During this conversation, Tite became momentarily more dignified, even judicial. He gazed at the glimmering river, at the sky that was neither silver nor gold but a blending of both; at the blue heron casting her reflection on the river.
Oddly enough Adeline Whiteoak agreed that it might add to Wilmott’s comfort to have a wife of Tite’s in the house with him. Often, she declared, she had been anxious about the neglect Wilmott had suffered during the winters when Tite’s studies took him into the town.
“It is madness,” she said, “for that fellow to imagine he can ever become a lawyer. You did wrong, James, to encourage him.”
“He’s clever, you know,” said Wilmott. “I am often surprised by his understanding. He’s loyal, too, in his own peculiar way. In the many years he’s lived with me, I’ve grown very fond of him. I planned some future for him that would be better than a marriage with a cast-off mulatto.”
Adeline spoke with decision. “In my opinion, Belle is far too good for him. She’s sweet-tempered. She’s religious. She adores Tite. When she told me that her infatuation for him was over — never for a moment did I believe her. She’ll be a good influence on him.”
“He no longer wants to be a lawyer,” said Wilmott. “He intends to be a poet like Byron — he says. He’s had verses published in the local paper.”
Adeline was impressed. “Really? I’d like to read them.”
“They’re pretty bad,” said Wilmott. Yet he could see that Tite had greatly risen in her opinion.
It was afternoon. Adeline wore a green velvet tea gown that enhanced the pearl-like lustre of her skin, the ruddy chestnut gleam of her hair which Philip called plain red, and there was firelight from silver birch logs to play on the diamonds, emeralds, and the one magnificent ruby of her rings. So many rings were in bad taste for a woman in this raw new country, Wilmott thought. Yet, he reflected, Adeline was of no particular country. She drew her background about her like a cloak. The ruby ring had been given her by a Rajah, and this, on Adeline’s finger, seemed natural.
Now she looked out at the first snowflakes, swarming, like bees from a hive, beyond the window. Some clung to the pane, as though they would enter the room. Others swirled again upward towards the grey sky. They danced on the air, in a gay allegro movement, deceptive, courting the belief that no dirge was to follow.
“James,” said Adeline, “are you happy in your life?”
“As happy,” he answered, “as it is in me to be.”
“Don’t you ever become restive?”
“Restive! Me? Oh, I passed through all that in England. Here, I’m content as a cow out at pasture.”
“A cow,” she laughed. “You a cow? Oh, James!”
He gave his reluctant smile. “I chew my cud. Reflect a little on the meaning of things, and consider how lucky I am to be here. Surely you are not restive.”
“Would you despise me if I say I am?”
“You know very well that I could not possibly despise you, but — I sometimes wonder at you.”
“Why?”
“Well, you have everything — beauty —”
She laughed in derision. “Beauty? I’ve lost all I had.”
He half rose. “When you say such things it’s time for me to go.”
She laid a restraining hand on him. “I’ve had a letter from Lucy Sinclair,” she said.
“Don’t tell me you are envying her.”
“How you read my thoughts! Thank heaven Philip is not like you. We should be at daggers drawn.”
“I look on Mrs. Sinclair,” he said, “as a very shallow woman.”
“You are quite mistaken, James.”
“I always am — where women are concerned.”
“Lucy is courageous.” Adeline’s voice vibrated with the fervour of her admiration. “She endured terrible things and seldom complained. Now, at last, I have had a letter from her.”
“So you have said.”
“In the restricted life I lead, it is necessary for me to repeat myself, else I should have nothing to say.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Whiteoak.”
“Mrs. Whiteoak!” she cried. “This is the last straw! To think that after all these years of friendship, I should be no more than Mrs. Whiteoak to you!”
Wilmott bit his nail in discomfiture.
“To think,” she went on, “that after all my many vicissitudes —”
This brought a smile to Wilmott’s sensitive lips. “Your vicissitudes, my dear. But, feel as sorry for yourself as you will, everybody envies you. You lead a delightful life.”
