"She got it from the Wansbarras," said Olive positively. "There's nothing like that in the Stirlings--nothing!"
"I hope not--I certainly hope not," Cecil had responded dubiously. "But then--to go out as a servant--for that is what it practically amounts to. Your cousin!"
Poor Olive felt the implication. The Port Lawrence Prices were not accustomed to ally themselves with families whose members "worked out."
Valancy could not resist temptation. She leaned forward.
"Olive, does it hurt?"
Olive bit--stiffly.
"Does what hurt?"
"Looking like that."
For a moment Olive resolved she would take no further notice of Valancy. Then duty came uppermost. She must not miss the opportunity.
"Doss," she implored, leaning forward also, "won't you come home--come home tonight?"
Valancy yawned.
"You sound like a revival meeting," she said. "You really do."
"If you come back."
"All will be forgiven."
"Yes," said Olive eagerly. Wouldn't it be splendid if she could induce the prodigal daughter to return? "We'll never cast it up to you. Doss, there are nights when I cannot sleep for thinking of you."
"And me having the time of my life," said Valancy, laughing.
"Doss, I can't believe you're bad. I've always said you couldn't be bad--"
"I don't believe I can be," said Valancy. "I'm afraid I'm hopelessly proper. I've been sitting here for three hours with Barney Snaith and he hasn't even tried to kiss me. I wouldn't have minded if he had, Olive."
Valancy was still leaning forward. Her little hat with its crimson rose was tilted down over one eye--Valancy's smile--what had happened to Valancy! She looked--not pretty--Doss couldn't be pretty--but provocative, fascinating--yes, abominably so. Olive drew back. It was beneath her dignity to say more. After all, Valancy must be both mad and bad.
"Thanks--that's enough," said Barney behind the car. "Much obliged, Mr. Stirling. Two gallons--seventy cents. Thank you."
Uncle Wellington climbed foolishly and feebly into his car. He wanted to give Snaith a piece of his mind, but dared not. Who knew what the creature might do if provoked? No doubt he carried firearms.
Uncle Wellington looked indecisively at Valancy. But Valancy had turned her back on him and was watching Barney pour the gas into Lady Jane's maw.
"Drive on," said Olive decisively. "There's no use in waiting here. Let me tell you what she said to me."
"The little hussy! The shameless little hussy!" said Uncle Wellington.
CHAPTER 22
The next thing the Stirlings heard was that Valancy had been seen with Barney Snaith in a movie theater in Port Lawrence and after it at supper in a Chinese restaurant there. This was quite true--and no one was more surprised at it than Valancy herself. Barney had come along in Lady Jane one dim twilight and told Valancy unceremoniously if she wanted a drive to hop in.
"I'm going to the Port. Will you go there with me?"
His eyes were teasing and there was a bit of defiance in his voice. Valancy, who did not conceal from herself that she would have gone anywhere with him to any place, "hopped in" without more ado. They tore into and through Deerwood. Mrs. Frederick and Cousin Stickles, taking a little air on the veranda, saw them whirl by in a cloud of dust and sought comfort in each other's eye. Valancy, who in some dim pre-existence had been afraid of a car, was hatless and her hair was blowing wildly round her face. She would certainly come down with bronchitis--and die at Roaring Abel's. She wore a low-neck dress and her arms were bare. That Snaith creature was in his shirtsleeves, smoking a pipe. They were going at the rate of forty miles an hour--sixty, Cousin Stickles averred. Lady Jane could hit the pike when she wanted to. Valancy waved her hand gaily to her relatives. As for Mrs. Frederick, she was wishing she knew how to go into hysterics.
"Was it for this," she demanded in hollow tones, "that I suffered the pangs of motherhood?"
"I will not believe," said Cousin Stickles solemnly, "that our prayers will not yet be answered."
"Who--who will protect that unfortunate girl when I am gone?" moaned Mrs. Frederick.
As for Valancy, she was wondering if it could really be only a few weeks since she had sat there with them on that veranda. Hating the rubberplant. Pestered with teasing questions like black flies. Always thinking of appearances. Cowed because of Aunt Wellington's teaspoons and Uncle Benjamin's money. Poverty-stricken. Afraid of everybody. Envying Olive. A slave to moth-eaten traditions. Nothing to hope for or expect.
And now every day was a gay adventure.
