“You remember Di Meredith gave her this in place of one she broke?”
What a memory he had for everything connected with that Blythe clan! But Susette put them resolutely out of her mind.
“Oh,” she sighed, “this toast is heavenly.”
“I had a good teacher, don’t forget,” grinned Dick. “Pull up to the table and let us break bread together. Don’t forget to compliment me on my tea. I’m an expert at making tea.”
“I suppose Anne Blythe taught you,” Susette could not help saying.
“She gave me some hints. But I had a natural gift for it.”
“Boastful as ever.” But she sat down at the table obediently. The tea was good; so was the toast; it seemed hard to think of Dick making toast. As for the jam it had evidently been made from old Susan Baker’s famous recipe. It had been known all over the Glen St. Mary neighbourhood.
“A jug of tea, a crust of bread and thou,” said Dick impudently. Susette refused... temporarily... to resent it. But why, oh why, should it be so delightful to sit in this half dark room drinking tea and munching toast with detested Dick?
“I ought to telephone Glenellyn,” she said weakly.
“You can’t. This line never works in thunderstorms. If I were Harvey Brooks I’d be scouring the countryside for you. Susette, did any poor devil ever tell you that the way you looked over your shoulder at him drove him entirely mad? It eclipses even Rilla Ford’s famous smile.”
“Do you remember,” said Susette slowly, “how, when we were going to play Robinson Crusoe, you wouldn’t let me be Man Friday because I was a girl?”
“And quite right I was! How could Crusoe have a distracting Man Friday like you? I showed my sense. I remember the Blythes agreed with me.”
“If he mentions a Blythe again I’ll throw that pitcher at his head,” thought Susette.
Much later... it might have been hours... months... years... Susette awoke to the fact that although the thunder and lightening had ceased the rain was still pouring down in a business-like way as if it meant to keep on for days. She looked at her watch and exclaimed in dismay.
“Half past six! It will be dinner time in an hour at Glenellyn. I can never get there!”
“I should think you couldn’t,” said Dick. “Have some sense, Susette. The road from here will be absolutely impassable for that little car of yours. You can’t go back tonight. You’ve just got to stay here.”
“Nonsense! I can’t stay here. I must telephone... Harvey will come for me somehow...”
“Just try to phone...”
Susette tried. There was no reply. She stood for a few moments before the telephone wondering why she didn’t mind.
“I... I don’t know what to do,” she said miserably. “Oh, I know it would be madness to try to get back in this storm... but I have to be at the office tomorrow morning and... and...”
“And how about Harvey’s proposal in the meantime?” grinned Dick. “Never mind, Susette. There are other proposals. I’m going to make one myself in the morning. I’ll be awkward... I’ve never had any experience... but I’ll get the thing said. I was on the brink of proposing to Di Meredith once but somehow never managed to be sure I wanted to. Now I know why.”
Susette sat down in fury because there didn’t seem anything else to do. Dick lit the candles on the mantelpiece... informing her that Dr. and Mrs. Gilbert Blythe had given them to Roddy and his wife for a wedding present... and crossed one long leg over the other. He didn’t pay Susette any more compliments or rag her about Harvey or drag in the Blythes or Merediths by the skin of their teeth. He talked all the evening about aviation and the Royal Canadian Air Force. Susette listened greedily. She almost forgot, until she found herself between the lavendar-scented sheets of Mrs. Roddy’s guest room bed in the upstairs, south-east corner of the farmhouse, that she hated Dick.
“Think,” she told herself desperately, “how he used to bully the other boys... how he once twisted Jack’s arm to make him apologize... how he told Aunt Marian it was Jack who took the pie... what he did to the kitten”... That memory was intolerable. Susette buried her face in the pillow and groaned. She was glad to recall what Jem Blythe had done to him for it. Still, the memory was intolerable. She hated him... she did hate him... she would get up ever so early in the morning and sneak away before she saw him again.
Suddenly Susette sat up in bed and shook her small white hand at the darkness. She had just remembered what had happened to her sensations when her fingers had happened to touch Dick’s as he gave her the second cup of tea.
