mud.
“Yes, ‘twere,” he repeated, agreeably
With a certain pathetic dignity, she turned toward the door.
“Will it be all the same to you, Maurice, if I go to my room?”
“Same to me—wherever you go—absolutely.”
How different this hall, she thought, as she dragged herself up the bare stairs, from the luxurious hall at Jalna, with its thickly carpeted stairs, its dark red rugs, its stained-glass window. The great moose head which had been her especial terror in childhood now glared down its long hard nose at her, with nostrils distended, as though it longed to toss her on its cruel horns.
She felt dazed. She scarcely suffered, except for the aching in her legs, as she threw herself across her old bed. With half-shut eyes she lay, staring at the two pictures on the wall opposite, “Wide Awake” and “Fast Asleep,” which had once hung in Maurice’s nursery. Darling little baby pictures; how she had always loved them— She wished she had the strength of mind to kill herself. Tear the sheets into strips and wind them tighter and tighter around her throat, or, better still, hang herself from one of the rafters in that back room in the attic. She saw herself dangling there, purple-faced—saw horrified Maurice discovering her—saw herself buried at the crossroad with a stake in her inside. She did not know whether that was still done, but it was possible that the custom would be revived for her—
She fell into a kind of nightmare doze, in which the bed rocked beneath her like a cradle. It rocked faster and faster, rolling her from side to side. She was not a real, a wholesome infant, but a grotesque changeling, leering up at the distraught mother who now peered in at her, shrieking, tearing her hair. Again the scream rent the silence, and Pheasant, with sweat starting on her face, sprang up in bed.
She was alone. The electric light shone brightly. Again came the loud peal—not a scream, but the ringing of the doorbell.
She leaped to the floor. The lock of the door had been broken many years. She began to drag at the washstand to barricade it.
Downstairs the sound had also penetrated Vaughan’s stupor. He lurched to the door, which Pheasant had locked behind her, and threw it open. Renny and Piers Whiteoak stood there, their faces like two pale discs against the blackness. Renny at once stepped inside, but Piers remained in the porch.
“Is Pheasant here?” asked Renny.
“Yes.” He eyed them with solemnity.
Renny turned to his brother. “Come in, Piers.”
Vaughan led the way toward the dining room, but Piers stopped at the foot of the stairs.
“Is she upstairs?” he asked in a thick voice, placing one hand on the newel post as though to steady himself.
Vaughan, somewhat sobered by the strangeness of the brothers’ aspect, remembered something.
“Yes, but you’re not going up to her. You’ll let her alone.”
“He won’t hurt her,” said Renny.
“He’s not to go up. I promised her.”
He took the youth’s arm, but Piers wrenched himself away.
“I order you!” shouted Vaughan. “Whose house is this? Whose daughter is she? She’s left you. Very well—let her stay. I want her.”
“She is my wife. I’m going to her.”
“What the hell’s the matter, anyway? I don’t know what it’s all about. She comes here—done up—frightened out of her wits—I remember now. Then you come like a pair of murderers.”
“I must see her.”
“You shall not see her.” Again he clutched Piers’s arm. The two struggled beneath the sinister head of the great moose, under the massive antlers of which their manhood seemed weak and futile.
In a moment Piers had freed himself and was springing up the stairs.
“Come into the dining room, Maurice,” said Renny, “and I’ll tell you what is wrong. Did she tell you nothing?”
Maurice followed him, growling: “A strange way to act in a man’s house at this hour.”
“Did she tell you nothing?” asked Renny, when they were in the dining room.
“I don’t remember what she said.” He picked up the decanter. “Have a drink.”
“No, nor you either.” He took the decanter from his friend and put it in the sideboard, decisively locking the door.
Vaughan regarded the action with dismal whimsicality. “What a to-do,” he said, “because the kids have had a row!”
Renny turned on him savagely. “Good God, Maurice, you don’t call this a row, do you?”
“Well, what’s the trouble, anyway?”
“The trouble is this: that brat of yours has wrecked poor young Piers’s life.”
“The hell she has! Who is the man?”
“His own brother—Eden.”
Vaughan groaned. “Where is he?”
“He made off in the car.”
Books 5-8: Whiteoak Heritage / Whiteoak Brothers / Jalna / Whiteoaks of Jalna Page 86
