The Wide House

by Taylor Caldwell

  “Oh!” cried Gretchen, pounding clumsily to the windows. “You mustn’t do that! The doctors ordered quiet and darkness!”

  But she stopped, quailing before Janie’s vitriolic green eyes. “You’ll be killing my lad,” she said. “It’s air and light he needs, and he’ll have them while his mother is here.”

  “You are unreasonable, Mother,” said Gretchen, shrinking. “You will make him worse.”

  Laurie, seeing that Angus was about to awaken, said: “If you two don’t stop bickering, you’ll disturb him more than air and light.”

  Angus was moving his head on the pillows, as if in great torment. And then, very sluggishly, he opened his eyes. There was no recognition in their exhausted gray depths as he looked at his sister, sitting quietly beside him. He looked at her with the empty far weariness of a sick child, still held by feverish dreams. She bent towards him. “Angus,” she said gently. “It’s Laurie. Are you a little better now?”

  But he did not reply. He only stared at her immovably, as if trying to see her face through mists. And then, at last, within his eyes there appeared a faint tired sparkle of recognition, and his lips parted on a sigh. He tried to smile. His hand moved. Laurie hesitated. She touched his hand lightly, and smiled at him with brilliance.

  “You are better, I see. We just heard of your sudden illness. But it is not serious, I understand. You must rest.”

  The hand under hers was cold and damp and feeble. She shrank from it. But her rusty pity broke through its barriers and flooded her. She clasped his hand strongly, willing him some of her strength and health. A bird of pain stirred in her cold heart, lifted its wings, fluttered. She felt a smarting about her eyelids, a weakening sadness all through her senses.

  He was trying to speak, moistening his lips, moving them. And then he could only whisper: “That song, Laurie. Dada’s song.”

  The words were simple, and childish, and in her the bird of pain grew to enormous dimensions. She bent closer over him. She murmured: “I sang it for you, Angus.”

  Suddenly, to her surprise, or perhaps not to her surprise, his face darkened, became tight and accusing, and full of bitterness. He withdrew his hand from hers. “It was a cruel thing to do, Laurie,” he said, and his voice was stronger.

  She was silent, watching him. At last she exclaimed: “No! it was not cruel, Angus. I thought I might reach you for the last time. I thought I might reach you, for my sake, too.”

  Janie and Gretchen had approached the bed, and were listening with bewilderment, exchanging perplexed glances, their enmity forgotten. Gretchen said: “You are disturbing him, Laurie.”

  Laurie stood up. She still looked at Angus. There was a flush on her cheeks, and anger in her eyes, but pleading, also. “It’s no use, is it, Angus?” she asked.

  He was silent. He turned his head away from her. Laurie sighed, shrugged. “Let him rest,” she said to her mother. “That is all anyone can do for him.”

  She hesitated. She saw his bleak and lonely profile on the pillows. She wanted to leave him immediately. But some-, thing made her say, with a tremor in her voice: “Angus, have you forgotten me entirely? This is still Laurie, you know.”

  He sighed heavily, but did not turn his head to her. “No,” he said faintly, “it isn’t Laurie.”

  Her mouth hardened, even while her pain devoured her. “It isn’t Angus, either, then,” she said.

  She waited, but he did not speak again. She looked at her mother, and signalled silently. Janie bent over her son and kissed his pallid cheek with her dry rouged lips. He did not make any sign of acknowledgment. The two women left the room together. Immediately, Gretchen drew the draperies over the windows, shut out the air. She tiptoed to her husband’s side again. He seemed to be sleeping.

  CHAPTER 59

  The river ran dark and winy, and with a distant sound, under a far gray sky, dimming and eerie. All the colors of the earth had faded and retreated, so that even the near-by grass, the greening trees, the brown flowerbeds, had an indistinct and shadowy look as if they belonged to a world of dreams or a strange planet. There was no sound of bird or wind, only a curious hollowness of atmosphere in which all echo was swallowed, or seemed muted and obscure. Even Stuart’s white house on its rise of ground retreated to an unreality, and appeared formed of floating mist.

