One calm, hazy afternoon I was coming slowly up from the mills. Happening to glance at the kitchen roof, I gasped. It was on fire in one place. Evidently the dry shingles had caught fire from a spark. There was not a soul about save Gussie, Aunt Lucy, and myself. I dashed wildly into the kitchen, where Gussie was peeling apples.
“The house is on fire,” I exclaimed. Gussie dropped her knife and turned pale.
“Don’t wake Mother,” was all she said, as she snatched a bucket of water from the table. The ladder was still lying by the well. In a second I had raised it to the roof and, while Gussie went up it like a squirrel and dashed the water on the flames, I had two more buckets ready for her.
Fortunately the fire had made little headway, though a few minutes more would have given it a dangerous start. The flames hissed and died out as Gussie threw on the water, and in a few seconds only a small black hole in the shingles remained. Gussie slid down the ladder. She trembled in every limb, but she put out her wet hand to me with a faint, triumphant smile. We shook hands across the ladder with a cordiality never before expressed.
For the next week, in spite of Rev. Carroll, I was happy when I thought of Gussie and miserable when I thought of Nellie. I held myself in some way bound to her and — was she not my ideal? Undoubtedly!
One day I got a letter from my sister. It was long and newsy, and the eighth page was most interesting.
“If you don’t come home and look after Nellie,” wrote Kate, “you’ll soon not have her to look after. You remember that old lover of hers, Rod Allen? Well, he’s home from the west now, immensely rich, they say, and his attentions to Nellie are the town talk. I think she likes him too. If you bury yourself any longer at Ashley Mills I won’t be responsible for the consequences.”
This lifted an immense weight from my mind, but the ninth page hurled it back again.
“You never say anything of Miss Ashley in your letters. What is she like — young or old, ugly or pretty, clever or dull? I met a lady recently who knows her and thinks she is charming. She also said Miss Ashley was to be married soon to Rev. Something-or-Other. Is it true?”
Aye, was it? Quite likely. Kate’s letter made a very miserable man of me. Gussie found me a dull companion that day. After several vain attempts to rouse me to interest she gave it up.
“There’s no use talking to you,” she said impatiently. “I believe you are homesick. That letter you got this morning looked suspicious. Anyhow, I hope you’ll get over it before I get back.”
“Are you going away again?” I asked.
“Yes. I am going to stay a few days with Flossie.” Flossie was that inseparable chum of hers.
“You seem to spend a good deal of your time with her,” I remarked discontentedly.
Gussie opened her eyes at my tone.
“Why, of course,” she said. “Flossie and I have always been chums. And she needs me more than ever just now, for she is awfully busy. She is to be married next month.”
“Oh, I see — and you—”
“I’m to be bridesmaid, of course, and we’ve heaps to do. Flossie wanted to wait until Christmas, but Mr. Martin is in a—”
“Mr. Martin,” I interrupted. “Is Mr. Martin going to marry your friend?”
“Why, yes. Didn’t you know? They just suit each other. There he comes now. He’s going to drive me over, and I’m not ready. Talk to him, for pity’s sake, while I go and dress.”
I never enjoyed a conversation more. Rev. Carroll Martin was a remarkably interesting man.
Nellie married Rod Allen at Christmas and I was best man. Nellie made a charming little bride, and Rod fairly worshipped her. My own wedding did not come off until spring, as Gussie said she could not get ready before that.
Kismet
The fifth heat in the free-for-all was just over. “Lu-Lu” had won, and the crowd on the grand stand and the hangers-on around the track were cheering themselves hoarse. Clear through the noisy clamour shrilled a woman’s cry.
“Ah — I have dropped my scorecard.”
A man in front of her turned.
“I have an extra one, madame. Will you accept it?”
Her small, modishly-gloved hand closed eagerly on it before she lifted her eyes to his face. Both started convulsively. The man turned very pale, but the woman’s ripe-tinted face coloured darkly.
“You?” she faltered.
