Years of Grace

by Margaret Ayer Barnes

  And this afternoon he was coming to pick them all up at five o'clock and Jane and Isabel must be ready at the window, for Flora's father never liked to be kept waiting, holding his pawing horses, at any one's door. Jane assured Muriel earnestly that she would be on the front steps. Of course she

  would. She didn't even want to miss seeing the coach swing around the comer, clattering and jingling and tooting — the Fumesses' new coach — to pick her up to drive all the way down to Jackson Park with Andre, to show him the Worid's Fair.

  At four o'clock Jane began very seriously dressing for the party. She solemnly considered the possibility of borrowing Isabel's curling tongs, but the sight of her sister, standing nervously in petticoat and combing jacket, heating the tongs in question for her own use at the gas jet beside her rosewood bureau, dissuaded her from the thought. Isabel didn't like to be bothered when she was dressing.

  'I wish you wouldn't talk to me,' she said irritably, when her mother came in, conversationally minded, and sat sociably down on the sofa. Mrs. Ward rose obediently and almost ran into Jane at the door. They walked together down the hall. All the family had learned it was better never to disturb Isabel. But her voice floated out to them, down the passage.

  'Shall I wear the blue or the green?' she called abstractedly. Jane's mother turned back, with interest.

  *The green, I think, dear.'

  Jane went into her own bedroom. She wouldn't borrow the curUng tongs. She would rough up her hair by running her comb through it the wrong way. That, after all, would be safer. Jane had never used curUng tongs. It would be better not to experiment for such an important party.

  At a quarter to five Jane came out of her front door and looked anxiously up the street. It was perfectly empty, save for one yellow ice-wagon that was waiting, halfway down the block. The big white horses stood patientiy, thefr noses in feed-bags. Thefr flanks were just a Uttle yellow, as if the paint from the wagon had run into them. The iceman was a long time delivering the ice. Jane knew him well. He was a friend of Minnie's.

  Jane sat down on the top step, carefully turning up the skirt of her blue foulard frock so that she wouldn't soil it. The mellow afternoon sunlight slanted down the quiet street. The grass plots looked yellow-green behind their iron palings. The elm trees were just a little brown and rusty with the decline of summer, but they still hung plume-Hke and ponderous, almost meeting over the cedar block pavement. The big red brick and brown stone houses stood tranquilly in their wide yards. Down at the corner was a grey brick block of five high-stooped residences. Jane's mother had thought it was dreadful when they were built, five years before.

  *Eye-sores!' she had said. She declared they spoiled the street. She thought it would be horrible to Uve in them and share a party wall with a neighbor. 'Dark as a pocket,' was her phrase. Jane's father had advanced the theory that, with the rise of real estate values, they'd live to see the yards built up all around them.

  'You might as well say,' Jane's mother had said incredulously, 'that we'll all be Uving in flats before we die — one on top of the other like sardines in a box.'

  They had all laughed at that. Jane didn't know any one who lived in a flat except Andre.

  The iceman came out of the house down the street, suggestively wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He hung up the ice tongs at the back of the wagon, then stepped around to take off the horses' nose-bags and cHmbed up over the wheel to the driver's seat.

  'Gittap!' he said. His voice echoed down the quiet block. The horses lumbered awkwardly into motion. Jane waved at him as he went by.

  Suddenly the coach swung around the corner, a warmng fanfare sounding on the horn.

  'Isabel!' screamed Jane. It seemed terribly important not

  to keep Mr. Fumess waiting a single second. Isabel appeared at the door. She looked very blond and pretty in her bright green dress. She had borrowed their mother's black silk cape. She shaded her eyes against the western sun and waved cheerfully to Rosahe as the coach drew up at the door.

  The groom sprang dowTi with incredible alacrity and took up his position at the bridle of the prancing roan leaders. The horses arched their pretty necks and pawed the cedar pavement. The chain harness jingled and the smart red rosettes on their bridles fluttered with their restless motion. Jane and Isabel ran down the steps.

