The Nymph and the Lamp

  She considered a moment. “I always go to church with them on Sunday mornings. I’ll ask Mrs. Hallett if you may come to tea in the afternoon, and I’ll phone you at the hotel.”

  The front door opened and Mrs. Hallett bustled in, throwing a naive inquisitive glance at Skane and crying, “Why didn’t you make a fire? That young man looks chilled. It’s quite frosty tonight. And you missed the fireworks. My dear, they were wonderful.”

  CHAPTER 35

  The Sunday morning service was remarkable for two things. The Reverend Palliser, contrary to all precedent, said not a word about the vanities and indecencies of the Fair, and instead devoted his sermon to the joys of a bountiful harvest and the beauties of the countryside, clear evidence of God’s smile on a people who while not deserving it could at least appreciate its magnificence. He quoted from the Scriptures and the poets and was very eloquent.

  The other phenomenon was the appearance of a tall and handsome stranger, walking down the aisle to the Hallett pew and saying “Do you mind?” in a clear voice to that odd person Miss Jardine. Her face had turned scarlet but she appeared to know him, she had moved over to make a place for him, and they had shared a hymnbook and sung together very nicely. When the collection was taken he had placed a five-dollar banknote in the plate beside Miss Jardine’s modest envelope. They made a good-looking couple when they stood together for the hymns, and after the service everyone asked everyone else who he was.

  Isabel, surprised by his uninvited presence but accepting it with all the nonchalance she could muster, knowing how the tongues would wag, had not forgiven Skane when he came on Mrs. Hallett’s own invitation to the Hallett house for tea that afternoon. But he carried off the tea as he had carried off the visit to church, with a pleasant assurance that disarmed her and enraptured the Halletts. There was no denying Gregory Skane’s charm. He talked with animation to Mrs. Hallett about the legends of the valley and especially of Kingsbridge, which he had studied apparently in a copy of the History at Duke County at the hotel. He talked to Hallett about the problems of an orchardist as if he had lived in the valley all his life. And when they asked him about himself, as they had been itching to do, he entranced them with tales of his life at sea, the pleasant side of it, with excellent word-sketches of queer out-of-the-way ports, and the humors and problems of his radio business in Montreal.

  He included Isabel in these conversations with remarks given particularly to her, and with a swift and intimate smile. The evening flew. The Halletts sat lost in these glimpses of a world unknown to them. When Skane left at eleven o’clock, long past the bedtime of that well-ordered house, Mrs. Hallett turned to Isabel and sighed gustily.

  “What an interesting man! So polite and nice—and so goodlooking. He seems quite fond of you.”

  “Yes.”

  Mrs. Hallett gave her a quizzical look. “Is he staying long?”

  “I really don’t know.”

  “It seems to me,” Mrs. Hallett said slyly, “that he’s come to Kingsbridge a-purpose to see you. Confess now, aren’t you a bit fond of him too?”

  “Yes.”

  “I could tell by the way you looked at each other, and the way you blushed in church. I hope you won’t mind me saying this, but it looks to me as if you two’d had a tiff and that’s why you came back to Kingsbridge. Isn’t that it? Well, I understand. A woman’s got to keep her pride where a man’s concerned. And you’ve made him come to you. That’s as it should be. And now I suppose…”

  Isabel was moving towards the stairs. She called over her shoulder, “You mustn’t suppose too much, Mrs. Hallett. I’m not nearly so romantic as you think.” The romantic Mrs. Hallett said no more. It seemed to her that beneath the sensible Miss Jardine was a rather willful minx, and she was indignant. You expected a girl of thirty to be womanly. And at thirty, when a charming and prosperous suitor like this appeared upon the scene, you expected her to be very womanly indeed.

