The trouble in Thor

by Armstrong Charlotte

  "They might as well," said Madeline bluntly.

  There was an atmosphere of shock between the two women, Madeline's shock at Eedie's hope; Eedie's shock that the other dared say she had none.

  Cyril interposed hastily. "I must get my sister home. She hardly knows . . . She's exhausted."

  "I'm sorry," said Madeline, wildly. "I never say anything right." She fell back and covered her face.

  "Poor lady," said Eedie gently. "Yes, take 'er 'ome, do. That's best. But there's a thing I want to say to you, Mr. Varker, if you'll take one minute."

  "Yes?"

  Cyril himself was full of nervous resentment. He thought if there had been no more taps on that damned pipe the whole population might have found sopie peace in a finality. But now he realized one could not even assume it was probably all over. Looking at Eedie Trezona, he knew it only began again.

  "I've been thinking," said Eedie, softly, as if she did not wish to disturb poor crumpled Madeline. "And I see now, 'tisn't right."

  "What?" He wheeled his attention to her words.

  "You loaned the money in good faith, Mr. Varker. And he made 'is promise. Rightfully, you should 'ave it. So 'is fayther will pay the boy's debt, Mr. Varker. 'E would w^ish to."

  Cyril was shocked.

  " 'Twas good of you," Eedie went on, cheeks pink, "to say if 'e's gone 'twill be canceled. But 'tisn't right." She nodded.

  He licked his lip. He said carefully, "Mrs. Trezona, I thought that the boy's father did not know about this."

  She said, "I can tell 'im, you see, for I was told."

  "You know how he . . . what the money was for?"

  "Yes," she said. " 'E told me all that."

  Cyril was quite well aware that the captain's fierce and narrow views existed and he knew they had force and pressure on his family. He knew how Wesley had feared them. He had thought this woman feared them, too.

  He said, "But it isn't necessar}". I wish you wouldn't. I'd much rather let it go." His fist hit the steering wheel.

  Eedie said warmly, "Oh no, Mr. Varker, 'tisn't right for you who 'elped the boy in 'is trouble, to lose by it."

  And Cyril saw that her eyes were soft and bright with gratitude toward him.

  He looked away and gnawed his lip. "But if the boy comes out alive," he blurted, "what then?"

  "Then it's 'is own business," slie said less vigorously. "Yours and 'is own, 'ow 'e'll pay it back. And I'd say naught without 'is leave." She straightened. "But you will surely 'ave it,. Mr. Varker, and the interest as was promised." She smiled and nodded.

  "Thank you," said Cyril blankly and then angrily. "Thank you, I'm sure." He put the car in motion.

  Eedie watched it go. Her hands came together. She hoped that in this matter she had truly understood Him.

  Cyril, rattling down the hill, heard his sister fall into hopeless, dreary weeping. But he was not thinking of her now. He thought: That old Cousin Jack is shrewd enough to understand, if his wife does not, just what kind of deal this was. He won't fall all over himself to thank me any. Oh, he'll pay, to the last penny. But if that boy is gone, Fm gone from this town.

  He didn't like it. He didn't see what he could do about it. In the back of his head moved a loveless conviction that it was stupid to fret, for something's will was going to be done and it probably was not Cyril's. His shoulders twitched. Wait and see, then, he thought glumly.

  "Ma—"

  "Darithy?"

  Dorothy was sitting at the dining-room table, her narrow blonde head bowed. "Ma, I was thinking."

  "Sssh," said Mrs. Combes. She was a friend who had come, a woman Eedie's age, plump and kind. But she sat.

  And because she was a visitor and sat, the women of the house must, for some obscure compelhng reason, sit too.

  "Eh Darithy?" Eedie sank down on the black couch. She was thinking of Pa.

  "Don't wake your brother," Mrs. Combes warned. "Poor lad." Dick was already asleep on Eedie's bed in the downstairs bedroom.

  But Dorothy sat, fingernail drawing lines on the cloth. "If it fell on them again," said Dorothy, "surely they're hurt. Ma? How could . . . ?"

  Eedie could feel the girl's gaze come up. She ought to meet it. But with all her heart she felt this kind of talk to be wrong. "If Wesley's 'urt," she murmured, "why 'e must bear it."

