05 Whiteoak Heritage

by Mazo de La Roche

  “Let’s see.”

  Finch straightened himself and shut his mouth tight. The tooth was jumping.

  “It’s all right,” he gasped.

  Piers took him by the chin. “Open your mouth. I won’t hurt you,” he said softly.

  “You promise you won’t touch it? “

  “Sure. Don’t be a little ass.”

  Finch opened his mouth. The smell of the wintergreen came out. He pointed. “There!”

  “You’ve been using my toothpaste!”

  “Just this once. Honestly.”

  Piers did not look angry. He just stared into his junior’s mouth. “It shouldn’t be pulled,” he said, “while it’s aching.”

  “Shouldn’t it?” Finch’s fears subsided. He looked trustingly at Piers. “Why? “

  Piers hesitated.

  “Would it hurt more?”

  “No. It wouldn’t hurt more. But it would stick in tighter. They always stick when they’re aching. I don’t suppose it’s very loose anyway.”

  “Oh, it’s pretty loose.” Something drove him to add — “Just feel it.”

  Piers’s fingers approached the tooth tentatively. “I’d better not touch it. It might hurt.”

  “I mean, just wobble it.”

  Piers gently took the tooth between finger and thumb. Then electrically there was a fierce tweak.

  “Ouch!” cried Finch. “You beast! You did hurt it after all. It’s aching like the dickens. You think it’s funny, don’t you.” He glared at Piers and felt for the tooth with his tongue.

  Piers laughed delightedly.

  “It’s out, you little duffer! I pulled it.” He displayed the tooth on his broad palm.

  “Out!” gasped Finch. “Out! Gosh, how glad I am! Oh, thank you, Piers!”

  “Rinse your mouth with salt and water.” Piers laid the little tooth on the washing stand. “And next time you have toothache come to me.”

  The joy of eating breakfast without the aching tooth! He crunched his toast without a care in the world. Sometimes, with his tongue, he felt for the little hard knob of the new tooth.

  There were only himself, Wakefield, Meg, and Renny at table. Grandmother had her breakfast in her room. The uncles and Eden were still in bed. Piers and Aunt Augusta had theirs earlier. The sun poured into the room. The windows were open. There were white lilacs on the table, as many plumes as possible pressed into the tall vase. Meg’s blue eyes rested on them approvingly.

  “The lilacs are lovely this year,” she said. Renny looked up from the account of a polo match in which he had played the day before. He was so interested that he forgot to chew and one cheek was distended by a bite of toast.

  “Yes,” he agreed.” They’re lovely.”

  “What are?” she asked, cornering him.

  “Your eyes.” He grinned and crunched his toast.

  “Baby, eat your porridge. You are just playing with it.”

  “Baby wants more sugar on it.”

  Meg weakly began to sprinkle sugar over the porridge.

  “More.”

  “No. That is enough.”

  “Baby says more.” He lay down on his spine.

  “Sit up,” Renny said sternly.

  “C-c-can’t s-s-s-s—”

  “Please don’t start him stammering first thing in the morning. It will go on all day.” Hastily Meg added more sugar. Wakefield smiled seraphically at her. He began to eat. He kicked his heels softly against his chair.

  Renny laid down his paper and again attacked his sausages and bacon.

  “I wish I might have seen the polo match,” said Finch.

  “I’ll take you next time.”

  Finch’s face glowed. “Oh, thanks, Renny.” Now was the time to ask if he might go to Steed. He drew a deep breath. He would ask neither Renny nor Meg, but the air midway between them. He fixed his eyes on that space and got out:

  “Please, may I go to Steed to buy my white rat? I have the money all ready. Please may I go?”

  “Baby wants a wh-wh-white wat.”

  “Shut up!” said Finch fiercely.

  “Finch, don’t be rude. I dislike rats but I suppose you may go.”

  “He can come with me,” said Renny. “I am going to see a man who wants the pony I rode yesterday. I am going in the car.”

  “How soon?”

  “In ten minutes. Another cup of tea, Meg.”