  On the following morning the fine fall weather broke. A hurricane had crept out of the Gulf of Mexico, leaped upon Florida, scourged the Bahamas, frightened the tourists of Bermuda, and now followed the Gulf Stream into northern latitudes, giving New England and Nova Scotia a lash of its tail. It began with a gray scud moving up the sky and then a drizzle of rain. An uncertain wind stirred out of the southeast and set up a shudder in the autumn leaves. The rain changed to heavy drops, to a torrent that drummed on the roofs and set all the eaves-spouts gushing. Then in the midst of this downpour a mighty wind rushed along the valley. The orchards, the woods along the mountain slopes, bent before the thrust of it like so much grass. The brooks, already raised by the first autumn rains, became red cataracts surging through the fields. The air was thick with flying leaves of all colors, like drops of paint flicked from an enormous brush. Shingles took wings, apples showered, chimneys toppled, sheds collapsed, half a dozen fine old elms that had stood for generations went down before the blast, tearing up lawns and taking with them a tangle of telephone wires.

  Isabel was blown and drenched when she reached Markham’s store, and she found the girl clerks huddled together about the stove and twittering like wet sparrows. She took off her hat and raincoat and stood for a time with the others, warming her wet legs. When she entered the little office Mr. Markham greeted her with his usual crisp good morning, and he arose and shut the door.

  “Well,” he announced dourly, “the wind’s in the east.”

  “Yes, and very wet.”

  “I don’t mean the weather,” Markham said, coming slowly to her desk. “I mean the wind up the street. The bank. They’ve clamped right down. No more money for anything. I must close up the cannery tomorrow.”

  “I see.” She thought for a moment or two. “That means laying off all the hands, doesn’t it?”

  She flicked over the leaves of her cashbook to see if there was money to pay them.

  “Got enough?”

  “Yes. They were paid on Saturday, of course. It means two days’ wages.”

  The old man fiddled with a letter basket on her desk. “Seems a pity, all those people out of work. No use dwelling on that, I suppose. If only I could sell the pulpwood! That’s all cash outlay. With that turned back to money I could handle the apple crop and keep the cannery going and settle with the bank—I could do everything! Trouble is, everything’s happening at once. I’m caught like one of those old-time sailing ships—in a hurricane with all my canvas up. Too eager! Too eager! But how was I—how was anybody to know that a storm like this would come up out of nowhere?”

  Isabel thought of Brockhurst and his quip about the Bible and the Courier.

  “You know what it means?” Markham added.

  “I’m afraid so, yes.”

  “I think I can salvage the store out of the mess,” the old tired voice went on, “but that’s about all. That and my house. Think of it! Right back where I started fifty years ago. Don’t seem possible.”

  “I’m awfully sorry, Mr. Markham.”

  “My dear, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blest be the name of the Lord. I wish I could say the same for the bank. I guess the bank’s got its own troubles though. You can close up that control ledger. There won’t be any more entries—there’s nothing left to control. Just the store books from now on.” He looked up at her earnest face. “I want you to know, Miss Jardine, that whatever happens you’ll have your job. You’re a good girl. Faithful. Hardworking. Smart head on your shoulders. This’ll all blow over, by and by. The valley’s still here. Soil’s as good as ever. Pulp mills’ll want wood after another year. World’s got to have food and newspapers. Um!” He walked over to his own desk and sat down heavily.

  Isabel blinked back tears. “Mr. Markham,” she said without turning her head.

  “Yes?”

  “What I’d be doing for you after this, any girl in the store could do, couldn’t she?”

  “I suppose so. But look here…”

  “You’re awfully kind, Mr. Markham. But, you see, so
mething’s happened to me, too. A man wants to marry me.”

  “Gracious, girl, you make it sound like a calamity. It’s not that schoolmaster?”

  “No, an old friend—from Montreal. You must have noticed him in church on Sunday, morning.”

  “Ah! So I did. Nice clean-looking chap.”

  “Mr. Markham, if I decide to marry him he’ll want me to go back to Montreal with him. And if I do—you won’t feel that I’m running away just when things are bad?”

  She turned and met the gaze of the old gray eyes. Mr. Markham smiled in a weary fashion, as if she were talking about teacups during an earthquake. He made a gesture. “My dear, if you think the chap’s good enough for you, take him. Be sure, that’s all. We’d all miss you very much—goes without saying—but nothing here’s half as important as a husband. When will you know?”

  She considered, as if it were a matter of careful calculation.

  “By tomorrow night.”