“But it is monotonous. You can’t deny that it is monotonous.”
“Better monotony than the changes that the Sinclairs have endured. Did Mrs. Sinclair tell you what is the condition of their plantation?”
“Ruin, James, ruin. But Curtis Sinclair has bought a fine house in Charleston, or what is left of Charleston. They beg us to visit them when conditions are more favourable.” She gave a start as the scampering of feet and shrieks of children came from above.
“Listen to them,” she said. “It’s a horrid game they play. Old Witch they call it.”
“Who takes the part of the Witch?”
“Gussie — and she’s even worse than the boys.”
“Dear me,” said Wilmott, “I thought Gussie was much too dignified for such a game.”
“She is at a ridiculous stage. Sometimes a wild child. Sometimes a prim miss. Sometimes shy. Sometimes forward … Listen to that! Even our youngest is into it.”
It was true. Baby Philip was noisiest of all.
Adeline sprang up. From the bottom of the stairs she called, “Children! Come straight down here!”
Reluctantly they trailed down the stairway, Augusta leading the youngest.
“You are driving me,” said their mother, “into nervous frustration. Oh, how I miss that nice Mr. Madigan! We had peace in the house when he was here.”
“It is the first time I’ve heard you say that, Mamma,” said Nicholas. “Always you said he had no discipline whatever.”
“You may thank your stars, my lad,” Adeline brought out in solemn tones, “that Mr. Wilmott is here or I would show you what discipline can be.”
“Discipline, my eye,” said Ernest.
Adeline let herself go in something approaching a scream. “Merciful heaven!” she cried. “Have I lived to see the day when I should get such sauce from a child of mine!”
“Apologize quickly, Ernest,” implored Gussie.
“Sorry,” said the little boy. “I didn’t mean nothing.”
An observer might well have thought that Adeline was about to faint were it not for her excellent colour. Now she spoke in a deep tone of sorrow.
“Bad language and bad grammar,” she mourned. “Whatever am I to do with him?”
“It’s nothing,” said Wilmott, “but association with the illiterate. He will soon forget.”
Baby Philip, seeing that Ernest was in disgrace, doubled up his little fist and hit him, but Ernest was not even aware of the blow.
“It is a puzzle to me,” said Adeline, “how these wretched children are to acquire an education in this wild country.”
“Is it wilder than Ireland, Mamma?” asked Nicholas.
“Ireland,” returned Adeline, “is the oldest Christian country in Europe. It was from Ireland that Joseph of Arimathea went to England as missionary to the barbarians of that country.”
When the children had drifted away Adeline said:
“I have engaged Elihu Busby’s daughter, Amelia, the one who was deserted by her husband, Lucius Madigan, to come as governess to my children till next spring. Then we shall take the two eldest to school in England.”
“Why don’t you send Nicholas to Upper Canada College?” asked Wilmott. “It has a quite passable reputation.”
Adeline chuckled. “Because I’m dying for a change.”
“This is extraordinary,” said Wilmott. “I had thought you were content at Jalna sinc
e your houseful of visitors has gone.”
“Everybody likes a change,” said she.
“Everybody but me,” said Wilmott.
“Lucky you!”
“Unlucky me — when you are away.”
He gave her a look half-quizzical, half-tender. It was seldom that he made a remark approaching the affectionate, and she sunned herself in it. “Poor pioneer wife that I am!” she ejaculated.
“There is one nice thing about you, James,” she added. “You understand what I mean, though I only half say it.”
“I’m glad there is at least one nice thing about me.” He now used his most distant voice.
Adeline suddenly rose and struck a somewhat flamboyant pose.
“Do you see anything remarkable about me?” she asked.
“There is nothing about you that is not remarkable, but what strikes me at the moment is that you are wearing one of those new-fangled bustles.”
She laughed, and demanded through her laughter, “Do you like it, James?”
“I find nothing to like or dislike about a bustle,” he said.
