“It’s a nice cool morning,” he remarked.
“Yes. It’s lovely. How’s the leg?”
“Better, but she’s fussy, like all females.”
“That’s a lie, Scotchmere. She’s not half so fussy as you are — or her master either. Has he come yet?”
“Yes. He’s in the little room next the harness room. He’s fitting up an office for himself there. I guess he wants some place where he can be private from his family when he likes.”
As they spoke Renny appeared at the end of the passage. The mare whickered and made as though to withdraw her hoof from Scotch-mere’s knees.
“Whoa!” he shouted.
Between her delight at seeing Renny, whose favourite she was, and her distaste for the smell of the ointment, the mare uncovered her big teeth in a monstrous grimace.
“Whoa!” cried Scotchmere again, and smacked her on her drum-like belly.
Renny nodded to Chris and squatted beside the groom, their two heads, grizzled and red, close together. The mare muzzled the red in a rough caress.
“Well, I must get to work.” Chris moved to the last loose box and ran her eye over Launceton, her especial care.
“It’s about time,” grumbled Scotchmere. “She’s wasted half an hour already. That brother of hers let off a stream of cursing because Jerry has a few oats in him. He wants a sheep to ride. What do you think of this here leg?”
Renny fingered it tenderly. “It’s fine.”
While he held the mare’s fetlock he listened to the pleasant sounds of the stable. He felt singularly happy. He realized this morning, as he had not realized before, that the war was over. There would be peace, he thought, for the rest of his life. Things were going better at Jalna. He was fitting into his new niche. There was less friction between him and his family.
Coming suddenly on Chris Cummings had sent a new excitement through his nerves. He went to the loose box and looked in. She was bent over, grooming Launceton, her slim body moving beside the reposeful bulk of his like a reed against a rock. As she heard Renny’s approach she worked with even more energy.
Scotchmere, who had followed Renny, exclaimed angrily — “Are you wanting exercise, Mrs. Cummings? That there horse has been groomed already.”
“Who groomed him?” she asked, without looking up.
“I did.”
“Well, all I can say is, you’ve left a hell of a lot of dust in him…. Look at it.”
An aura of dust was indeed surrounding both the horse and her.
“You can always get dust out of a horse’s hide,” Scotchmere declared furiously.
“You bet I can when I come after you.”
“If you was a boy I’d have something to say to you.”
“If you were a man you’d get out of my way and let me finish my work.”
“I’ll stay here as long as I like.”
“All right — if your boss doesn’t mind paying you for wasted time.”
With a furious look the groom shuffled off, his thin bow-legs bending under him. Chris grinned at Renny as she saddled and bridled the horse. Renny remarked:
“He looks fit.”
“He is. I believe he’s a winner. He has the best set of pegs I’ve ever seen.”
“And what shoulders!”
They stared absorbed at the horse so charged with quiescent energy. His great eyes mirrored their figures in a look less of curiosity than of noble interest.
“He’s a superior being,” observed Renny.
“He’s rather like you.”
Renny gave an embarrassed grin. He passed his hand over the horse’s flank.
“Now, I’m wasting my time!” she exclaimed. There was a nervous tension in her voice. She hooked her arm through the bridle and began to walk towards the door. Renny followed her.
“Why are you in such a hurry?”
“It will be hot later on.”
In the paddock they found that Eden had mounted the two-year-old. Dayborn was nursing an elbow. “I’ve had a nasty tumble,” he muttered.
“Your brother said he’d carry on for a bit.”
Renny frowned. “He doesn’t know how to school a hunter.”
“That one is as cantankerous as the devil.”
There was more hilarity than skill in Eden’s handling of the colt who did not approve of the change of riders. His ears were laid back and his tail held tight down. He was going to buck. He began. The violent intermingling of the lines of his powerful body with those of the youth, the distortion of the kicks and the momentary return to immobility while a new series of bucks was generating, held the eyes of the onlookers in fascination. Tod stared between the palings, a dandelion in his mouth.
Eden was on his back on the ground. The horse galloped down the paddock, a stableboy running after him.
“How do you like it?” called out Dayborn as Eden picked himself up and came toward them.
“Fine.” His eyes were sparkling. “What do you suppose, Renny? I’ve had a poem accepted by an American magazine! That’s why I wanted Pegasus under me!”
“A poem? Are they going to print it?”
“Print it! Why, they’ve sent me twenty-five dollars.”
“Well, that’s good,” said Renny, but his heartiness carried no conviction. He hoped the boy was not going to be a queer egg. “I didn’t know that you sent poetry about?”
“I wouldn’t tell you till I had a success.”
“Better read us the poem,” put in Scotchmere. “I’ll bet it don’t rhyme.”
“Is that baby allowed to eat dandelions?” interrupted Renny.
“Not till it’s in print,” answered Eden. He passed his hand over his bright tumbled hair of a gold that had a greenish cast. “Well, I’m off,” he added. He picked up his coat, vaulted over the palings, and walked quickly along the path toward the cherry orchard.
No one had replied to Renny’s question. He picked up Tod, put a finger in his mouth and extracted the dandelion. The stableboy led up the hunter.
