XXIX
FROM CHURCHYARD TO VAUGHANLANDS
MEG, WITH HER daughter on one side of her and her niece on the other, moved with as great rapidity as was decorous, out of the church and toward the family plot where she could see other members of the family already drawn together. A sumach tree had sprung up just inside the hedge which surrounded the churchyard and had reached medium size, scarcely noticed, till its leaves had turned blood red and, by the last squally rain, been swept onto the Whiteoak plot. There they lay like a gorgeous carpet. Meg looked at them astonished and then at the naked tree, its thin black limbs wet with rain.
“However did that get in here?” she asked Piers who was leaning against one of the iron supports of the fence surrounding the plot. His leg that had suffered amputation always pained after the fixed postures of church service. His brow was contracted as he turned to look at the tree.
“I’ve no idea,” he said. “The leaves are pretty though.”
“I always dislike sumachs. They’re so untidy. I must tell Noah Binns to cut it down.”
“Be here to see him do it or he’ll get the wrong tree.”
“It’s lovely,” said Roma.
Meg took Piers by the arm. “Is your leg hurting, dear?”
“A bit. It always does in church. It’s not being able to stretch it out.”
“what a pity! Piers, wasn’t it ridiculous of Renny to put such a sum in the offertory? Did you see how many notes there were?”
“Five.”
“Merciful heavens! I don’t see how you bore it — knowing how he needs money. I think I should have snatched it off the plate.”
Piers laughed. “He did what it pleased him to do. He’s had little enough pleasure for a long while. Why grudge him this?”
“I don’t grudge it, if he wants to do it but — it looked — like an act of contrition. I was so embarrassed. You should have seen Patience’s face! But Roma never flickered an eyelid.”
Meg turned to Renny who now joined them, and said, “Oh, my dear, it was so like you to make that thank-offering! But wasn’t it a little too generous? You know, if you keep on the way you have begun, you will soon be rid of all the money.”
“My feeling is,” he returned, “that I did not give half enough.”
“You should have prepared me,” laughed Piers. “I almost dropped the collection plate.”
“I am sure,” Meg went on, “that Piers will agree with me when I say that what you gave to his boys was far too much. If you had given any such sum to Patience, I should insist on her returning it.”
Piers looked uncomfortable but said nothing.
“Of course,” she continued, “if Piers is willing to allow you to hand out twenty-dollar notes like pennies to his children, just at a time when you scarcely are accountable for what you do, I am powerless to prevent it but I can only say I am astonished and mortified for him.”
“Meg,” said Piers, leaning hard on the iron fence, “you may keep your astonishment and your mortification for yourself. I feel neither.”
“Don’t quarrel,” put in Renny.
“The trouble is,” Meg said, “that Piers has become so used to taking favours from you, that he thinks nothing of them.”
“The trouble with Meg is,” retorted Piers, looking only at Renny, “that she is eternally trying to put me in an unfavourable light.”
“How unjust!” cried his sister. “why, from the time you were a small boy, I have always shielded you — stood between you and justice.”
“That’s right,” said Piers, “make me out a criminal.”
“Don’t quarrel,” repeated Renny. “I am perfectly accountable for what I do, and I’ll give away all the remainder of the money if I choose.”
Nicholas now stumped up, leaning on Maurice’s arm. Ernest, following with Patience, Pheasant, and the four children, exclaimed:
“what a glorious day! It seems as though all nature were rejoicing with us. How very pretty those scarlet sumach leaves look, scattered over the graves.”
“what I want to know,” said Meg, “is how that tree got in here. I never saw it till today.”
All eyes turned, somewhat accusingly, toward the naked tree.
“Neither have I,” Ernest agreed. “How very extraordinary!”
“Birds eat seeds,” said Archer, “and the seeds fall down in their droppings and a tree grows.”
“Those are things,” said Ernest, “that we don’t talk about in public.”
“Trees?” demanded Archer.
“No. Droppings.”
