A Tangled Web (12 page)

“Sit down, Joscelyn. You now, I've been lying here thinking how many people will be glad when I'm dead? And not one to be sorry. And it seems to me that I wish I'd lived a bit differently, Joscelyn. I've always taken my fun out of them—I haven't spared them—they're all afraid of me. I'm just an ogress to them. It
was
fun watching them squirming. But now—I don't know. I've a devilish sort of feeling that I wish I'd been a kind, gentle, stingless creature like—well, like Annette Dark, for instance. Everybody was sorry when she died—though she never said a clever thing in her life. But she was smart enough to die before she got too old. Women should, Joscelyn. I've sat up too late. Nobody will miss me.”

Joscelyn looked levelly at Aunt Becky. She knew that what Aunt Becky said was true enough in a way. And she sensed the secret bitterness in the old woman's soul behind all her satire and bravado. She wanted to comfort her without telling a lie. Joscelyn could neither tell nor live a lie—which was what had made a clan existence hard for her.

“I think, Aunt Becky, that every one of us will miss you a great deal more than you suppose we will—a great deal more than we imagine ourselves. You're like—like mustard. Sometimes you bite—and a big dose of you
is
rather awful—”

“As today, for example,” interjected Aunt Becky with a faint grin.

“But you
do
give a tang to things. They'd be flat without you. And you seem like—I don't know how to put it—the very essence of Dark and Penhallow. We won't be half so much a clan when you're gone. You've always made history for us somehow. If this had been an ordinary afternoon—if we'd come here and you'd been nice to us—”

“And fed you—”

“We'd have all gone away and forgotten the afternoon. There'd be nothing in it to remember. But this afternoon
will
be remembered—and talked about. When the girls are old women they'll tell their grandchildren about it—you'll live by it fifty years after you're in your grave, Aunt Becky.”

“I
have
often thought it would be a frightfully dull world if everybody were perfectly good and sweet,” conceded Aunt Becky. “I guess it's only because I'm tired that I'm wishing I'd been more like Annette. She was as sweet and good and unexciting as they make 'em. She never said a naughty word in her life. And I was far handsomer than she was, mind you. But Crosby loved
her.
Now, Joscelyn, here's a queer thing. You heard what I said today. There was a time I'd have given my soul if Crosby had loved me—I'd have given and done anything—except be like Annette. Not even for Crosby would I have been willing to be like Annette—even though now I'm getting childish and wishing I had been. I'd rather sting people than bore them, after all. But—”

Aunt Becky paused and looked earnestly at Joscelyn. Joscelyn had held her own well. She was very good-looking. The evening light, falling through the window behind her, made a tremendous primrose nimbus around her shapely head. But her eyes—Aunt Becky wanted to solve the haunting mystery of Joscelyn's eyes.

“I didn't keep you here to talk about my own feelings. I'm going to die. And I'm not afraid of death. Isn't it strange? I was once so afraid of it. But before I die I want to ask you something. I've never asked you before—do me that justice. What went wrong between you and Hugh?”

Joscelyn started—flushed—paled—almost rose from her chair.

“No—sit down. I'm not going to try to make you tell if you don't want to. It isn't curiosity, Joscelyn. I'm done with that. I feel I'd just like to know the truth before I die. I remember your wedding. Hugh was the happiest-looking groom I ever saw. And you seemed very well pleased with yourself, too—when you came in first, at least. I remember thinking you were made for each other—the sort of people who should marry—and found a home—and have children. And I
would
like to know what wrecked it all.”

Joscelyn sat silent a few minutes longer. Oddly enough, she was conscious of a strange desire to tell Aunt Becky everything. Aunt Becky would understand—she was sure Aunt Becky would understand. For ten years she had lived in an atmosphere of misunderstanding and disapproval and suspicion. She had not minded it, she thought—the inner flame which irradiated life had been her protection. But today she felt oddly that she
had,
after all, minded it more than she had supposed. There was a soreness in her spirit that seemed old, not new. She
would
tell Aunt Becky. No one else would ever know. It was a confidence to the grave itself. And it might help her—heal her. She bent forward and began to speak in a low, intense voice. Aunt Becky lay and listened movelessly until Joscelyn had finished it.

