He looked at her gravely and asked, “where is the other baby?”
“On the couch in the living room. Want to go and see it? It’s just been fed. This bottle business is new to me and I was nervous, but I think it’s all right.”
Dennis bent over the crimson-faced mouthing infant, newborn, scarcely recovered from its terror of suffocation.
“He’s all right,” said Patience, “even though he does look miserable. It’ll be nice for you to have a little brother.”
“We must keep him out of my father’s sight,” said Dennis. “Both of us must keep out of his sight. He doesn’t want to see his children about.”
XXIII
Aftermath
When Adeline went to Finch’s house that same evening, she found Fitzturgis standing before the door trying to make up his mind to enter. Any embarrassment he had felt on their meeting at Christmas had now given place to a reaching out to the warmth, the almost painful compassion of her presence. She, too, remembered at this moment nothing of their past love, except that it was a common ground for their present sorrow. The hush of a heavy snowfall enfolded them. He said, in a low voice, without preliminary:
“You have been here before, I suppose.”
“No. I had not the courage to come. Not till now.”
“Neither had I.” He looked at her questioningly and added, “This has happened, I suppose? I’m not dreaming?”
“It’s happened,” she said sombrely, and held out her hand to him. So, holding to each other’s hands, they entered the cool, flower-scented house.
They could hear low voices from the back of the house but the music room was silent and lighted only by candles. That was where Sylvia lay, surrounded by pale flowers.
In silence they stood looking down at her, then Adeline said, “How beautiful she is! I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful.”
Fitzturgis did not speak but bent and kissed the marble-white forehead, on which the fair curls lay. He drew back from that cold touch and suddenly and utterly lost command of himself. He broke into wild sobs that shook him.
“No — no,” Adeline said, in fear as much as in pity. “Mait — you must not.”
“My sister — oh, my sister,” sobbed Fitzturgis and, giving himself up to his grief, sank on his knees beside the coffin.
On an impulse that she could not and did not even try to restrain, Adeline flung herself to the floor beside him, put both arms about him and mingled her weeping with his harsh sobs.
Meg and Finch came in from the adjoining room.
Finch’s tragic eyes accepted this abandon of grief as though nothing were too extreme to be fitting to the occasion — not even to the tearing of hair and the rending of garments. There was something almost noble in the kneeling figure of Fitzturgis — in his reiterated: “My sister … my sister.”
Finch did not speak, but Meg laid a hand on the head of each of the kneeling figures. “Come — come,” she said soothingly yet reprovingly, “we must try to resign ourselves to God’s will.”
Fitzturgis, with difficulty it seemed, got to his feet. He made as though to reply to Meg, but could only turn away his face and repeat, “My sister … my sister …” He came then to Sylvia and, laying his hands on the coffin, said, “She won’t speak to me. I can’t make her hear.”
Finch touched Adeline on the shoulder. He said, “You must take Mait out of here. There are people coming. I hear a car. Please take him away.”
Adeline rose and took Fitzturgis by the hand. He allowed himself to be led from the room out into the enfolding silence of the snowbent trees. More snow was falling. For a moment they were in the bright light of a standing car; they heard low voices, then were alone under the trees. In silence they plodded along the quiet road. Now Adeline had the strange, new sensation of being the older of the two, and with this she experienced a new tenderness for Fitzturgis. She said gently:
“I’m not going to talk of my grief, Mait, because I know that yours must be far greater, but I never have had a sister and I loved Sylvia like a dear sister.”
“She suffered so much in her life,” he said brokenly, “and then this.”
“You always were so good to her, Mait.”
“No — I wasn’t,” he denied passionately. “Looking back, I think I was sometimes harsh with her. In Ireland, I mean, when her nerves were in such a bad way. You were there once, I remember.” He wheeled, as he said the last words, and, pulling his hand from Adeline’s, he began to retrace his steps.
“where are you going?” she demanded, in sudden fear.
“Back to Sylvia,” he said. “I must see her again.”
But Adeline caught his arm and held him fast. “You can’t — not now. You shall see her again tomorrow. Come — let us walk along this road and talk of her.”
