“And never have you been out of mine!”
He turned his head away as though he could not bear to see that happy face. “My darling,” he said, “you and I have nothing to look forward to — that is, together.”
“Aren’t we going to get married, Mait?”
“How can we?” he exclaimed in exasperation. “I have nothing to offer you. You see what my life is. In the first place I’m poor, but I could soon remedy that — if I were free. I’m not free. My mother and sister are completely dependent on me. You see how unpractical my mother is — though she does her share of the work, make no mistake about that. My sister … well, there are times when I am the only person who can control her.”
“She doesn’t seem — terribly different. I quite like her.”
“She was one of the most attractive girls I’ve ever known. Gay — high-spirited — but now — well, now there are days when she’s sunk in melancholy, and other days when, as I said, I’m the only one who can control her.”
“Isn’t she going to get better?”
“She possibly may. She may get worse.”
“In that case,” Adeline tried to make her voice impersonal, “you’d have to put her in a mental home, wouldn’t you?”
“That would be the end of her.”
“But they treat people in those places, so that they recover.”
“We have had the best advice. It is — give her a country life and as little restraint as possible. The local doctor is very good and gets on well with her.”
“She’ll get better,” cried Adeline. “She must!”
“It will be a long time.”
“Years?”
“Yes, years.”
“And we can’t be engaged?”
“No.”
“I’m willing to be.”
“Oh, you reckless child — you don’t realize what you’re saying.”
“You don’t realize how I love you … You know, Mait, all my family say I am my great-grandmother over again. I’m named for her. She had many little loves in her life but only one great love. I will be the same, and you are my great love.”
He turned to her. His face was ugly with pain.
“You’re making this terribly hard for me,” he said.
“It needn’t be.”
“Adeline — you don’t know what you say. You will look back on me, some time in the future, as one of your little loves —”
“I will not!” she cried, and broke into sobs.
In consternation he shut the door of the little room. He heard voices beyond the hall. He reached up and turned off the light. He took her in his arms and pressed his lips to hers, murmuring soothing words, then, as her sobs ceased, words of passionate endearment.
The mother’s voice came to them insistingly calling his name. He put Adeline gently to one side, turned on the light, opened the door. He crossed the hall and said, in a repressive tone, “I was helping Miss Whiteoak telephone to her cousin. I told her you said she must spend the night with us and she has accepted. He’s coming for her in the morning.”
Adeline then appeared and Mrs. Fitzturgis warmly welcomed her as a guest for the night. “It will seem like old times,” she said, “to have a young person staying in the house. We used to have so many visitors and, of course, when my daughter has recovered, we shall have many more. We are not accustomed, you know, to living like this. I well remember times when …”
She ran on in this vein while Fitzturgis crossed into the drawing-room and began to mend the fire. Sylvia was pacing the length of the long narrow room, her hands clasped behind her back.
“I feel restless tonight,” she said. “This weather stirs me. I wish I were a fish out there in the sea, with all that heaving salty space about me and the stormy sky overhead.”
“Well,” he said cheerfully, “you happen to be snug in your own house, with a good fire burning and a nice visitor. I must ask her to tell you about Jalna, her own home. It will amuse you. She’s mad about horses and takes prizes for riding at the big shows over there.”
“I wish I had a saddle horse,” said his sister. “If only I could gallop for miles and miles, I could get rid of this confused feeling in my head. I’m sure violent exercise would help me. Do you think you might get me a horse, Maitland? I’m cooped up too much with Mother.”
“Yes, after a while, when you’re stronger,” he said soothingly, while he strained to hear what was passing between his mother and Adeline.
They came into the room and he was startled by Adeline’s pallor which so accentuated the luminous darkness of her eyes.
“I’ve been telling my sister,” he said, “of your riding. She’d love to hear about your horses and the life at Jalna. Tell her of the feud between your father and that man Clapperton.”
“Imagine your remembering that,” she exclaimed, her eyes caressing him.