Lady Jane flew over the fifteen miles between Deerwood and the Port--through the Port. The way Barney went past traffic policemen was not holy. The lights were beginning to twinkle out like stars in the clear, lemon-hued twilight air. This was the only time Valancy ever really liked the town, and she was crazy with the delight of speeding. Was it possible she had ever been afraid of a car? She was perfectly happy, riding beside Barney. Not that she deluded herself into thinking it had any significance. She knew quite well that Barney had asked her to go on the impulse of the moment--an impulse born of a feeling of pity for her and her starved little dreams. She was looking tired after a wakeful night with a heart attack, followed by a busy day. She had so little fun. He'd given her an outing for once. Besides, Abel was in the kitchen, at the point of drunkenness where he was declaring he did not believe in God and beginning to sing ribald songs. It was just as well she should be out of the way for a while. Barney knew Roaring Abel's repertoire.
They went to the movie--Valancy had never been to a movie. And then, finding a nice hunger upon them, they went and had fried chicken--unbelievably delicious--in the Chinese restaurant. After which they rattled home again, leaving a devastating trail of scandal behind them. Mrs. Frederick gave up going to church altogether. She could not endure her friends' pitying glances and questions. But Cousin Stickles went every Sunday. She said they had been given a cross to bear.
CHAPTER 23
On one of Cissy's wakeful nights, she told Valancy her poor little story. They were sitting by the open window. Cissy could not get her breath lying down that night. An inglorious gibbous moon was hanging over the wooded hills and in its spectral light Cissy looked frail and lovely and incredibly young. A child. It did not seem possible that she could have lived through all the passion and pain and shame of her story.
"He was stopping at the hotel across the lake. He used to come over in his canoe at night--we met in the pines down the shore. He was a young college student--his father was a rich man in Toronto. Oh, Valancy, I didn't mean to be bad--I didn't, indeed. But I loved him so--I love him yet--I'll always love him. And I--didn't know--some things. I didn't understand. Then his father came and took him away. And--after a little--I found out--oh, Valancy,--I was so frightened. I didn't know what to do. I wrote him--and he came. He--he said he would marry me, Valancy."
"And why--and why?"
"Oh, Valancy, he didn't love me anymore. I saw that at a glance. He--he was just offering to marry me because he thought he ought to--because he was sorry for me. He wasn't bad--but he was so young--and what was I that he should keep on loving me?"
"Never mind making excuses for him," said Valancy a bit shortly. "So you wouldn't marry him?"
"I couldn't--not when he didn't love me anymore. Somehow--I can't explain--it seemed a worse thing to do than--the other. He--he argued a little--but he went away. Do you think I did right, Valancy?"
"Yes, I do. You did right. But he--"
"Don't blame him, dear. Please don't. Let's not talk about him at all. There's no need. I wanted to tell you how it was--I didn't want you to think me bad--"
"I never did think so."
"Yes, I felt that--whenever you came. Oh, Valancy, what you've been to me! I can never tell you--but God will bless you for it. I know He will--'with what measure ye mete.'"
Cissy sobbed for a few minutes in Valancy's arms. Then
she wiped her eyes.
"Well, that's almost all. I came home. I wasn't really so very unhappy. I suppose I should have been--but I wasn't. Father wasn't hard on me. And my baby was so sweet, Valancy--with such lovely blue eyes--and little rings of pale gold hair like silk floss--and tiny dimpled hands. I used to bite his satin-smooth little face all over--softly, so as not to hurt him, you know--"
"I know," said Valancy, wincing. "I know--a woman always knows--and dreams--"
"And he was all mine. Nobody else had any claim on him. When he died, oh, Valancy, I thought I must die too--I didn't see how anybody could endure such anguish and live. To see his dear little eyes and know he would never open them again--to miss his warm little body nestled against mine at night and think of him sleeping alone and cold, his wee face under the hard frozen earth. It was so awful for the first year--after that it was a little easier, one didn't keep thinking 'this day last year'--but I was so glad when I found out I was dying."
"'Who could endure life if it were not for the hope of death?'" murmured Valancy softly--it was of course a quotation from some book of John Foster's.
"I'm glad I've told you all about it," sighed Cissy. "I wanted you to know."
