“Please stop,” she interrupted, dramatically. “Let me see for myself how he is…” Her agitation found vent in correcting Wakefield. He was wiping his fingers on the edge of the tray cloth.
He was sticky, argumentative. Before he was quelled, another knock sounded on the door, this time a quick tattoo, signalling a delicate urgency.
“It’s Baby,” said the singer’s voice. “She’s been crying for you.”
Wakefield flung wide the door. A blonde young woman stood there, holding in her arms a plump infant.
Meg’s face was smoothed into an expression of maternal adoration. Her lips parted in a smile of ineffable sweetness. She held out her arms, her breast becoming a harbour, and received the child. She pressed a long kiss on its flower-petal cheek.
At forty-two she had been made a mother by Vaughan, and he had realized his dream of becoming the father of her child. But their inner selves had not been welded together by the birth. She who had never yearned toward motherhood now became extravagantly maternal, putting him outside the pale of that tender intimacy. Sometimes he found himself with the bewildered feeling of a dog whose own door is closed against it. He loved this child as he had never loved Pheasant, who had been so lonely, so eager for love. Meg had named it Patience. “But why?” he had exclaimed, not liking the name at all. “Patience is my favourite virtue,” she had replied, “and we can call her Patty for short.”
It was an odd thing that while “Mooey,” as he was nicknamed, the child of the boy and girl, Piers and Pheasant, was a serious infant, staring out at the world from under a pucker in his brow, Patty, the child of middle-aged parents, was lively, with inconsequent exuberance. She bounced now on her mother’s lap, kicked out her heels, and showed her four white teeth in a hilarious grin.
Her uncle poked her with his finger. She reached for his red hair. “Ha,” he said, “you young vixen! Look at her, Maurice.”
“Yes. She can give a good pull, too”
Meg turned smiling to Minny Ware. “Don’t go,” she said, graciously. “Sit down, please. I may want you to take Baby again.”
Minny Ware had had no intention of going. The infant had not so longed for the society of its mother as she had longed for the society of men. It was ill going for her when there was a man about and she not bathed in his presence. At this moment of her life it was her hot ambition to capture the master of Jalna. But he had a wary eye on her. She almost feared that he scented her desire.
She sat with crossed knees, watching the family group about the baby. A bright blue smock, very open at the throat, showed her rather thick milk-white neck and full chest. The smock was short, and beneath it were discovered excessively pink knickers, and stockings such as only a London girl would have the courage to wear.
She had, as a matter of fact, been born, not in London, but in a remote part of England, where her father had been rector of a scattered parish. She had rarely known what it was to have two coins to rub together. When her father had died, two years after the close of the War, she and another girl had gone up to London, keen after adventure, strong and fresh as a wind from their native moor. For several years they had earned a precarious living there. They managed to preserve their virtue, and even kept their wild-rose complexions. But life was hard, and after a while they thought of London only as a place from which they longed to escape. Mercifully, the friend had a small legacy left to her, and they decided to go to Canada. A short course was taken at an agricultural college. Armed with this experience, they set out to run a poultry farm in Southern Ontario But they had not sufficient capital to support them while they became accustomed to conditions so different. The seasons were unfavourable; the young chicks died in large numbers from a contagious disease; the turkey poults were even more disappointing, for they succumbed to blackhead. The cost of putting up the poultry houses had been greater than they had expected. Grain was very expensive; food was dear. At the end of two seasons they were stranded, with just enough left to pay their debts. They did this, for they were inherently honest, and turned their thoughts again cityward.
If they had been stenographers, they might easily have got situations. As it was, they tried unsuccessfully to get taken on by the proprietors of small high-class shops, as doctors’ or dentists’ assistants. At long last they got employment as waitresses in a tea shop. A year of this, and Minny Ware’s feet became afflicted. To stand on them all day, to carry heavy trays, was an agony too great. One night she read an advertisement for a “mother’s help” and companion—a Mrs. Vaughan the advertiser. The place was in the country, the child an infant. She longed for the country, and she “loved babies.” She applied for the position by letter in excellent old-country handwriting. She explained that she was the daughter of a clergyman, and had come to Canada to raise poultry. Having failed in that, she felt that nothing would be so congenial to her as a position in charge of a young child. She did not mention her experience as waitress. The fact that she had failed in an undertaking commended her to Maurice. He had always a fellow-feeling for failures. Meg liked the idea of her being the daughter of a parson. Minny Ware had now been with them for five months.