“But birds aren’t like us. They do it in public.”
Pheasant and her two little boys giggled.
“what’s all this about?” asked Nicholas. “I didn’t hear.”
“Nothing of importance, Uncle Nick,” answered Meg. “The important thing is that I am now going to take Roma to Vaughanlands, to tell Mr. Clapperton, with her own lips, that she took the money. That is what we decided yesterday, isn’t it?”
“Yes, yes. Bless me — it will be the talk of the countryside.”
“Renny’s name must be cleared,” said Piers.
Ernest gave Roma a pat on the shoulder. “Well, there’s one thing certain,” he said, “they can’t put you in jail.”
“what a good thing,” said Pheasant, “that she goes back to school tomorrow.”
Renny asked of Meg, “Is Roma settling down all right?”
“She is settling down beautifully. She’s really a dear little thing and so unusual. I’m sure she meant no harm by what she did. Alayne is always talking about child psychology — why doesn’t she apply it to Roma? How is Alayne?”
“Pretty well.”
“Hm. She made quite a scene last night.”
“She was at the end of her tether. Would you like me to drive you to Clapperton’s? Finch can drive the uncles home.”
“Oh, yes. I’d like that.”
Cheerfully, considering the difficulty of her errand, Meg collected Roma and they set out along the country road where gleaming puddles reflected the blue of the sky and the last bright colours of autumn grouped themselves for a final show. The three spoke little till Renny stopped the car in front of Eugene Clapperton’s door. Looking over his shoulder, he said:
“I can’t tell you how strange it seems to me to come to this house where I saw you and Maurice living happily together, and to realize you no longer own it and — that bounder Clapperton does.”
“I’m sure it must seem very strange to you,” she said. “what sad changes took place during the wars. After the first war you came home to find dear papa in his grave — to say nothing of our stepmother — and after this war you returned to find me living in a small house and Maurice gone.”
“It’s a peculiar thing,” he said, “that all I experienced in these last years has not dimmed — not in the least dimmed — what we went through here, at the time when Eden died. It’s as though it were yesterday.”
Meg drew a deep sigh. “Yes, as though it were yesterday.”
“Did he die here?” asked Roma. “I always thought he died at Jalna.”
“why, Roma, I don’t see how you got that idea,” exclaimed Meg. “Look! You see the window at the corner, just above where the clematis grows? That’s the room, up there.” She gazed at the window as though she might again see there the emaciated figure of a young man, in a light blue dressing gown, looking longingly through the pane for a sign of spring.
Roma peered up at the window. “Did he die in the summer, Auntie Meg?”
“No. There was snow on the ground.”
“Well do I remember,” said Renny, “standing in the snow, by that spruce tree, waiting for Piers — to make him go in to look at Eden.”
“Was he dead then?” asked Roma.
“Yes.”
“why didn’t Uncle Piers want to look at him? He must have looked beautiful when he was dead. He was young and he was a poet.”
Meg and Renny exchanged loo
ks of painful remembrance, then she said, “Yes, he had a beautiful face. Come now, dear, we must go in to see Mr. Clapperton. Don’t forget that you are to speak clearly and look right into his eyes. Come.”
Renny opened the door of the car for them. They got out and went up the steps to the front door. Meg had first entered this house when, as a child of two years, she had come to take tea with little Maurice Vaughan.
The door was opened by a maid who looked at them with surprise. She showed them into the living room and, in a few minutes, Eugene Clapperton with an air of being ready for anything, came in. His grey suit, his neat grey hair, looked businesslike but he wore soft, fleece-lined slippers, so that his coming was noiseless. He greeted Meg stiffly, ignoring the child.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Clapperton,” she said, in her warm, confidential voice. “This is my little niece. She and I have come on important business. Haven’t we, Roma?”
“Well, is that so?” he said, giving the two a suspicious look.
“Stand up, Roma,” Meg said, “and tell Mr. Clapperton why you have come.”