His lips parted in the coldly-grave smile she remembered and hated.
“You are not glad to see me,” he said calmly, “but that, I suppose, was not to be expected. I did not come here to annoy you. This meeting is as unexpected to me as to you. I had no suspicion that for the last half-hour I had been standing next to my—”
She interrupted him by an imperious gesture. Still clutching the scorecard she half-turned from him. Again he smiled, this time with a tinge of scorn, and shifted his eyes to the track.
None of the people around them had noticed the little by-play. All eyes were on the track, which was being cleared for the first heat of another race. The free-for-all horses were being led away blanketed. The crowd cheered “Lu-Lu” as she went past, a shapeless oddity. The backers of “Mascot”, the rival favourite, looked gloomy.
The woman noticed nothing of all this. She was small, very pretty, still young, and gowned in a quite unmistakable way. She studied the man’s profile furtively. He looked older than when she had seen him last — there were some silver threads gleaming in his close-clipped dark hair and short, pointed beard. Otherwise there was little change in the quiet features and somewhat stern grey eyes. She wondered if he had cared at all.
They had not met for five years. She shut her eyes and looked in on her past. It all came back very vividly. She had been eighteen when they were married — a gay, high-spirited girl and the season’s beauty. He was much older and a quiet, serious student. Her friends had wondered why she married him — sometimes she wondered herself, but she had loved him, or thought so.
The marriage had been an unhappy one. She was fond of society and gaiety, he wanted quiet and seclusion. She Was impulsive and impatient, he deliberate and grave. The strong wills clashed. After two years of an unbearable sort of life they had separated — quietly, and without scandal of any sort. She had wanted a divorce, but he would not agree to that, so she had taken her own independent fortune and gone back to her own way of life. In the following five years she had succeeded in burying all remembrance well out of sight. No one knew if she were satisfied or not; her world was charitable to her and she lived a gay and quite irreproachable life. She wished that she had not come to the races. It was such an irritating encounter. She opened her eyes wearily; the dusty track, the flying horses, the gay dresses of the women on the grandstand, the cloudless blue sky, the brilliant September sunshine, the purple distances all commingled in a glare that made her head ache. Before it all she saw the tall figure by her side, his face turned from her, watching the track intently.
She wondered with a vague curiosity what induced him to come to the races. Such things were not greatly in his line. Evidently their chance meeting had not disturbed him. It was a sign that he did not care. She sighed a little wearily and closed her eyes. When the heat was over he turned to her.
“May I ask how you have been since — since we met last? You are looking extremely well. Has Vanity Fair palled in any degree?”
She was angry at herself and him. Where had her careless society manner and well-bred composure gone? She felt weak and hysterical. What if she should burst into tears before the whole crowd — before those coldly critical grey eyes? She almost hated him.
“No — why should it? I have found it very pleasant — and I have been well — very well. And you?”
He jotted down the score carefully before he replied.
“I? Oh, a book-worm and recluse always leads a placid life. I never cared for excitement, you know. I came down here to attend a sale of some rare editions, and a well-meaning friend dragged me out to see the rac
es. I find it rather interesting, I must confess, much more so than I should have fancied. Sorry I can’t stay until the end. I must go as soon as the free-for-all is over, if not before. I have backed ‘Mascot’; you?”
“‘Lu-Lu’” she answered quickly — it almost seemed defiantly. How horribly unreal it was — this carrying on of small talk, as if they were the merest of chance-met acquaintances! “She belongs to a friend of mine, so I am naturally interested.”
“She and ‘Mascot’ are ties now — both have won two heats. One more for either will decide it. This is a good day for the races. Excuse me.”
He leaned over and brushed a scrap of paper from her grey cloak. She shivered slightly.
“You are cold! This stand is draughty.”
“I am not at all cold, thank you. What race is this? — oh! the three-minute one.”
She bent forward with assumed interest to watch the scoring. She was breathing heavily. There were tears in her eyes — she bit her lips savagely and glared at the track until they were gone.