“So that was it,” she said, when the passionate voice had ceased. “Something none of us ever thought of. I never thought of it. I thought perhaps it was something quite small. So many of the tragedies of life come from little, silly, ridiculous things. Nobody ever knew why Roger Penhallow hanged himself forty years ago—nobody but me. He did it because he was eighteen years old and his father
spanked
him. Ah, the things I know of this clan! All the things I said today were things everyone knows. But I didn't say a word about scores of things nobody dreams I know. But weren't you very cruel, Joscelyn?”

“What else could I have done?” said Joscelyn. “I
couldn't
have done anything else.”

“Not with that Spanish blood in you, I suppose. At least we'll blame it on the Spanish blood. Everything that isn't right in your branch of the Penhallows is laid at the door of that Spanish blood. Peter Penhallow and his hurry to be born, for instance. It must be the Spanish blood that makes you all fall in love with such terrible suddenness. Most of Captain Martin's descendants have been lovers at sight or not at all. I thought you'd escaped
that
curse—Hugh took so long courting you. Have you ever felt sorry you did it, Joscelyn?”

“No—no—no,” cried Joscelyn.

“Two 'no's' too many,” said Aunt Becky.

“I want to tell you the exact truth,” said Joscelyn slowly. “It is quite true—I've never been sorry I
did
do it. You can't be sorry you did a thing you
have
to do. But I have been sorry—not many times but all the time—that I
had
to do it. I didn't want to do it. I didn't want to hurt Hugh like that—and I
did
want to have Treewoofe. I want it yet—you don't know how much I want Treewoofe—and all the lovely life I had planned to have there. It was dreadful to have to give it up. But I couldn't do anything else, Aunt Becky—I
couldn't
.”

“Well, God bless you, child. The less we say about it the better. You'll probably hate me tonight because you've told me this. You'll feel I tricked you into it by being old and pitiful.”

“No, you didn't trick me. I wanted to tell you. I don't know why—but I wanted to. And I'm glad you don't blame me too much, Aunt Becky.”

“I don't blame you at all. I might even believe you were right if I were young enough to believe it. God save us all, what a world it is! The things that happen to people—things without rhyme or reason! Frank has never married, has he? Do you think it happened to him, too?”

Joscelyn's face crimsoned.

“I don't know. He went away the next morning, you know. Sometimes I think it might have—because—when I looked at him—oh, Aunt Becky, you remember that absurd thing Virginia Penhallow said about the first time she met Ned Powell. The whole clan has laughed over it. ‘The moment I looked into his eyes I knew he was my predestined mate.' Of course it
was
ridiculous. But, Aunt Becky, that was just the way I felt, too.”

“Of course.” Aunt Becky nodded understandingly. “We all
feel
those things. They're not ridiculous when we feel them. It's only when we put them into words that they're ridiculous. They're not meant to be put in words. Well, when
I
couldn't get the man I wanted, I just decided to want the man I could get. That was Craig Penhallow's way of looking at it, too. Ever hear the story of Craig Penhallow and the trees in Treewoofe lane, Joscelyn?”

“No.”

“Well, you've noticed—haven't you—something odd about the spruce trees up and down that lane? There's a gap in them every once in so long.”

Joscelyn nodded. Aunt Becky could not tell her much she didn't know about the appearance of the trees in Treewoofe lane.

“Thirty years ago old Cornelius Treverne owned Treewoofe. Craig was courting his daughter Clara. And one night Clara turned him down. Hard. Craig was furious. He flung himself out of the house and stormed down the lane. Poor old Cornelius had spent that whole day setting out a hedge of little spruce trees all along both sides of that long lane. A hard day's work, mind you. And what do you think Craig did by way of relieving his feelings? As he stalked along he would tear up a handful of old Cornelius' trees on the right hand—a few steps more—up would come a bunch on the left. He kept that up all the way down the lane. You can imagine what it looked like when he got to the end of it. And you can imagine what old Cornelius felt when he saw it next morning. He never got time to replant the trees—Cornelius was a great hand to put things off. He was a good man—painfully good. It was a blessing he hadn't sons, or they'd certainly have gone to the bad by way of keeping up the family average. But he was no hustler. So the trees that were left grew up as they were. As for Craig, by the time he had finished with the lane he felt a lot better. There were as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it—Maggie Penhallow was just as handsome as Clara Treverne. Or at least she managed her eyes and hands so well, she passed for handsome. You see, Craig was like me. He decided to be sensible. Perhaps your way is wiser, Joscelyn—and perhaps we're all fools together with the Moon Man's high-seated gods laughing at us. Joscelyn—I don't know whether I should tell you this—but I think I should, for I don't think you know, and the things we don't know sometimes hurt us horribly, in spite of the old proverb. All Hugh's family are at him to go to the States and get a divorce. It's been done several times, you know. People brag that Prince Edward Island hasn't had but one divorce since Confederation. Stuff and nonsense! It's had a dozen.”