  It was heaven to be in the car with Renny, flying swiftly toward the place where his loved white rat, all unsuspecting of his coming, waited. He sat small and tense beside his elder, his hand between his bare knees clasping his purse. The fields with their growing crops, the little gardens with their young flowers, road menders with their picks and muscular arms, girls with their hands full of marsh marigolds, made him strangely happy. He felt with his tongue for the space where the aching tooth had been. He knew what he would do. He would buy caramels for Piers from the extra five cents. Piers deserved a present.

  Renny was letting him out in front of the shoemaker’s. “I’ll be back here for you in half an hour,” he said.

  Finch was in the shop.

  There were a dozen mice and rats in cages, but only one he wanted. It was the smallest rat, scarcely larger than a mouse, with a silky white body with black markings, bright eyes, and delicate pink feet. He was so intelligent, the shoemaker said, you could teach him anything.

  Now Finch had him, safe in his cage, clasped in his two hands. He walked carefully so as not to affright him. There was five cents left in his purse. He made his way along the village street to the confectioner’s.

  Outside the shop he thought he heard music. He was not sure because there was a kind of music inside him. His heart beat in time to it. Then he saw an organ grinder with a little barrel organ just ahead of him. A monkey, wearing a tight red jacket, was perched on the organ. Its sweet wistful eyes peered first at Finch, then at the rat in the cage. A quiver ran through the length of its subtle tail. It beamed with pleasure. Its eyes invited the confidence of the rat. The rat, clasping the bars of the cage with its delicate paw, looked at the monkey without fear. The overture from William Tell came rushing out of the organ.

  The monkey doffed his gilt-braided cap and bowed to Finch. Finch could not help himself. He took out his purse and gave his last five cents to the monkey. The monkey grinned his pleasure. The organ grinder touched his cap. The music changed to a Strauss waltz. Finch, hypnotized, followed the organ from street to street.

  Suddenly, Renny’s tall figure loomed above him. “You little dud,” he said. “I’ve been all over the place after you. Hop in.” He half lifted, half pushed Finch into the car. The car started with a jerk, for he was an abominable driver. A back wheel took the edge of the curb. The rat looked wildly through the bars.

  “You’re all right. You’re safe, pet,” whispered Finch, his thin hands encircling the cage.

  On the open road Renny dropped a chocolate bar into Finch’s lap. “Give me a bite of it too,” he said.

  “We’re off together,” thought Finch. “We’re pals. He’s splendid! He’s kind!” He offered Renny a square of chocolate. Renny bent his head and took it into his mouth from Finch’s fingers. Finch thought:

  “He looks as though he could give a good bite.” He asked:

  “Did the man buy the polo pony?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m glad. Can I tell the others?”

  “No, I want to tell them myself.”

  “Do you think the rat might have a bit? “

  “Of course. They’ll eat anything.”

  Renny watched the rat take the bit of chocolate in his tiny paws and hold it to his lips, on which the pale whiskers vibrated. The car almost collided with a load of hay driven by one of his own men.

  “It would have served him right if I had run into him,” he remarked to Finch as they sped on. “Fancy having to buy hay with the amount of land we have! ”

  “It’s a darned shame,” said Finch solemnly. Their anger
fused together into a flame of comradeship. Finch asked:

  “How old do rats live to be, Renny?”

  “It depends on how well you treat them.”

  “Do pet rats live longer than wild ones?”

  “Well, they haven’t poison and traps to contend with.”

  “You saw lots of wild ones in the trenches, didn’t you?”

  “They weren’t so wild.”

  “I don’t suppose they lived to be old.”

  “Not when I could prevent it.”

  “But you do like this one, don’t you?”

  “He’s a nice little fellow.”

  Finch saved a square of chocolate for Piers. Piers opened the door of the cage and allowed the rat to run out on to the palm of his hand. It stood breathless in an agony of fear and delight. Finch’s heart was filled with envy at the sight of it on Piers’s palm.

  “Be careful!” he implored. “It’ll get away. Please give it to me, Piers!

  Please! ”

  Piers’s lips curved at the delicious tickling of the tiny paws. Then his tilted hand approached the cage and he tipped the rat into captivity.