Roma stood up, as though in school. “I came,” she said clearly, “to tell that I took all that money and hid it and yesterday Uncle Renny found me with it, in the woods. I had it hidden in an old kettle.”
“whatever is this fabrication?” Eugene Clapperton demanded testily.
“It is no fabrication.” Meg spoke with some heat. “This little girl followed my brother when he came to your house, on the day when the bank notes were taken. She followed him right into the house and, when he left, she slipped into the room where the money lay on the desk and took it. All these months she’s kept the secret but now it’s discovered. Mr. Clapperton, you know what queer things children sometimes do.”
“I don’t know anything about children,” he returned with severity, his face reddening.
“She is such a good little girl,” said Meg. “It’s the first naughty thing she’s ever done.”
“If you can call a criminal act naughty.”
“Indeed, it was scarcely even naughtiness. She had been reading Robin Hood and she wanted to be like him, don’t you see?”
“I know nothing of Robin Hood.”
“How very strange! Then I must tell you that he was a robber who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Roma set out to do just that, didn’t you, dear?”
“Yes, Auntie Meg.”
“She knew my brother, the one who owns Jalna, was in somewhat straitened circumstances financially. He usually is, unfortunately.”
“So I have heard,” said Eugene Clapperton, not without satisfaction.
“She thought she would assist him by occasionally hiding one of the notes where he would find it. We never suspected her, and she kept her secret perfectly.” Family pride kept Meg from disclosing the complete story of mystification and mental anguish to which Renny had been subjected.
She concluded, “Quite an achievement for a child of her age, wasn’t it?”
“It is well that you can regard what she has done in such a favourable light, Mrs. Vaughan.” He added, turning to Roma:
“I hope you have promised never to do such a thing again.”
“Yes. I have.” She spoke without embarrassment. She still was standing. Looking at Eugene Clapperton out of her slanting eyes, she said, “May I go upstairs for a minute?”
“why, yes,” he stammered. “Certainly, if you want to. Do you think you can find your way?”
She did not answer but over her shoulder gave a little smile at Meg.
Meg said when she had gone:
“Roma is such an unusual child. I know quite well why she has gone upstairs. She wants to see the room her poor father died in. It was the corner room — just above us.”
“Well — well —” Eugene Clapperton looked at the ceiling. Steps sounded over their heads. There she was, moving about in the room above. His anxious mind flew up to the dressing table and he wondered if he had left any valuables lying about.
Meg’s face suddenly burned in anger. This man — this nincompoop — had given her not one single word of sympathy in exchange for her telling him that her poor young brother had died in the room above. But what could you expect of such people? She rose, and said:
“I must be going as soon as Roma comes down.”
He rose too. “I saw Colonel Whiteoak in the car. If you are agreeable to it, I think I’ll go out and tell him I’m glad his reputation has been cleared.”
Meg looked doubtful but she said, “Just as you like.”
Roma was coming down the stairs.
“I saw the room,” she said to Meg. “I guess it looks different.”
Eugene Clapperton, with an air of formality and even self-importance, accompanied them to the car.
Renny Whiteoak’s eyebrows shot up when he saw him. He had been standing by the car and now acknowledged Clapperton’s greeting with a derisive grin. He opened the door of the car but kept his eyes on Clapperton’s face.
“Everything explained to your satisfaction?” he asked.
“Yes. I’m very pleased that the affair has been cleared up. I’m glad I didn’t take any action in the matter. Colonel Whiteoak, I’d like to forget our past differences and shake hands, if you’re willing.”
He advanced, holding out his hand. Renny Whiteoak looked at it as though he would refuse but, with a smile still flickering over his face, he suddenly gripped it with decision, like a distasteful duty performed.
Eugene Clapperton cleared his throat. He said:
“I hope neighbourly relations will be resumed among us. I’m a sociable man and I enjoy a feeling of goodwill in my surroundings and I like to entertain my friends.” He did not wait for any response but hurried on, “I want to tell you that I am engaged to be married. Perhaps you have heard a whisper of it. I am to marry one of the Miss Griffiths — the second one — the one who was crippled — now a lovely girl and becoming more active every week. We hope to be married in the early spring.”
