Amorelle (9 page)

She ate her delicious lunch when noontime came, sampled some of her candy, shared some of it with a shy little girl and her weary mother across the aisle, and found plenty left in the lunchbox for her dinner. But when darkness began to come down and obscure the landscape, her brave spirit faltered. She felt that she must stretch out on a bed and sleep in spite of the price it would cost, so she found her way to a sleeper and, fortunately, secured a berth.

It was late when she awoke the next morning. She had missed many of the sights which would have interested her, but she felt more rested than she had for a week. When she had dressed, she explored her lunchbox and found a sandwich and a large, juicy pear left for breakfast.

The train was due to arrive at her uncle’s city at three o’clock that afternoon, and Amorelle, more cheerful than the night before, began to take an interest in the new landscape around her. She went to the dining car at lunchtime and began to feel herself part of a new world.

As her destination drew nearer, she tried to fancy how the strange relatives would look and act. She had not seen even her uncle since she was a very little girl. It was good to think of having some relatives. She made a lot of resolves about making them love her, and she tried to hope they were all going to be glad to see her. She wondered if they were Christians. She knew her father had been troubled about his brother. He had said he was immersed in business and never wrote on such topics but that he was a church member. Amorelle wondered if it would be any easier to live in the same house with people who were not Christians than it would be to be married to them.

As it drew near three o’clock, she got out her aunt’s letter and read the directions over carefully, though she almost knew them by heart. But when she landed in the strange station with many people jostling by her and the noise of the big city outside, she felt very much alone and wished someone had seen fit to meet her.

Seated in the taxi, she found her heart beating wildly. She felt she had come a long way from the girl she had been yesterday. It seemed as if her father had been dead a year and she had been growing up very fast. When she looked up at the somewhat pretentious house at which the taxi stopped, her heart almost failed her. Just for an instant she wanted to turn back, go somewhere else and get a job, support herself, and write her uncle she had changed her mind. Why hadn’t she thought before that that was the thing to do?

But the driver was opening the door and waiting for his fare, and of course someone might see her out of the window. Now she was here, she must go in. She steadied herself with the thought that, of course, she could make an excuse and go away in a day or two if she found things unpleasant. And then with an upward cry for help, she got out of the cab and went up the steps of the house.

While she waited for the door to be opened, she glanced around curiously. It was a pleasant neighborhood. There was shrubbery in front of the house, partially hiding it from the street. The wide porch was covered with matting of an orange and black pattern, and there were bright orange cushions on the chairs and couch and swing that hung from the ceiling on chains. The tables and other furniture were lacquered black. Scattered around lavishly were bright magazines, with startling pictures of movie stars in sketchy bathing suits. A book with silver and black covers entitled
Her Scarlet Sin
lay open facedown on the black wicker table. Beside it a cloisonné ashtray held several cigarette stumps and plenty of ashes.

Amorelle turned from a thoughtful contemplation of the scene to see that the door was opening and a maid, obviously finishing the adjustment of her hastily donned cap and apron, stood looking at her curiously.

“Is this where Mr. Enoch Dean lives?” Amorelle asked with a frightened wish that the girl would say no and she might yet turn and flee.

But the girl nodded.

“You’re Miss Dean, aren’t you? Well, you’re to go right upstairs to the third story, the middle room, not the front room—that’s the sewing room. You’ll find it right at the top of the stairs. Ms. Dean is gone to a bridge party and Miss Louise, she’s at the country club. They said fer you ta make yerself at home.”

Amorelle stepped into the hall with a feeling as if cold water had been suddenly thrown in her face and yet a relief that she would not have to face the formidable strange aunt and cousin right at once.

“Is—my uncle—able to see me?” she asked, hesitantly pausing on the first step of the stairs.

The maid was already untying her apron and unpinning her cap and did not stop in the action as she answered.

“Oh, him? He’s down at the office. He don’t get home till six any night.”

“Oh, but I thought he had been in an accident,” said the girl, puzzled. “I thought he had hurt his knee.”

“Oh, he did, last week, but he ain’t missed a day at the office yet. Ef he wanted to
she
wouldn’t let him anyway. You got a trunk coming, ain’t you?”