As soon as there was an opportunity, she said in a low tone to Renny: “New York must be great fun.”
“I suppose it is,” he returned. “I wasn’t there for fun. I dare say you would like it. Do you want to go there?”
“Who doesn’t? But do you think they would let me across the line?”
“Not with that London accent, I’m afraid.”
She gave a rich, effortless laugh, which, having passed her lips, left her face round and solemn, like a child’s. She said: “You must teach me how to speak, so they will take me in.”
“Are you so restless, then?” His eyes swept over her, resting on the freckles that accentuated the whiteness of her rather thick nose. “You have looks that are unusual. You’ve got a voice. What are you going to do with them?”
“Exploit them in the States. There’s nothing to keep me here.” Her eyes, of an indeterminate colour, narrow above high cheekbones, looked provocatively into his.
The frustrated torrent of his passion for Alayne turned, for a moment, toward this girl. As he realized this, he felt an intense, inexplicable irritation. He looked beyond Minny Ware to his sister.
“Alayne,” he said, “has come back to look after Eden.” Let Meggie fly into a rage, if she would, before an outsider.
“Alayne come back…” she repeated the words, softly, curling her lip a little.
“Eden begged her to come.”
“She has not much pride, has she?”
“She’s full of pride. She’s too proud to care what you or anyone else thinks.”
“Even you?” Her lip curled again.
Minny Ware looked eagerly from one face to another. Could she make herself a place here?
Renny did not answer, but his eyes warned Meg to be careful.
She sat, winking very fast, as though to keep back tears or temper, her full cheek rested against her closed hand. She was, in truth, blinking before a new idea… If Alayne and Eden were reconciled, so much the better. Let Alayne provide for the poor darling. There was no use in Alayne’s pretending she was poor. Americans always had plenty of money. Eden might be delicate for a long time. And if he—if Alayne fancied that he were not going to recover—that she could capture Renny through Eden’s death—she would find how mistaken she was!
In any case Renny must be protected from Alayne. There was only one way by which he could be protected. A wife. And here, at hand, was Minny Ware. Meg’s perceptions, slow but penetrating, left no doubt in her mind that Alayne loved Renny—that Renny was intensely aware of Alayne. Very different this controlled awareness from the calculated passion and abrupt endings of his affairs with other women, which Meg had sensed rather than observed. Affairs which her stolid pride had made her overlook.
She absorbed the picture of Renny and Minny Ware side by side. Should she, she asked hersel
f, be willing to see them so attached for the rest of their days? Her heart’s answer was in the affirmative. Though she was ready to find fault with Minny—for being careless, for making up too readily to Pheasant—it was certain that Minny was the one woman she would be willing to accept as a sister. She knew already what it was to hate two women married to her brothers. From the first, Minny’s lavish light-heartedness, her physical exuberance, her good temper under correction, her willingness to be at another’s beck and call, had caused Meg to look on her with favour, even an approaching affection.
Could Renny have a wife better suited to him? People would say that he had married beneath him. That prospect did not trouble Meg. It was her opinion that, no matter where a Whiteoak should seek his mate, the fact that he married her placed her above questioning. And, whatever Minny had been forced to do, the fact remained that she was the daughter of a clergyman, and had been nicely reared. Even though her skirts were too short and her stockings strange— well, life in post-war London was doubtless strange. She had rebuked Minny for the flamboyancy of her clothes, but the girl had been adamant. She had said, in effect, that, if Mrs. Vaughan did not like her clothes, she would go. She could not dress soberly to fit her situation. It would break her spirit.