  The coach was a chaos of festive colour and movement. Mrs. Lester had her purple parasol and Muriel her bright red frock and Flora her pale blue one. RosaUe looked lovely in rose-coloured taffeta, sitting with Mr. Fumess on the box seat, but leaning back to talk to Freddy Waters, on the row behind her. Jane reahzed with relief that Edith had not come. But Bob and Teddy were there, and Robin Bridges for Isabel. Andre was on the back seat, close by the Uttle platform where the groom stood up to blow the horn. Jane scrambled up over the back wheel to sit beside him, while Robin was helping Isabel up the httle steps.

  'Where's Jane?' said Mrs. Lester, bewildered.

  'I'm here!' piped Jane, brushing the dust off her flounces.

  Mr. Fumess waved his whip and fhcked it over the shoulders of the leaders. The little groom sprang back, under peril of instant dissolution. The horses plunged and started. The groom climbed up behind Jane and Andre. In a minute they were trotting smartly down Pine Street and the wind was blowing freshly in Jane's face, blowing her hair across her pink cheeks as she laughed up at Andre, terribly happy to be driving hke this, right under the boughs of the elm trees, high up in the air, almost on a level with the second stories of the

  houses, laughing at Andr^, with a whole evening before her that was going to be such fun.

  The sun had long been set when they reached the fair grounds. They all climbed down from the coach and strolled in the gathering twiHght past the ghmmering, glamorous buildings, through the jostling, pleasure-bent crowd until they reached the restaurant.

  'Let's eat on the terrace,' said Rosalie. The September night was very mild. Mr. Furness found a waiter who made one long table out of five so all twelve of them could sit together. Jane sat between Andre and Freddy Waters. Freddy didn't speak to her once, all through the meal, he was so busy talking to Rosalie on his other side and answering the sallies of Isabel fi-om across the table. Andre didn't say much, either.

  'Is this like Paris?' Jane asked him. She meant the terrace and the candleUt tables and the sky overhead, with just the largest stars gleaming faintiy through the yellow glow of the fair grounds.

  'Something,' said Andr^. 'Paris is really just like itself Jane felt a Uttle disappointed. She had hoped so much that it was.

  The moon came up before the meal was over, a little lopsided, just past the full, enormous and very clear, out of the waters of the lake. It made a silver path from the horizon to the very foot of the terrace.

  'There's nothing like that in Paris,' said Andre solemnly. Jane felt a httle better about Chicago. When dinner was over they started for the Midway. The crowds were dreadful there, but Jane loved the side shows. Rosalie had her fortune told and so did Isabel and so did Muriel. But Mr. Furness didn't want Flora to touch the dirty gypsy and Jane didn't want to hear her fortune with Andre there and Muriel at hand

  to giggle, Muriel had even giggled at Freddy Waters when the gypsy found a blond young man in Rosalie's pink palm.

  Then they went to the Streets of Cairo and rode riotously on camels. Mrs. Lester sat on a green bench beside Mr. Fur-ness and laughed herself into hysteria as the girls cUmbed timorously up on the leather saddles, clutching at petticoats in a vain attempt to cover protruding ankles, when the dreadful animals lurched clumsily to their feet and rocked away. It was Uke nothing else than an earthquake, Jane decided, as she clung desperately to the awkward humps.

  Later Mrs. Lester shepherded them safely past the hoochee-couchee dances and the perils of the Dahomey Village to the more adequately clothed Esquimos, who tactfully volunteered upon question, as a tribute to the Chicago chmate, that they felt the cold more on the Midway than in Labrador. The Ferris wheel
loomed up before them in the night. They must all go up in that, Rosahe decided.

  Jane stepped into one of the swinging cars in front of Andre. She had never been up in the Ferris wheel before. The compartments looked as small as bird cages when dangUng in mid-air. Jane was surprised to see that they were really almost as big as street cars. She sat down with Andre in a corner seat. The car swayed slightly as the wheel started. They moved up and out, then stopped again while other cars were loading. They swung slowly around the huge circumference, starting and stopping at regular intervals. The ground fell away beneath them and Jane lost all sense of movement. The car seemed suspended motionless in midair, with the ground sUding sideways beneath it and the great steel trusses of the wheel revolving slowly past the window. It paused a moment as they reached the top of the circle. The lights of the fair grounds ghttered brightly below them. Long lines of yellow street lamps radiated out in the darkness.