  “He’s a nice little fellow,” he said. “Don’t stuff him with food.”

  The rat was already nibbling the bread soaked in milk which the cook had provided.

  “He’s hungry. He likes it. I know what he likes.”

  Finch took the white rat everywhere he went. He could not bear to be separated from him. He could scarcely eat his lunch for thinking of him. He asked everyone what he should name him. But no names suited. No name was good enough. He decided he would have a secret name for the rat which none but they two should know.

  Wakefield begged to hold the rat for just one little minute, and Grandmother insisted that he should be allowed.

  “He’ll drop it,” said Finch. “I know he’ll drop it.”

  “No, Baby won’t drop it.” He held it close in his little sallow hands.

  “You’re squeezing it!” cried Finch. Baby dropped it.

  There was a wild search. The rat was somewhere in the massive folds of Grandmother’s apparel. She was more frightened than she would own. “He’ll bite me,” she declared, “but I don’t suppose I shall die of it. Bother the boy. I wish he’d keep his pets off me!” She peered anxiously into the bosom of her dress.

  “There he is!” shouted Uncle Nicholas. Like a furtive thought the rat darted across the room.

  “Boney!” screamed Meg. “He’s after it!”

  All predatory wings and beak, the parrot had swooped from his perch. He hung, like an electric cloud, above the scurrying rat. Finch threw himself between the two and felt his pet scramble to safety under his jacket. His heart and the rat’s palpitated beneath his jacket. He shouted:

  “I knew he’d drop it. He shan’t touch it again! Nobody can touch it! It’s mine!”

  With a perfunctory slap on the behind, Eden turned him out of the room. He went to the orchard and lay on the warm grass, alone with the rat.

  It was growing more and more tame. It no longer quivered under the outstretched hand but gave itself meekly to his caresses. He lay at full length while it ran here and there over him, in and out of his sleeves, through his fine straight hair, or peered at him between the spears of long orchard grass.

  As it was Saturday, he knew that Miss Pink would be practising on the organ. He thought he would like to take the rat to the church and show him to Miss Pink. So, when he had tired of the orchard, he trotted along the grass path that led to the road. Every now and again he stopped to tempt the rat with some tidbit, a clover blossom which it rejected, a bit of bread dropped by a bird, a biscuit from his own pocket. Obligingly the little rat nibbled till his sides were broad as his length. He raised his sweet face trustingly to Finch.

  The church was pierced by a sunbeam from the west window. Miss Pink was playing “Lead, Kindly Light,” with variations. He stole softly up the chancel steps and sat down on a low seat by the organ. The music enveloped him, caught him up as in a cloud. His rapt eyes were fixed on Miss Pink’s profile. The rat lay curled in his hand.

  Miss Pink knew he was there. She played on and on for his pleasure. She always felt that she played better when Finch Whiteoak was listening.

  She was not prepared for the appearance of the rat on the keys. Finch had forgotten him and he had set out to explore. Miss Pink screamed. She was frightened and would not be mollified. Finch regretfully took the rat and trotted out into the churchyard.

  There the grass, green as the sea, rose and sank over the graves. The old headstones slanted this way and that, like drooping sails. But the mariners all were asleep. Like the sound of distant surf, the singing of the organ came from the church. Like a lighthouse, the tall plinth that marked the Whiteoak plot rose above the clustered graves. So Finch saw it and leant against the iron chain that surrounded the plot. He put down the rat and it ran in and out among the graves. It perched on the headstone of an infant Whiteoak, and nibbled at something held between its paws. Finch and the rat spent a happy hour there.

  As Piers was getting into bed beside Finch that night he said — “You’ve got the rat in here. I smell him.”

  “Please let me have him, Piers. He’d be terribly lonely if he was put outside and he scarcely smells at all. Sniff hard and you’ll find he scarcely smells.”

  Piers sniffed and grunted.

  “Where is he?”

  “Under the bed.” There was bright moonlight. Piers rolled over and looked beneath the bed.

  “Doesn’t he look comfortable?”

  “He’s awfully fat.”

  Finch chuckled. “You bet he is. He’s had all sorts of good things.”

  “You handle him too much.”