  It was an atmosphere, a scene, which depressed and disquieted Laurie. It reminded her of the dream garden of which Stuart had told her long ago. She and Stuart walked along the shore of the river in a heavy silence they could not for some time break, feeling themselves disembodied, moving in a vacuum over a landscape only faintly formed and likely to dissolve at any moment. They stood for a moment, hand in hand, to watch the river, seeing it but not hearing it except for an obscure dulled murmur, marking how each smooth and glimmering wave slipped into another as if made of soundless glass. The Canadian shore had melted into a drifting gray fog, so that the waters had no visible boundary. Though it was near sunset, there was no glow in the western sky, only a shadowlike purple tint darkening perceptibly.

  They found a large whitish flat stone, and sat upon it. Stuart uneasily lit a cheroot. Laurie watched the smoke idle away into the air hardly less gray and sluggish. Her eyes were tired, fixed on her inner thoughts. But her hand in Stuart’s was the only warm thing in that quiet gloom.

  He said gently: “Long ago I decided it was no use about Angus. You are distressing yourself futilely, my love.”

  She moved restlessly, signed. Her expression became sadder, darker. “It was foolish of me even to try. He changed years ago, and I could do nothing but watch him change. I don’t know what came over me that night. Perhaps,” and she laughed drearily, “it is because I never acknowledge defeat, and thought I might break through to him.”

  She pushed back her hair impatiently, threw up her head, which was bare. Her hair burned, bright yellow, in the dreamlike dusk, but her face was drained of all color. She forgot Stuart, in her gloomy thoughts, and he gazed intently at her heroic profile, all strong clear planes and delicate angles. What a woman was this! He had never known an honest woman before, a woman of strength and purpose and resolution, who could yet be so tender, so sweetly wild and passionate. She made him feel weak and exhausted and irresolute, and he wondered again why she loved him. Was it some delusion that clouded her judgment? He smiled ruefully to himself. No, she was not deluded. She had been quite forthright and blunt at moments, agreeing with him that he had despoiled and muddied his life.

  She will go away soon, he thought, and pray God she will forget me. The unselfish thought gave him a strange strength and courage even when it filled him with pain and desolation. He had nothing for her, could give her nothing, not even freshness or hope. And not even the dubious honor of his name. But surely, he reflected, she will forget me! What am I, compared with those she has known, and will know?

  But it was a humble wonder to him that she had come so far to be with him, that she had moved through shadows to the reality of him. What tenacity! What delusion! Pity mingled with his sorrow and desolation, and he lifted her hand to his lips.

  She smiled at him absently. Her eyes were still dark with restlessness and pain. She was still thinking of Angus.

  She said softly: “He, Angus, and I, used to walk by the river. We always had so much to say to each other. How can I forget him, abandon him? He is part of my child life. He was my friend. We loved each other so. And then he changed. I hated my mother, for influencing him to his destruction. But now I am not so sure. Only a weakling can be turned by another human creature to ruination and despair.”

  With a rare impetuosity, she snatched her fingers from Stuart’s gentle grasp, clenched her hands, and beat them on her knees. She said with a kind of suppressed fierceness: “I don’t know why I sang that song! The reason must have been hidden in my mind, for I obeyed the impulse blindly. I hardly knew whether I would sing it or not. And then I looked up and saw his face, I saw the living corpse he had become, and for the firs
t time in years it seemed terrible to me that it was Angus, my brother—that man sitting there beside that stolid stupid woman, with his life all around him like a heap of dead stones!

  “I could hear my father singing, and I sang with him, to Angus. My father’s hands reached out for Angus, through me. I heard his voice in mine.”

  She was silent, breathing deeply and irregularly. Then she looked up at Stuart, and her eyes were full of sorrow and tears. “It sounds ridiculous, I know. But I saw my father, reaching out for Angus, trying to save him. I—I believe, perhaps, that there are times when the ‘dead’ cry out to others, stretch out their hands to them, through the medium of another’s voice and flesh. I felt this was so, last night, with my father.”