  The storm blew itself away, leaving a drenched and tousled valley in its wake. Towards noon on Tuesday the overcast broke in the west and within an hour a pallid sunshine fell upon the countryside. The “late” orchards, still unpicked, had been stripped of their fruit; but the great change in the landscape was the face of the long hills, where the gaudy autumn foliage had been erased by the great wind like so much colored chalk from a blackboard. Isabel phoned Skane at the hotel, and at two o’clock she picked him up with the Markham car. She wore her tweeds and tam, for there was a damp chill in the air in spite of the sun. Skane got in beside her murmuring, “Nice car. Yours?”

  “Of course not. It’s Mr. Markham’s. I use it a lot for business errands but this is the first time I’ve ever taken it for pleasure.”

  “Thank you, Ma’am. It’s very nice of you to say so. But why didn’t you phone me yesterday? I thought I’d go wacky sitting about the hotel parlor, smoking myself blue in the face and looking out at the rain.”

  Isabel turned off the main highway towards Scotch Springs. “All the wires were down—you ought to have known that. Besides, there was nothing to do. I’d thought we might go to the movies but of course there was no electricity. When the Kingsbridge movie man can’t put on a show for any reason he always says he’s got a dark house. Last night he really had one.”

  Skane watched her as she drove. “I like your suit. Nice fit. Lovely figure. Seems to me I’ve told you that before somewhere. Where are we going? Looks to me as if you’re heading straight for the North Mountain—which, I may say, we’d consider just a good steep ridge in Cape Breton.”

  She went on for a time without answering. Then she said quietly, “I thought it was time we finished what we were talking about the night you came.”

  “Aha!”

  “You sound like the villain in the play. I’m taking you to a place where we can talk freely without being watched or over-heard by anybody, and you mustn’t presume on the fact. Is that agreed?”

  “It’s all very cold and businesslike. Why don’t you just drive around in the car?”

  “Because I can’t drive and look you in the face at the same time.

  “Okay. Anything to please.”

  They left the car at the roadside beyond Scotch Springs and walked up the log road to the old mill. The stream was a shouting torrent. The pool above the crazy dam had spread and flooded the grass where Isabel had lain, and upon its surface a thick mat of colored leaves eddied slowly like a great painted wheel. Around the mill itself the stripped maples had a wintry look. The firs, dense and dripping still, remained triumphant and untouched after the great wind.

  “I used to come here a lot during the summer,” Isabel explained. “It was quiet and sunny, a good place to lie and smoke.”

  Skane glanced about the sodden edges of the stream, “You couldn’t say that now. Rum sort of spot. That sawmill looks like something Champlain left behind. Where shall we sit? That log over there?”

  He produced cigarettes and they smoked for a time in silence, sitting well apart, each waiting for the other to speak.

  “Well?” Skane exclaimed impatiently at last. He regarded the flooded grass with a wry expression. He was bareheaded and wearing a gray suit with a smart blue polka-dot tie. He looked no more like the shabby and savage Skane of Marina than this torrent in the woods resembled the quiet pool amongst the dunes. He might have stepped out of an office in St. James Street.

  “You want me to come with you to Montreal,” Isabel said. “I suppose that means you’ll marry me?”

  “Of course, as soon as you’re free. Carney will give you a divorce all right. We’ll get a lawyer in Halifax to draw up the necessary papers and send ’em to Marina for him to sign. The Elgin sails in two days’ time—I phoned to make sure. You’ll have to write a formal letter to Carney saying you don’t intend to return to him, and that should be all the evidence required. If desertion isn’t sufficient grounds for divorce in the Nova Scotia courts we’ll take the papers some place where it is. In the meantime, well, after all we’ve been to each other I suggest that we go on right where we left off. Why waste any more of our lives over some legal fiddlesticks?”

  “Greg,” she said carefully, “suppose I told you that Matthew and I weren’t married?”

  He looked up sharply. “You don’t mean it!”

  “I do. We got a license and a wedding ring, but we discovered that you have to wait three days—and we had to catch the boat. So we dashed off just as we were, without benefit of clergy or even a justice of the peace.”

  “Well I’m damned! Why didn’t you tell me that before?”

  “Does it make any difference?” Isabel said bluntly.

  “No—not at all. It—simplifies things, doesn’t it?” He was still amazed.