“Oh, do tell us,” cried Mrs. Fitzturgis, pleased as a child by the prospect of diversion. “We’ll sit cosily about the fire and you shall tell us about life in Canada.”
“I’d like to go there,” said her daughter.
“why, my dear, we can scarcely persuade you to go into the village!”
“That’s different,” said the girl gloomily.
They were seated about the fire and Fitzturgis drew on Adeline to talk.
“I’m sure,” said Mrs. Fitzturgis, “that everything over there is very much better than here in Ireland. It must be so or the Irish wouldn’t have emigrated the way they have.”
“Oh, no,” said Adeline. “Lots of things here are far nicer than there. But we have some better things. A few, I mean.”
“what, for instance?” asked Mrs. Fitzturgis, happily clasping her hands on her stomach.
Adeline looked at the quietly flickering fire. She said — “Firewood, for instance. You should see the fire of birch logs my great-uncles sit in front of. It’s silver birch, very white and pretty, and the flames leap and crackle in it. It throws a terrific heat.”
“How lovely!” cried Mrs. Fitzturgis. “And have you central heating?”
“Oh, yes. My great-uncles can’t bear the slightest draught. My uncle Ernest knows when the thermometer falls one degree below seventy-five. He just knows. He feels it all through him.” She looked proudly about the little circle. “And my great-uncle Nicholas is a wonderful old man. He can play the piano though he’s ninety-six. Not new pieces, of course, just bits of the ones he learned long ago. We’re hoping they’ll live to be a hundred like my great-grandmother did.” Fitzturgis led her on to talk of Jalna, of horses and riding. He sat watching her face, now happily animated, now serious, one elbow on an arm of his chair, his hand shielding the telltale lips that could not hide his longing for her. The mild firelight played over the features of the group — the man, his mother, his sister, and the girl he loved, drawing them into a pensive intimacy, as though they had known each other for years.
When it was time to prepare the dinner Mrs. Fitzturgis rose with dignity. “I do all my own cooking, Miss Whiteoak,” she said, “and since you have asked me to call you by your Christian name, I will, though I don’t approve of using Christian names too early in acquaintance, but you are so young and so friendly that I’d like to call you Adeline — you pronounce it Adeleen, don’t you? — as I say I do all my own work with the exception of what little my son can do to help, for he is busy all the day with his farm — well, not exactly busy all the day because I often think he’s inclined to indolence like his poor father was, though when his father became really interested in anything, I’ve never known anyone who could be more absorbed, unless it is my son. As I say I shall go now and prepare the dinner. Fortunately I have a chicken stewing — well, not exactly a chicken, for to tell the truth it isn’t very young but it’s been simmering so long that I’m sure it will be tender, though perhaps not so actually tender, as possibly eatable. Mike, the man who works for my son, always peels the potatoes for me, for the sake of my hands, no — fran
kly for my sake, he’s so very obliging, and I don’t allow Sylvia to do anything with a knife, she’s so nervous. So, if you will come and give me a hand, Maitland, we’ll soon have dinner ready, though it can scarcely be dignified by the name of dinner as there are only two simple courses and one of them uncertain to say the least of it.” Mrs. Fitzturgis smiled jauntily at Adeline, the firelight gleaming on her earrings.
Adeline thought, — “She smiles but her eyes look as though she’d cried a lot.” She said, — “Please let me help. I’d love to.” She feared to be left alone with Sylvia, who, as though aware of this, said, in her cool musical voice, — “Yes, do let her help you, Mother. I’m in no mood to be companionable.” As though to settle it she picked up a book from the sofa and buried her nose in it.
This unexpected pleasure of helping to prepare the meal in the old-world kitchen with Fitzturgis by her side, touching her, as they passed, recklessly snatching a kiss from her, for in this moment he ceased to restrain his love, filled her with a wild exhilaration. Her mood affected Mrs. Fitzturgis, making her happy, and all three were for the time like people with no troubles.