“I won’t fall in love with him! I won’t! I won’t!”
She was aghast. When she put her danger into words it terrified her. There was nothing for it but an early morning flit back to safety and sanity and... and Harvey.
When Susette awoke she knew something she had not known when she went to sleep. She had only been afraid of knowing it. She got out of bed very softly and tiptoed to the window. The sun was not yet visible but the whole morning sky behind the eastern hill of spruces was rose-hued, with gossamer clouds of pale gold strewn over it. Little shivers were running over the silver-green pond. The distances were hung with pale blue mists. Susette knew she must drive instantly away through those lovely morning mists or she was a lost woman.
Swiftly and noiselessly she dressed. Swiftly and noiselessly she crept down the stairs, opened the front door and stepped out. She looked about her and caught her breath with delight. The sun was up now and a new lovely world, with its face washed, was blinking its innocent baby eyes at it. She had forgotten what the farm was like at dawn. And she hadn’t seen all the dear spots she had loved. Wasn’t there time at least for a sneak down to the pond? Dick wouldn’t be up for an hour yet.
She would take a stolen run through this golden world. She would slip down to the pond on the old pathway with the wind as a gallant companion. The grasses would bathe her feet in green coolness and the water would sing to her... just once before she went back to Harvey.
When she was almost at the pond a suspicious fragrance met her nostrils. Before she realized the truth she had broken through the trees and saw Dick squatted by a wood fire, broiling bacon, with a coffee pot beside him. A tablecloth was spread on the ground and... what was on it? Wild strawberries! Wild strawberries on a green leaf! How long was it since she had eaten wild strawberries of any kind, much less the kind that grew on the farm? She recalled as in a dream that Jem Blythe had always claimed to know a secret place where they grew bigger and sweeter than anywhere else.
Dick waved a fork with a piece of bacon on it at her. “Good girl! I was just going to call you. We’ve got to start soon to be in town in time. Besides, I didn’t want you to miss such a chance to bathe your soul in dawn as Anne Blythe used to say. Look what I have for you... I found Jem Blythe’s old plot in the back pasture. Such amazing luck! But then this farm has always been noted for its good luck. Besides... see... a bunch of the little red columbines you used to love. Pick out a soft spot on that rock and sit down.”
Susette did as she was told. She felt a little dazed. Dick poured her coffee and fed her on bacon and wild strawberries. Neither of them said much. There were zones of beautiful colour on the pond, with little pools of pellucid shadow here and there. Great white cloud-mountains with amber valleys rose up in the sky over Glen St. Mary way. Presently, she supposed, Dick would be flying over them. The idea drove her to the banality of offering him a penny for his thoughts.
“I was wondering what would happen if I suddenly called you ‘darling,’” he said solemnly.
“I should go away, of course,” said Susette. “I’m going anyway. We can’t sit here forever.”
“Why not?” said Dick.
“That is a silly question and of course not meant to be answered,” said Susette, getting up.
Dick got up, too.
“I’m going to answer it. We can’t sit here forever, heavenly as it would be, because the next bunch of big boys leaves th
e day after tomorrow. There isn’t a great deal of time for us to get a special licence and be married.”
“You’re quite mad,” said Susette.
“Do you remember Walter Blythe’s favourite quotation? Funny how the Walters in that family seem to run to poetry. I’ve been told his uncle would have been famous if he hadn’t stayed in France in the last show. Anyway, it’s a poor family that can’t afford one madman. I was never much of a one for poetry but didn’t somebody once write something like this? I’m sure I’ve heard Walter quoting it.
There is a pleasure sure in being mad
That none but madmen know.
“I was never as intimate with the Blythes as you seem to have been,” said Susette coldly.
“That was a pity. They were a delightful family.”
“And I am going to the house to get my car and hurry back to Glenellyn,” said Susette firmly.
“I know that’s what you intend to do but it won’t take long to change your mind.”
Susette looked about her a bit helplessly. Then she happened to look at Dick. The next moment she was caught tightly in his arms and was being kissed... one long, wild, rapturous, breathless kiss.
