Books 13-16: Return to Jalna / Renny's Daughter / Variable Winds at Jalna / Centenary at Jalna

by Mazo de La Roche

  Finch was becoming wrought up, and his excitement had the effect of calming Renny. As often before, he felt ashamed for Finch’s emotionalism. He said, “Come along with me. We’ll find the Hut. That’s where Wakefield plans to rest. Did I tell you? I think it’s a good idea.”

  Now, in unison, they strode toward the Hut, scarcely large enough to be called a cottage, that was half-buried in a neglected part of the estate. So buried was it in the luxuriant growth of summer that it was difficult to find. The path leading to it was obliterated. A mingling of weeds and wild shrubs grew waist-high. Among these hid small garter snakes and above circled bats, singing their nocturnal song, heard only by themselves. But above the other growth flourished an exuberant wild grapevine. It covered the windows of the Hut, wound itself about the latch of the door, fixing it as with a bolt. Its great leaves shone in the moonlight, as though lacquered. Its strong tendrils hung in wait for anything they could capture.

  Renny was engaged in tearing the vine from the doorway, releasing the latch. Even as the vine, ripped from its stronghold, hung limp in his hand, its tendrils reached out for something to cling to.

  Now he was able to open the creaking door.

  Their nostrils were met by the smell of mould. They could just make out the shapes of a few pieces of furniture that had been left there. A melancholy place. Finch asked:

  “How long since it was occupied?”

  “It must be twenty-five years.”

  “Good God!… It surely isn’t the place for Wake.”

  “when I have cleared it up it will be.”

  “It feels so damp.”

  “Eden recovered his health here.”

  “But he died — later.”

  “Only because he went to Europe and knocked himself about. I shall come here tomorrow and set to work. You’ll be surprised by what I shall do tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow!” exclaimed Finch. “Today! Look.”

  Through the open doorway they could see the clouds above the treetops tinged by the coming dawn. The moon had sunk. The two brothers stood looking upward, conscious of the towering mystery of life. In that dim little dwelling they stood surrounded by shadows of the past.

  The two became suddenly more visible to each other. A greenish light from the east had penetrated the lush growth and showed their hands and faces as though seen underwater. The bats had retreated but a small bird burst into song and a mysterious movement was felt, rather than seen or heard, through the woodland.

  “I shall get a few hours’ sleep,” Renny said, “then come here after breakfast to clear up. Want to help me?”

  To do something with Renny was exhilarating to Finch. He agreed and they retraced their steps, hearing the first cock-crow as they neared the poultry house.

  Going softly up the stairs to his room, Renny noticed that the light was still burning in Alayne’s room. He opened the door quietly and put in his head.

  “Still awake?” he asked.

  She gave him a look.

  “Did you expect me to sleep,” she demanded, “after hearing you go out at such an hour?”

  “Now, look here, Alayne,” he said with the arch grin of his grandmother, “if you have been lying awake, worrying over that word you used about me, forget it. I have forgiven you.”

  XI

  Preparing the Hut and the Arrival

  It was eleven o’clock in the morning when Renny and Finch, armed with scythe and axe, arrived at the Hut.

  He looks as fresh as ever, thought Finch, if he can be said to look fresh with that weather-beaten complexion.

  Looking Finch over, Renny remarked, “You certainly need the good rest you’re getting.”

  “I find it hard to relax,” said Finch. “I don’t quite know why.”

  “Nothing will do you so much good as manual labour. Here — begin by pulling this wild grapevine up by the roots.”

  “It’s very pretty,” Finch said regretfully.

  “It’s smothering everything for its own satisfaction. Pretty but ruthless — like some women.”

  They set to work.

  Now the vine lay in a great leafy mound, its tendrils reaching out as though for succor, for something to cling to, even in its death. Shrubs and saplings were cut down, trees were felled, undergrowth and bracken torn away. Sunshine and breeze came pouring in. Small creatures that had reveled in that sequestered greenness came hastening out. In the height of the work they were joined by Dennis, whom Renny set to collecting brushwood and placing it in a mound for burning later on. The boy threw himself into the work with zest, showing no embarrassment at having been sent home from camp, appearing rather to be pleased with himself, and above all to be happy to be working with Finch and Renny.