“Will you come with me tomorrow?”
“Yes, if you will be good and come with me tonight.”
She spoke to him as to a deranged child. Standing there in the falling snow, she looked stately as a young queen. She had tied a black veil over her head and beneath it Fitzturgis could dimly see her pale face. He gained control of himself and said docilely:
“Very well — if it will not tire you.”
“Nothing tires me,” she said, and they plodded on through the snow that lay heavy on the road.
As they walked they talked of Sylvia. Adeline recalled her first meeting with her and of how their attraction for each other had flowered into love. “It was love on my side, anyway,” she said, “and I do think Sylvia was fond of me. Did she speak of me as though she were?”
Fitzturgis tried to recall a time when he and Sylvia had talked of Adeline, but he could think only of his present grief for his sister.
“Sylvia had great affection for you,” he said briefly, then went on to talk of youthful days in Ireland. As he talked, his nerves grew steadier. Adeline drew him by questions to recall the past. They walked on and on, their hands linked. At last he fell silent for a space. She too was silent, brooding on the monumental consequences of life, trying in her simplicity to understand.
Now he looked about him bewildered; the white fields, the gaunt trees that edged the road looked alien. The snow had ceased to fall and a wan moon moved in and out among the clouds.
“where are we?” exclaimed Fitzturgis. “Do you know, Adeline?”
“These roads I know like the palm of my hand,” she said. “We have walked a long way.”
They turned back and again were silent, as though there were nothing left to say; but, as they reached the road that led to the church, he remarked, with somber resignation:
“I have lost my sister and I have lost you.”
“You still have a sister,” she said, “and you have a wife.”
“My older sister,” he said, “means little to me, as compared with Sylvia. Any affection I am capable of giving Roma is slight compared to the love I gave you. Oh, we get along very nicely, but — sometimes I wonder how we came to marry. I suspect that Roma wanted a husband and I more or less filled the bill.”
Adeline drew the width of the road, away from him. “You mustn’t say that — it’s wrong.”
She gave him a look, almost of appeal, as though she doubted her own strength to deny what he, in this moment, might say.
Fitzturgis, however, went on: “And you can’t make me believe that you are able to give that handsome boy, Philip, the love you once gave me. Oh, I know I’m nothing to you now, but I stick to it that we’ve lost something terribly valuable, and that we shall never find its like again. Do I flatter myself?” He tried to see her face but could not. He went on to say, “I’ll wager you never give me a thought.”
“I do think of you. I’m not one to forget. But — it’s all over between us — I can’t talk about it.” She spoke with a sudden weary finality, as if she had borne all of stress and strain that she was able to bear.
“You are right,” he said. “After all, we are no more than these snowflakes that are
falling.”
“It’s stopped snowing,” Adeline said, in a practical voice. They did not speak again till their brief, almost abrupt goodbye, when they reached Jalna and he left her to walk back to the Rectory.
“It must be very late,” he said.
“I have no idea of the time.” But, as she opened the door, they heard the clock strike two.
“It’s two o’clock,” she said over her shoulder. “Are you sure you know the way to Auntie Meg’s?”
“Quite sure. Good night.” He turned away and was gone.
As Adeline was about to close the door she saw a small figure standing close against the wall in the porch. It was Dennis.
“Hello,” he said, coming into the light. “I guess I’ve frightened you.”
“You ought to be in bed,” she said, taking him by the arm and leading him indoors. “why aren’t you?”
“I don’t know where to go.”
“Not know where to go?” she repeated. “where did you spend last night?”
“I don’t remember,” he replied, in his clear boy’s treble. “I don’t remember last night.”
She heaved a sigh, as though his coming were indeed the last straw. “Very well,” she said, “we’ll go upstairs and find a bed for you. Come along. Keep your voice down.”
But he clasped the newelpost and hung there. He raised his eyes pleadingly to hers. “I’m afraid to be alone in there, Adeline. Please let me stay here with you.”
“There’s no bed for you.”
“I’ll sleep with you,” he pleaded. “Please let me sleep with you.” His lips quivered.