“Sweetheart... joy... delight... wonder. Don’t look so furious, darling. Don’t you know that when you look at a man with eyes like that you are simply asking him to kiss you? You are mine, Susette. I’ve made you mine with that kiss. You can never belong to anyone else.”
Susette stood very still. She knew this was one of the rare splendid moments of life. She knew that she would never marry Harvey.
“We’ll be on our way to Charlottetown in fifteen minutes,” Dick was saying. “It’ll take me that time to put away Mrs. Roddy’s frying pan and lock your car into Roddy’s barn.”
Susette went back to her room for her watch, which she had left under her pillow. She supposed she was bewitched... literally bewitched. Nothing else would account for it. She remembered that Dr. Gilbert Blythe had been rather laughed at because he had said there might be such a thing at the time of the goings-on at the old Field place. If she could only forget about the kitten! But so many boys were cruel at first.
When she got back to the pond she could not see Dick anywhere at first. Then she saw him standing a little way off in the shadow of some spruces. His back was towards her and a red squirrel was perched on his shoulder. He was feeding it with something and the squirrel was chattering to him.
Susette was very still. She knew another thing now. And she would have run if Dick had not wheeled round at that moment. The squirrel made a wild leap to the trees and Dick came striding to her.
“Did you see that little chap? And do you remember how Jem Blythe always loved squirrels? They’ve always been fond of me, too... the folk of fur and feathers.”
“You are not Dick,” said Susette, in a low tone, looking up at him.
Dick stopped.
“No,” he said, “I’m not. I was wondering how I was going to tell you. But how did you find out?”
“When I saw the squirrel on your shoulder. Animals always hated Dick... he was so cruel to them. People don’t change as much as that. No squirrel would ever have climbed his shoulder... that was why the Blythes hated him so much. And may I ask who you really are?”
“Having promised to marry me you have a right to the information,” he said gravely. “I am Jerry Thornton, a second cousin of Dick’s through Aunt Marian, but no earthly relation to you. We lived in Charlottetown but I was here one or two summers when you weren’t. I heard all about you from the others... especially Jem, with whom I was great pals and who had a youthful passion for you at the time. And remember you called me Dick first. I was afraid, if I undeceived you, you wouldn’t stay long enough to let me make you love me. I thought I’d a better chance as Dick... even though you had such a grudge against him. We always looked alike... our grandmothers were sisters... but honest to goodness we aren’t alike under our skins. Besides, Dick is married... as are most of the old gang.”
“He would be,” said Susette.
Jerry looked down at her a bit anxiously. “A little thing like a mistake in the man isn’t going to make any difference, is it, Susette?”
“I don’t see why it should,” answered Susette. “But tell me two things. First, how did you know that Dick once kissed me?”
“As if any boy wouldn’t kiss you if he ever got the chance!” scoffed Jerry.
“And how did you know I loved wild columbines?”
“Everybody loves wild columbines,” said Jerry.
A Commonplace Woman
It had been raining all day... a cold, drizzling rain... but now the night had fallen and the rain had partially ceased, though the wind still blew and sighed. The John Anderson family were sitting in the parlour... they still called it that... of the ugly house on the outskirts of Lowbridge, waiting for their great-aunt Ursula, who was dying in the room overhead, to die and have done with it.
They would never have expressed it like that but each one in his or her secret soul thought it.
In speech and outward behaviour they were all quite decorous, but they were all seething with much impatience and some resentment. Dr. Parsons supposed he ought to stay till the end because old Aunt Ursula was his grandfather’s cousin, and because Mrs. Anderson wanted him to stay.
And he could not as yet afford to offend people, even distant relatives. He was just starting to practise in Lowbridge and Dr. Parker had been the doctor in Lowbridge for a long time. Almost everyone had him except a few cranks who did not like him and insisted on having Dr. Blythe over from Glen St. Mary. Even most of the Andersons had him. In Dr. Parsons’ eyes they were both old men and ought to give the younger men a chance.
But at all events, he meant to be very obliging and do all he could to win his way. One had to, these days. It was all very well to talk about unselfishness but that was the bunk. It was every man for himself.
