Anne's House of Dreams (24 page)

‘Now, Gilbert, you are not “going off mad”. Sit down here and I’ll apologize bee-yew-ti-fully. I shouldn’t have said that. But – oh, if you knew –’

Anne checked herself just in time. She had been on the very verge of betraying Leslie’s secret.

‘Knew what a woman feels about it,’ she concluded lamely.

‘I think I do know. I’ve looked at the matter from every point of view – and I’ve been driven to the conclusion that it is my duty to tell Leslie that I believe it is possible that Dick can be restored to himself; there my responsibility ends. It will be for her to decide what she will do.’

‘I don’t think you’ve any right to put such a responsibility on her. She has enough to bear. She is poor – how could she afford such an operation?’

‘That is for her to decide,’ persisted Gilbert stubbornly.

‘You say you think that Dick can be cured. But are you
sure
of it?’

‘Certainly not. Nobody could be sure of such a thing. There may have been lesions of the brain itself, the effect of which can never be removed. But if, as I believe, his loss of memory and other faculties is due merely to the pressure on the brain centres of certain depressed areas of bone, then he can be cured.’

‘But it’s only a possibility!’ insisted Anne. ‘Now, suppose you tell Leslie and she decides to have the operation. It will cost a great deal. She will have to borrow the money, or sell her little property. And suppose the operation is a failure and Dick remains the same. How will she be able to pay back the money she borrows or make a living for herself and that big helpless creature if she sells the farm?’

‘Oh, I know – I know. But it is my duty to tell her. I can’t get away from that conviction.’

‘Oh, I know the Blythe stubbornness,’ groaned Anne. ‘But don’t do this solely on your own responsibility. Consult Doctor Dave.’

‘I
have
done so,’ said Gilbert reluctantly.

‘And what did he say?’

‘In brief – as you say – leave well enough alone. Apart from his prejudice against new-fangled surgery, I’m afraid he looks at the case from your point of view – don’t do it, for Leslie’s sake.’

‘There now,’ cried Anne triumphantly. ‘I do think, Gilbert, that you ought to abide by the judgement of a man nearly eighty, who has seen a great deal and saved scores of lives himself – surely his opinion ought to weigh more than a mere boy’s.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Don’t laugh. It’s too serious.’

‘That’s just my point. It
is
serious. Here is a man who is a helpless burden. He may be restored to reason and usefulness –’

‘He was so very useful before,’ interjected Anne witheringly.

‘He may be given a chance to make good and redeem the past. His wife doesn’t know this. I do. It is therefore my duty to tell her that there is such a possibility. That, boiled down, is my decision.’

‘Don’t say “decision” yet, Gilbert. Consult somebody else. Ask Captain Jim what he thinks about it.’

‘Very well. But I’ll not promise to abide by his opinion, Anne. This is something a man must decide for himself. My conscience would never be easy if I kept silent on the subject.’

‘Oh, your conscience!’ moaned Anne. ‘I suppose that Uncle Dave has a conscience too, hasn’t he?’

‘Yes. But I am not the keeper of his conscience. Come, Anne, if this affair did not concern Leslie – if it were a purely abstract case, you would agree with me – you know you would.’

‘I wouldn’t,’ vowed Anne, trying to believe it herself. ‘Oh, you can argue all night, Gilbert, but you won’t convince me. Just you ask Miss Cornelia what she thinks of it.’

‘You’re driven to the last ditch, Anne, when you bring up Miss Cornelia as a reinforcement. She will say, “Just like a man”, and rage furiously. No matter. This is no affair for Miss Cornelia to settle. Leslie alone must decide it.’

‘You know very well how she will decide it,’ said Anne, almost in tears. ‘She has ideals of duty, too. I don’t see how you can take such a responsibility on your shoulders.
I
couldn’t.’

quoted Gilbert.

‘Oh, you think a couplet of poetry a convincing argument!’ scoffed Anne. ‘That is so like a man.’

And then she laughed in spite of herself. It sounded so like an echo of Miss Cornelia.

‘Well, if you won’t accept Tennyson as an authority, perhaps you will believe the words of a Greater than he,’ said Gilbert seriously. ‘ “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” I believe that, Anne, with all my heart. It’s the greatest and grandest verse in the Bible – or in any literature – and the
truest
, if there are comparative degrees of trueness. And it’s the first duty of a man to tell the truth, as he sees it and believes it.’