Adeline kept her mind from the thought of tomorrow. Her gaiety affected them all. Even Sylvia laughed outright at some nonsense passing between the lovers at table. At the sound of her daughter’s laughter Mrs. Fitzturgis sprang up, ran round the table to Sylvia’s side and embraced her, then returned to her seat smiling, with tears in her eyes.
“Oh, how happy you’ve made us!” she exclaimed. She gave Adeline and Fitzturgis no opportunity to be alone together. This was not from any desire to separate them but because she herself so enjoyed the girl’s company, was so eager to pour out the trivialities of her pent-up talk, so anxious that she should enjoy her dinner, so determined that she should be comfortable in her bedroom. Adeline had hoped that mother and daughter might go early to bed, leaving her and Maitland to sit together by the fire. All through the evening she pictured the two of them sitting together by the fire.
But that was not to be. Mrs. Fitzturgis all but put her to bed. She brought a nightdress of Sylvia’s for her and a little crocheted jacket of wool to wear over it because of the chill of the bedroom. The bedroom, thought Adeline, left alone in it, felt as though it had not been occupied in a lifetime. Everything she touched had a clammy chill on it. Outside the rain still whipped the heavy foliage of the rhododendrons … She heard the clock in the passage give a rattling wheeze, as though this were its last effort, then sound the strokes of twelve. She fell asleep.
Though she did not hear it the clock had just struck one when she was woken by the sound of voices. They were raised as though in anger. Adeline sat up alert and shivering in apprehension. She heard Sylvia say:
“Let me go! I tell you I will go! Neither you nor anyone else can stop me.”
Then came the voice of Fitzturgis but she could not tell what he said. Sylvia’s voice was raised still more fiercely.
“You can’t stop me! I’ve got to go outdoors.”
There was the sound of a scuffle and a thud on the bedroom door. A girl less impulsive or of a more timid nature would have covered her head with the bedclothes in fear, but Adeline sprang out of bed and threw open the door, standing there in her nightdress staring with startled eyes at the brother and sister.
They stood, locked in each other’s arms, like two wrestlers.
Fitzturgis was facing her. He tried to smile reassuringly He said, — “Don’t be frightened. Sylvia is feeling nervous. That’s all.” He released his sister and she wheeled and faced Adeline. She wore a loose coat over her nightclothes but her feet were bare. Her face was pale and distorted by emotion. She raised her hands in a beseeching gesture toward Adeline.
“Make him let me go,” she said. “You can understand that I must be out of this house … out in the open … in the rain. You love Mait. I can see that. Make him let me go or — I swear I’ll do something desperate.”
“Come, come, Sylvia.” Fitzturgis took her gently by the arm but she violently tore herself away.
“Will you tell me,” asked Adeline, trying to think what Renny would have done at such a time, “why you want to go out? It’s an awful night, you know. You’d get as wet as a rat.”
“what should I care!” Sylvia cried wildly. “It’s what I’d like. I’m suffocating in the house.”
“I guess you’d a bad dream,” said Adeline quietly, though she felt her heart beating uncomfortably in her throat.
“Yes, that’s what I woke from.” Sylvia passed her hand across her forehead and Adeline could see the beads of sweat there. “A terrible dream. My baby — my poor little baby — was in bed with me. It was living and it was feeling for my breast — the way a baby would — but my heart was breaking and I knew the milk in my breast had turned to blood. Then the window opened — not the door, mind you, but the window — and Dick, my husband, crawled in over the sill. He said, — ‘I’ve come for the baby — all the way through this storm’ — and I said — ‘You can’t take it out. It will kill it!’ And he laughed, as though it was a huge joke, and said, — ‘Kill it! why, it’s dead as a doornail already.’ And I felt for the baby and it was an ice-cold nail — driven into my heart!”
“That’s the way she goes on,” said Fitzturgis, quietly, as though deadly tired.
Sylvia laid her forearm against the wall and hid her face on it. She was shaking as though from cold.
“Go back to bed, like a good girl,” said Fitzturgis.
“No!”
“But you must.” He spoke authoritatively. “You know very well that I shall not let you go out.”