Presently he spoke again, in the low, even tone demanded by circumstances.
“This is a curious meeting, is it not? — quite a flavor of romance! By-the-way, do you read as many novels as ever?”
She fancied there was mockery in his tone. She remembered how very frivolous he used to consider her novel-reading. Besides, she resented the personal tinge. What right had he?
“Almost as many,” she answered carelessly.
“I was very intolerant, wasn’t I?” he said after a pause. “You thought so — you were right. You have been happier since you — left me?”
“Yes,” she said defiantly, looking straight into his eyes.
“And you do not regret it?”
He bent down a little. His sleeve brushed against her shoulder. Something in his face arrested the answer she meant to make.
“I — I — did not say that,” she murmured faintly.
There was a burst of cheering. The free-for-all horses were being brought out for the sixth heat. She turned away to watch them. The scoring began, and seemed likely to have no end. She was tired of it all. It didn’t matter a pin to her whether “Lu-Lu” or “Mascot” won. What did matter! Had Vanity Fair after all been a satisfying exchange for love? He had loved her once, and they had been happy at first. She had never before said, even in her own heart: “I am sorry,” but — suddenly, she felt his hand on her shoulder, and looked up. Their eyes met. He stooped and said almost in a whisper:
“Will you come back to me?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered breathlessly, as one half-fascinated.
“We were both to blame — but I the most. I was too hard on you — I ought to have made more allowance. We are wiser now both of us. Come back to me — my wife.”
His tone was cold and his face expressionless. It was on her lips to cry out “No,” passionately.
But the slender, scholarly hand on her shoulder was trembling with the intensity of his repressed emotion. He did care, then. A wild caprice flashed into her brain. She sprang up.
“See,” she cried, “they’re off now. This heat will probably decide the race. If ‘Lu-Lu’ wins I will not go back to you, if ‘Mascot’ does I will. That is my decision.”
He turned paler, but bowed in assent. He knew by bitter experience how unchangeable her whims were, how obstinately she clung to even the most absurd.
She leaned forward breathlessly. The crowd hung silently on the track. “Lu-Lu” and “Mascot” were neck and neck, getting in splendid work. Half-way round the course “Lu-Lu” forged half a neck ahead, and her backers went mad. But one woman dropped her head in her hands and dared look no more. One man with white face and set lips watched the track unswervingly.
Again “Mascot” crawled up, inch by inch. They were on the home stretch, they were equal, the cheering broke out, then silence, then another terrific burst, shouts, yells and clappings—”Mascot” had won the free-for-all. In the front row a woman stood up, swayed and shaken as a leaf in the wind. She straightened her scarlet hat and readjusted her veil unsteadily. There was a smile on her lips and tears in her eyes. No one noticed her. A man beside her drew her hand through his arm in a quiet proprietary fashion. They left the grand stand together.
Lilian’s Business Venture
Lilian Mitchell turned into the dry-goods store on Randall Street, just as Esther Miller and Ella Taylor came out. They responded coldly to her greeting and exchanged significant glances as they walked away.
Lilian’s pale face crimsoned. She was a tall, slender girl of about seventeen, and dressed in mourning. These girls had been her close friends once. But that was before the Mitchells had lost their money. Since then Lilian had been cut by many of her old chums and she felt it keenly.
The clerks in the store were busy and Lilian sat down to wait her turn. Near to her two ladies were also waiting and chatting.
“Helen wants me to let her have a birthday party,” Mrs. Saunders was saying wearily. “She has been promised it so long and I hate to disappoint the child, but our girl left last week, and I cannot possibly make all the cakes and things myself. I haven’t the time or strength, so Helen must do without her party.”
“Talking of girls,” said Mrs. Reeves impatiently, “I am almost discouraged. It is so hard to get a good all-round one. The last one I had was so saucy I had to discharge her, and the one I have now cannot make decent bread. I never had good luck with bread myself either.”