  “So you see, you can really make an honest woman of me,” she went on in a composed voice. “That’s rather important, isn’t it? At least it’s important for a woman to know if a man wants a wife and companion or if he just wants to go to bed with her.”

  Skane uttered a short laugh. “You’re very frank, aren’t you?”

  “Shouldn’t I be? We’re considering a frank relationship.”

  Skane looked at the stream again, sucking hard on his cigarette and blowing out the smoke through his nostrils slowly. For a time he seemed lost in thought. His jaw tightened. He turned to face her with the old hot blue blaze in his eyes.

  “I don’t care. Say anything you like. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters except that I’m mad about you and I’ve got to have you. You’ve been frank. I’ll be frank with you. When I left Halifax after that empty search I cursed you thoroughly. I convinced myself that our affair on the island was just one of those things, that you’d seemed attractive there for lack of any comparison, and that anyway the whole thing was a shabby trick on Carney, who trusted me, who’d trusted both of us. It seemed to me that you’d run away and hid because you felt guilty. Well, so should I. For a man running away from anything I can recommend Montreal. Prohibition doesn’t trouble them up there. You don’t have to sneak behind a fence and drink hard cider and furniture polish. And there are droves of pretty women ready to amuse a lonely man.

  “I don’t mean that I behaved like a sailor on a spree. There was too much work, too many interesting things to learn about Hartigan’s business, to leave time for much foolery. But at certain times I tried very hard to confirm the notion that you meant absolutely nothing to me. Well, it didn’t work. Every time I came back to my room Monna Pomona was there to remind me of that idyll on Marina. If I’d thrown the picture out of the window it wouldn’t have made any difference. The whole truth was that there was something about you no other woman had, and it spoiled me for anyone else. When I told you that on the island you thought I was just swinging the lead. Well, I was stating a simple fact. One woman in a thousand has what you’ve got and none of the rest are worth a damn. Isabel, I don’t know what else I can say. There isn’t anything to say. That’s everything.”

  He tossed
the cigarette into the stream with the gesture of a man throwing everything to the wind. With this rush of words he had brought his emotions to a sudden pitch. He was visibly excited. He regarded Isabel with an almost arrogant impatience. She ground out her own cigarette on the log, very slowly and carefully.

  “And Matthew?” she asked deliberately. “Surely Matthew found that quality in me, whatever it is? You must remember that for a time we were very much in love. He was passionate in my arms. Don’t look so incredulous. He was my lover and I know. I was the first woman in his life. And having had me after all those lonely years do you think he can forget so easily?”

  “Matthew!” Skane snapped. “For God’s sake put Carney out of your mind, Isabel. Carney hadn’t an earthly right to you. He deliberately swindled you. He was going blind and he damned well knew it.”

  CHAPTER 36

  Isabel gazed at the crushed cigarette stub lying on the log between them. She said in a small voice, “Please say that again—that last.”

  “He’s going blind,” Skane repeated contemptuously. “He made me promise not to tell anyone, but there it is. He noticed it first in the spring before he went to the mainland. He was a great reader—always had his nose in a book or a magazine or anything else in print that he could get his hands on. And one graveyard watch, after a winter’s reading by the light of oil lamps, suddenly he couldn’t see. He told me everything went green. For several hours he sat there at the instruments doing everything by touch. After a day or so his sight cleared again. But he found that when he walked the beach at night, as he liked to do, things weren’t as distinct as before. He could always see like a cat in the dark. Suddenly he couldn’t. And it worried him. He decided to go ashore on the spring boat and see an oculist, and at the same time to hunt up his mother, whom he hadn’t seen since he was a boy. A business-and-pleasure sort of thing.

  “He went to an oculist in Halifax, who told him that in a year, or two at the outside, he’d be stone blind, and that nothing could be done about it. It seems that years before, on a voyage to the West Indies, Carney’s ship had gone into a port where there was an epidemic of malignant ophthalmia, and he caught it. He had the devil of a time in some miserable port hospital but eventually he recovered and shipped north again. His eyes seemed to be all right and he didn’t give it another thought. But apparently after all this time the thing’s caught up with him. Some sort of optical atrophy—I think that’s the term—has set in, aggravated no doubt by all those years in the sun-blaze of Marina, and all that poring over books in the winter nights.