“I’m so happy — so happy, Mother,” sobbed Marigold. “I was so afraid you were.”
“And that’s why you’ve been so funny to him. Marigold, why didn’t you ask me—”
“I couldn’t bear to. I was so afraid you’d say it was true.”
Lorraine Lesley cuddled her baby closer. She understood and did not laugh at the torture the little soul had endured.
“Darling, no one who had loved your father could ever love any one else. I’ve had love — and now I have its memory — and you. That is enough for me.”
“Mother,” whispered Marigold, “were you — disappointed because — I wasn’t a boy?”
“Never. Not for one minute. I wanted you to be a girl. And so did your father. There hadn’t been a little girl at Cloud of Spruce for so long, he said.”
Marigold sat very still with her face against her mother’s. She knew this was one of the moments that last forever.
4
Mr. Thompson was such a nice man. Such a nice, jolly, friendly man. She hoped that pig hadn’t eaten all his parsnips. She was dreadfully sorry for him because he wasn’t going to get Mother, but Aunt Ellice would do very well. She was so useful. A ministers wife should be useful. And Jane was a darling. How jolly it was not to hate anybody any more. Life and she were good friends again.
It had stopped snowing. A big round silvery moon was floating up over a snowy hill. The little hollow in Mr. Donkin’s field that would be a pool, blue-flagged, in summer, was a round white dimple, as if some giantess had pressed her finger down. The orchard was full of fine, faint blue shadows on the snow. It was a lovely world and life was beautiful. The paper that day had said a king’s son had been born in Europe and a millionaire’s son in Montreal. A far more interesting event which the paper had not chronicled, was that the Witch of Endor had three lovely kittens in the apple-barn. And to-morrow she would go up the hill and tryst again with Sylvia.
CHAPTER XV
One Clear Call
1
I am afraid that if Marigold could have defined her state of mind when her mother told her she must go to the missionary meeting in the church that evening, she would have said she was bored with the prospect. For a little girl who had three fourth cousins in the foreign-mission field it must be confessed that Marigold was shamefully indifferent to missionary work in general.
She had planned to spend the evening with Sylvia and she didn’t want to exchange Sylvia’s alluring company for a dull, stupid, poky, old missionary meeting. The adjectives are Marigold’s, not mine, and if you blame her for them, please remember that very few lasses of eleven, outside of memoirs, have any very clear ideas of the heathen in their blindness. For Marigold, foreign missions were something that grown-ups and ministers naturally took to but which were far removed from her sphere of thought and action. So she didn’t see why she should be dragged out to hear a foreign missionary speak. She had heard one the night she went with Gwennie — a queer, sun-burned spectacled man, tremendously in earnest but dreadfully dull. And Marigold considered she had had enough of it. But Grandmother could not go out after night because of her rheumatism and Salome had a sore foot; and Mother, for some strange reason, was set on going. It seemed that the speaker of the evening was a lady and an old schoolmate of hers. She wanted Marigold for company. Marigold would have done anything and gone anywhere for Mother — even to a missionary meeting. So she trotted resignedly along the pleasant, star-lit road with Mother and thought mainly about the new dress of apricot georgette that Mother, in spite of Grandmother’s pursed lips, had promised her for Willa Rogers’s birthday-party.
Marigold got her first shock when the missionary rose to speak. Could that wonderful creature be a missionary? Marigold had never seen any one so entrancingly beautiful in her life. What strange, deep, dark, appealing eyes! What cheek of creamy pallor despite India’s suns! What a crown of burnished, red-gold hair! What exquisite out-reaching hands that seemed to draw you magnetically whither they would! What a haunting voice, full of pathos and unnameable charm! And what a lovely, lovely white dress with a pale, seraphic-blue girdle hanging to the hem of it!
Dr. Violet Meriwether had not been speaking for ten minutes before Marigold was longing through all her soul to be a foreign missionary, with the uttermost ends of the earth for her inheritance. The only thing that surprised her was that there was no visible halo around Dr. Violet’s head.