“But do you think it becomes me?”
He countered with another question.
“Does Philip like it?”
“No.”
“Then neither do I.”
Adeline pushed out her underlip in a pout which Wilmott found more attractive than the smiles of other women, but he thought the bustle was disfiguring.
Steps were coming down the stairs. The four children appeared, Gussie leading the little Philip.
“What? Are you back?” cried Adeline.
“A lovely present for you, Mamma,” said Nicholas. “We were investigating Mrs. Sinclair’s bedroom and we found these tied up in a neckerchief with a note saying ‘To be returned to my dear friends’ — but she forgot, do you see?”
“My pearl necklace,” Adeline cried, snatching it.
“My watch and chain,” said Nicholas, appropriating them.
“My moonstone ring!” Gussie put it on her slim white finger and held it up to catch the light.
“Me’s pin,” said Baby Philip, feeling it on the front of his pinafore.
“What about me?” quavered Ernest. “What about me and my gold pen?”
“Never mind, my angel.” Adeline clasped him to her. “I will give you Papa’s best pen.”
XVII
THE IVORY PEN
“Where is my ivory pen?” roared Philip, from the library. “Has anybody seen my pen?”
Ernest upstairs giggled, then clapped his hand over his mouth. He waited for his mother to reply. She did. “Your ivory pen, Philip?” she called back. “Your best ivory pen?”
“You know very well,” he roared, “that I have only one ivory pen. I want to know who took it.”
“Did you by chance give it to anyone?” she asked, with a wink at the children.
“I want to know where it is,” he shouted. He was now at the bottom of the stairs. “I’d not be such a fool as to give it to anyone.”
“Perhaps Mrs. Sinclair took it.”
“I had it yesterday. Somebody in this house took it and I pity him.” His eyes ran over the group at the top of the stairs, coming to rest on Ernest.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Adeline, her voice full of sweetness. “We’ll all go down and help you search for it. Come, children.”
They trooped down the stairs. At the bottom she said to Philip, “Have you thought of the possibility of Nero’s having taken it? He might have looked on it as mere bone and chewed it up.”
“Nero would not have taken it off my writing table.”
Nero, from his place on the bearskin rug, rolled up an innocent eye. He yawned, as though to prove that no morsels of ivory clung to his teeth. Never, he intimated, would he offer any criticism of the family, but it was necessary for him to defend himself.
Ernest squatted, looking into Nero’s mouth, again stretched in a yawn. “I see no signs of a pen,” he said.
Nicholas also squatted in front of Nero. He said, “His tongue certainly would be bloody.”
Nero now rolled over on his back, as though posing his body for inspection.
“His feelings are hurt,” said Augusta.
“He is innocent,” said Philip, “but someone has meddled with my things and I’m going to find out who it is.”
“The best thing to do,” said his wife, “is for all of us to search together. Come, children.” They began to ransack the room. Augusta was of an age to be critical of her parents. She asked herself, “Why should they go on like this?” Listlessly, knowing there was no hope of discovering the pen — she had seen it in Ernest’s room — she peered into corners. To Nicholas it was great fun. He began to open the drawers of the bureau bookcase and examine their contents.
“I have an idea,” exploded Philip.
“Have you really?” answered Gussie. She intended to be polite but Philip did not like the remark. His eyes became prominent. “What is there peculiar in my having an idea?” he demanded.
“It depends on the idea,” she said, but she trembled a little at his expression.
“Ideas are more often mine,” said Ernest.
“If I hear anything more from you,” said his father, “I’ll put you across my knee.”
Philip went on, now addressing Adeline, “What I think is that Boney has stolen my pen.”
In great good humour Adeline led the way to the bedroom shared by Philip and her. Boney was in his cage hanging head downward from his swing. He gave a malevolent look at Philip. “I hate Captain Whiteoak,” he enunciated clearly.
“Of course you do,” said Philip, “you old devil, and that’s why you’ve stolen my pen.”