Cissy died a few nights after that. Roaring Abel was away. When Valancy saw the change that had come over Cissy's face she wanted to telephone for the doctor. But Cissy wouldn't let her.
"Valancy, why should you? He can do nothing for me. I've known for several days that--this--was near. Let me die in peace, dear--just holding your hand. Oh, I'm so glad you're here. Tell Father good-bye for me. He's always been as good to me as he knew how--and Barney. Somehow, I think that Barney--"
But a spasm of coughing interrupted and exhausted her. She fell asleep when it was over, still holding to Valancy's hand. Valancy sat there in the silence. She was not frightened--or even sorry. At sunrise Cissy died. She opened her eyes and looked past Valancy at something--something that made her smile suddenly and happily. And, smiling, she died.
Valancy crossed Cissy's hands on her breast and went to the open window. In the eastern sky, amid the fires of sunrise, an old moon was hanging--as slender and lovely as a new moon. Valancy had never seen an old, old moon before. She watched it pale and fade until it paled and faded out of sight in the living rose of day. A little pool in the barrens shone in the sunrise like a great golden lily.
But the world suddenly seemed a colder place to Valancy. Again nobody needed her. She was not in the least sorry Cecilia was dead. She was only sorry for all her suffering in life. But nobody could ever hurt her again. Valancy had always thought death dreadful. But Cissy had died so quietly--so pleasantly. And at the very last--something--had made up to her for everything. She was lying there now, in her white sleep, looking like a child. Beautiful! All the lines of shame and pain gone.
Roaring Abel drove in, justifying his name. Valancy went down and told him. The shock sobered him at once. He slumped down on the seat of his buggy, his great head hanging.
"Cissy dead--Cissy dead," he said vacantly. "I didn't think it would 'a' come so soon. Dead. She used to run down the lane to meet me with a little white rose stuck in her hair. Cissy used to be a pretty little girl. And a good little girl."
"She has always been a good little girl," said Valancy.
CHAPTER 24
Valancy herself made Cissy ready for burial. No hands but hers should touch that pitiful, wasted little body. The old house was spotless on the day of burial. Barney Snaith was not there. He had done all he could to help Valancy before it--he had shrouded the pale Cecilia in white roses from the garden--and then had gone back to his island. But everybody else was there. All Deerwood and "up back" came. They forgave Cissy splendidly at last. Mr. Bradly gave a very beautiful funeral address. Valancy had wanted her old Free Methodist man, but Roaring Abel was obdurate. He was a Presbyterian and no one but a Presbyterian minister should bury his daughter. Mr. Bradly was very tactful. He avoided all dubious points and it was plain to be seen he hoped for the best. Six reputable citizens of Deerwood bore Cecilia Gay to her grave in decorous Deerwood cemetery. Among them was Uncle Wellington.
The Stirlings all came to the funeral, men and women. They had had a family conclave over it. Surely now that Cissy Gay was dead Valancy would come home. She simply could not stay there with Roaring Abel. That being the case, the wisest course--decreed Uncle James--was to attend the funeral--legitimize the whole thing, so to speak--show Deerwood that Valancy had really done a most creditable deed in going to nurse poor Cecilia Gay and that her family backed her up in it. Death, the miracle worker, suddenly made the thing quite respectable. If Valancy would return to home and decency while public opinion was under its influence all might yet be well. Society was suddenly forgetting all Cecilia's wicked doings and remembering what a pretty, modest little thing she had been--"and motherless, you know--motherless!" It was the psychological moment--said Uncle James.
So the Stirlings went to the funeral. Even Cousin Gladys' neuritis allowed her to come. Cousin Stickles was there, her bonnet dripping all over her face, crying as woefully as if Cissy had been her nearest and dearest. Funerals always brought Cousin Stickles' "own sad bereavement" back.
And Uncle Wellington was a pall-bearer.
Valancy, pale, subdued-looking, her slanted eyes smudged with purple, in her snuff-brown dress, moving quietly about, finding seats for people, consulting in undertones with minister and undertaker, marshaling the "mourners" into the parlor, was so decorous and proper and Stirlingish that her family took heart of grace. This was not--could not be--the girl who had sat all night in the woods with Barney Snaith--who had gone tearing bareheaded through Deerwood and Port Lawrence. This was the Valancy they knew. Really, surprisingly capable and efficient. Perhaps she had always been kept down a bit too much--Amelia really was rather strict--hadn't had a chance to show what was in her. So thought the Stirlings. And Edward Beck, from the Port road, a widower with a large family who was beginning to take notice, took notice of Valancy and thought she might make a mighty fine second wife. No beauty--but a fifty-year-old widower, Mr. Beck told himself very reasonably, couldn't expect everything. Altogether, it seemed that Valancy's matrimonial chances were never so bright as they were at Cecilia Gay's funeral.
