Books 9-12: Finch's Fortune / The Master of Jalna / Whiteoak Harvest / Wakefield's Course

by Mazo de La Roche

  Renny dropped her hand and looked at Clara who returned his look stoically.

  “It’s quite true,” she said; “there’s no use in trying to dissuade her.”

  “When are you going?” he asked Pauline. “Wherever it is, let me tell you that I consider this temporary in both your cases. You’ve gone neurotic and I’m convinced that inside six months you will both be back with your people.”

  She moved her head from side to side in grave negation. Her eyes were full of tears.

  Seeing her, as he thought, weakening, he exclaimed:

  “Have you no pity for your mother? She will be left alone.”

  Pauline could not speak. She swiftly left the room and they heard her sobbing as she ran up the stairs. Renny turned an incredulous face to Clara.

  “I can’t bring myself to believe it,” he said. “Wake and Pauline! It was a good match…. I was very glad of it.”

  He was aware of something different in her attitude toward him. She was looking at him curiously, speculatively, as the male whom Pauline loved. He had become two men to her — this man and the lover from whom she was parting. The knowledge that he thought of Pauline only as a child was a relief so poignant that it gave her courage to face all other evils. If she had felt that those hands had touched Pauline, those lips had met hers, in ever so tentative an amatory caress, she could never forgive him — not from jealousy but for the hurt he had given her child. In Clara sexual love was overshadowed by maternal. In Alayne passion dominated maternity, while in Pheasant the two were equally balanced.

  “Where will she go?” he asked.

  “To a convent in Quebec where an aunt of her father’s is Mother Superior. She will be very kind to Pauline.”

  He made a grimace of distaste, then said abruptly — “That priest of Wake’s is a nice man and a very sensible one. He was so thoroughly understanding. He came the next day to see my horses and you should have seen Wake’s face when he discovered us in a loose box holding a confab — not about him but about a brood mare.”

  “That was good,” answered Clara, and she looked at him compassionately.

  Then, with an effort of lightness, she offered him a cigarette and his accustomed chair. She said:

  “All this has to be gone through. I expect that in a year we shall look back on these scenes with equanimity. It’s when you brood on things that they are so awful.”

  He looked into her round face of which the bony structure was becoming visible and the blackness beneath the eyes looked as though it had been hammered there. He laid a hand on her knee. “I should never have consented to your going away. I need you too badly as a friend…. But now I believe it’s the best thing for all of us.” A quiver passed over his face.

  Clara broke out bitterly — “I bring unhappiness to everyone! Let us hope that I’ll be a ray of sunshine in my brother’s house.”

  “It’s foolish to talk like that. No one can ever know what you’ve been to me — and coming to this house as I have — and watching Pauline grow up.”

  Her self-control failed her. “Pauline has told me.” Her face reddened.

  He looked at her blankly. “Told you what?”

  She would have given much to take back her words. Now she did not answer him but sat staring at the polished leather of his riding boots.

  In acute embarrassment he muttered — “She is a child.”

  He remembered the scene in this very room when during a heavy storm, Pauline had thrown herself into his arms and formed with her lips the words — “Kiss me.” His heart was wrung for her as he answered:

  “She is too sensitive for life. Perhaps where she is going will be best for her.”

  Clara said — “I suppose Alayne — your wife — was upset. Still, I was only saying goodbye to you.”

  He answered stiffly — “It was terrible for her. I have never known her so — well, she’s ill. You only have to look at her to see that.”

  “Do you think you should have come here this morning?”

  “She couldn’t possibly know. Besides she must understand that I have business arrangements to make with you and this affair of the youngsters’ to talk over.”

  “I will have a sale.”

  He looked about the room, at the blinds he had helped to put up, the pictures he had hung. He said:

  “It was fun, settling you here.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, “lots of fun.”

  “The time has gone quickly.”

  “I can scarcely believe in it all. So much has happened!”

  “Yes. It seems only yesterday that my uncles went to England. Now we are expecting them home in a fortnight. They’ll stop the summer, I hope.”

  “And Finch and his wife, are they coming?”

  “Yes. Finch has to have a rest. He’s been working too hard, it seems. He’s feeling seedy. Nerves, I expect.”

  “Will you be glad to have the house full again?”

  He looked at her almost pathetically. “I can’t tell you how glad I shall be. Jalna is like a tomb these days. I’m sure having other people about will help — Alayne and me.”

  His tone, in coupling their names, brought home to Clara her position as an outsider. She said:

  “I don’t think anything will do her so much good as knowing that I am a hundred miles away.”

  She set her face determinedly toward the future and began to talk of plans for the subletting of the tea shop and the sale of her furniture.

  As always her calm acceptance of events tranquillized him. He became animated on the subject of making the most for her out of the transactions.

  Upstairs Pauline lay listening to the steady flow of their voices, filled with an aching curiosity to know what they talked about. When she heard him leaving the house she went to a window and looked down on her mother and him. In an agony of jealousy she saw Clara accompany him to the gate and stroke the bright flank of his mare and then, almost caressingly, touch his stirrup.