All began to search the room while Boney, head down, cackled derisively. On Adeline’s dressing table Ernest found a bit of treacle toffee wrapped in paper. He put it in his pocket.
Finally Philip said, “I can’t waste any more time. I must use my old pen. One thing is certain, I will not have any more birds in this house.” He stalked out. At the door he turned. “If one of you children should find the pen,” he said, “you’ll get a reward.”
“Now is your chance,” Adeline said to Ernest, “to get a nice reward.”
“I prefer the pen,” he said.
However, the more he thought about his moral responsibility, the less happy he was. With the lump of treacle toffee in his cheek he lay on the sofa in the schoolroom considering his position. He had not stolen the ivory pen. His Mamma had stolen it — then given it to him. Yet once she had told him that what belonged to husband belonged to wife also. Children for instance. If Mamma had not stolen the pen, who had? Yet Gussie had once told him that to receive stolen goods was as bad as stealing.
Gussie now came into the room. He asked her, “What should I do with the pen, Gussie?”
She answered firmly, “Give it back.”
“To Papa?”
“Certainly.”
“But he would be hard on me. Oh, Gussie, I don’t like to be whacked.” Tears filled his eyes.
“Then give it to Mamma.”
“But I can’t bear to part with it.”
Gussie came and looked at him. Her eyelashes were a black fringe on her long pale eyelids. She had fastened a small sofa cushion under her skirt at the back to represent a bustle. “Do you like it?” she asked.
“It’s lovely.”
She turned her profile to him, that he might the better view the bustle.
“It may be a bit too big,” she said.
“The bigger the better.”
Gussie looked at him with disapproval.
“How can you know? You have never seen a bustle in your life till Mamma’s.”
“I like them big,” he persisted. “And I like hoops big and I like waists small.”
“Oh, Ernest,” suddenly she broke out, “I wish I were pretty.”
He was astonished. “I thought you were,” he said. “I thought all girls were pretty.”
“No, indeed,” she said. “Now you are pretty. I heard Mrs. Sinclair say to Mamma that you should have been a girl, that you are too pretty for a boy.”
Nicholas had that moment come in. He heard what Gussie said and he danced about the room chanting, “Oh, what a pretty little boy, and what a jolly good licking he’s going to get when Papa finds out about the pen!”
Ernest took the pen from under him and gazed at it proudly. “I’m not going to give it up,” he said. Augusta swept across the room to his side, the bustle prominent. “You’ll never be happy,” she said, “while the pen is in your possession.”
“Why?” he demanded, in a trembling voice.
“Because you have a conscience. Nicholas,” she went on, “has no conscience. He will be able to enjoy wrong things without ever thinking — are they right or wrong? But you will have to keep your conscience clear.”
It pleased Ernest to hear himself so analyzed. He could not always understand Gussie but she had a way of talking almost as good as Mr. Pink’s. “That is why it is strange,” she went on, “that you should so often do bad things.”
“I try not to,” he said.
“You must try still harder, now that Mrs. Madigan is coming to live here and to teach us.”
“How can she be Mrs. Madigan?” asked Nicholas.
“Because she married him.”
“Then why didn’t she go off to Ireland with him?”
For a moment Gussie was shaken by silent laughter. Then she whispered, “Because he ran off and left her.”
“Why?”
“Because he hated her.”
“But married people can’t behave like that. They’ve got to stay together and have children,” said Nicholas.
“Not the Irish.”
“But Mamma is Irish,” said Nicholas. “Is she likely to run away?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me,” said Augusta.
Mrs. Madigan came to Jalna that afternoon bringing two portmanteaux and a bonnet box with her. She did not wear a bustle and looked askance at Adeline’s. As she had been a school mistress before marriage she felt quite capable of instructing the young Whiteoaks and keeping them in order. Her brief marriage with Lucius Madigan had made a deep impression on her. She hoped and occasionally prayed, in a cool Presbyterian way, that he would return to her.
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 53