‘In this case the truth won’t make poor Leslie free,’ sighed Anne. ‘It will probably end in still more bitter bondage for her. Oh, Gilbert, I
can’t
think you are right.’

A sudden outbreak of a violent type of influenza at the Glen and down at the fishing village kept Gilbert so busy for the next fortnight that he had no time to pay the promised visit to Captain Jim. Anne hoped against hope that he had abandoned the idea about Dick Moore, and, resolving to let sleeping dogs lie, she said no more about the subject. But she thought of it incessantly.

‘I wonder if it would be right for me to tell him that Leslie cares for Owen,’ she thought. ‘He would never let her suspect that he knew, so her pride would not suffer, and it
might
convince him that he should let Dick Moore alone. Shall I – shall I? No, after all, I cannot. A promise is sacred, and I’ve no right to betray Leslie’s secret. But oh, I never felt so worried over anything in my life as I do over this. It’s spoiling the spring – it’s spoiling everything.’

One evening Gilbert abruptly proposed that they go down and see Captain Jim. With a sinking heart Anne agreed, and they set forth. Two weeks of kind sunshine had wrought a miracle in the bleak landscape over which Gilbert’s crow had flown. The hills and fields were dry and brown and warm, ready to break into bud and blossom; the harbour was laughter-shaken again; the long harbour road was like a gleaming red ribbon; down on the dunes a crowd of boys, who were out smelt-fishing, were burning the thick, dry sand-hill grass of the preceding summer. The flames swept over the dunes rosily, flinging their cardinal banners against the dark gulf beyond, and illuminating the channel and the fishing village. It was a picturesque scene which would at other times have delighted Anne’s eyes; but she was not enjoying this walk. Neither was Gilbert. Their usual good-comradeship and Josephian community of taste and viewpoint were sadly lacking. Anne’s disapproval of the whole project showed itself in the haughty uplift of her head and the studied politeness of her remarks. Gilbert’s mouth was set in all the Blythe obstinacy, but his eyes were troubled. He meant to do what he believed to be his duty; but to be at outs with Anne was a high price to pay. Altogether, both were glad when they reached the light – and remorseful that they should be glad.

Captain Jim put away the fishing net upon which he was working, and welcomed them joyfully. In the searching light of the spring evening he looked older than Anne had ever seen him. His hair had grown much greyer, and the strong old hand shook a little. But his blue eyes were clear and steady, and the staunch soul looked out through them gallant and unafraid.

Captain Jim listened in amazed silence while Gilbert said what he had come to say. Anne, who knew how the old man worshipped Leslie, felt quite sure that he would side with her, although she had not much hope that this would influence Gilbert. She was therefore surprised beyond measure when Captain Jim, slowly and sorrowfully, but unhesitatingly, gave it as his opinion that Leslie should be told.

‘Oh, Captain Jim, I didn’t think you’d say that,’ she exclaimed reproachfully. ‘I thought you wouldn’t want to make more trouble for her.’

Captain Jim shook his head.

‘I don’t want to. I know how you feel about it, Mistress Blythe – just as I feel meself. But it ain’t our feelings we have to steer by through life – no, no, we’d make shipwreck mighty often if we did that. There’s only the one safe compass and we’ve got to set our course by that – what it’s right to do. I agree with the doctor. If there’s a chance for Dick, Leslie should be told of it. There’s no two sides to that, in my opinion.’

‘Well,’ said Anne, giving up in despair, ‘wait until Miss Cornelia gets after you two men.’

‘Cornelia’ll rake us fore and aft, no doubt,’ assented Captain Jim. ‘You women are lovely critters, Mistress Blythe, but you’re just a mite illogical. You’re a highly eddicated lady and Cornelia isn’t, but you’re like as two peas when it comes to that. I dunno’s you’re any the worse for it. Logic is a sort of hard, merciless thing, I reckon. Now, I’ll brew a cup of tea and we’ll drink it and talk of pleasant things, jest to calm our minds a bit.’

At least, Captain Jim’s tea and conversation calmed Anne’s mind to such an extent that she did not make Gilbert suffer so acutely on the way home as she had deliberately intended to do. She did not refer to the burning question at all, but she chatted amiably of other matters, and Gilbert understood that he was forgiven under protest.

‘Captain Jim seems very frail and bent this spring. The winter has aged him,’ said Anne sadly. ‘I am afraid that he will soon be going to seek lost Margaret. I can’t bear to think of it.’