What the Stirlings and Edward Beck would have thought had they known the back of Valancy's mind must be left to the imagination. Valancy was hating the funeral--hating the people who came to stare with curiosity at Cecilia's marble-white face--hating the smugness--hating the dragging, melancholy singing--hating Mr. Bradly's cautious platitudes. If she could have had her absurd way, there would have been no funeral at all. She would have covered Cissy over with flowers, shut her away from prying eyes, and buried her beside her nameless little baby in the grassy burying-ground under the pines of the "up back" church, with a bit of kindly prayer from the old Free Methodist minister. She remembered Cissy saying once, "I wish I could be buried deep in the heart of the woods where nobody would ever come to say, 'Cissy Gay is buried here,' and tell over my miserable story."
But this! However, it would soon be over. Valancy knew, if the Stirlings and Edward Beck didn't, exactly what she intended to do then. She had lain awake all the preceding night thinking about it and finally deciding on it.
When the funeral procession had left the house, Mrs. Frederick sought out Valancy in the kitchen.
"My child," she said tremulously, "you'll come home now?"
"Home," said Valancy absently. She was getting on an apron and calculating how much tea she must put to steep for supper. There would be several guests from "up back"--distant relatives of the Gays' who had not remembered them for years. And she was so tired she wished she could borrow a pair of legs from the cat.
"Yes, home," said Mrs. Frederick, with a touch of asperity. "I suppose you won't dream of staying here now--alone with Roaring Abel."
"Oh, no, I'm not going to stay here," said Valancy. "Of course, I'll have to stay for a day or two, to put
the house in order generally. But that will be all. Excuse me, Mother, won't you? I've a frightful lot to do--all those 'up back' people will be here to supper."
Mrs. Frederick retreated in considerable relief, and the Stirlings went home with lighter hearts.
"We will just treat her as if nothing had happened when she comes back," decreed Uncle Benjamin. "That will be the best plan. Just as if nothing had happened."
CHAPTER 25
On the evening of the day after the funeral Roaring Abel went off for a spree. He had been sober for four whole days and could endure it no longer. Before he went, Valancy told him she would be going away the next day. Roaring Abel was sorry, and said so. A distant cousin from "up back" was coming to keep house for him--quite willing to do so now since there was no sick girl to wait on--but Abel was not under any delusions concerning her.
"She won't be like you, my girl. Well, I'm obliged to you. You helped me out of a bad hole and I won't forget it. And I won't forget what you did for Cissy. I'm your friend, and if you ever want any of the Stirlings spanked and sot in a corner send for me. I'm going to wet my whistle. Lord, but I'm dry! Don't reckon I'll be back afore tomorrow night, so if you're going home tomorrow, good-bye now."
"I may go home tomorrow," said Valancy, "but I'm not going to Deerwood."
"Not going."
"You'll find the key on the woodshed nail," interrupted Valancy, politely and unmistakably. "The dog will be in the barn and the cat in the cellar. Don't forget to feed her till your cousin comes. The pantry is full and I made bread and pies today. Good-bye, Mr. Gay. You have been very kind to me and I appreciate it."
"We've had a d--d decent time of it together, and that's a fact," said Roaring Abel. "You're the best small sport in the world, and your little finger is worth the whole Stirling clan tied together. Good-bye and good luck."
Valancy went out to the garden. Her legs trembled a little, but otherwise she felt and looked composed. She held something tightly in her hand. The garden was lying in the magic of the warm, odorous July twilight. A few stars were out and the robins were calling through the velvety silences of the barrens. Valancy stood by the gate expectantly. Would he come? If he did not--He was coming. Valancy heard Lady Jane Grey far back in the woods. Her breath came a little more quickly. Nearer--and nearer--she could see Lady Jane now--bumping down the lane--nearer--nearer--he was there--he had sprung from the car and was leaning over the gate, looking at her.
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