To understand Meg Vaughan, it must be remembered that she had led a life of extraordinary isolation. She had been educated by governesses. She had made no friends. Her brothers, her elderly uncles, her grandmother, had sufficiently filled her life. During the long years of her estrangement from Maurice, she had acquired a taste for solitude. Those long hours in her chamber—what did she do with them? Brush her long hair that showed a feather of grey above the forehead? Eat comforting little lunches? Dream, with her head supported on her short plump forearm? In winter three weeks would pass in which she would not set foot out of doors except to go to church.
Now here she was, with a husband and a baby, and a companion whom she desired to marry to her favourite brother. She was as comfortable as a plump rabbit in its burrow. She longed to secure Renny in a peace as nearly approaching hers as was possible to his turbulent nature. One’s mate must not matter too much, if one were a Whiteoak. Maurice did not; Minny would not. One’s children mattered terribly. Her breast rose in a heavy sweet breath when she thought of Baby.
Meg did not know what it was to be socially ambitious. How could she, since they were the most important people thereabout? She did not take into account rich manufacturers or merchants who had built imposing residences only a few miles away on the lakeshore. She had not changed the position of a piece of furniture since she had come to Vaughanlands.
During the rest of Renny’s stay she was sweetly, solidly acquiescent toward him. He left thinking how perfect she was. In Maurice’s stable, looking over a new mare from the West, he told Maurice that Meggie was perfect, and Maurice agreed.
When the two women were alone, Minny Ware exclaimed: “Let me brew a fresh pot of tea. They spoiled your little lunch.”
“Do,” said Meggie. “We’ll have it together.”
They looked into each other’s eyes and smiled. Then Minny’s eyes filled with tears. She snatched up the infant and kissed it extravagantly.
XVI
WOODLAND MEETINGS
EDEN was pathetic. He was like a capricious child, weak and tyrannical. He could not in those first weeks bear Alayne out of his sight. There was so much to be done for him that only she could do to his satisfaction. The young Scotch girl came every day to help; their meals were carried to them in covered dishes by Rags, from the house. But Alayne must move his hammock from place to place, following the sun; she must make his eggnogs, his sherry jelly, read to him, sit with him at night by the hour when he could not sleep, encourage and restrain him. Like a child, he was sweetly humble on occasion. He would catch her skirt, hold it, and say, brokenly: “I don’t deserve it. You should have left me to die”; or, “If I get better, Alayne, I wonder if you could love me.”
She was endlessly patient with him, but her love was dead, as his was, in truth, for her. A tranquillity, born of the knowledge that all was over between them, gave them assurance. The mind of each was free to explore its own depths, to see its own reflection in the lucent pool of summer. Eden, with his invincible desire for beauty, read poems in the opening scroll of violets, tiny orchids, hooked fern fronds that covered the woodland. He read them in the interlacing pattern of leaves, branches, the shadows of flying birds.
In all these Alayne read passion. She thought only of Renny
She had seen little of him, and then only in the presence of Eden or others of the family She had several times taken tea with old Mrs. Whiteoak and Augusta. On all occasions the talk was of Eden’s health. He was improving. Almost from the first Alayne had been convinced that his illness was not to be fatal. He was responding to rest and good food. She could imagine his life in New York. But how weak he was! Once, adventuring across the orchard path to the edge of the paddock to watch a group of romping, long-legged foals, he had met Piers. Piers, sturdy and sunburnt in the sunlight. There had passed no word, but a look from Piers, and a forward movement that had shocked the sap from Eden’s legs.
He had tottered back through the orchard, and flung himself on his bed. After a while he had muttered: “I met brother Piers. God, what a look! There was murder in it. To think I’d let him see I was afraid of him!” He did not venture that way again.