  “He’s a nice little fellow underneath all his queerness,” remarked Renny, when Dennis was out of earshot. “Don’t worry about him. He’ll be all right.”

  “I wish I thought so. I can’t tell you how he irritates me.”

  Renny laughed. “And I can’t tell you,” he said, “how Archer irritates me, but he amuses me too. That’s the way with boys. Just when your patience has reached breaking point they make you laugh.”

  “Dennis doesn’t make me laugh,” Finch said grimly. Then he added, with sudden childlike yearning, “Used I to make you laugh?”

  “By jingo,” said Renny, “you used rather to make me want to cry.”

  The mound of brushwood grew. More light and air came into the Hut. Meg and Patience, Adeline and Philip visited and brought their advice. Within a week a path was made to its door. Its inner walls were tinted. Its windows polished. Furniture was brought from Jalna, but it was Alayne who made curtains and ordered a supply of groceries for the kitchen. Something of the spirit of pioneer days was reborn. When all was made ready Philip remarked to Adeline:

  “D’you know, I shouldn’t mind living in this little cottage.”

  “Do you mean you and me?” she asked.

  “Yes.” He spoke shyly. Never did he feel quite sure of himself when alone with Adeline.

  “It’s too small.” She spoke with decision. “I like lots of room about me.”

  “Room for what?” he asked. “Here we’d have all outdoors and nobody in the house with us.”

  “The house,”she mocked. “You call thisa house?”

  “We’d be alone here.” Fearful that she would think him sentimental, he added, “I’d like to lie in bed and smell my bacon cooking in the morning.”

  “who’d be cooking it?”

  “You, of course.”

  “Don’t deceive yourself. I’m used to being waited on.”

  “Do you mean to say” — and he looked more astonished than he felt — “that you’d refuse to cook my bacon?”

  “If bacon was to be cooked,” she said, “you’d do it.”

  “All right,” he said sulkily. “I’d do it. And you’d lie in bed — a lazy wife — smelling it. My mother makes the breakfast. So does Patience. Do you think you’re different?”

  “Certainly I could do it, if I had to. But I’m used to coming down to breakfast and finding it ready. Also I like quite a lot of people about me.”

  “Waiting on you, eh?” Philip spoke with heavy youthful sarcasm.

  Adeline looked him over without answering; then she asked a question. “Do you know what you make me think of, standing there?”

  His nostrils dilated a little in expectation of a compliment.

  “You are,” she said, “a cross between a Hussar — ”

  He exhaled in pride. There was the resemblance to his grandfather, naturally.

  “A Hussar,” she finished, “anda Dresden china shepherd.”

  He gave a “Humph” of disgust. He searched his mind for a clever retort but found there nothing of the kind. But he felt it right that he should have some authority over her. She had turned away and was looking in at the neat white bedroom. He followed her and looked over her shoulder.

  “You mustn’t come here,” he said, �
��after those two arrive; you know that, don’t you?”

  “If you mean I might get the disease — well, there’s no danger of that. Uncle Wakefield is not much affected. But — I have promised Mummy.”

  She turned her head. Philip was close behind her. He looked compellingly into her eyes. “Your mother has a better reason,” he said.

  “A better reason?” she repeated, surprised.

  “Yes. Those two — aren’t married.”

  “who told you?”

  “My brother Christian.”

  “why?”

  She was startled now. He had a sense of power over her and spoke with gravity.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Perhaps she has a husband living. Anyhow, I think your mother is right.”

  “I don’t need anyone, thank you, to keep me in order.”

  “But I just wanted to tell you,” he said, “that Molly and Wake aren’t married.”

  With a tantalizing glance she exclaimed, “what fun!”