“Yes,” said Amorelle, feeling more of a stranger than ever. “Here is my check. Had I better leave it with you? Will they bring the trunk up to my room?”

“Not n’less you pay him an extra quarter. It’s fifty cents fer the second floor, seventy-five fer the third. Of course you could unpack it and lug it up yerself ef you wanted to.”

Amorelle coldly handed the maid the seventy-five cents and plodded up the two flights of stairs. When she reached the little middle room with its one high dormer window, its ugly collection of heterogeneous furniture, she closed her door, sat down in a shaky rocking chair with her elbows on its arms, and buried her face in her hands. What a home to come to! She thought of the dear little manse in Rivington with its tasteful arrangement of fine old furniture; she thought of her own dainty bedroom; she remembered the loving faces at the station when she had left, even dear old Hannah in her plaid gingham, and the world seemed very black. She wondered why she had ever come here.

It was a good thing that her trunk arrived just then—she had started it a full day ahead of herself—else she might have fallen into utter despair, so prone are these spirits of ours to be affected by our surroundings. But the trunk demanded immediate attention. She had asked the expressman to unstrap it for her, and at once she became more cheerful as she caught sight of her own things lying on the top, just as she had placed them a couple of days before.

She took out her father’s picture and placed it on her bureau, the beautiful picture that the kind-hearted photographer, a member of their church, had had enlarged and framed for her a Christmas ago. What comfort it was that she had that picture now. She remembered that Johnny Brewster had said he wished he had a copy of that picture, and she thought to herself that she would write and get one finished and framed for him. Johnny hadn’t taken a cent for all the moving and help he had given her. But that was one thing she could do for him, and she must see to it at once. How good Johnny had been to her! A brother could not have done better, at least in the ways he understood her need.

There was an ugly bureau of golden oak in the room and a maple chiffonier. They were not decorative, but they provided plenty of room for putting away garments. There was also a rather shallow closet containing six hooks and three wire hangers. However, it was more interesting and less disheartening to dispose of her garments than to sit and wonder why she had come, and she went to work trying to forget her cold welcome and the dismalness of the little room. At least it was her own. She would not have to share it with any disagreeable cousin, the dread of which had been one of the bugbears of her way there. There was a bathroom down the hall. She would probably have to share it with that grumpy maid, but there might be worse things than that. At least she looked clean.

About half past five, she thought she heard a car drive up to the house and opened her door to see if any of the family had arrived.

She had dressed herself in a pretty silk of brown with Persian red that her father had always liked, and she was questioning within herself just what etiquette required of a guest who had arrived during the absence of family. Should she rush down and try to be quietly glad to see them, or should she wait for them to come to her? Of course her own feeling was to await developments, but maybe that was not the Christian attitude. They were relatives, and there might have been plenty of excuses for their not having planned a more cordial greeting. Besides, it was all pride anyway. She must put those thoughts aside and try to be natural.

But just as she reached this conclusion, she heard voices.

“Oh, so she’s come, has she? Oh heck, Clara, she’s
come!
Now isn’t that awkward with Sam Bemis coming to dinner, and very likely Anne and Tommy and George Horton will be in for the evening!”

It was a young voice that was talking, but who was she speaking to as Clara? Not her mother, surely! But yes, that must be it, for an older, bored voice replied, “Oh, for sweet pity’s sake, Louise, don’t worry me now! I’m tired to death! I can’t see what difference it makes about this particular night. If your stepfather insists on having her here all winter, why, there isn’t anything we can do about it. Just act as you would anyway.”

“Oh heck!” said the younger voice. “Does she have to come down to dinner?”

“Certainly! I suppose she does. You know you couldn’t get away with a thing like that. It’ll just have to be understood that she belongs to the family. She won’t likely want to be very social just after a funeral! Louie, dear, go tell Ida not to disturb her yet awhile. I want to get a nap before dinner. I’m simply passing out. Tell her to call your cousin when dinner is ready and not before, do you understand?”

“That’s a help!” said a relieved younger voice. “Clara, you certainly are a cherub when it comes to in-laws. I’m simply dying for a smoke and a hot bath before I dress. I was afraid you were going to make me the goat, and I simply wouldn’t stand for that!”