  The girl's whole face quivered. "Maybe he's one that's not alive?"

  "I said to 'er," murmured Mrs. Combes piously, "there's no pain then."

  Eedie's blue eyes shot a spark. " 'E wants to live" she said sharply. "Don't forget tliat! It's not for us to judge. Never, for no reason."

  "Ma?"

  (Too hard, too hard, for the child.)

  "I'm not going to sit 'ere," snapped Eedie, "and talk about 'is aches and pains. Wesley can bear that, as well as you or I or better. For I'm not stone and I'm in pain, let me tell you. I'm tired to my bones and my 'ead's aching fit to break open."

  "Oh Ma, put your feet up." The girl flew into motion. "Let me take your shoes off. It's so hot. Let me get a bit of ice in a towel."

  "Tea!" cried Mrs. Combes and jumped up.

  The cold cloth came wetly down on Eedie's forehead.

  "Ma, can I rub your neck?"

  "Rub it, do," said Eedie sighing, "and down my back, Darithy, for it aches to my waist." She turned on her side and closed her eyes. "Ah, there, Darithy."

  (Something to do. Lord. Give her something to do.)

  "Where do you keep sugar?" Mrs, Combes was calling.

  "Blue can."

  "Will she take a piece of bread?"

  "Ma?"

  "If 'twere toasted," said Eedie. Her lashes stirred.

  "Mrs. Combes, you'll find bread . . . Wait, I'll show you.

  Eedie caught the slipping towel and pulled it down over her eyes. She could hear whispering. Loving excuses for Eedie's weakness. Loving plots for her comfort.

  Well then, she must make her mouth droop and not smile from old habit over the good, busy girl.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The struggle began again. Now, because young Fred Davies had seen something and felt something, although he did not go about deliberately telling it to everyone, his feeling became known. It got around.

  It was told and corroborated. Men were enabled to see what he had seen. So much he added to the story.

  People were touched and enlarged and encouraged by the rumor of a strong man, who met defeat head on and strode over it and began again. So Captain Trezona grew in the story and became a symbol of men against black odds.

  Those who went on working under his direction were spurred and stimulated and filled with hard pride. A setback was magically changed into an opportunity. The rescuers were cheerful.

  On the surface the hot day declined to a stifling twilight. No breeze lifted the blanket of heated air that wrapped the town close. There was something mean and cruel in the weather as if the malignant sun hid over the horizon and sent dark blind feelers back. It would not let the town go,

  Down at the corner where the arc lights bloomed, three disconsolate youths stood hunched and, from time to time, looked over their shoulders or up into the sky as if they feared something watched them accusingly. They did not stand here long. No girls came by.

  Cyril sat in his castle, on his throne, and surveyed his kingdom. It soothed him to put down the figures and add the sums and consider the money. He was glad to be alone.

  His sister, Madeline, in a loose gown, roamed the hot little downstairs rooms. The mass of her hair was hot and heavy on her head. She took it down and combed it and swept it

  up. She was glad to be alone. It was good to be by herself and no need to think how she looked.

  But she needed to show someone how she could look, to obliterate a false scene, retrieve something lost.

  She told herself now that there was no real hope for Arthur, whatever people like Mrs. Trezona chose to pretend.

  Oh, Arthur would never come back. Face it, she thought, and she wept for him. Tears s
queezed from her eyes. Cyril was wrong. Of course she wept for him, poor Arthur. She had been very fond, very fond, somehow. He had loved her. Of course it had come into her mind what the world would look like if he died. She wagered it had come into the mind of every wife or woman whose man was in this thing. Why it would! It must! There was nothing so wrong just in imagining.

  Cyril was heartless. It wouldn't occur to him that the heart could be fond, while the head saw the consequences.

  Cyril was cruel. He liked to wound and to harry people. But she knew he was smart, smarter than she, or more sensitive. He often saw things and prophesied correctly. Now she went over and over in her mind the words she had said to Henry Duncane. The way she had said them.

  Of course a heart that was fond would think of pain, and hope there was no pain for another. There was nothing so wrong in what she had said. Or how she'd said it. Anyhow, she'd been distracted. Out of her mind with anxiety. Cyril had nearly said so.

  To cover up? Had there been need to cover up?