  Stuart placed his big warm hand firmly over one of the cold clenched fists on her knee. He said quietly: “It isn’t ridiculous.” He sighed, and looked over the silently sliding river. “A year or two ago, I dreamt of my mother. She was a poor, good and colorless little creature. I thought she came to me and took me by the hand and drew me out of bed. She said to me: ‘Stuart, you have always believed you had enemies. And perhaps one terrible enemy, in particular. You are right. You have a most frightful enemy. Come with me, through your life, and I will show you his face, so that you may know him and never forget him.’”

  Laurie tried to smile, to speak, and then was silent. Finally, as Stuart said nothing more, but only stared at the darkening river with the most tragic expression, she said: “Yes, Stuart? Did she show you the face of your enemy?”

  He did not look at her, but said only: “Yes. She did. She took me through the most tangled and stinking jungle one can imagine. It was full of snarls and smells and rustlings and pits and creeping vines with horrible red flowers on them. It was night, and there was a crimson moon peering through the choking tops of trees. She finally brought me to a little pool of water in the midst of crawling weeds and stenches, and pointed to it. ‘There is your enemy. Be warned against him in time.’ I looked in the pool and saw my own face.”

  He sighed again, tried to laugh. “She was right, you know. And I do believe she came to me that night.”

  Laurie was very still on the stone on which she sat. She moved restively. All the vitality seemed to have seeped from her, leaving only disquiet behind. She resumed: “So I tried to reach Angus. It was a mistake. I could only give him pain. He hates me now.”

  But Stuart said quickly: “How can you know what you have done for him? Perhaps the time will come when he will understand.” He laughed, wryly. “I, too, worked on Angus, and finally gave up. But perhaps I planted something in his mind which might spring up some day when least expected. At least it is pleasing to my conceit to think so.”

  She took his hand and held it in her smooth palms. He put his other arm about her, and she dropped her head on his shoulder. She began to speak, very softly: “Stuart, when will you be in New York again?”

  The arm about her slackened, but he said with forced lightness: “I don’t know, my darling. Why should I go? The shipments I ordered from France and England have been ‘indefinitely delayed,’ to quote the War Department. As for the cotton shipments from the South, there are none, now. Of course I could accept contraband, but I won’t. I can pay huge prices for illegal stuffs, but I won’t.”

  She said: “But the cotton is manufactured in New England, is it not?”

  “I used to import my own cotton and then ship it to the mills in New England, where it was manufactured in accordance with my own patterns, at a very reasonable price. That is not possible now, of course. Certainly, however, I could buy regular cottons in the usual patterns from the mills, but the price has gone up so enormously that most of my customers could not afford it. The mills are profiteering by this war; I can buy what I wish at a price beyond reason, and gouge my trade in accordance. In fact, I was so cynically advised. Is not the North in a surge of prosperity brought on by this war, while the South starves? But such prosperity, bought with soldiers’ blood and the sweat of underpaid women and children, is not the prosperity I will encourage. I will not deal with such scoundrels.” He laughed, bitterly. “Moreover, they demand cash.”

  Laurie bit her lip. “Are matters bad with you then, Stuart?”

  “Very bad,” he admitted frankly, and with sudden weariness. “I dare not think how bad. I live from day to day now.” He dropped his arm, looked over his shoulder at his house, and a stark expression of hunger and passion stood in his eyes. “If only I keep my house, nothing else will matter.”

  He added: “I cannot pay my bills on time. In some instances I am six months behind. Only the fact that Sam draws hardly a penny from the shops keeps us in business. If the war ends this year, I shall survive. If not—I go under. But, surely, it will end this year!”

  He added: “It must end this year.” His voice was grim.

  “What do you sell, under these circumstances?”

  “I sell what I can. I buy what, and where, I can. Many of my shelves are empty. I have had to discharge almost half my clerks. That was the worst of all. Fortunately many of them enlisted, and others found employment elsewhere. They are not suffering.” He forgot her for an instant, and exclaimed almost with ferocity: “I need five hundred dollars a month! I can’t exist on less. And so I never look at the books these days. If a day passes without ruin, I draw a deep breath, and wait for tomorrow.”