  The illuminated cable-cars on Cottage Grove Avenue crawled like mechanical toys. The glow of the city was visible at the north but the stars overhead were lost in the radiance of the myriad gas-lamps of the Midway. The silver moon looked incredibly remote, hung halfway up the eastern sky.

  Jane drew in her breath with a little gasp of delight. Why — flying must be Uke this! They started slowly down again around the great wheel. The car swung out over the circle's edge. It seemed horribly unsupported, hanging dizzily over an abyss. Jane shut her eyes quickly and groped for Andre's hand. She felt a distinct shock of surprise when his fingers closed on hers.

  T — I'm giddy,' she said faintly.

  Andre took her hand in both his own.

  'Keep your eyes shut,' he said practically. He moved a little nearer on the seat and his arm rested against her shoulder. *A11 right, now?' he asked.

  'Yes,' said Jane faintly, stiU not daring to look. Andre continued to hold her hand in his. The starting and stopping went on disquietingly.

  'Aren't we nearly there?' asked Jane.

  'We go around twice,' said Andre. 'The second time without stopping.'

  'Can't I get out?' asked Jane.

  'No,' said Andre, 'but it's all right now. You can look.'

  She did, and removed her hand from his as they moved slowly by the crowded landing platform and out and up once more into the heavenly vault.

  'Shut your eyes again,' said Andr^ very capably as they began the descent. He took her hand as if a precedent had been established. Jane felt his fingers close reassuringly about her own. She was roused a moment later by a giggle fi"om Muriel. She puUed her hand away and forgot to be dizzy in the heat

  of her indignation. Muriel was outrageous. The car stopped at the landing stage. Every one crowded out.

  They strolled back, now, for a look at the Court of Honour before picking up the coach at the gates. Mrs. Lester was tired and walked very slowly at Mr. Fumess's side. No one said much of anything. Even Rosalie and Isabel were silent. The Hghts from the Japanese tea-house on the Wooded Island glimmered across the pond. A few scattered gondolas were drifting sofdy in the moonlight. Jane watched their graceful motion.

  'Have you ever been in Venice?' she asked.

  'No,' said Andre.

  'I went there on my wedding trip,' said Mrs. Lester.

  'That's what I mean to do,' said Andre.

  Jane walked along in silence, looking very straight before her. She was a little startled by her own thoughts.

  The Court of Honour was ablaze with hght and crowded with people. The strains of a Strauss waltz, rising and falUng with the light September breeze, fell faintly on their ears. John Philip Sousa was conducting his orchestra in the open air band stand.

  T'd like to sec the MacMonnies fountain,' said Andre.

  'Well — there it is,' said Mrs. Lester wearily. She didn't look as if she wanted so see much of anything any more. The party strolled over to the Grand Basin and leaned against the parapet of stucco. Mrs. Lester sank on a green bench. Mac-Monnies's medieval barge, propelled by Arts and Sciences, with the figure of Time at the helm, rose sharply up before them in the moonlight, amid its misty jets of water. Andre stood silent at Jane's side, looking at it intentiy.

  'I like it,' he said.

  Flora was leaning a little wearily against the parapet beside her father. Isabel and Robin and Rosalie and Freddy and

  Muriel and the two other boys were laughing together, facing the band stand, a few feet away. The Strauss waltz was over, but Sousa was still leading his band. Suddenly he raised his arm. The high, shrill notes of a comet solo rose above the orchestral accompaniment. The sweet, sentimental strains soared over the heads of the restless, moving crowd. Freddy Waters began very softly to sing. His eyes were fixed a Uttle mockingly on Rosahe's pretty, laughing face. It was De Koven's love song.

  *Oh, promise me that some day you and I Will take our love together to some sky *

  Jane was looking at Andre's stem young profile. He was still quite intent on the fountain. Freddy Waters continued to sing:

  'Where we can be alone and faith renew *

  Suddenly Flora gave a little startled cry.