Amorelle shut her door softly and went and sat down on her bed, staring off at the ugly flowered wallpaper, her heart sinking lower and lower. Was this what she was up against for the winter? What could she do about it? What would her father want her to do?

I
da did not take the trouble to call her even when she heard a silver chime ring out, which surely must be the dinner signal. She hesitated at the door, wondering what she ought to do. Her own wish in the matter would be to remain where she was until summoned even if it took all night. But she had spent some time on her knees, inquiring her way through this difficult path that lay before her, and a spirit of meekness had come upon her through heavenly converse, which shone sweetly in her quiet face and made her anxious to do the thing that would the least provoke. So far as was in her, she was determined to try out this unknown world and see if she could win its inhabitants. Or, failing in that, at least to leave a Christian witness behind her if she had to go.

So now she paused at the head of the stairs and heard a clatter of voices downstairs. It might be only one girl and one young man, but they were conversing loudly. Then she heard a door open on the floor below and a man’s slow step going downstairs.

The young voices did not pause for more than “Hello” as the elder man arrived among them but chattered and laughed on. And then she heard another door open on the second floor and a woman’s step, the rustle of a skirt, a waft of perfume, and she knew her aunt was coming out. Now was her time, and she sped down her flight and met the imperious lady of the house, just advancing from her room to the head of the lower flight of stairs.

“Is—this—Aunt Clara?” she asked, shyly lifting her eyes to meet hard, calculating gray ones that surveyed her coldly.

“Oh, it’s
you
, is it?” said the woman, not offering any warmer salute. “Ida said you had come. Did you have any trouble in finding your way?” She put her hand on the balustrade and advanced one foot to the top step of the stairs.

“Oh no,” said Amorelle quietly, wishing she had stayed in her room, “no trouble at all.”

“Well, you may as well come right down to dinner,” said the aunt, launching her heavy body on the downward way and indicating by a casual motion of her free hand that Amorelle might follow her if she chose.

Amorelle, struggling to keep her meekness, followed.

At the foot of the stairs, the rest of the party was grouped. An elderly, sad-eyed man with a cane, somewhat apart from the young people, leaned back against a heavy mulberry curtain, which draped the wide doorway to the dining room, as if he had no part in the activity that was about to occur. There was something half-familiar in the lines of his face, though when she tried to find it, there seemed only dullness and indifference, a disappointing likeness to something precious.

The two young people turned and stared at her rudely. There was something half-belligerent about the girl’s look, but there was a supercilious sneer on the young man’s face, mingled with something like surprise and an unexpected interest when he saw her.

“Mr. Dean,” said the wife as she arrived heavily on the first floor, “your niece is here!” She gave a half wave of her hand toward Amorelle and stepped at once into the dining room.

Amorelle thought she saw a brief gleam of interest in the silent man’s eyes as he looked up and said “Ah!” and she stepped quickly to his side and put out her hand. Her impulse would have been to give him a warm little-girl kiss; but he showed no sign that this would have been welcome, and she seemed to feel the eyes of the two young people scorching her back with contempt.

But her uncle took her hand, slowly, in both of his own, and held it warmly, looking down into her eyes with something like hunger for an instant.

“Oh, you look like your mother!” he said in a half-hesitant voice. “You have eyes like hers! I’m—glad you have come!” Then he dropped her hand suddenly, as if he felt he had forgotten himself and held it too long already, and a peevish voice from the dining room showed he was right.

“Come, Mr. Dean, are you going to stand out there in the hall all evening sentimentalizing? Don’t you know you are holding us all up and the dinner is getting cold?”

A sensitive flush went over the man’s face and Amorelle felt for him, almost as if he had been her father. That sensitive look was like her father.

He hurried in instantly and went to his seat at the head of the table. Amorelle all too soon came to see that it was one of the few places in this household where he took the actual head.

His wife was already standing grimly at her own chair, looking reproachfully at him until he was in place. Then she turned hard eyes on the new arrival.

“You
may sit there!” She indicated the seat at her left. “I’m sure I don’t know what to call you. You have a simply impossible name. I’ve never been able to pronounce it or remember it.”

Amorelle tried to summon a pleasant smile.

“It is an odd name, isn’t it? It was my mother’s maiden name, you know, Amorelle!”