  She took her thumb from her teeth and looked at it. The thumbnail had been stripped down to the quick. Well, naturally. Of course she worried. Everyone did. If her anxieties were a little different and a little more complicated, so was she!

  If she could only see Henry Duncane for two minutes! He had not thought anything wrong. She could tell in two minutes. She had not given a wrong impression. How could she? For nothing she had thought or felt was really bad.

  She remembered her spell over Henry was just the quality of being forthright, and ruthlessly so. Bold and clearheaded. What if she were to say to him . . .

  (Now she saw herself, the pure hne of her face, the candid simphcit)' of her gaze, hfted.) "If Arthur dies down there," (her voice would be low, musical and sad.) "I'm sorr' for his sake. But for mine ... he was a violent man and I . . ."

  No, no.

  Anyhow, she did not feel so, no matter what Cyril said.

  She felt . . .

  Why she wept for him! It was terrible, terrible! She had not wanted to get away from Arthur in this fashion. Not her fault the rocks fell down.

  If she could only see Henry for one minute, somewhere alone where meanings needn't be double. Alone. But there was no way to manage it. She could not go to his house. That was impossible, and he had forbidden it, besides.

  He would never come here.

  Unless, when the news came, finally, he came to condole. She dreamed awhile.

  But he might not come. She wasn't absolutely sure that he would come.

  Wait and see, she supposed drearily. Wait and wait, and months later, and she a widow. . . .

  One minute, tonight, and she would know where she was. She didn't know where she was, and it was intolerable!

  So hot! She brushed up her hair from her ears with both hands and went to the door. Dark on the porch. She slipped out. No breeze. No stars. The sky was low. This heat after dark was abnormal. She lifted the pure lines of her face and her lovely eyes rolled up.

  There might be a storm brewing.

  In a minute she felt sure of it.

  She went softly upstairs and got her raincoat, she brought it down softly and hid it behind the kitchen door.

  A storm? A lightning storm! It meant, to Madeline, a chance, a hope. Something might happen that she could seize upon for her own purposes.

  Libby Duncane was disappointed to be able to sit at table for their late supper. It was late because Henr}' was late. When he came in finally he was surprised that they had waited for him.

  Libby still wasn't hungry. She didn't want to talk—especially not about how she was feeling. She was impatient, and already very tired, and it seemed to her that the afternoon had been days long, the night would never come and never end, this baby was never going to be born, it would never leave her. She longed to get on with the ordeal, get into it, and get it over.

  She felt as if she had fooled the whole household, that had waited with her all day, to be able to sit to supper. It was anticlimax. It was shabby of her to have held so much attention under false pretenses.

  But Mrs. Trestrial would not leave her. She said her hired girl, Ethel, could manage. She had given instructions over the phone. Her young men must make do with a cold supper.

  Henr)^ seemed tired. He was taciturn. "Hot night." He eyed the soup.

  "Miz Duncane, taste the soup, child. Yes, 'tis 'ot." Mrs. Trestrial's curls quivered. "Getting on, Mr. Duncane, are they? Up to the mine?"

  The story had reached them, the collapse of the rescuers' first effort, the deaths and sun'ivals, and the brave new beginning, Libby had heard it all filtered through Mrs. Trestrial's way of telling it which was bald and calm.

  "I mind when Gideon Trezona was a youngish man," said his cousin now. " 'E was that stubborn. Or so 'is Ma called 'im. My Auntie Bess—old Miz Trezona, that was— she was the stubborn one in that lot. My—a terror, I'll tell you! Ah, she's gone now. Seven boys, she 'ad, and Gideon the one in the middle. 'Twas a lovin' family. Strict, she was, but lovin' always." Mrs. Trestrial sucked soup.

  Celestina came in with the chops too soon. Her face was beaded and wan.

  "It's so hot," said Libby. Her eyes hcked around at the windows. "Henry, are you going back to the mine?"

  "Not tonight," he said quickly. "Nothing for me to do there."

  "They'll 'ave 'em out before mornin'," said Mrs. Trestrial, her shrewd eye on Celestina. "We'll 'ear soon enough. No

  need to try pushin' 'em from 'ere. They be pushin'! I mind, one time . . ." She told a tale of a disaster.