  'Why, there's Mamma!' She pointed in the direction from which they had come. Jane turned quickly, in surprise, to look.

  There, gUding from the darkness into light, beneath the httle bridge across the lagoon, was a single gondola. The romantic figure of the gondoHer stood stark in the moonlight. The hght from a lamp on the parapet fell clearly on the faces of his passengers. Jane recognized them in an instant. They were Mr. Bert Lancaster and Flora's mother. Flora's mother, looking more beautiful than Jane had ever seen her, with a long black lace veil about her head, hiding her golden hair, framing the oval of her lovely face. A veil of mystery and romance.

  It was over in a moment. The gondola turned, on a deft stroke of the oar, and the hood hid its passengers. Mrs. Lester had risen to her feet at Flora's cry. She stood there, now, at Mr. Fumess's side, still staring at the unconscious back of the

  gondolier. Suddenly she threw a quick glance at Mr. Furness. Jane's eyes followed hers. Flora's father was looking after the gondola, too, and his great pale eyes were almost starting out of his head. His hps were trembling under his grey moustache and his face looked queer and wooden, as if all expression had been wiped out of it. Mrs. Lester looked quickly at Flora, Jane, and Andre. Andre's eyes had never left the fountain. Mrs. Lester put her arm around Flora.

  'It did look Hke your mother, didn't it, dear?' said Mrs. Lester kindly. 'But of course it couldn't have been, as she's in Galena.'

  Mr. Furness stirred at that.

  *We — we'd best be going home,' he muttered thickly.

  Mrs. Lester threw him a strangely admiring glance.

  'Yes. That's best,' she said simply. None of the others had seen it. They moved slowly off toward the entrance gates.

  Jane thought it was all very funny. Mrs. Lester and Mr. Furness looked so very queer. And of course that was Flora's mother. She had seen her quite distinctly. Suddenly she realized that Mrs. Lester was beside her.

  'Wait a minute, Jane,' she said kindly. 'Your frock's unbuttoned.'

  Jane paused, blushing, and Mrs. Lester's fat friendly fingers ftimbled up and down her back.

  'That wasn't Flora's mother, Jane,' she said, as she stood behind her. 'It did look very like her. But it wasn't. Flora was mistaken.'

  Jane didn't reply. This was funnier and fiinnicr. Why did Mrs. Lester care so much? People often saw Flora's mother out with Mr. Bert Lancaster. Freddy Waters had seen them last week, lunching at the RicheUeu.

  'Jane ' said Mrs. Lester, and stopped.

  *Yes,' said Jane, twisting about to look at her.

  *I don't like to tell a little girl not to — to tell her mother anything,' said Mrs. Lester hesitatingly, 'but I wouldn't — I wouldn't mention Flora's mistake at home. Not even to Isabel.'

  Jane looked at her wonderingly.

  'It — it might make trouble,' said Mrs. Lester falteringly.

  Jane underst
ood that, though she didn't understand why. Jane knew all about things that made trouble. Things that were never forgotten and always discussed. Funny little things. Like Andre's Paris studio.

  *I won't mention it, Mrs. Lester,' she said firmly.

  Mrs. Lester looked incredibly grateful.

  'Good Utde Jane,' she said; 'I don't like to give you a secret.'

  Jane privately thought that it wasn't her first. She couldn't remember a time when there weren't things she knew it was wiser not to say to her mother and Isabel. She smiled brightly at Mrs. Lester.

  'I don't mind,' she said.

  The drive home was just a little cold and very strange and silent. Jane found herself, rather unexpectedly, on the box seat with Mr. Furness. Mrs. Lester had Andre in the row behind. The others sat back of them, singing a little just at first, reminiscent strains of 'Oh, Promise Me,' then lapsing into silence. Mr. Furness never spoke once, all the way home. He drove very fast, flicking his horses with his whip, until they broke their trot and cantered for a step or two, then pulling them in again, with a great tug of the reins. The leaders reared once, near the Rush Street Bridge, and Jane very nearly screamed.