Oh, what a thrilling address! Marigold had a moment of amazed wonder at herself for ever supposing foreign missions were poky before she was swept out on that flood-tide of eloquence to a realm she had never known existed — a realm in which self-sacrifice and child-widows and India’s coral strand were all blended together into something indescribably fascinating and appealing. Nay, more than appealing — demanding. Before Dr. Violet was half through her address Marigold Lesley, entranced in the old Lesley pew, was dedicating her life to foreign missions.
It was a sudden conversion but a very thorough one. Already Marigold felt that she was cut off forever from her old life — her old companions — her old dreams. She was not the silly, wicked little girl who had come unwillingly to the missionary meeting an hour ago, thinking of apricot dresses and fairy playmates on the hill. Not she. Consecrated. Set apart. All the rest of her life to follow that shining, upward path of service Dr. Violet Meriwether pointed out. Some day she, too, might be Dr. Marigold Lesley. Think of it. She had sometimes wondered whom she would like to resemble when she grew up. Mother? But Mother was “put upon.” Everybody bossed her. But she had no longer any doubt. She wanted to be exactly like Dr. Violet Meriwether.
She hated Em Church for giggling behind her. She looked with scornful contempt at Elder MacLeod’s four grown-up daughters. Why weren’t they in the foreign-mission field? She almost died of shame when she sneezed rapidly three times in succession just when Dr. Violet was making her most impassioned appeal to the young girls. Was there not one in this church to-night who would answer, “Here Am I” to the “one-clear call”? And Marigold, who longed to spring to her feet and say it, could only sneeze until the great moment was passed and Dr. Meriwether had sat down.
Mr. Thompson followed with a few words. He lacked entirely the fascination of Dr. Meriwether, but one of his sentences struck burningly across Marigold’s thrilled soul. A foreign missionary, he said, must be calm, serene, patient, tactful, self-reliant, resourceful and deeply religious. Marigold remembered every one of his adjectives. It was something of a large order but Marigold in her uplift had no doubt she could fill it eventually. And she would begin at once to prepare herself for her life-work. At once. She went down the aisle as if she trod on air. Oh, how wicked and foolish she had been before this wonderful night! But now her face was — what had been Dr. Meriwether’s phase—”set towards the heights” — distant, shining heights of service and sacrifice. Marigold shivered in ecstasy.
Tommy Blair was going down the opposite aisle. Marigold had hated Tommy Blair bitterly ever since the day he had written across the front page of her reader in his sprawling, inky hand,
“This book is one thing, my fist is another. If you steal the one, you’ll feel the other.”
But she must forgive him — a missionary must forgive everybody. She smiled at him so radiantly across the church that Tommy Blair went out and told his cronies that Marigold Lesley was “gone” on him.
2
Marigold could not tell her mother of her great resolve. It would make poor Mother feel so badly. If Father had been alive, it would be different. But she was all Mother had. That was where part of the self-sacrifice lay. As for telling Grandmother, Marigold never dreamed of it. But she plunged at once with all her might into the preparation for her life-work. Grandmother and Mother knew there was something in the wind, though they couldn’t imagine what. I do not know if they considered Marigold calm, serene, patient, tactful, etc., but I do know they thought her very funny.
“Whatever it is I suppose it will run it
s course,” said Grandmother resignedly, out of her experience. But Mother was secretly a little bit worried. Something must be the matter when Marigold said she would rather not have a new apricot dress — her old one was quite good enough. And she didn’t even want to go to Willa’s party — only Grandmother insisted because the Rogerses would be offended. Marigold went under protest and condescended to the other little girls, pitying them for the dull, commonplace lives before them. Pitying Algie Rogers too. Every one knew his mother had vowed he should be a minister when he wanted furiously to be a carpenter. How different from her high, self-elected lot.
“My, but ain’t Marigold Lesley getting stuck-up,” Willa Rogers said.
Marigold laid aside the tiny diamond ring Aunt Marigold had given her on her last birthday. Consecrated people should not, she felt, wear diamond rings. Uncle Klon offered to get her one of the new striped silk parasols she had craved, but Marigold thanked him firmly and serenely and would he please give her a concordance instead. Uncle Klon chuckled and gave it to her. He did not know what particular magic Marigold was making now, but he knew she was getting a tremendous lot of satisfaction out of it.