If he could win Zoe Maylock... apart from all considerations of love... and Dr. Parsons imagined he was wildly in love with the acknowledged belle of Lowbridge... it would help him quite a bit. The Maylocks were rather a run-down old family, but they had considerable influence in Lowbridge for all that. They never had Dr. Parker either. When any of them were sick they sent for Dr. Blythe. There was some feud between the Andersons and the Parkers. How those feuds lasted!
Dr. Parker might laugh and pretend he didn’t care but the young doctor thought he knew better. Human nature was better understood nowadays than when poor old Dr. Parker went to college.
Anyhow, young Dr. Parsons meant to be as obliging as he could. Every little helped. It would be some time yet before his practice would justify him in marrying, confound it. He even doubted if the John Andersons would pay his bill... and it seemed the old girl who took so long in dying had no money. They said Dr. Blythe... and even Dr. Parker sometimes, though he was more worldly-minded... attended poor people for nothing. Well, he was not going to be such a fool. He had come to old Ursula because he wanted to ingratiate himself with the Andersons, some of whom were well off enough yet. And cut out Dr. Blythe if it were possible... though it was wonderful what a hold that man had on the countryside, even if he was getting along in years. People said he had never been the same since his son was killed in the Great War.
And now another war was on and they said several of his grandsons were going... especially a Gilbert Ford who was in the R.C.A.F. People were constantly dropping hints that they thought he ought to volunteer. Even Zoe at times seemed to have entirely too much admiration for this aforesaid Gilbert Ford. But it was all nonsense. There were plenty of ne’er-do-wells to go.
Meanwhile he would do what he could for a poor, run-down family like the John Andersons. The progenitors of the said Andersons had, so he had been told, once been rich and powerful in the community. The biggest stone in the Lowbridge cemetery was that of a certain David Anderson. It was moss-grown and lichened now but it must have been considered some stone in its d
ay.
He seemed to recall some queer yarn about the same David and his funeral... old Susan Baker at Glen St. Mary had told it to a crony. But likely it was mere gossip. Old Susan was getting childish. People said the Blythes of Ingleside kept her there merely out of charity. No doubt the yarn was only gossip. There was no love lost, he had heard, between the Bakers and the Andersons... though that feud, too, was almost ancient history, as Mrs. Blythe of Ingleside called it. It was her son who had been killed in the Great War... and another one had been crippled. She had three sons go, so it had been said. Young fools!
But the survivors were old men now... at least callow young Dr. Parsons thought they were. One of the sons of one of them was also thought to have a liking for Zoe. She was very popular. But he thought he had the inside track... not to mention the fact that it was whispered that Dr. and Mrs. Blythe had no great liking for the affair. And gossip again... confound it... said he had dropped Zoe because she had once laughed at Susan Baker. Or was it Gilbert Ford?
Well, it didn’t matter. The whole yarn was unlikely. As if any man in his senses would “drop” Zoe Maylock! Even Gilbert Ford with his Toronto airs!
Well, thank goodness... young Dr. Parsons stole a sly look at his watch... old Ursula Anderson was dead... or as good as dead. He was sure the John Andersons in their secret souls would be very glad... and he did not blame them in the least. Trouble and expense was all she had meant to them for years. Though she had earned her way as a dressmaker until late in life, he understood. The idea made him laugh secretly. It was more than funny to think of anyone wearing a dress made by Ursula Anderson, he thought. The wearer must have looked as if she had stepped out of one of those awful faded photo-graphs or crayon enlargements he was so often called upon to admire.
Would that old woman overhead ever die? He wished he had invented some excuse for going long ago. One could carry obligement too far. And it was too late to go to Zoe now. Perhaps Walter Blythe... named after his uncle, of course... had been spending the evening with her. Well, let the best man win! Dr. Parsons had little doubt who it would be. Zoe might be angry... or pretend to be... but a doctor could always think up a good excuse. And Gilbert Ford, of whom he was secretly more afraid than of Walter Blythe, had gone back to Toronto.
The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 600