“I’ll have a go at him,” said Chris, seeing how pale Dayborn was. She opened the gate into the paddock and went in.
“All these changes are damned bad for him,” repeated Renny. Then to Tod — “If you eat dandelions I shall put you over the fence among the horses.”
“Gee-gee,” Tod chuckled and filled his hands with earth.
“I’ll be all right in a few minutes,” said Dayborn.
“Come into my office and have a drink.” Renny felt a boyish pleasure in speaking of his office though not till today was it ready for use.
They waited, however, to see Chris ride the colt. The boy held him. The groom helped her to mount. He stood docile a space, then began to buck.
“Ah, he’s an ugly brute,” observed Scotchmere. “You’ll never get a decent price for him, sir.”
Chris hit the colt with her crop. There was a struggle — a contest of bucking and reprisal. Suddenly he flew into a grand gallop. She looked thin as a spider on his back. Round and round the field they flew. He seemed magically to be in good humour. She put him over a hurdle. Then another. Then over a thick high fence.
“Hurrah!” cried Scotchmere. “She can ride! I take off my hat to her.”
They stood watching, Tod with his mouth full of dandelions, Launceton calmly awaiting his turn.
“You ought to be proud of your sister,” Renny said to Dayborn as they went toward the office.
“I am. She can ride anything. The colt will make a fine hunter. As to Launceton — if he goes on the way he’s begun — he’ll be fit for the Grand National.”
“God!” exclaimed Renny, his heart in his voice. “If only I could win that.”
In the office he took a bottle of Scotch from a cupboard and offered Dayborn a drink. “How do you like my office?” he asked.
“Very much. It looks businesslike.”
“See this desk? I bought it second-hand.” He opened and shut the various drawers. “Here I shall keep pedigrees, recor
ds of sales and accounts. How do you like my pictures?” He indicated a number of coloured lithographs of horses.
“They’re fine.”
“They belonged to my father.”
He sat down in the swivel chair, turning it slightly as he sipped his whiskey and water.
Dayborn said abruptly — “Mr. Whiteoak, I wonder if you know that an affair is going on between your young brother and Mrs. Stroud?”
Renny stared.
“I know it’s none of my business,” added Dayborn.
“Do you mean Eden?”
“Yes…. And Mrs. Stroud.”
“That — woman? It’s impossible.”
“Impossible? They’re male and female.”
“She’s old enough to be his mother! An affair? What sort of affair?”
“He’s always there. I hate to tell of it. But there’s gossip. I thought you ought to know. One day, for instance, I went to her door. No one answered my knock. I could hear voices. Then I saw him leave the house by the back door. I was talking to her a bit later and she asked me if I had seen him recently. She said she guessed he was studying hard and not going anywhere. Another time I was up with the kid and I saw Eden leaving the house. It was past midnight.”
Renny ruefully bit his thumb. He did not want to hear disturbing things about Eden. He was getting on better with him. He was getting on better with his family. He did not want a row. He wanted very much to be happy, to savour the peace of this country life, to adjust himself to his new responsibility. He missed his father continually. That easy good humour, that look of beaming confidence in the well-being of tomorrow, had seemed so permanent a part of Jalna. He sometimes felt himself to be irritable, authoritative and even harsh, yet he burned with a protective paternalness toward the boys left in his care.
“What sort of woman is Mrs. Stroud?”
“Well, she’s been kind to us — in a sort of way, but she’s too possessive. You daren’t call your soul your own. That’s one reason I think an affair with her would be so bad for an impressionable poetic boy like Eden.”
“Has she told you anything of her past life?”
“Only that her husband was a paralytic for years. I think he led her an awful life. I imagine she’s out to make the most of the time that’s left.”
“Hm…. Well, thanks for telling me. How do you feel now?”
“All right. I’ll get on with the schooling.”
They found Chris galloping over the course on Launceton. He had been working hard. His sides showed dark patches of sweat. The girl’s thin face was pale, but set in an expression of exaltation. She waved her hand.
“He’s a wonder!” she cried.
As the heat of the sun increased, the horses were taken into the stable and rubbed down. Chris Cummings’s hair clung to her forehead. She went to her child who had curled himself up in the shade and brushed a mosquito from his cheek. She opened her bundle and took out his bottle of milk. He was fast asleep, but the nipple, pressed between his lips, woke him to ecstatic feeding. He gave her a look of deep gratitude, as though she had spent the morning in tending him.
Renny strolled to her side.
“What a good child,” he exclaimed.” Upon my word, I believe that wholesome neglect develops them.”
“I’m not much of a mother,” she said. “But I do love him.”
“Can he manage the bottle alone? Can you leave him?”
“Of course. Do you want me to work some more?” She rose and adjusted her belt.
“What do you take me for? A slave-driver? I want you to come and see my office. I want to talk to you about something your brother told me.”
She looked a little startled but acquiesced. They went into the stable, Tod rolling his eyes after them with a mingling of disappointment at his mother’s departure and resignation in the possession of a bottle of rich Jersey milk, fresh from the cows of Jalna and very different from what he had once thought palatable.