  She met Clara at the door. They were startled to see each other, like friends long separated by a rift. Clara said then, rather breathlessly:

  “He is coming back again to see you. He wants to say goodbye. He couldn’t bear to do it today.”

  “I don’t want to see him!” cried Pauline passionately. “I don’t ever want to see him again! I know about you and him — I understand it all.” She fled back up the stairs.

  VIII

  RETURN OF THE UNCLES

  RENNY DISCOVERED A business trip to Montreal that coincided with the arrival of Nicholas and Ernest. For the first time in his life he found the atmosphere of Jalna unbearable. The separation of a few days, he thought, might lighten the weight of depression. Relieved of his presence, the tension of Alayne’s mind might be eased. With him out of her sight the weakness of his flesh might appear less heinous.

  An expression of relief did indeed cross her face when he told her of his intention. Adeline alleviated the situation for them both by her demands for a fine new toy. She seemed to care nothing for the fact of his going away. It was just what would he bring her? What would the now almost forgotten uncles bring her? For the hundredth time Alayne was impressed by her egotism, her greed.

  Alayne had never been able to bring herself to perform those wifely duties of preparation for Renny’s journeyings from home. He was so capable, so Spartan in his belongings that she would have felt self-conscious in so doing. Yet she had seen Pheasant fussing distractedly over Piers’s packing for the absence of two days, and he had seemed to like it.

  There was nothing unusual then in his making his preparations alone, but when it came to the moment of departure under Wragge’s penetrating eye she had to draw on her resources of dignity and calm.

  She followed him to the door. Wright was waiting in the car and Wragge had installed the one suitcase with officious care. She asked casually:

  “When will you be back?”

  “Inside the week, I expect.”

  “I hope the uncles wil
l have had a good voyage.”

  “Yes, I hope so too.”

  Adeline shouted — “What do you think they will bring me?”

  He snatched her up and kissed her. “Little rogue Why should they bring you anything?”

  She gave him a strangling hug, wrapping her bare legs about him, clinging like a leech.

  “Because I’m so good!”

  “Who told you that?”

  “God. He said in my ear — ‘You’re the best child of all!’ And so are you — aren’t you, Daddy?”

  He smiled grimly at Alayne and set the child on her two feet.

  “Kiss him! Kiss him, Mummie!” cried Adeline.

  He bent, touched Alayne’s hair with his lips, and was gone. She and the child watched the car disappear, Adeline holding tightly to her fingers, her small face suddenly grave. A quivering sigh rose from Alayne’s chest. Nearly a week! she thought. Now that I have this week alone, I shall be able to bear it!

  In the days that followed, Adeline seemed keenly aware of her isolation with her mother and also of something unusual in Alayne. The child had never before been so demonstratively affectionate toward her. She was continually running to her, clasping her about the knees and laughing up into her face. But to Alayne there was more of blandishment than affection in these embraces and she saw in the child’s eyes a searching, appraising look. And why did Adeline speak so little of Renny? What instinct told her that there was something amiss between her parents? But she was determined to earn her presents by goodness; she had never been so little trouble, so obedient.

  Wakefield was seldom at home except to sleep. Chalk, the blacksmith’s son, was taking over the filling station and there was business to be done with him. He spent part of each day at Vaughanlands or with Piers and Pheasant. Though his family gave him no peace he seemed to welcome these long conversations of heart-probings and determined essays to shake him from his purpose. The more Meggie implored, Piers derided or Pheasant gave him sagacious counsel from her store of experience, the more inflexible he became, the more austerely happy. He was glad that he would still be at Jalna when his uncles arrived because he expected from them a dignified onslaught such as he had not yet experienced. He wanted to be tried in every respect, to feel supremely sure of himself before he entered the monastery.

  It was a balmy day at the end of May when Nicholas and Ernest found themselves again under the roof of Jalna. It was a playful, caressing, wild May day. Ernest declared:

  “I had forgotten there were such days, Nick! One gets them nowhere but here.”

  Nicholas took a deep breath of the clover-scented air and ejaculated:

  “How good it feels to be home again! After all, there’s no place like Jalna! Alayne, my dear, you’re looking very peakish. I wish you could have made the sea voyage with us. It was really delightful.”

  Ernest too thought that Alayne looked badly in need of a change. The long Canadian winters were very trying. But, now that he and Nicholas were here, they would liven her up. Perhaps she would go away for a visit. They stood on either side of her exuberant and affectionate, Nicholas a little heavier, a little more stooped, wearing his grey hair a little longer; Ernest, looking younger and stronger than when they had last seen him.

  Renny stood a little apart from the rest giving swift looks from one face to the other, noticing, with a deep sense of relief, that Alayne looked less worn, less ill than when he had left. Her eyes refused to meet his.

  Now Adeline rushed in, newly washed, newly dressed, her hair in a flutter of waves. Her uncles could not make enough of her either to satisfy themselves or satiate her. She ran from one knee to the other, ignoring her father, till at last she threw herself tired against his side and whispered:

  “Have they brought me anything, do you think?”

  They had indeed brought presents to everybody. Pheasant and Piers and their three boys arrived just as they were being unpacked. Piers was examining his cigarette case, Pheasant twirling her bracelet, the children on the floor with their toys when the Vaughans’ car arrived and Meggie came panting in, overflowing with embraces, followed by Maurice and Patience, hand in hand.