There was something in his face, in his voice, on the verge of tears, that made her agree to this added burden on this night of sadness. She gave a groan of sudden weariness as she went down the hall to her bedroom behind the stairs. She turned on the light and took warm pajamas from a drawer.
“These will be miles too big,” she said, “but, if you’re as tired as I am, you’ll not mind. You may go up to the bathroom first. You must keep quiet. Then I’ll take my turn.”
Dennis agreed with almost passionate docility. Sleeves down to his knuckles, he crept into bed and lay, slim and straight, next to the wall. He put his arm across his eyes either to shield them from the light or to shut himself off from conversation.
“Did you wash?” inquired Adeline, reaching out toward commonplace matters for ease from the tension of the past hours.
“Yes,” he said, almost in a whisper.
“You haven’t said your prayers. Better get up and say them.”
Dennis burst into tears. Beneath the bedclothes his legs kicked as though in agony.
“Don’t ask me to pray,” he sobbed. “I can’t — I can’t.”
“All right,” Adeline said hastily. “I’ll say them for both of us.”
She brushed the burnished chestnut of her hair and, going inside the clothes cupboard, took off her clothes and put on a nightdress. She turned out the light and knelt down beside the bed. She tried to say her prayers, but suddenly she was unutterably tired and could not remember a word. Kneeling there she fell asleep. She had opened the window and the frosty air blew in on her. Yet she slept, and was waked only when the boy’s timid hand touched her.
“Hadn’t you better get into bed, Adeline?” he said.
She grunted. Where was she? Had she been asleep? Was all that had passed a terrible dream?
“Hadn’t you better come to bed?” Dennis repeated.
She opened her dark eyes on the darkness and crept into bed. She put an arm about Dennis and patted his back. She did not speak, but the consolation of her nearness drew him to turn over and press his face against her breast. Again he began to cry.
Now she was all awake.
“Stop it,” she said sternly. “You can’t go on like this. I tell you I’ve borne enough.”
Now he was speaking, and she made out the words.
“I killed her.… I didn’t mean to, but I killed her.…”
“Killed whom?”
“Sylvia. I made her help me with the snowman. I had her alone and I hated her but I didn’t mean she should die. Oh, Adeline, I didn’t phone for the doctor, but the vet!”
“That’s all nonsense,” said Adeline. “You had nothing to do with it. Sylvia would have died anyway. The doctor says so. A boy like you shouldn’t be mixed up in such things, but I’ll tell you this. Women aren’t all alike. For some it’s dangerous to give birth. Sylvia was one of those.”
“I taunted her,” he said. “I killed her.”
He continued in his morbid self-accusations and questioning, which she quieted as best she could, till at last he fell asleep, holding fast to her, as though in her soundness he would hide himself.
She lay thinking. The scene with Fitzturgis, the strange, confused confession of the sleeping child, mingled in her mind like dark birds seeking rest. The death of Sylvia, the marriage of Roma and Fitzturgis, filled her with shrinking from the experience of marriage, of childbirth. The touch of a man’s hand laid on her, even in tenderest love, was more, she thought, than she could endure. She put the thought of Philip away from her in fear.
Then, as though summoned by her thought of him, she heard Renny’s light step in the hall. He opened her door a little and put in his head.
“Adeline, are you awake?”
“Yes, Daddy.” Her heart began to beat quickly, in apprehension of she knew not what.
“Have you seen Dennis? I’ve been telephoning all the family and nobody seems to know.”
“He’s here. In bed with me. Fast asleep.”
“Good Lord.” Renny turned on the light and bent over the bed.
Adeline said, “Don’t wake him, Daddy. He’s been terribly upset — by everything.”
“He can’t stay here,” said Renny. “If he must sleep with someone, it had better be me.”
“Oh, Daddy, he’ll begin all over again.”
“He’ll be all right with me. I’ll carry him upstairs. He weighs nothing.”
Renny drew the boy from beneath the blankets and laid him against his shoulder. Dennis lay inert, like someone rescued from drowning. Adeline, relieved of his presence in the bed, stretched herself and raised her eyes to Renny’s face.
