The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche (271 page)

“Can’t I?”

“Oh, I know you’ve had a lot of trouble—Eden, and all that—but still, in yourself, you’re a reasonable being and… oh, dash it all, I can never express myself!”

“I know what you mean, Finch. And perhaps it is so. I don’t believe I am capable of suffering as you are.”

“Well, I always bring it on myself. That’s one thing,” he said darkly.

“Is it possible that Renny could not appreciate the fact that you were doing a piece of good acting?” How she loved to drag in that name, to caress it with her tongue, even while her heart was angry against him!

“The trouble was,” answered Finch, “that he hated seeing me in that part. I was in my bare feet, and dirty. I hadn’t much on but an idiotic expression. Renny’s awfully conventional.”

“But think of some of the men—horse dealers and such—that he goes about with, seems to make friends of. That’s not conventional.”

“If you said that to Renny, he’d say: ‘Yes, but I don’t get up on a stage with them and charge people admission to watch my antics.’ Most of all, it was the halfwittedness of the part. He thinks I’m a bit that way already.” He pulled his lips
again, and then went on more quickly, so that the tale of his misdeeds might be done with. “So there was no more playacting. The next thing was an orchestra. George Fennel— you remember the boys at the rectory, Alayne—and myself and three other chaps got it up—a banjo, two mandolins, a flute, and the piano. All the practising was done on the sly. We played for club dances. You know the sort of club it would be. Cheap restaurants. But we made quite a lot of money—five dollars apiece, each night.”

Alayne looked at him with a mingling of admiration and amusement. “What amazing boys! Had you planned to do anything special with all this money?”

“We bought quite a good radio. We had that at the rectory, of course.”

“Where did Mr. Fennel think that came from?”

“Oh, he never asks many questions. He’s awfully unpractical. He probably thought we’d rigged it up out of some odds and ends of wire. Then some of the money went toward hearing some good music—Paderewski, Kreisler. But I saved most of it. That’s how I got here, to New York. And then too we’d blow in quite a bit on grub. I’m always hungry, you know.”

There was a peculiar expression on his face, as he said this, that startled Alayne. A sudden break in his voice. She thought: “Is it possible the boy is hungry now?” She said: “You’re like I am. I’m always getting hungry at odd times. Here it is, only half-past eight, and I’m starving. But of course I didn’t eat much dinner. Supposing, Finch, that you tell me quickly how things came to a head, and then we can have the details over some supper.”

He agreed, in his odd, hesitating way, and then, in a muffled voice, told of the last performance of the orchestra, of his
return to Jalna, of the scene in the washroom. “It wasn’t only that I’d been lit, and was feeling dazed—oh, absolutely awful—but there was something else. I’d pulled my handkerchief out of my pocket, and with it a note from Arthur Leigh. There, was nothing to that, but he’d called me ‘darling Finch’ and Renny and Piers went right up in the air over it.” His face twitched as he remembered the scene.

“Finch, do you tell me that they read your letter?”

“I told Piers he might.”

“But why?”

“I forget.”

It was useless; she could never understand them.

“But why should they have been angry? It was harmless enough, surely.”

He flushed a dark red. “They didn’t think so. They thought it was beastly. Neurotic, and all that. Oh, you can’t understand. It was just the last straw.” He clasped his hands between his knees, and Alayne saw that he was shaking. She got up quickly. She was afraid he was going to cry, and she could not bear that. Something in her would give way if he cried. She must hang on to herself. She said, almost coldly: “So it was then you decided to run away?”

“Yes. I stayed in my room all day. Lay on the bed trying to think. Then, when night came, I sneaked out with a suitcase of clothes and got a late bus into town on the highway. In the morning I took the train for New York.”

“And you’ve been here three weeks?”

“Yes. I’ve never written home either.”

“What have you been doing, Finch?”

“Trying to get a job.” He raised a miserable young face to hers. “I thought it’d be easy to get one here, but I simply can’t round up anything. There seemed to be dozens ahead of
me whenever I answered an advertisement. Gosh, it’s been awful!”

She looked down at him with compassion. “But why in the world didn’t you come to me before? It hurts me to think that you’ve been walking the streets here looking for work, and have never come to see me.”

“I didn’t want to come until I had got something, but tonight—I just gave in… I—I was so frightfully homesick,” He reached out, took her hand, and pressed it to his forehead. “Oh, Alayne, you’ve always been so good to me!”

