CHAPTER VII
THE PORTRAIT OF CICELY
If Janet had needed any further clue to Anthony Crawford's character,she would have had it in the sudden trembling terror of his littleson. She was shaking herself, yet she mustered an outward appearanceof courage for a moment, as she turned to face him squarely and tohear his biting words:
"First the brother, peering over the wall, then the sister, rummagingthrough my house. Did Jasper Peyton send you here to find where I keptthe picture of Cicely Hallowell that he was so reluctant to give up tome?"
"I didn't know it was Cicely Hallowell," returned Janet, trying tospeak steadily. "I didn't even know that she was a real person; Ithought she was just some one in a story."
Then as Crawford stepped nearer, as little Martin gave a sudden squeakof alarm, blind panic took possession of her. She ran toward thestairs and, though the man put out his arm to intercept her, shedodged under it with undignified agility and plunged down the steps.They were of the broad, shallow kind that made her feel, for all herspeed, that she would never reach the bottom, yet she came at lastinto the hall below and out upon the stoop. She fled past Mrs.Crawford, sitting with the sleeping baby across her lap and looking upanxiously, with good cause for misgiving since she had heard herhusband go up the stair.
It was only when she was safely outside the gate that Janet stopped todraw breath, to realize how her knees were trembling and how her heartwas pounding. Yet it stopped suddenly and seemed to miss a beat whenshe realized something further, that she still held in her hand theminiature of Cicely Hallowell.
"Can I go back?" she wondered desperately, but knew instantly that shecould never find courage to do so. She went on, hurrying and stumblingas she made her way down the lane. Only once she ventured to look overher shoulder and saw Anthony Crawford standing on the doorstep staringafter her while the scarecrow that was so vaguely like him seemed tobe lifting its straw-filled arm in a mocking gesture of farewell.
Janet and Oliver held an anxious conference that evening as they saton the terrace, for until that moment they had not been alonetogether. She brought out the miniature and told of the astonishingand disturbing manner in which it had come into her possession, whileOliver wondered, in frank dismay, how it was to be restored to itsowner.
"I can't think how I came to carry it away with me," wailed Janet. "Ofcourse it was clutched tight in my hand and I was so frightened that Ididn't think of anything but getting away. I thought of putting itdown on the grass by the gate, but it is too valuable to risk beinglost like that. And that man will say I stole it. I don't know what todo."
"We shall have to give it back to him," said Oliver firmly. "To-morrowwe will----" but he stopped in the middle of his sentence, unable,even in imagination, to contemplate facing Anthony Crawford and givinghim the miniature.
"Shall we tell Cousin Jasper?" Janet suggested, but Oliver declaredagainst it.
"Anthony Crawford will be quite ready to say that Cousin Jasper sentyou to get it from him. The miniature and the pictures seem to be partof the trouble, though I don't understand why. So if that man comeshere with such an accusation, it would be better for Cousin Jasper tobe able to say he knew nothing about it."
"Yes," assented Janet. "I believe, if he knew, Cousin Jasper would tryto shield us and Anthony Crawford would use it as one more thing tohold over him. I am beginning to understand both of them better.We--we have overlooked a good many things about Cousin Jasper."
It was only a few minutes later that Cousin Jasper joined them, norhad he yet sat down in the long wicker chair that Oliver placed forhim, before Hotchkiss came out with a message.
"John Massey is in the kitchen, sir, and he says to tell you that hewould like to see you about something important."
"Bring him out here," Cousin Jasper directed, and, when the somewhatembarrassed visitor in his worn best clothes appeared upon the terracehe got up with as elaborate courtesy as he would have accorded themost distinguished guest.
"What is it, John?" he asked, for the sunburned farmer was evidentlyan old acquaintance. The other burst out with his news and his errandat once.
"I've been turned off, sir," he said. "Told to leave the farm, with nonotice at all and my crops all in the ground. I'll admit I'm a littlebehind on my rent, but not many landlords around here collect asclosely as Mr. Crawford does; they get all their money at the end ofthe season and don't haggle over it month by month when the farmer hasnothing coming in. And what can you do on land that's never improved?He lets the place run down and then turns me out because I can't makea fortune for him on it. I--I was wondering if you couldn't dosomething for me, sir."
"Do something for you?" echoed Jasper Peyton. "I can't use anyinfluence with Anthony Crawford, if that is what you wish."
"I don't understand it," the man persisted. "Three years ago you weremy landlord and none of us ever had dealings with Anthony Crawfordexcept that we used to know him when he was a boy. The whole bottomland along the river was yours and all your tenants were farming itfor a fair rent and every one was satisfied. But then--he comes, andthe upper half is his, we hear, and it is bad luck for us, as we soonknow. Everything runs down, no one is treated fairly, and here I am,turned off at a word, and all his doing. Couldn't you make room for mefarther down the river somewhere, sir, where the land is yours?"