“That is Mrs. Porter’s great grievance too. It is no light task to bake bread for all those boarders. Have you made your jelly yet?”
“No. Maria cannot make it, she says, and I detest messing with jelly. But I really must see to it soon.”
At this point a saleswoman came up to Lilian, who made her small purchases and went out.
“There goes Lilian Mitchell,” said Mrs. Reeves in an undertone. “She looks very pale. They say they are dreadfully poor since Henry Mitchell died. His affairs were in a bad condition, I am told.”
“I am sorry for Mrs. Mitchell,” responded Mrs. Saunders. “She is such a sweet woman. Lilian will have to do something, I suppose, and there is so little chance for a girl here.”
Lilian, walking down the street, was wearily turning over in her mind the problems of her young existence. Her father had died the preceding spring. He had been a supposedly prosperous merchant; the Mitchells had always lived well, and Lilian was a petted and only child. Then came the shock of Henry Mitchell’s sudden death and of financial ruin. His affairs were found to be hopelessly involved; when all the debts were paid there was left only the merest pittance — barely enough for house-rent — for Lilian and her mother to live upon. They had moved into a tiny cottage in an unfashionable locality, and during the summer Lilian had tried hard to think of something to do. Mrs. Mitchell was a delicate woman, and the burden of their situation fell on Lilian’s young shoulders.
There seemed to be no place for her. She could not teach and had no particular talent in any line. There was no opening for her in Willington, which was a rather sleepy little place, and Lilian was almost in despair.
“There really doesn’t seem to be any real place in the world for me, Mother,” she said rather dolefully at the supper table. “I’ve no talent at all; it is dreadful to have been born without one. And yet I must do something, and do it soon.”
And Lilian, after she had washed up the tea dishes, went upstairs and had a good cry.
But the darkest hour, so the proverb goes, is just before the dawn, and after Lilian had had her cry out and was sitting at her window in the dusk, watching a thin new moon shining over the trees down the street, her inspiration came to her. A minute later she whirled into the tiny sitting-room where her mother was sewing.
“Mother, our fortune is made! I have an idea!”
“Don’t lose it, then,” said Mrs. Mitchell with a smile. “What is it, my dear?”
Lilian sobered herself, sat down by he
r mother’s side, and proceeded to recount the conversation she had heard in the store that afternoon.
“Now, Mother, this is where my brilliant idea comes in. You have often told me I am a born cook and I always have good luck. Now, tomorrow morning I shall go to Mrs. Saunders and offer to furnish all the good things for Helen’s birthday party, and then I’ll ask Mrs. Reeves and Mrs. Porter if I may make their bread for them. That will do for a beginning, I like cooking, you know, and I believe that in time I can work up a good business.”
“It seems to be a good idea,” said Mrs. Mitchell thoughtfully, “and I am willing that you should try. But have you thought it all out carefully? There will be many difficulties.”
“I know. I don’t expect smooth sailing right along, and perhaps I’ll fail altogether; but somehow I don’t believe I will.”
“A great many of your old friends will think—”
“Oh, yes; I know that too, but I am not going to mind it, Mother. I don’t think there is any disgrace in working for my living. I’m going to do my best and not care what people say.”
Early next morning Lilian started out. She had carefully thought over the details of her small venture, considered ways and means, and decided on the most advisable course. She would not attempt too much, and she felt sure of success.
To secure competent servants was one of the problems of Willington people. At Drayton, a large neighbouring town, were several factories, and into these all the working girls from Willington had crowded, leaving very few who were willing to go out to service. Many of those who did were poor cooks, and Lilian shrewdly suspected that many a harassed housekeeper in the village would be glad to avail herself of the new enterprise.
Lilian was, as she had said of herself, “a born cook.” This was her capital, and she meant to make the most of it. Mrs. Saunders listened to her businesslike details with surprise and delight.
“It is the very thing,” she said. “Helen is so eager for that party, but I could not undertake it myself. Her birthday is Friday. Can you have everything ready by then?”
The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 609