“Do you think we shall ever be happy again, Daddy?” she asked.
“Of course, we shall. This is a bad time. It’s like a storm at sea. It rocks the ship but doesn’t sink it. We’ll recover and sail on. I’ll carry this youngster up to my room, then come back and tuck you up.”
She lay, awaiting his return, with an almost blissful melancholy. Her clothes and the boy’s clothes lay on the floor. She shut herself off from the thought of Dennis — from the thought of Finch and of Fitzturgis — and waited only for Renny’s return. She asked, when he reappeared:
“Did Dennis wake?”
“Yes, but fell right off again. He seemed dazed. What did he say to you?”
“He babbled in a strange way. I could make no head or tail of what he said — except that he blames himself for — everything. Daddy, what time is it?”
He looked at his watch. “Four o’clock.”
“I’m hungry,” she said. “If only I had a biscuit I could go to sleep.”
“I’ll get you something more substantial.”
“No, no, just a biscuit.”
He went across the hall to the dining room. From the sideboard he took a biscuit jar, then filled two glasses with sherry and set them on a small silver tray. When he returned to Adeline she was sitting up in bed. She gave him a tremulous smile. He sat on the side of the bed and they ate biscuits and sipped sherry together. He began to talk of his horses, and on that healing subject, and in the power of his presence, Adeline found tranquility. Scarcely had he tucked her up and left the room when she fell asleep.
XXIV
The Tolling of the Bell
Sylvia’s mother was prostrated by the shock of her daughter’s death. That sweet-tempered yet rather vag
ue Irish woman had built high hopes on the coming of the grandchild who would, she was sure, complete the restoration to health which a happy marriage had begun. The older sister of Fitzturgis remained in New York to nurse their mother, but his American brother-in-law came up to Canada for the funeral.
The New Year was on the way and for it the weather had turned brilliantly but bitterly cold. A gusty wind, straight from the Arctic, blew the fine snow in bright clouds across the crusted surface of the deep snow in the graveyard. The snow lay so deep on the graves that they were almost hidden beneath it and showed only as gentle undulations in the sea of snow. The gravestones looked less than impressive, as any slant from the upright was made the more noticeable by the meticulous austerity of the surroundings. If the gravestones were of white marble they were inclined to look dingy against the immaculate whiteness. The graves of the family were, however, marked by a granite plinth which, unaffected by weather, stood up with sombre dignity to point out to the passerby where the Whiteoaks lay in their last rest.
Inside the church it was fairly warm, though with each opening of the door the outer cold rushed into the vestibule. The church was not warm with its accustomed Sunday warmth but with the sudden warmth of an unexpected weekday service. It was filled with people, in spite of the fact that it was the holiday season, the very season of the birth of Christ. But, here at the chancel steps, lay the body of a young mother who had died in giving birth to her child. Although Sylvia had lived in the neighbourhood but a short while, she had been greatly admired and liked for her shy friendliness, her simple, unpretentious air of a woman of the world. Her sudden death had come as a shock. The hearts of all went out in sympathy to Finch, sitting there among his brothers.
Throughout the service, Finch’s eyes, when he was not kneeling, were fixed on the coffin, on the marble profile of Sylvia, as she lay, a lily among the lilies, a pale rose among the roses. Fitzturgis, on the contrary, continually shielded his eyes with his hand.
The Rector was so much moved when reading the service that more than once his voice faltered. Even when he was able to read steadily and with feeling, he found his mind wandering, recalling another burial service, when snow had covered the ground, when another young person from that same family had died — Eden Whiteoak. And there was Eden’s little daughter, Roma, a grown woman, and married … How the years flew — the scene changed — yet the Church and its services remained the same. Surely something to cling to, in a changing world. He experienced, too, a certain feeling of gratitude toward the Whiteoaks for retaining, more or less, the quality of their forebears who had built and been loyal to this small church. His eyes, moving over the family as they sat in the below, rested a moment on the smooth head of Dennis, the youngest present, and he wondered what thoughts were in that little head, what the child would make of all this ritual, this intrusion of death into his young life.
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 530