Alayne brooded on this meeting for a little, and she felt angry at Piers. But her thoughts, like strong, cruel birds, flew back to Renny. Yet her care was for Eden. She wished there were more sunshine for him. June was windless, and sometimes they felt suffocated under the lush greenness that enclosed them. Fiddler’s Hut was half hidden by a twisted creeper that shadowed the small-paned windows. It seemed impossible to keep Eden in the sunlight for more than half an hour without the necessity of moving him. Even the path that wound from the door across the little clearing was bordered by such a growth of fern and bracken that an adventurer along it was certain of wet knees. Here summer not only was born and flourished, but seethed with life. Each morning was fresh and lucent, as though the first morning on earth. The jewelled leaves of the wild grape and bracken scarcely dried before another dew.
Weeks ago she had asked Renny if something might not be done to let in air and sunshine. Nothing had yet been done. Enough that he had brought Eden back to Jalna. It would require effort to rouse him to further action. The family now took it for granted that Eden would recover.
She had left him in a comfortable chair, a glass of milk at his elbow, a book in his hand. A splash of sunlight, of a richness suggesting autumn rather than June, gave the effect of his being a figure in a tableau, as she looked back. This effect was heightened by the pensive immobility of his attitude, and by the, one might almost think, conscious pose of his hands and beautifully modelled head. She had come near to touching his hair in a passing caress, as she had left. She was glad now that she had not. She went down the moist path, past the spring, overgrown with wild honeysuckle, and followed it swiftly, as it rose into the wood.
She must have exercise. Her muscles were aching for movement. In walking she discovered that these weeks had brought fresh physical strength to her. She distended her breast and drew deep breaths. This was her first walk since she had come to Jalna.
A bridle path, smooth with pine needles, lay through the wood. On each side of it, raising waxen bells to the light, clustered frail lilies of the valley. A clump of poplar saplings, looking pale and lost against the thick trunks of the pines, were covered by silvery unfolding leaves, as though a flock of wan butterflies had settled there. High in the pines she heard the plaintive notes of a mourning dove. Here and there rose the towering pallid bole of a silver birch, shining as though from an inner light.
The notes of the mourning dove were drowned by the rapid thudding of a horse’s hoofs. Alayne drew out of sight behind a massive, moss-grown trunk. She peered out to see who the rider might be. It
was Pheasant, riding bare-headed astride a slender Western pony. They passed in a flash— padding hoofs, flying mane, great shining eyes, and, above, little white face and tumbled dark hair. Alayne called her name, but the girl did not hear, and in a moment was gone beyond a curve.
It was Alayne’s first glimpse of Pheasant since her return. She felt a quick out-going of warmth toward her. Poor wild, sweet Pheasant, married so young to Piers! If she had not known her, she would have taken that flying figure on horseback for a boy.
The bridle path emerged from the pine wood. Irrelevantly appeared a field planted with potatoes. The potato plants, lusty and strong, in flower, compact in the midst of the woodland, were not unlovely. Neither was the bent old man, Piers’s labourer, unlovely in his blue shirt, in his attitude of patient hoeing.
She followed the path, now in the full blaze of sunshine. The woods about were no longer pine, but oaks and birch and maple. In every hollow were gay gatherings of wood lilies, white and purplish pink, and through all the trees sounded the ring of bird song. An oriole flashed. She caught the blue of a jay’s swift wing and thought she saw, but was not sure, a scarlet tanager. Then again came the hoofbeats. Pheasant was returning. Alayne trembled, looking down on the path, where in the dust lay the little hoofprints.
Pheasant was beside her. She had leaped from her horse. His breathing sounded, quick and passionate. His velvet nose was introduced between the faces of the two girls.
“Pheasant!”
“Alayne!”
Their eyes embraced, their hands touched; they wavered, laughing, then kissed. The horse, puzzled, flung back his head, shaking his bridle.
“Let’s sit down in the wood,” cried Pheasant. “How splendid our meeting like this! Away from all the family, you know. Those people. Well, we’re different, after all, you and I. We can’t talk just the same, be ourselves, when they’re all about us.” And she added, quaintly: “I think you’re noble, Alayne! But how can I tell you what I think? I’ll never forget how beautiful you were to me. And now you’ve come back to nurse Eden!”
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 230