Adeline laid a firm, comforting hand on the shaking shoulder. She said, — “Will you let me go with you to your room — for company I mean? We could talk.”
Sylvia raised her face, her blue eyes wet with tears. She gave Adeline a penetrating look, then, — “Yes,” she breathed.
They went into Sylvia’s room together. Fitzturgis stood hesitating in the doorway, anxious for Adeline.
“May I speak to you for a moment?” he asked.
His sister broke in, — “To talk about me! That’s what you want.”
“Nonsense. It’s something — just between us.”
“All right. Talk then.” Sylvia sank to her bed as though exhausted.
Adeline followed him into the passage. “I think she’ll be quiet now,” he said, in a muffled voice, “but it’s a shame you should lose your sleep like this. I hope you weren’t too badly frightened.”
“Oh, no.”
“I shall leave the light on, in the passage, and when she’s quiet you will go back to your room. If you have any trouble … well, I shall be listening.”
She smiled rather wanly at him. She was so tired she wanted terribly to yawn. All emotion had left her.
“You must be sorry you looked me up,” he said.
Still with the pale smile on her face she said, — “No. How could I be sorry … except for you?”
She went back into Sylvia’s room, closing the door behind her. Sylvia had thrown her coat over a chair and got into bed.
“Shall I put out the light?” asked Adeline.
“Yes. I don’t mind the dark, now that you’re here.”
Adeline felt her way to the bed and crept in beside Sylvia. She put her arm about her. How thin that body was, compared with the firm, rounded slenderness of her own!
“Talk to me,” Sylvia said, “talk steadily. Tell me about your horses and dogs and your old uncles. Anything you can think of. Only talk. It’s the silence that’s so horrible.”
Adeline held her firmly. She told her of the foal that had been dropped the very day she had left for New York, of its markings, of its sire’s pedigree, of the prizes its dam had won. Purposely she went into details of the achievements of all the horses she could remember. When that came to an end she told her of Mr. Clapperton and the threat of his bungalows, of Tom Raikes and the name he was getting for drinking and car-smashing and ge
nerally cheating his employer. On and on she talked, till her voice grew husky, but if she stopped, Sylvia would say, like an insatiable child, — “Tell me more.”
The image of everyone at Jalna was, in turn, conjured up and an oddly frank biography of them related, but when, at last, she reached the “cute” sayings of baby Mary, Sylvia said, — “Go on, tell me more.”
Now Adeline turned to Maurice and Finch. She told how Maurice had come to live with Cousin Dermot when he was a small boy, of his life with the old man and of how he had inherited his property. Within ten minutes she had exhausted the adventures and possibilities of Maurice’s life. But Sylvia still said, “Tell me more.”
Finch only was left. Adeline, with a supreme effort, tore from her memory all she knew about Finch. She was glad she had saved him till the last, for Sylvia showed a new sort of interest. She no longer just listened but asked questions, made comments, was in arms on Finch’s side. Adeline remembered little of Sarah, Finch’s wife, but she ruthlessly repeated all she could recall of what she had heard Renny, Piers and the great-uncles say of her. And, listening to this recital, Sylvia forgot about herself and her being expanded toward the life of another. Her limbs relaxed, her body, beneath Adeline’s arm, rose and fell in regular breathing. At last she slept … Now there was only one thing left for Adeline to do — to say her prayers. These she mumbled in a husky whisper, even thanked God that she had been able to keep awake, and had scarcely said Amen when oblivion came to her also.
XVI
WORDS WITH MAURICE
It was nine o’clock when Adeline woke to find Sylvia dressing in the room and glittering after-storm sunshine pouring in at the window. For a moment she was confused. Where was she and who was the slim white-skinned girl with the curling fair hair and large blue eyes? Sylvia smiled at her.
“Have a good night?” she asked, as if that sort of night were nothing out of the ordinary.
“Oh, yes,” Adeline answered, remembering all. “Is it late?”
“Not really late but later than I have slept for a long while. It’s a lovely morning.”
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 459