“Congratulations,” Renny rapped out, his eyes on Eugene Clapperton’s tie, as though he could not bring himself to look above it.
“Yes, indeed,” added Meg. “It will be so nice for both of you. Will her sisters stay on at the fox farm?”
“No. They will come here with her. They are dear girls and I am only too glad to take them into my home. We are grateful to you, Colonel Whiteoak, for the loan of the fox farm but we shall no longer require it. Would you like to sell the property?”
“Yes. Fifty thousand dollars.”
“Ha, ha — that’s a good joke. It’s not worth a penny more than ten thousand.”
“Fifty thousand to you.”
“Well, I see you don’t want to sell. Let’s hope you can let it. There’s such a demand for those little houses I am building on my property I might ask what I please. But I like to be moderate. All through my life moderation has been my aim.”
“It seems scarcely moderate,” observed Meg, “to take three girls into your house at once.”
Eugene Clapperton laughed in genuine pleasure. “when it comes to human relations,” he said, “I don’t believe in moderation. I believe in unlimited generosity and affection.”
“I do hope you’ll be happy,” said Meg.
As he watched the car disappear he straightened his shoulders with an air of relief and thought, “That man depresses me. I hate to be near him. I don’t like any of them and that’s a fact. They don’t like me. They’re envious and no wonder. But I’ll be civil to them for the sake of my three dear girls — above all, for my dearest girl. As soon as I have had lunch I’ll go straight to see her. How happy my life will be when I have her with me — with me continually and Sidney gone! I’m sick of having him in the house. He is the most egotistical, self-centred person I’ve ever met. Horribly ungrateful too. He has all the qualities I dislike. I wonder I have endured him so long. He has made a convenience of me — that’s what he has done.”
The waiting till
spring for his marriage seemed almost unendurable. Had it not been for the sake of Gem’s health he never would have endured it. Over and over he would count the weeks — even the days — crossing them off on his calendar like a schoolgirl. This calendar, with the days crossed off in red ink, was a source of amusement to Swift. “Your Nemesis is drawing ever nearer, old boy,” he would say to himself, as he fingered it.
XXX
A MORNING CALL
RENNY HAD WANTED to carry flowers to her. It seemed the proper thing to do on this first call after her engagement was announced. It was curious to think how the Griffiths had come to the fox farm, three young girls in black with scarcely a penny among them and Gem a cripple, and how she was now able to walk and soon was to become the wife of a prosperous man and mistress of Vaughanlands. Yes, certainly, it was an occasion for flowers. But, when he had gone to the flower border, he had found all the dahlias sodden and dead from frost: even the tough-stemmed chrysanthemums were frozen. All that were left were the low bushy French marigolds, their foliage still extraordinarily green, their flowers vivid copper, giving out their pungent scent. They had all the garden to themselves. He took out his knife and snipped off a sizeable bunch. He was not quite pleased with it. He should have taken roses to her, or lilies of the valley or — considering what he was about to ask her — orchids. However, at the verge of the ravine he found some Michaelmas daisies, tiny pale blue flowers on thin stems, and he added a few of these to the marigolds. Though they were wild they improved the bouquet, he thought, giving it a more girlish, more ethereal look.
The fox farm was very sheltered among the trees. The grass was greener here, the air less sharp. He had a moment’s misgiving when he passed between the two round flower-beds, on either side of the path to the door, lest there might be marigolds blooming there. But there were only purple petunias and bronze-colour nasturtiums. He was relieved and knocked at the door.
For the first time Gemmel herself opened it. It was amazing to see her standing there without support. For a moment he just stood and stared. Then, presenting his offering, he said:
Books 13-16: Return to Jalna / Renny's Daughter / Variable Winds at Jalna / Centenary at Jalna Page 37