“But—but—they're not really legal—here, are they?” stammered Joscelyn.

“Legal enough. They're winked at, anyhow. Mind, I don't say Hugh is going to do it. But they're at him—they're at him. Times have changed a bit these last ten years. No easy divorce for us—but in Hugh's case they'd condone it. Mrs. Jim Trent is the moving spirit behind it, I understand. She lived so long in the States she got their view-point. And she and Pauline Dark are as friendly just now as two cats lapping from the same saucer. Pauline's as much in love with Hugh as she ever was, you know.”

“It matters nothing to me,” said Joscelyn stiffly, rising to go. She bade Aunt Becky good-bye rather shortly. Aunt Becky smiled cryptically after Joscelyn had gone out.

“I've made Joscelyn Dark tell one fib in her life, if she never tells another,” she thought. “Poor little romantic splendid fool. I don't know whether I feel envy or contempt. Yet I remember when I took myself almost as seriously as that. Lord, what
does
get into girls? Old Cy Dark's son!”

16

Joscelyn went home slowly through the glamour and perfume of the June evening. Slowly, because she was in no hurry to get home where her mother and her Aunt Rachel would be talking the afternoon over indignantly and expecting her to be as indignant as they were. Slowly, because some unwelcome shadow of imminent change seemed to go with her as she walked. Slowly, because she was living over again the story she had told Aunt Becky.

She had been very sure she loved Hugh when she had finally promised to marry him. She had been happy in their brief engagement. Everybody had been happy—everybody well enough pleased about it, except Hugh's mother, Mrs. Conrad Dark, and his second cousin, Pauline Dark. Joscelyn did not care whether Pauline was pleased or not, but she was sorry Mrs. Conrad wasn't. Mrs. Conrad did not like her—never had liked her. Joscelyn had never been able to imagine why—until this very afternoon, when Aunt Becky had illuminated the mystery by her reference to Alec. Joscelyn had known Mrs. Conrad detested her from their first meeting, when Mrs. Conrad had told her that her petticoat was below her dress. Now, in the days of petticoats, there were three different ways you could tell a girl that her petticoat was below her dress. You could tell it as a kindly friend who felt it a duty to help get matters righted as soon as possible before anyone else noticed it, but who felt a sympathy with her as the victim of an accident which might happen at any time to yourself. You could tell it as a disinterested onlooker who had no real concern with the affair but wanted to do as you would be done by. Or you could tell it with a certain suppressed venom and triumph, as if you rather delighted in catching her in such a scrape and wanted her to know you saw the fatal garment and had your own opinion of any girl who could be so careless.

The last way had been Mrs. Conrad Dark's, and Joscelyn knew her for an enemy. But this did not disturb to any extent the happiness of her engagement. Joscelyn had a good deal of Peter Penhallow's power of detachment from the influence of anyone else's opinion. As long as Hugh loved her it did not matter what Mrs. Conrad thought; and Joscelyn knew how Hugh loved her.

Soon after their engagement, Treewoofe Farm at Three Hills came into the market. Treewoofe had been so named from some old place in Cornwall whence the Trevernes had come. The house was built on a hill overlooking the valley of Bay Silver, and Hugh bought the farm because of its magnificent view. Most of the clan thought the idea of buying a farm because it was beautiful very amusing and suspected Joscelyn of putting him up to it. Luckily, they thought, the soil was good, though run down, and the house practically new. Hugh had not made such a bad purchase, if the winter winds didn't make him wish he'd picked a more sheltered home. As for the view, of course it was very fine. None of the Darks or Penhallows were so insensitive to beauty as not to admit that. There was no doubt old Cornelius had tacked another hundred on his price because of that view. But it was a lonely spot and rather out of the world, and most of them thought Hugh had made a mistake.