  Nicholas and Ernest had never had a heartier welcome, not even when their dear Mamma was living. Each member of the family looked with warm approval on their return, even though, and, in some cases because, it was for only a visit. To Renny it renewed the background of his life, without which he felt insecure, the design of his days fragile. To him and to Alayne also their full deep voices, which seemed not to age with their bodies, made endurable the hollow space between. Both Pheasant and Piers felt that the combined wills of the uncles would reduce Wakefield to submission, while for the Vaughans, their presence made Jalna a much pleasanter, more genial house to visit.

  In the two old men Adeline found new heights to climb, new pockets to explore, new hair to rumple, and new necks to squeeze. Already she showed a positive preference for men. She was tolerably amiable to Meg and Pheasant but on Piers, Maurice, and the male portion of the tribe she lavished her fervour. To Nook alone she was a terror.

  Ernest and Nicholas succumbed to her absolutely.

  “She is the very incarnation of Mamma!” exclaimed Ernest.

  “And will be a beauty later on,” said Nicholas. “Just now her nose is too big and her eyebrows too definite for such a small child.”

  Ernest agreed and added regretfully:

  “I wish we might see her grow up, Nick.”

  “Not much chance of that,” returned his brother gruffly.

  “But look at Mamma! She lived to be a hundred and two.”

  “Yes, and look at us! We’ll never do it.”

  It was amusing and rather touching to see Adeline take them by the hands and lead them where she willed. Alayne seeing them pass slowly along the hall to the drawing room, the light from the stained glass window falling over them, had a moment’s feeling that here was a macabre re-embodiment of the trio that had so impressed her when she first came to Jalna.

  Toward Wakefield’s resolution they were unexpectedly tolerant. Real consternation was felt by the family at this lack of support in its opposition.

  “Well, well,” Nicholas growled, “there are worse places than monasteries. For my part I had rather see the lad in a monastery than running a filling station. That has been a thorn in my flesh, I can tell you.”

  “I agree,” said Ernest. “A movement toward monastic life is taking place in England. Religious houses are springing up all over the country with their triple vows of celibacy, poverty, and obedience. The cosmos of the Victorian age no longer exists. Young people find themselves with nothing to hold on to. They are bewildered. I confess that, if I were a young man today, I should have a decided leaning that way.’’

  He and the boy had long sympathetic talks on the subject. Nicholas was tolerant but believed that he would never stick it out. Both brothers felt a renewed vigour and an exhilaration in the family contacts. The long autumn, winter, and spring spent in their sister’s house, with her accustomed presence removed, had been a period of pensiveness, even though the fact that they had inherited her income had kept them from melancholy. Now they took pleasure, not only in the vigorous life about them, but in the fact that they were financially independent and could come and go as they chose. They had in fact let their house furnished to a tenant who would be willing to extend his short lease indefinitely.

  Their rooms had been spring-cleaned for their reception and all the familiar time-worn objects shone back their welcome. Renny’s Cairn puppy took a fancy to Nicholas and established himself in the armchair that had been Nip’s stronghold. Ernest carried the parrot cage to his room and endeavoured to cajole Boney into renewed speech, but he remained silent and aloof.

  A good deal of amusement was created in the family when Ernest disclosed to them his new hobby. The amusement was changed to respect when they saw the beauty of what he created and were made the recipients of such charming gifts. In going over A
ugusta’s belongings he had discovered a half-finished piece of gros point in a delightfully coloured Italian design. She had always been a skillful needlewoman and evidences of her needlework were displayed in every drawing room among the connection. Still, this was something new, a bold and strikingly handsome effort, and Ernest had felt keen regret that it had not been finished. His regret had merged into determination. He had taken up Augusta’s needle and delicately, carefully proceeded with her work. A neighbour had kindly given him help. He had been an unusually intelligent pupil. And, when that piece of work was completed, he had gone to London with the express purpose of selecting new patterns.

  Meggie, Pheasant, and Alayne each owned an example of his work and now he planned new coverings for the seats of the Chippendale chairs in the drawing room.

  His eyesight was excellent while that of his brother had failed considerably. Nicholas liked to lounge in his easy chair, the puppy on his knees, and watch Ernest’s long figure bent above the embroidery frame while they discussed in turn the affairs of each member of the family which for them had a never-failing fascination.

  IX

  THE RETURN OF SARAH AND FINCH

  AS THEY PASSED through the railway station followed by porters with Sarah’s profusion of luggage and her maid carrying a bundle, Finch wondered which of his brothers would meet them. Scarcely Piers, for it was his busiest time of the year. Scarcely Wakefield, who had a filling station on his hands. He decided that it would be Renny — who was always able to get away. His eyes swept the line of faces behind the barrier. He had a longing that it should be Renny’s face that he would see first. The nine months he had been away seemed unconscionably long. He strode forward on his long legs till Sarah’s voice, petulant from heat and weariness, restrained him.

  “You will have to go on alone, if you go at that speed. I simply cannot walk any faster.”