She bent and kissed him; then she said, assuming a businesslike tone: “Now we must have something to eat. There are cigarettes. You smoke while I forage in the pantry.”

In the glittering little pantry, with its air of trig unhomeliness, she discovered some potato salad bought at a delicatessen shop, a tin of vermicelli with tomato sauce, a lettuce, and some dill pickles. She and Rosamond took only their breakfast and lunch in the apartment.

Strange fare, she thought, as she arranged the things on the tea-wagon, for a Whiteoak! She had made coffee, and now she remembered some jars of preserves given to her by the aunts who lived up the Hudson. She chose one of blackcurrants in a rich syrup. Last, she added some slices of rye bread and some little chocolate-covered cakes.

Finch’s back was toward her as she entered the living room. His head was enveloped in tobacco smoke. He was examining her books. She noticed how loosely his coat hung on him. The boy looked half-starved, she thought.

“Great Scott,” he exclaimed, turning round, “what a lot of new books, Alayne! How do you ever get the time to read them all?”

“By not getting time for anything else,” she returned. “That one you have in your hand is very interesting. Take it along with you, Finch. I believe you might like it.”

“Poetry,” he commented, turning over the leaves… He looked up from the book. Their eyes met, and he took a quick step toward her. “Alayne—have you ever—seen
him
—heard of him?” His face grew scarlet.

“Eden?” She said the name with composure. “I’ve never seen him or heard from him, but Miss Trent, who shares the apartment with me, insists that she saw him one night last fall outside a theatre. Just a glimpse. She thought he looked ill. Your aunt told me in a letter that you had heard nothing.”

“Not a thing. I’ve been afraid ever since I came here that I’d run up against him. He and I had an awful scene”—oh, Lord, why had he recalled that time to her?—“I guess he hates me, all right.”

She had begun to set the supper things on a small table. He came to her and touched her arm timidly. “Forgive me, Alayne. I shouldn’t have spoken of him.”

She looked up with continued composure. “It doesn’t upset me to speak of Eden. He is nothing to me now. I don’t believe I should feel greatly disturbed if I met him face to face. Now do sit down, Finch, and try to imagine that this food is not so sketchy. If only I had known you were coming…”

How hungry the boy was! She talked incessantly to cover the fact, to give him a chance to eat without interruption. He swept the plates clean, and drank cup after cup of coffee. Over coffee and cigarettes he gave her news of each separate member of the family. Finally he told her in detail of the last performance of the orchestra, of the wild night in the streets afterward. He began to laugh. Finch’s
laughter was infectious. Alayne laughed too, and as he imitated the maudlin outpourings of the different players they could no longer restrain themselves, and laughed till they were exhausted. Alayne had not given way to such primitive emotions since leaving Jalna, had had no impulse to do so.

Rosamond Trent, returning, discovered them thus abandoned to hilarity. She was astonished to find this lank youth sprawling in the Chinese-red leather armchair, a fair lock dangling over his forehead, making himself tremendously at home. She was still more astonished to find Alayne deeply flushed, weak with laughter.

Finch got to his feet, embarrassed by the arrival of the sophisticated-looking middle-aged woman whose small bright green hat looked as though it had been moulded to her head.

“Rosamond,” said Alayne, “my brother-in-law, Finch Whiteoak.”

Miss Trent looked at him keenly, smiled humorously, and shook his hand heartily.

“I’m glad you came,” she declared. “I don’t often find Alayne in such spirits.”

She took to Finch at once. When she heard that he was looking for a position, she was instantly ready to take him under her wing, to place him where he would have an excellent chance of advancement. She was in the advertising business.

“The very thing for him!” she exclaimed to Alayne, energetically snapping her cigarette-lighter. “I’ll see about it first thing in the morning.”

But Alayne could not picture Finch in an advertising office. She had already made up her mind to see Mr. Cory
about him. It required courage to oppose Rosamond when she had set her mind on taking someone under her wing, but Finch helped her by boldly saying that he felt a greater urge in himself toward publishing than toward advertising.

Before he left, Finch helped to carry out the supper things, and in the kitchen Alayne gave him some money—it was to be only a loan—and learned from him that he had been forced to pawn his topcoat and his watch.

In a few days Finch was installed in a minor clerk’s position in the publishing house, and Rosamond Trent had had to satisfy her instinct for managing by finding him a more comfortable lodging.