‘Four Winds won’t be the same place when Captain Jim “sets out to sea”,’ agreed Gilbert.

The following evening he went to the house up the brook. Anne wandered dismally around until his return.

‘Well, what did Leslie say?’ she demanded when he came in.

‘Very little. I think she felt rather dazed.’

‘And is she going to have the operation?’

‘She is going to think it over and decide very soon.’

Gilbert flung himself wearily into the easy chair before the fire. He looked tired. It had not been an easy thing for him to tell Leslie. And the terror that had sprung into her eyes when the meaning of what he told her came home to her was not a pleasant thing to remember. Now, when the die was cast, he was beset with doubts of his own wisdom.

Anne looked at him remorsefully; then she slipped down on the rug beside him and laid her glossy red head on his arm.

‘Gilbert, I’ve been rather hateful over this. I won’t be any more. Please just call me red-headed and forgive me.’

By which Gilbert understood that, no matter what came of it, there would be no I-told-you-so’s. But he was not wholly comforted. Duty in the abstract is one thing; duty in the concrete is quite another, especially when the doer is confronted by a woman’s stricken eyes.

Some instinct made Anne keep away from Leslie for the next three days. On the third evening Leslie came down to the little house and told Gilbert that she had made up her mind; she would take Dick to Montreal and have the operation.

She was very pale and seemed to have wrapped herself in her old mantle of aloofness. But her eyes had lost the look which had haunted Gilbert; they were cold and bright; and she proceeded to discuss details with him in a crisp, business-like way. There were plans to be made and many things to be thought over. When Leslie had got the information she wanted she went home. Anne wanted to walk part of the way with her.

‘Better not,’ said Leslie curtly. ‘Today’s rain has made the ground damp. Good night.’

‘Have I lost my friend?’ said Anne, with a sigh. ‘If the operation is successful and Dick Moore finds himself again Leslie will retreat into some remote fastness of her soul where none of us can ever find her.’

‘Perhaps she will leave him,’ said Gilbert.

‘Leslie would never do that, Gilbert. Her sense of duty is very strong. She told me once that her Grandmother West always impressed upon her the fact that when she assumed any responsibility she must never shirk it, no matter what the consequences might be. That is one of her cardinal rules. I suppose it’s very old-fashioned.’

‘Don’t be bitter, Anne-girl. You know you don’t think it old-fashioned – you know you have the very same idea of the sacredness of assumed responsibilities yourself. And you are right. Shirking responsibilities is the curse of our modern life – the secret of all the unrest and discontent that is seething in the world.’

‘Thus saith the preacher,’ mocked Anne. But under the mockery she felt that he was right; and she was very sick at heart for Leslie.

A week later Miss Cornelia descended like an avalanche upon the little house. Gilbert was away and Anne was compelled to bear the shock of the impact alone.

Miss Cornelia hardly waited to get her hat off before she began.

‘Anne, do you mean to tell me it’s true what I’ve heard – that Dr Blythe has told Leslie Dick can be cured, and that she is going to take him to Montreal to have him operated on?’

‘Yes, it is quite true, Miss Cornelia,’ said Anne bravely.

‘Well, it’s inhuman cruelty, that’s what it is,’ said Miss Cornelia, violently agitated. ‘I did think Dr Blythe was a decent man. I didn’t think he could have been guilty of this.’

‘Dr Blythe thought it was his duty to tell Leslie that there was a chance for Dick,’ said Anne with spirit, ‘and,’ she added, loyalty to Gilbert getting the better of her, ‘I agree with him.’

‘Oh, no, you don’t, dearie,’ said Miss Cornelia. ‘No person with any bowels of compassion could.’

‘Captain Jim does.’

‘Don’t quote that old ninny to me,’ cried Miss Cornelia. ‘And I don’t care who agrees with him. Think –
think
what it means to that poor, hunted, harried girl.’

‘We
do
think of it. But Gilbert believes that a doctor should put the welfare of a patient’s mind and body before all other considerations.’

‘That’s just like a man. But I expected better things of you, Anne,’ said Miss Cornelia, more in sorrow than in wrath; then she proceeded to bombard Anne with precisely the same arguments with which the latter had attacked Gilbert; and Anne valiantly defended her husband with the weapons he had used for his own protection. Long was the fray, but Miss Cornelia made an end at last.