  What a witless way of existing! thought Laurie. She frowned, shrewdly. “Angus, however, knows the books,” she said. “Doubtless he would inform you if you were approaching the danger point.”

  “Doubtless,” he agreed, with relief.

  Doubtless, she repeated to herself, with gloomy and apprehensive irony.

  And then her apprehension sharpened, and she saw Angus’ face. Surely to God Stuart could trust him! Surely he would remember that it was Stuart who had given him his opportunities, had trusted him, extended to him only the deepest kindness, had expended on him a consideration and affection and regard he had never encountered before. She tried to remember that Angus had at least a high sense of honor and integrity, that he never lied or cheated, that his dour religion would restrain him from blackguardly tactics. She shook her head as if in denial, over and over. Janie might have her schemes, but Angus had his rigid integrity. Whatever else had gone from him, surely he had retained that!

  Stuart was speaking again. “Do you remember River Island, Laurie? Sam now tells me he has saved ten thousand dollars. The Island is municipal property, and is up for sale. No one wants it particularly, or has bid for it, except that old spider Allstairs. (My God, do you realize the man is over eighty, and as malignant as ever?) Allstairs thinks it can be developed into farms, though there is the difficulty of transportation. At all events, he has offered seven thousand dollars for it. Sam is offering ten. He hasn’t given up his dream, apparently, and now the stubborn old rascal sees an opportunity of realizing it. He has deprived himself, these last few years, of practically every decency of living in order to save that money. You see, there was another pogrom in Poland about four years ago, and he feels there will be another soon, as soon as it is convenient for the land-owners, and the clergy. He wants to bring over at least four thousand terrified Jews and establish them on the Island.” Stuart paused; his brows drew together. “I can’t forget that if he had not paid some—debts of mine, some obligations, he might have saved those wretched people from death, and torture. I feel—in some way—that I am guilty.” He moved away from her a little. “About a month ago he offered me that money, but I can’t take more blood money from him. I wish to God I’d never taken the other, which, by the way, I have repaid only to the extent of four thousand dollars.”

  He was consumed with vivid misery. He twisted his fingers together, his hands hanging between his knees. Laurie was impatient. She said: “But Sam has never asked you to return the money, Stuart?”

  “No! Of course not! He never would. He was reluctant to accept what I could repay him. And then c
ame the pogroms, and I realized what my stupidity had cost him. He aged ten years in as few days, when the reports came out in the papers. When I cursed myself, to him, he said: ‘If I had not preferred you above anything else, my friend, I would not have given you that money. You must forget it. It is no more than you would have done for me,’” and again Stuart smiled, with bitterness.

  Laurie moistened her lips. She looked steadily before her, and said: “Stuart, let us be honest and reasonable. How much have you expended upon me?”

  He moved away from her with a gesture of outrage and repugnance. She cried, gathering up her force: “Stuart! Don’t look at me like that, as if you were a fool! Did you think I intended to accept your bounty without repaying it—when I could? Am I an object of charity? A disgusting creature without pride or self-respect? It is true you are my kinsman, but the relationship is distant. Do you never wonder whether people don’t ask who assisted me, and why? I assure you these questions have been asked. I informed the inquisitive creatures that I was lent this money, which must be repaid.”

  His nostrils distended, and his expression was violent. She laid her hand on his arm. “I am a rich woman now, Stuart. I demand that you allow me to repay you, or I shall lose my self-respect, my dignity.”

  She laughed, drily: “If I were a man, there would be no question of this between us. It would be understood.”

  He stood up, as if to leave her. She rose, also. “Is your own pride hurt, Stuart?” she asked tauntingly. “If so, consider mine.”

  He tried to speak quietly, but his voice was hoarse: “Laurie, you must not speak of this again. There is more involved than what you know. I will say only this one thing: our words have weakened what self-respect I still possess, what assurance, what mastery of circumstance.” He added, as if violently distraught: “Let me be proud of one thing, at least!”