She was. It was positive rapture to refuse the new ribbon hat-streamers for which her soul had once longed and wear her old hat to Cousin Nellie’s wedding. Once Marigold had been interested in weddings. Who knew — when one grew up — ? But that was past. She must never ever think of being married. Marigold was nothing if not thorough. Naught but counsels of perfection for her. She washed dishes and beat eggs and weeded her garden rapt as a saint.
She gave up reading everything except missionary literature. She pored over the missionary books from the Sunday-school library — especially one fascinating little fat brown volume, the biography of a missionary who had “prepared” herself from the age of six. Marigold felt she had lost many precious years. But she would do her best to catch up. She rose at five o’clock — once — to read the Bible and pray. That would sound well in a memoir. The said missionary had arisen at five o’clock every morning of her life from her sixth birthday. But said missionary did not have a Grandmother. That made all the difference.
The only thing that really hurt very badly was giving up Sylvia. At first Marigold felt that she could not — could not — do this. But she must. Sacrifice was not really sacrifice unless it hurt you. Dr. Violet had said so. She explained it all tearfully to Sylvia. Was it only fancy or did a mocking elfin-rill of laughter follow her down the orchard from the cloud of spruce? It almost seemed as if Sylvia didn’t think she meant it.
Marigold tried to fill up the resulting gap in her life by imagining herself being carried about on the backs of elephants and rescuing child-widows from burning, at the risk of her life. To be sure, Dr. Violet had not said anything about riding on elephants — she had even mentioned a prosaic motor-car — and Mr. Thompson said widows were no longer burned. But no doubt something just as dreadful was done to them. Marigold stifled her longing for Sylvia in rescuing them by the dozen. Oh, I fancy Uncle Klon was right.
Marigold had some moments of agonised wonder if she would ever be able to pray in public. She tried to make a small beginning by saying “Amen” under her breath whenever Mr. Thompson said anything in his prayers that appealed to her. And it was very hard to decide where she would go as a missionary. She shuddered for days between Japanese earthquakes and Indian snakes. Until she got a book about the lepers in India. The lepers carried the day. They must be attended to, snakes or no snakes. She would be a missionary to the lepers. And meanwhile Grandmother was horribly cross because Marigold had forgotten to water the geraniums. She couldn’t explain to Grandmother that she had forgotten because she was bringing an Indian village through a famine. But she was calm and serene under Grandmother’s disapproval. Very.
3
For two or three weeks this was all very well and satisfying. Then Marigold yearned for what Alexander the Great would have called more worlds to conquer and Dr. Violet Meriwether might have termed a wider field of service. The heroine of the memoirs was always visiting some one who was sick or in trouble and working wonders of consolation. Marigold felt she should do the same. But whom to visit? There was nobody sick or in trouble — that Marigold knew of — near Cloud of Spruce just then. Unless it might be Mrs. Delagarde. The thought of her came to Marigold like an inspiration. Mrs. Delagarde of the black robes and the sad, sad face. Who never went anywhere but wandered about in her big garden all day long in South Harmony.
Marigold had heard some one say that Mrs. Delagarde was a “little off.” She did not know what that meant exactly but she felt sure any one with that sorrowful face was in need of comforting. She would go to see her and — and — what? Read the Bible to her as the Lady of the Memoirs had done? Marigold could not see herself doing that. But she would just go to see her — and perhaps the way would be opened up. In the Memoirs a way was always opened up. Marigold slipped up to her room before she went, and said a little special prayer. A very earnest, sincere little prayer, in spite of the fact that it was couched largely in the language of the Memoirs. Then she stole away through the fragrant evening.
Marigold had a moment of panic when she found herself really inside Mrs. Delagarde’s gate facing a grim house that looked black against the sunset. But a missionary must be self-reliant. A missionary must not give way to panic. With a gallant smile Marigold marched down the aisle of daffodils to where Mrs. Delagarde was standing among the pale gold of lemon lilies in the shadows, with an amber sky and dark hills behind her, staring unseeingly before her with her large, strange agate-grey eyes.
Mrs. Delagarde surprised Marigold. Her whole sad face lighted up with a wonderful radiance of joy. She stepped forward and held out her hands. Marigold was to be haunted for weeks by those long pale hands held out in supplication.