It was only a week later that Alayne had a letter from Lady Buckley, written in a long, graceful hand, with frequent underlinings.

JALNA,
April
18, 1927.
MY DEAR ALAYNE—
I was so
pleased
to receive your last, and to hear that you are in good health and as good spirits as possible, under the
circumstances.
We are in fair health, excepting my brother Ernest, who has been suffering from a cold. My brother Nicholas is troubled by gout, as usual with him in the spring. I reiterate the word
diet
to him, but it has little effect. My mother is excessively well, considering her great age. Has come through the winter with no more serious ailments than occasional attacks of
wind
on the stomach. Renny is in good health, as always, but is limping about on a stick as the result of a severe kick on the knee from a vicious
horse.
Luckily the veterinary was in the stable at the time and administered
first aid.
It is really at Renny’s instigation that I am writing to you about our trouble. He is greatly upset in his mind, as indeed we all are, excepting perhaps Mama, who seems singularly callous about it all. I am sure that by now you are quite
wrought up
by curiosity, so I shall relieve it by coming to the point at once. Finch has
disappeared.
Knowing what a closely knit, affectionate family we are, you can imagine our
state of mind.
He has been gone four weeks and we are now thoroughly alarmed. Wakefield quite threw us into a state at the dinner table yesterday by suggesting that perhaps Finch has been
murdered.
What a dreadful word that is! I doubt if I have ever written any so
low
word in my correspondence hitherto.
Renny has had a private detective on the search for Finch, and has traced him to New York. He now declares that, unless he is found inside of the week, he will
publicly
advertise for him. This would be very humiliating for us, as we have given out that he is away on a visit for his health. As a matter of fact, it was none too good. I think the poor boy worried a great deal over being denied access to a pianoforte, and I firmly believe this was at the root of the
disaster.
You are so sympathetic, dear Alayne. You understand, as no outsider could, our extreme devotion as a family, in spite of little
surface
flurries. I trust you will be able to send us some word of Finch. Remembering how fond he was of you, we think it quite probable that he has sought you out. Pray heaven we shall not have to go through the agony of
publicly
advertising for him. Renny has already gone to the length of writing a
complete
description of him, and it sounded so unattractive when read aloud.
Hoping to hear good news from you.
In urgent haste.
Ever affectionately,
A
UGUSTA
B
UCKLEY
.
P.S.—Wakefield sends his love. His heart has been very troublesome. The Canadian winter inevitably pulls him down, as it does me.—A.B.

Alayne wrote by return post:

DEAR LADY BUCKLEY—
It is as you have guessed. Finch has been to see me. He is quite well, and has a position in which he has a good chance of advancement. If I were you (and by you, I mean the entire family) I should not interfere with him, or try to get in touch with him. For the present, at any rate. Finch has been through an unhappy time, and I think he should be left quite to himself for the present.
I will see him regularly, and send you a report of him frequently, but you may tell Renny that I absolutely refuse to send his address.
I am glad you got through the winter as well as you did, and I am sorry to hear of the various disabilities, especially that Wake’s heart has been troubling him. Please tell him that I often, often think of him, and wish I could see him.
I really do not think you need to worry about Finch.
Yours lovingly,
A
LAYNE

E
RNEST’S
A
DVENTURE

R
AGS
carried in the mail and laid it before Renny, who was sitting on one side of the fireplace, his injured leg propped on an ottoman, the top of which was worked in a design in green and silver beads, portraying an angel carrying a sheaf of lilies. On the opposite side of the fireplace sat Nicholas, his gouty leg supported by an ottoman of exactly similar pattern, a glass of whisky and soda at his elbow. He was chuckling deeply over a month-old copy of
Punch.
At a small table sat Ernest, stringing afresh a necklet of enormous amber beads for his mother. His long face drooped above the task in hand with an expression of serene absorption. Old Mrs. Whiteoak, leaning forward in her chair, watched every movement of his fingers, gratifying from the glow of the amber in the firelight her love of colour, as a heavy old bee might extract sweetness from a flower. Her breath came and went more noisily over her thrust-out underlip than was usual, partly because of her attitude, and partly because of the effort of concentration. This gusty breathing and the occasional chuckle from Nicholas were the only sounds as Renny read his letters, and they served but to emphasize the
seclusion of the room, the sense of an excluding wall against the rest of the world which a group of Whiteoaks always achieved.