“Absurd!” said the older woman. “I shall never be able to pronounce it in all the world. So unpractical, something like a fairy tale. Haven’t you a middle name?”

“No,” said Amorelle gravely.

“We’ll have to find something. Just plain Jane would be better than that fancy thing. Well, shall we sit down, Mr. Dean?”

They sat down, and Uncle Enoch bowed his head and mumbled and hurried an inaudible grace while the others maintained a half-amused silence, with heads scarcely even inclined toward a respectful angle.

“So absurd in this day and age,” gurgled Aunt Clara with an embarrassed smile toward the grinning youth who was their guest. “It’s an old custom in Mr. Dean’s family, and he can’t seem to get over it,” she explained.

Amorelle flashed a quick look of sympathy toward her uncle before she remembered that every glance was being watched by the lynx-eyed Louise who sat opposite her. It would not be a politic move, for either herself or Uncle Enoch, for her to be ranged with him against them all on this first night of her arrival, before she even knew them. And what was to be gained by it? So she dropped her eyes to her lap for the time being until they stopped noticing her. Later, when the talk was going more freely between Louise, her mother, and her guest, she could venture to study this other girl who was her cousin.

She wasn’t really pretty, Amorelle decided; her mouth was too selfish for that and her black eyes too small, but she was smart looking. Her hair was very black and slicked close to her head, bobbed of course, and licked out sharply on the artificial pallor of her sallow cheeks. Her ears were showing and carried long, sparkling earrings. She was wearing a bright red satin dress, cut exceedingly low in the back and with no sleeves. Amorelle studied her curiously. She was not familiar with low backs except in fashion magazines. Her world did not wear them, though of course she knew they existed. One did not wear low-backed dresses to a prayer meeting, or even to a church social, in Rivington. She realized that her plain brown crepe was not in a class with this new cousin’s apparel. Even Aunt Clara was wearing a low-cut black lace dress, and her stout white arms were bare to the shoulder. Amorelle realized that she must look like a little brown sparrow next to her aunt and cousin.

But it was presently borne in upon her that neither aunt nor cousin was aware now of her existence. At least they had the air of trying to forget that she was there. And presently when she raised her eyes to her uncle, who had been addressing himself to his fruit cup, she found his eyes upon her furtively, and she flashed him a real smile without getting caught at it by the others.

“Did you have a comfortable journey?” he suddenly asked her in a low tone, under cover of the hilarious laughter over one of the young man’s jokes.

“Quite comfortable, thank you,” she answered with another warm look that thanked him for the friendly little question.

“What did you say, Mr. Dean?” demanded the querulous tone of Aunt Clara, stopping in the midst of her flattering laughter.

“Oh, nothing!” said the man of the house quickly. “I was just asking Amorelle about her journey.”

“Oh, you seem to have mastered her name quickly enough, though I’m sure you haven’t heard it in years!” she sneered politely. “Well, don’t you think it would be better form if you spoke loud enough for everybody to hear? I hate to be thinking someone is speaking to me and I have not known it.”

The man flashed her a bitter look. It struck Amorelle that he looked so much older than her father had, though she knew he was almost five years younger.

“Will you ring for some bread and butter to be brought?” he suddenly demanded and looked down at his plate again.

“Oh, Enoch, don’t you know this is
dinner?
We don’t eat bread and butter with
dinner!”
snickered Louise amusedly.

“Do you
really
mean that you want
bread
at
dinnertime
, Mr. Dean?” asked his wife disapprovingly. “You know it is not our custom to serve it in the evening.”

“I
do!”
said Uncle Enoch, lifting his eyes sternly to his wife’s for an instant and then dropping them to his plate again.

“But you know that
nobody
, simply
nobody
, serves bread at night with dinner,” argued his wife.

“I do,” said Uncle Enoch doggedly.

“And
butter?”
asked the incredulous voice.

“And
butter!”
said the determined voice.

“But I never heard of such a thing, Mr. Dean!”

“Yes,” said Uncle Enoch, apparently unexpectedly, for his answer had a sudden silencing effect, “you have heard of it. You heard of it last night when I asked for it, and the night before, and the night before that, and all the nights!”