  “He likes it. He knows me better than anyone.”

  Each could see the other’s face upside down staring at the rat’s cage. Finch’s hair touched the floor. It was a pale halo in the moonlight.

  “I had white mice once. Do you remember?”

  “Yes. One of the dogs killed them. Were you sorry?”

  “Yes, — at the time. I’ve never wanted any more.” Piers lay back on his pillow and yawned. He murmured — “I tell you the rat stinks.”

  “I think it’s a nice fuzzy, warm smell.”

  “It’s the last night you can keep him here.”

  “I’ll find a place for him tomorrow.”

  “All he’ll need is a grave, if you go on stuffing him and handling him the way you do.”

  “Don’t you worry about him,” returned Finch.

  Long after Piers was asleep Finch lay staring at the patch of moonlight by the bed. He would strain his ears if his pet moved. When he heard a faint movement he would lean over the side of the bed and see the tiny creature once more compose himself to sleep.

  It was grey dawn with a scattering of raindrops on the roof when Finch woke. He crept out of bed and lifted the cage from the floor. The rat was curled close round and sleek. It was very fast asleep. Finch opened the door of the cage and took out the rat. It lay curled in his hand. It was quite cold. Why — it was dead! It lay in his hand with no breath of life in it.

  After a little he was able to think more clearly. He made up his mind that he would say the rat had escaped. He would leave the door of the cage ajar and hide the rat till he could bury it secretly. He stole softly to the clothes cupboard and hid the little body in an old shoe. It would be safe there. It lay curled in the shoe as though sleeping.

  Finch crept into bed and pulled the bedclothes over his head. In his mind he rehearsed what he would say — “Why — my little rat’s gone, Piers! It’s escaped. I’ll bet I didn’t shut the door tight! It’s a darn shame, isn’t it? But I’m like you, Piers. I don’t want another. What I’m glad of is that you pulled my loose tooth.”

  VIII

  SCHOOLING FOR HORSES AND MEN

  JIM DAYBORN AND Chris Cummings were going toward the stables for their morning’s work, he carrying Tod, she a bundle con
taining an extra sweater, a rug for the child’s rest time, a packet of sandwiches, some biscuits, and a bottle of lukewarm tea. All three wore a businesslike early-morning air that revealed nothing of the disorder they had left behind them in the house. The baby sat on Dayborn’s arm with an expression of determination on his chubby blond face. He seemed to feel that the livelihood of all three depended on his behaviour. Dayborn carried him so carelessly that a sudden stride over a ditch all but dislodged him from his perch, but he allowed himself no more than a moment’s discomfiture, then gripped Dayborn’s collar more firmly.

  “I hope to God,” said Dayborn, “that the old groom hasn’t given that four-year-old sixteen pounds of oats, as he did yesterday. He was like a tornado to handle.”

  “Whiteoak himself overfeeds them, so what can you expect of the grooms?”

  They walked on in silence for a space, leaving dark footprints on the dew-grey grass. Then Dayborn said, the colour rising in his thin cheeks as he spoke:

  “He’s making up to you, isn’t he?”

  She laughed. “The groom?”

  “You know who I mean.”

  “If you mean Renny Whiteoak, you’re dotty.”

  He looked shrewdly into her face. “You’re a bad liar,” he said.

  “And you’re a bad judge of character. He’s not interested in women.”

  Dayborn gave a derisive laugh.” You should hear what they say about him in the village!”

  “Well, when we’re together, it’s always horses he talks about.”

  “What do his eyes say?”

  “You make me tired, Jim…. I’m able to look after myself.”

  Tod looked dubiously into their faces, as though he feared a quarrel. They were nearing the stables. In the paddock a groom was leading about a dark bay two years old that scarcely was able to contain itself for the spirits that drove it to eccentric plunges and kicks. It was a recent acquisition and was being schooled as a hunter.

  “Look at him,” exclaimed Dayborn bitterly. “Ready to jump out of his skin and his belly fit to burst!” He set down the baby, who toddled forward and looked between the palings at the capering horse with the eye of a judge. Dayborn slouched round to the gate and entered the paddock.