In the office Chris stood, hands in pockets, gazing at the desk. She said:
“I can’t picture you at a desk.”
He sat down at it to show her.
“Well, you look damned queer. And you’ve got a typewriter too. I can imagine your saying ‘whoa’ to it.”
“More likely ‘get up’! Look here.” He began slowly to pick out some words on it.
She laughed and came to his side.
“What are you writing?”
“Can’t you read?”
She bent closer.
“Your typing’s awful.”
“It’s quite legible. Read it aloud.”
She read, “give me A K i Ss.”
She said — “Like hell I will.”
He painstakingly typed “you have a Horrid tongue, but your lips are adorable.”
She asked — “Why is it going off at a slant?”
He answered with a slight huskiness in his voice — “Because I’m trying to see your face.”
“Don’t try. It’s not a nice face.” She laid a hand on each side of his head and turned his face toward the typewriter.
He sat very still a moment, then his hands covered hers. He drew her hands down to his breast and raised his face to hers. She bent and put her lips to his half-smiling, inviting mouth. She thought:
“I’ll kiss him. Why not? That will be an end to it. How thick and dark his lashes are, and the whites of his eyes are like Tod’s.”
She felt dizzy before the mystery of his eyes, so close to her own; she closed hers, kept them tight shut while his upturned face was still as the carved face in a fountain, all its vitality concentrated in the passionate mouth.
She pushed her hands violently against his chest.
“Let me go!” she gasped.
He released her and rose with a swift, eager movement. They faced each other.
“Not again,” she breathed. “No, not again.”
“Why not? You liked it.”
“I mustn’t.”
“Mustn’t?”
“I hate love-making. I’ve had enough.”
“Not with me! We’ve only begun.”
“No — I tell you. I hate it.”
His eyebrows rose incredulously, but he said:
“Very well. Let’s talk about other people’s love-making.”
She touched his sleeve with her thin brown hand. “Don’t think I don’t like you…. I like you only too well.”
“If that isn’t like a woman!” he exclaimed.
“How?”
“They put up a sign — ‘Keep off ’ — then wreathe the sign in roses.”
“Look here,” she said, “I came here to school horses. If you’re not satisfied with me, fire me.”
“I’m perfectly satisfied,” he answered curtly. He sat down on a corner of the desk and took out a somewhat battered packet of cigarettes. He offered her one. He continued — “If you think I’m one of those men who can’t work with a woman without making love to her, you’re mistaken.”
“I’ve never thought that,” she answered simply. “But Jim suspects us.”
“Good Lord,” he exclaimed, “Jim seems to suspect everyone. He’s been telling me a tale about Mrs. Stroud and Eden.”
Chris frowned. “I wish he hadn’t.”
“You think there’s truth in it?”
“I think Mrs. Stroud is out for sensation. She’s had a bitter sort of life. I think she’s trying to make up for it. She adores Eden’s beauty.”
“I detest her sort of woman. She’ll make a fool of him.”
“She thinks he needs her appreciation.”
“I suppose she calls him a poet — because he’s had one piece accepted. Good Lord, I’d rather he were anything else! His mother was always reading poetry. He’s a well-set-up fellow too. He could ride. He could be a help to me if he had the guts.”
“He hasn’t. Not that sort.”
“You know Mrs. Stroud. Tell her to let Eden alone. I’ve a mind to go and see her myself.”
“What do you think of her? What sort of woman is she?”
“I think she’s a smouldering volcano.” He took a quick turn about the room, then said:
“If you are going home now I’ll walk along with you.”
“All right.”
With a matter-of-fact air he followed her out of the office.
They lingered a few moments to admire a foal that had been dropped two days before. It lay curled, bony yet weak, at its mother’s feet, its eyes beaming an infantile pride, fearing nothing, the mare nuzzling the silken fringe of its forelock.
“Isn’t it feeling grand!” exclaimed Chris.
“I’ve never seen a likelier one,” he agreed.
They found Tod staggering around the yard like a drunken sailor, his empty bottle under his arm. Renny picked him up while Chris collected her other belongings. They set off across the fields.
“Has anyone ever called you Kit?” he asked.
“No.”
“It’s good, as short for Christine. I shall call you Kit. Do you mind?”
“Call me whatever you like,” she answered indifferently.
“Why are you so don’t-care?”
She set her thin, delicately moulded lips in a firm line. She said — “I’m finished with that sort of thing.”
“Do you mean pet names?”
“You know what I mean.”
His eyes searched her face. “Are you the sort who thinks herself capable of only one great love?”
“I’ve never had one.”
His mobile brows went up. Then he said — “Why not try?”
“Like hell I will.”
“But why not?”
“You’re too dangerous.”
“Is that why you swear at me?”
“I swear because I can’t help it.”
“You mustn’t let my sister hear you.”
“I never see your sister.”
“But you will. She’s asking you and Jim to tea. Mrs. Stroud too.”
Books 5-8: Whiteoak Heritage / Whiteoak Brothers / Jalna / Whiteoaks of Jalna Page 10