“Delight — Delight — you have come back to me—” she said.
Marigold let Mrs. Delagarde take her hands — put her arms round her — press her lips to her forehead. She suddenly felt very queer — and frightened. There was something about Mrs. Delagarde — and she was being drawn into the house. What was Mrs. Delagarde saying — in that quick, strange, passionate voice of hers, that wasn’t like any voice Marigold knew?
“I’ve often seen you walking before me — with your face turned away. You’d never wait for me. But now you have come back, Delight. So you must have forgiven me. Have you forgiven me, Delight?”
“Oh — yes — yes.” Marigold would have said “yes” to any question. She did not know what she was saying. She was no brave missionary — no ambitious candidate for Memoirs — she was only a very badly frightened little girl — shut up in a strange house with a strange — a very strange woman.
Again that wonderful flash of joy crossed Mrs. Delagarde’s face.
“Come up to your room, Delight. It is all ready for you. I have kept it all ready. I knew you would come back to me sometime — when I had been punished enough. So I have kept it ready for you.”
Marigold was being drawn up the stairs by that insistent arm — across the hall — into a room. A large, shadowy room with four great windows. And in the midst a huge white bed with something lying on it. Marigold felt a prickling in the roots of her hair — Was it — was it — ?
“There is your big doll, Delight,” said Mrs. Delagarde, laughing a little wildly. “I’ve kept it for you, you see. Take it up and play with it. I want to see you play, Delight. It’s so long since I have seen you play. And your dresses are all in the closet for you. See.”
She opened the closet-door and Marigold saw them — rows of dainty dresses hanging there, awfully like Bluebeard’s wives in a picture-book she had.
Marigold found her voice — a shaky, panicky voice.
“Please may I go home now?” she gasped. “I — I think Mother will be wanting me. It’s — getting late.”
A look of alarm crossed Mrs. Delagarde’s pale face — followed by a look of cunning.
“
But you are home, Delight. You are my child — though you have left me so long. Oh, it was cruel to leave me so long. But I will not scold you — I will never scold you again. Now you have come back. You must never leave me again. Never. I am going to find your father and tell him you have come back. I have never spoken to him since you went away — but I will speak now. Oh, Delight, Delight!”
Marigold eluded the outstretched arms.
“Please, please let me go,” she entreated desperately. “I’m not your little Delight — really I’m not — my name is Marigold Lesley. Please, dear Mrs. Delagarde, let me go home.”
“You are still angry with me,” said Mrs. Delagarde sorrowfully. “That is why you talk so. Of course you are Delight. Don’t you think I know your golden hair? But you are angry with me because I whipped you that day before you went away. I will never do that again, Delight. You need not be afraid of me, darling. Tell me again that you forgive me, sweetest — tell me again that you forgive me.”
“Oh, I do — I do.” If only Mrs. Delagarde would let her out! But Mrs. Delagarde knelt down by her entreatingly.
“Oh, we will be so happy now that you have come back, Delight. Kiss me — kiss me. You have turned your face away from me so long, my golden-haired Delight.”
Her voice was so appealing that Marigold, in spite of her terror, could not refuse. She bent forward and kissed Mrs. Delagarde — then found herself seized in a wild embrace and smothered with hungry kisses.
Marigold tore herself from the encircling arms and darted towards the door. But Mrs. Delagarde caught her as she reached it — pushed her aside with a strange little laugh and slipped out. Marigold heard the key turn in the lock. She was a prisoner in the house of a crazy woman. She knew now. That was what people meant when they called Mrs. Delagarde “a little off.”
What could she do? Nothing. Nobody knew where she was. Alone in this horrible, big, darkening room with the shrouded windows. With those dreadful dresses of dead Delight hanging in the closet. With that terrible doll lying on the bed like a dead thing. With a huge, black bearskin muff on a little stand by the bed. What wild tale had Lazarre once told her about those big, old-fashioned bearskin muffs? That they were really witches and went out on moonlit nights and danced in the snow. There was a moon to-night — already its faint radiance was stealing into the room — suppose the muff began to dance around the room before her!
The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 472