  Philip would have liked to be sentimental in this little white nest, would have liked to feel nobly protective toward Adeline, but this last remark of hers made him almost wonder if he really wanted to marry her. As for her lovely looks, he was so accustomed to being with her that he scarcely noticed them. It was more important to him that he resembled his great-grandfather. A Hussar — a soldier — certainly not a Dresden china shepherd.

  “It’s a good thing,” he said, “there were no other fellows about, to hear you make that remark.”

  “what did I say?” She tried to look artless. She wanted to hear what her words would sound like on his lips.

  “You said,” he now spoke with severity, “that it would be fun not to be married.”

  “Well,” she laughed, “I still think so. Now take us. Do you like the thought of being tied to me for the rest of your days?”

  It was as though she had read his mind — that moment’s wavering — that brief disloyalty. “Yes,” he said instantly. “I do like it. I don’t want anything different.”

  Without knowing how he had done it, he realized that he had pleased her and also asserted his masculine authority. His look of solid tranquility returned.

  They saw then that little Mary was standing in the doorway. She looked ready for flight, like a small bird that had alighted there. But Adeline welcomed her. “Do you know,” she said to Philip, “when Mary was tiny, your brother Maurice and I promised each other that we’d never get married to anyone and that she would be our little girl.”

  “I can’t imagine Maurice agreeing to that,” said Philip, “for he always wanted to marry you. He’ll be pretty sick when he hears of our engagement. Have you written to tell him?” Philip tried to keep the triumph out of his voice.

  “No. I have not written. I don’t think Maurice will mind. Have you written?”

  “No. But Christian has. He thinks Maurice will be awfully sick.”

  “For goodness’ sake, stop saying people are going to be sick.”

  “I only said Maurice is.”

  “You said it twice too often.”

  She left the Hut, her light walk expressing her irritation. She could not have said why Philip so easily irritated her, why she either chafed at his assumption of masculine authority or found his schoolboy vocabulary ridiculous.

  Mary watched the two of them go down the path and out of sight. Adeline had not led her away as she usually did when they met by chance, but had gone without even a goodbye. But Mary did not mind. She was indeed pleased to find herself in possession of this tiny cottage that was like something in a fairy tale. Mary would not have been greatly surprised to see the Three Bears ambling in at the door or to discover Red Ridinghood’s grandmother in bed. She tiptoed from one small room to another, happy in her sense of seclusion. A square of sunlight fell on the stone floor, shadows of leaves fluttering in it like birds. Yet she neither heard nor saw any living thing. Philip and Adeline had disappeared down the path. If they never had returned Mary would scarcely have been surprised. People came and went, came out of the leafy strangeness of the outer world, disappeared into it. Mary did not question where or why. She had no curiosity about their doings, which sometimes gave her a sense of fear by their strangeness. She knew that her father had returned from the war (in her fancy she pictured it as men in armour fighting with lances) and that, sometime later, she had been found beneath a rosebush in the garden — a tiny baby, with no clothes. She knew that her father had “lost a leg” in the war, and it seemed to her strange indeed that he should lose something so large and substantial as a man’s leg.

  In her times of solitude Mary reflected on the strangeness of life. Her thoughts were not clear but confused and intermingled like shapes underwater. Sometimes she remembered a visit she had made with her mother to her brother Maurice in Ireland. She would recall the towering black rocks of the shore, with the eddying dark waters beneath and the thousand waves rippling as far as she could see, with the little sea pinks blooming on the rocks. She did not see it clearly in her memory but as a confused picture, of which she was the centre. All the world seemed to revolve round her, yet often she longed to hide herself from it. Exciting things were always moving relentlessly toward her but, unlike most children, she did not long for excitement. She wanted things to remain always as they were.

  This little hut pleased her by its leafy seclusion, its smallness. Through the open doorway a spider swung on an invisible thread. He swung joyously — lighter than air — free as the breeze — in at the door and out again, disappearing into the greenness beyond. Her hands clasped in front of her, Mary stood watching him in rapture.

  But she was not long alone. Her cousin Dennis came running in through the back door. He ran three times round her and then stopped behind her and took a handful of her hair. “who said you could come in here?” he demanded.