  It was like reading history, Libby thought. It comforted. This was not the only time that men had been in trouble. Nor am I, she said to herself, the only woman who ever had a baby in thunder, lightning, and in rain. For, all of a sudden, she was perfectly sure that there was going to be a dreadful storm. I would, she thought with some amusement, with a faint relish for coming drama.

  The storm, however, held off. The house was hot. The evening was cruel. Henr)' watched her. Mrs. Trestrial watched her. Celestina, when she had a chance, watched out of her dark sly eyes.

  About nine o'clock Libby was standing in her bedroom showing Mrs, Trestrial some baby clothes—for the sake of motion, any kind of motion—when something took hold of her body and shook her. She was held in a great invisible paw that would do what it intended to do with her, now. No effort of hers was required whatsoever.

  She said, with a sensation of delight, "Oh. Is that how it really begins?"

  Mrs. Trestrial said, baldly, "Yes. Tis."

  "Oh, I see! But it's so surprising! But that's not me doing anything!"

  "Certain not," Mrs. Trestrial bridled. "You wasn't thinkin' you would 'ave to see to the Lord's work, single 'anded, was you? 'E's about, child. 'E'll attend to it."

  "Well!" said Libby Duncane. She thought: I must write to Mother, it's the funniest thing. . . .

  She heard Mrs. Trestrial at the phone calling the doctor. Henry came in. It was a strange and awkward moment. They seemed to have absolutely nothing to say to each other.

  Thunder said, Remember me?

  Libby spoke first. "Henry, it's going to storm. You know it is. And the lights will go out, of course. Tliey always do. So you'd better fetch a lot of candles."

  "Just you run across street and fetch mv kerosene lamps," said Mrs. Trestrial behind him briskly. "My young men can sit in the dark tonight. Doctor's coming in about ten o'clock, child."

  "Thank you," said Libby affectionately. Now she felt keyed-up and as pleased as a prima donna moving into her spotlight. "Go get the lamps, Henry, for goodness sakes. There isn't another thing that you can do."

  His look became unfathomable as he ducked away.

  Libby waited for the big paw to clutch her again.

  Mrs. Trestrial said, "Walk about, do. We'll 'ave a baby in the 'ouse, before mornin'."

  Now she went to draw the shades and transform Libby's bedroom into a fortress against the weather. Now it was battened dowTi, cozied in.r />
  Henry came hurrying back with the lamps, brushing raindrops from his shoulder. Now Libby shuddered again in the grasp of the powerful thing that was attending to its mysterious business. She saw his face.

  "Oh, Henry, don't watch me!" she cried. "Go away, please. Because," she said with her jaw hard, "if this gets bad and I feel like screaming, I'm darn well going to scream."

  His look was funny. He doesn't understand, she thought. This is just necessary. It's all arranged.

  "Go and read or something," she said crossly. "This is my job."

  "All right/' said Henry meekly.

  She thought: now, he thinks I'm being brave but it isn't that. It's only necessary.

  Thunder rolled over the roof. She thought of something else. "And Henry, listen. If the phone rings for you, and it probably will—it always does—you just go. I'll have the doctor and Mrs. Trestrial, who know what to do . . ."

  His lips opened. She was unreasonably annoyed that he should think her remarkably thoughtful of him in these circumstances. It was simply easier to make the matter clear right now. "After all," she snapped, "the baby's going to get born whether you're in the house or not, you know."

  "Well, I guess so," he said meekly.

  She cocked her tousled head. She thought, I must sound like a shrew, and I must look a perfect fright, and I don't care. But she said, half-apologetically, "Don't I sound bossy?"

  "You sure do," said Henry meekly. The blinds were glowing. The thunder cracked. "Close," he said, watching her.

  He didn't seem to know. The storm and the thing that had her now were all the same.

  "She'll be fine," said Mrs. Trestrial, coming in with things on her arm, "Now—"

  Henry put up his hands. "All right, I'm getting out." He grinned. (But she thought his eyes did not.) "I'll be in the sitting room."

  Libby thought with grim pleasure, I don't believe he knows what to make of all this.

  The storm rolled over the town and the rain drummed down slashing the hot dust. Lightning rived the thick air and cool currents threaded through.