He looked so red and anxious and unhappy that Janet's heart was fairlywrung for him. His wife was ailing, she knew, the season was backward,and here he stood, facing the loss of all his work and the necessityof beginning all over again. She waited eagerly to hear what offerCousin Jasper would make.
"I--I can't help you, John," he said at last, very slowly and heavily."Even if I made room for you on one of the lower farms, it would onlystir up trouble, and you might wake up some day to find that AnthonyCrawford was your landlord again, after all. I can give you the moneyto pay your rent, if you wish to stay where you are, but that is allthat I can do. There are times when we are none of us free agents, ormasters of our own affairs."
"I don't care to stay on, sir," John Massey returned. "I've had toomany words with Anthony Crawford for things ever to go easy again.I've been patching up the dike with my own spare time, and maybe thefarm has suffered by my doing it; anyway he says so and calls me afool. I thought perhaps you would help me, since I'd been your tenantso long before _he_ came." His voice, dragging with disappointment,trailed lower and lower. "I don't seem to know just where to turn.Well, good night to you, sir." He turned and walked heavily away.
They sat very silent after he was gone. Oliver was leaning against theterrace rail, Janet in her big chair was clenching her hands in herlap, Cousin Jasper, with his hands on the railing, stood in absolutequiet, staring out over the garden. The light of the house camethrough the long windows, falling on his face that was so pale andtired. He had seemed weary and unhappy for some time, but to-night helooked desperate. The minutes passed, but still he stood in silence,staring straight before him.
The sight of his distress seemed more than either of the two couldbear. Oliver could think of nothing to say, but stood dumbly helpless,while Janet moved closer to their cousin and spoke with shyhesitation:
"Couldn't we help you? Won't you tell us what you are thinking?"
"I was only thinking," Cousin Jasper answered very slowly, "I waswondering, as I do sometimes lately, how strangely life can change andtwist itself and make things seem other than they should be. If youhave lived all your years following your own sense of honor, if youhave tried, in everything you do, to be fair and just, how can it be,when the years have passed, that suddenly all the results of honestdealing should be swept away? How can it be that a man who hasdisgraced himself, whose ways are known to be everything that isdevious and unfair, how can he gain power over you, threaten to takefrom you everything that is yours, even say that he can destroy yourgood name? How can every effort you make toward a fair settlement onlyrender matters worse? Is there really something so wrong with theworld that a disho
nest man can work more harm than a man of honor canever undo? Do _you_ think so?" he concluded, turning to regard themfrom under his knitted brows as if he must, in his distress, find someword of reassurance somewhere.
"No," said Oliver emphatically, finding his voice somewhat to his ownsurprise. "I don't think so at all. I believe a man who doesdishonorable things can--can mix you up and make you miserable, but hecan't go on forever. His plans are bound to come to grief in the end."
His halting words carried the real earnestness of conviction. Theyseemed to give Cousin Jasper some sort of comfort, for his facerelaxed, he moved from his tense attitude, and turned to walk up anddown the terrace through the patches of light and shadow that laybetween the windows. Janet thrust a friendly, affectionate hand underhis arm as she walked beside him. It was a hot night, at June's veryhighest tide, with the garden at the summit of its beauty. The Madonnalilies were in bloom, showing ghostly white through the dark, rows andranks and armies of them all up and down the walks and borders,sending sudden ripples of sweetness upward to the terrace whenever thefaint breeze stirred. There was no moon yet, but the stars were thickoverhead, and the moving lanterns of the fireflies glimmered among thetrees, low down still as they always are in the first hours of thedark. Janet was thinking that when the world was so beautiful, it wasdifficult to believe that things could go entirely wrong in it, butshe did not find it possible to put her idea into words. It may havebeen that Cousin Jasper was thinking the same thing as he stopped andstood for a long time at the head of the brick-paved stair leadingdown from the end of the terrace into the garden. At last he began todescend slowly, unable to make out the steps in the dark, so that heput his hand on her shoulder to steady himself. He spoke verysuddenly.
"It is not only in body but in spirit that the old must sometimes leanupon the young," he said, and then, with his voice quite cheerfulagain, began to talk of how well the flowers were doing this year.
Oliver had followed them to the top of the stair and stood above them,listening, but not, apparently, to what Cousin Jasper was saying. Hishead was bent and he was straining every nerve to hear some far-offsound. His face looked troubled, then cleared suddenly as he came downthe steps.
"Cousin Jasper," he said, "didn't I tell you that the gardener wantedyou to know that the night-blooming cereus is open just now? Supposewe walk out to the back of the garden and see it."
His cousin hesitated.
"It is rather late," he answered. "It will be open still to-morrownight."
"Janet has never seen one," persisted Oliver, putting a firm armthrough Cousin Jasper's, "and it might rain or something to-morrownight. She would be so disappointed and so would the gardener."
They went down the last steps together, into the sea of white liliesand drifting fragrance, and disappeared into the darkness toward theback of the garden.