  “I just came,” she said, and she moved away from him a little fearfully as he released her hair.

  “I’ll bet,” he said, “that you don’t know who is coming to live here.”

  “Wakefield and Molly — because he’s going to get well here.” She was proud to know, but Dennis, because of the way his eyes held her, made her feel less certain.

  “They’re actors,” said Dennis. “They’ll be rehearsing terrible plays. They’ll be shouting and screaming. You’d better keep away, if you don’t want to hear them. It might frighten you to death. Did you ever know anyone who was frightened to death?”

  “No.” She was breathing quickly, her eyes wide.

  “I did,” he said. “And she was a grown up woman. She was the stepmother of a friend of mine. She died a terrible death — from fright.”

  “Was your friend sorry?” Mary asked, fascinated.

  Dennis thought a moment. “Yes. He was sorry because he hadn’t meant to do it.”

  “what did he do? I mean that frightened her?” Mary’s heart was beating fast.

  Dennis looked puzzled, then — “I forget,” he said.

  He darted about examining everything. Two candlesticks, with tall white candles, caught his eye. He found matches and lighted the candles. “Now,” he said, “we’re ready for the ceremony.”

  “what ceremony?” Mary asked.

  Dennis began to chant a meaningless jargon, in his high boy’s treble. He genuflected and crossed himself. The thought of the sea came to Mary. A roaring of waves surged through her nerves. Its burning brightness dazzled her. Why this strange behaviour of her cousin’s should have brought the strangeness and wonder of the sea to her, she did not know. But she knew she was afraid of Dennis.

  Yet soon he was only a schoolboy again. He went to a cupboard and brought out a tin of shrimps. “Have a shrimp, Mary?” He shook the tin in front of her. “Say the word and I’ll open it for you.” She backed away. “Have a Romary biscuit, Mary? No? All right. Don’t have one.” He put the tins back in the cupboard, and turning in a flash caught her round the waist. “Mary.” he said, “do you want to
grow up to be a cow — like other women?”

  “what women?” she breathed fearfully.

  “Patience — you’ve seen her nursing her baby? Isn’t it disgusting? And my stepmother — she’ll be having one before long. Shall I tell you how I know?”

  Mary tore herself from him and ran out through the door. She heard voices approaching. To escape she ran through the undergrowth, past the heaps of brushwood, into a little clearing where a vegetable garden had been made. She stood in its midst, crying a little, then noticed the green pods of peas among the leaves. She picked a pod, squeezed it till it opened with a tiny plop and disclosed the perfect row of peas. These she ate greedily and suddenly felt happy again.

  Dennis stood his ground in the cottage but he swiftly blew out the candles. When Wakefield and Molly entered he was standing erect as though to receive them.

  “why, here’s Dennis,” Wakefield exclaimed. “How he has grown! Look. Molly — here’s Dennis.”

  “Have I grown?” asked Dennis. “Everybody says how small I am for my age.” He walked up and down in front of them.

  “Well, perhaps you are rather small,” said Wakefield, “but you look a fine fellow to me.”

  Wakefield was consciously pleased to be at the Hut. He was eager to make Molly feel that all would go well there, to make her feel she was welcomed by the family. He was tired after the journey but not so tired as Molly, for she had had much to do in the preparations. Now her first thought was that he must be put to bed to begin his cure.

  Finch, having met them at the station, now returned with their luggage in a station wagon. Dennis ran to meet him, putting all his small strength into the carrying of suitcases along the path and into the Hut.

  “what a darling boy,” Molly exclaimed to Wakefield. “I’d like to steal him. Did you notice the adoring look he gave his father?”

  “Yes,” said Wakefield, “and did you ever see a son so unlike his father?”

  The luggage stowed away, Dennis was hanging on Finch’s arm. Finch stood irresolute, not knowing whether to go or stay. Finch was embarrassed by Molly’s presence. It was one thing to visit them in their apartment in New York, that mighty city which could make all within it seem unimportant. It was quite another thing to see them together at Jalna.