“Mr. Dean!” said Aunt Clara and subsided into dumb fury. Then in a moment she rang the bell and gave the order.

“Ida, bring Mr. Dean a piece of bread and a helping of butter.”

“No, Ida, bring a plate of bread, plenty of it, and a
dish
of butter!” said Uncle Enoch. “My niece may care for some also.”

“Would you really care for bread and butter at night?” asked Aunt Clara in that incredulous tone, turning to look at Amorelle curiously but much as if she were asking it of a toad that had inopportunely hopped in her way.

“Yes, thank you,” said Amorelle, giving her what she hoped was a bright smile that ignored the pitiful dialogue that had just occurred.

“Oh,
really?”
That was all Aunt Clara said, but she flashed Amorelle a look of malice and later gave her husband another.

Louise ducked her head sideways toward the young man and giggled, murmuring into her napkin, “Oh, Enoch, you’re just the limit!”

“That will do, Louise!” said Uncle Enoch sternly, speaking to her as if she were a child. “If you can’t be respectful you can leave the table and the room!”

“Oh, yeah?” said the girl resentfully and relapsed into a sullen silence.

Amorelle was very uncomfortable during the remainder of the meal. She felt that in some mysterious way she had been the cause of the unpleasantness. But the young man was most effervescent. He told a funny story and presently had them all laughing, all but Uncle Enoch, who seemed not to have heard it, and Amorelle, who couldn’t quite see the point. She wondered if Aunt Clara could. Aunt Clara was apparently laughing to encourage the young man.

It was a relief when the meal was ended.

A man, it appeared, had been waiting in the library to see Uncle Enoch. He picked up his cane from the floor and limped off. Amorelle was relieved to see that he was really lame and hadn’t just made an excuse about coming to the funeral. But in the doorway, he suddenly turned back and looked at her as she rose from the chair.

“You’ll—be—all right?” he asked her, under cover of the chatter of the others.

“Oh, surely!” she said brightly with a smile. It warmed her heart to have him care and stabbed her with the consciousness that there seemed no one else to care.

The front doorbell had rung again and several more young people barged into the house noisily. They were hailed boisterously by Louise and placidly by her mother.

Amorelle hesitated on the threshold of the dining room and wondered what she ought to do next. Was she supposed to go in with the others? But no one made any move to introduce her. They were all engaged in talking, shouting almost it seemed, for each spoke louder than the other, and there was an immoderate amount of laughter about nothing. Amorelle felt utterly out of it. It was as if she had not been present. She began to feel like a ghost. Had she suddenly become invisible?

Only one young man glanced across and noticed her, tried to draw her into a laugh over something he had said. They called him George. He was big and good looking, with bold blue eyes slightly disguised by long, gorgeous, golden, curly eyelashes that added a touch of the angelic to a face that otherwise might have seemed coarse. And George lifted those bold blue eyes more than once toward Amorelle, seeking for her approval of his remarks, seeking to draw her into the general conversation.

If Amorelle had not felt so exceedingly alone there, she might have been annoyed at his informality; but as it was, she could not help a kindly feeling toward him.

Louise, however, had noted his glance, and with a supercilious look toward her new cousin, she drew George away into the living room. The rest of the young people immediately followed.

Amorelle made one step forward, hesitated, and Aunt Clara immediately turned upon her like a detour sign in an open road.

“And you,” she said, looking at Amorelle as if she were something out of place, “what are you going to do now?”

Amorelle was like a thermostat, instantly sensitive to temperature, and she knew that she was not wanted.

“I wonder if you would mind if I slipped away and went to bed?” she asked sweetly. “I find I’m rather tired with all I’ve been through.”

“I was wondering if you wouldn’t want to go to your room,” said the aunt, speaking more warmly than she had yet spoken to her. “If there is anything you need, or don’t know about, you can just ask Ida. I guess she gave you towels, didn’t she? Well, we have breakfast at eight o’clock. At least your uncle does. I take mine in my room and don’t usually come down before ten. Louise, of course, stays out all hours and sleeps as long as she pleases. Ida’ll tell you how you can help around after breakfast in the dining room. Good-night. I hope you’ll be comfortable!” Aunt Clara sailed placidly off into the living room and settled down to her elaborate knitting.