In spite of his insistence, Oliver did not seem so deeply interestedas the others in the plant that was slowly opening its pink flowersthat have so brief and beautiful a season. The gardener, hastilysummoned, came across the lawn to exhibit his favorite plant with thegreatest pride, but Oliver left the others to admire and ask questionsand, in ten minutes, came back alone. Coming upon the terrace again,he saw Hotchkiss, just inside the long window, ushering out a visitorwho was talking in loud, easily recognizable tones.
"No, he doesn't seem to be here," Anthony Crawford was saying, "thoughI didn't believe you, until you let me come in and see for myself. Ihad something of great importance to say to him--and to the girl.Well, I will come again to-morrow."
He passed down the room and must have come very close to the light,for his shadow loomed suddenly, misshapen and bulky, all across thelibrary, even dropping its black length over the terrace outside. Itfollowed him, a striding giant, from window to window and thendwindled suddenly again as Anthony Crawford himself stood under thelight in the doorway giving Hotchkiss final directions.
"Be sure to tell him that I shall be here to-morrow night and that Ishall expect him to be at home," he ordered, then climbed into thecreaking cart and drove away.
Hotchkiss stood peering into the dark after him, evidently sending nogood wishes to speed him homeward. Seeing Oliver coming up the stepsat the far end of the terrace, he walked down to speak to him.
"There was something more than usual wrong to-night," he saidanxiously. "He vowed that he must see Mr. Peyton and didn't want totake my word for it that he was out. It was fortunate that he had goneinto the garden."
"Yes," responded Oliver, "I thought I heard that miserable rattletrapturning in at the gate and I remembered, all of a sudden, that thegardener told me yesterday about the night-blooming cereus. I--Ithought they ought to look at it at once."
Hotchkiss had been nervous and agitated during what must have been astormy interview, and he found this sudden relief too great for thecomposure even of a butler. He burst into a great laugh of delight andslapped his knee in ecstasy.
"That was the way to serve him!" he cried. "To think that pryingscoundrel found some one that was too clever for him, for once."
Oliver grinned broadly, but recovered himself in a moment.
"Hotchkiss," he said with great gravity, "you would never do for themovies."
Janet was eating her breakfast very deliberately next morning,lingering even after Cousin Jasper had left them and while Oliver satback in his chair fidgeting in frank impatience. When her brotherfinally urged her to make haste she broke forth into an explanationthat was almost a wail.
"It is because I can't forget where we have to go to-day," shedeclared. "Oh, why--why did I make such a terrible mistake and carrythat miserable picture away?"
Even Oliver looked none too cheerful at the prospect before them.
"We have to do it," he agreed, "but I think we will go over to theWindy Hill first. I promised Polly's father I would tell him what Isaw from the boat. But after that there will be plenty of time and wewill go to Anthony Crawford's."
"I ought to go alone," Janet said, "for it was I who made the trouble.And shall we tell the Beeman?"
"Not until afterward," replied Oliver. "If there is difficulty aboutthe picture it would be easier if no one were concerned but justourselves. And indeed you won't go alone! We are in this thingtogether."
It had rained in the night so heavily that the clumps of larkspur andmore tender plants were beaten down and only the shower-loving lilieslifted their wet, shining faces above the green. The sky was stillovercast, with threats of another downpour, yet the two put on theirraincoats and set forth undeterred.
"There is an old apple shed in the corner of the orchard where we canleave the car," said Oliver. "Polly showed me, last time, where wecould drive in."
The highway was smooth and wet and the river was perceptibly higherunder the bridge. They pressed onward, up the grass-covered road,drove through the gap in the orchard wall, and felt their way alongthe open lane between the apple trees. The car was finally housed inthe shelter of the shed and Janet and Oliver raced up the hill, forthe first drops of a new shower were just beginning to fall, andPolly, in the doorway of the cottage, was beckoning them to makehaste. The downpour was a sharp one that pattered on the roof, ranstreaming from the eaves, and blotted out the hills opposite. Thegrass and the orchard, however, seemed to grow greener every momentunder the refreshing rain, and the clumps of pink hollyhocks thatcrowded about the doorstep lifted their heads gratefully.
"We can't do much with the bees for an hour or two," observed theBeeman, sitting down in the corner with his pipe. "Now tell me whatyou saw on the river, Oliver. I noticed your sail and knew that youwere out."
Oliver made his report upon the scouring banks while the Beemanlistened and nodded gravely.
"That is something we must look into," he declared. "It is likeAnthony to have let things go. And now, if you have time to wait,suppose we have a story."
They had ample time, they assured him, being only too glad to postponethe errand that must come later. They wer
e eager for another tale,moreover, for they were beginning to realize that these were not merehaphazard narratives, but stories with some definite bearing upon theplaces and people about them.
"We have plenty of time," Oliver assured him. "We are in no hurry atall. You might even make it a very long one."
The Beeman nodded assent with that queer smile that seemed to betrayan uncanny understanding of the whole situation.
"A long one it shall be," he agreed, "for I have a good deal to tellyou."
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