Authors: Mazo de la Roche
Tags: #FIC045000 – FICTION / Sagas
“Look here, Finch,” came Piers’s voice, “can you let me have a cigarette?”
“No,” growled Finch, “haven’t got any up here.”
“The kid says you have.”
“He’s a little liar.”
“Well, look here, I’d like to speak to you a minute.”
“Sorry. I can’t just now. I’m busy.”
“Is anything wrong? The kid says you didn’t seem very well when he was up before.”
“Let me alone!” roared Finch, and he showed, furthermore, that the example he had had before him in the matter of swearing had not been entirely lost.
When they had gone he looked down at the carnation. He had flattened it against the door... He looked at his wrist-watch... The fracas had done one thing for him, at any rate. It had made time fly.
The Vaughans were the first to arrive: Meggie, a little plumper, a little more exuberantly the wife and mother; Maurice, a trifle greyer, his masculinity a trifle more muffled. She clasped Finch to her. Oh, the lovely depth of that bosom! He was never taken to it, but he wished he might burrow into its tender depths and remain forever enfolded there. She gave him three kisses on the mouth, and put a packet into his hand. “With
our
love and many, many good wishes.” Wake crowded up beside him to see. It was a white evening scarf of heavy silk. “Oh, thanks,” Finch murmured; and Maurice shook him by the hand.
Maurice had been warned on the way by his wife not to make any reference to Finch’s inheritance, but he could not resist saying:
“Well, enjoy it while you’re young!” And his glance did not indicate the scarf.
Meg caressed Wakefield, remarked his delicate looks, and went up to Alayne’s room to lay off her things. The men stood about with the conciliatory air worn by them in the presence of female antagonisms. They knew that Meggie and Alayne disliked one another, that there was no love lost between Meggie and Pheasant. They would be glad when other guests arrived.
They soon arrived in a stream. The Fennels: the rector, thickset, beaming, his hair and beard tidier than was usual even on Sundays; George, resembling him; Mrs. Fennell, long-backed, hatchet-faced, with eyes always searching for a vacant seat into which she might drop; Tom resembling her. Next, the two Miss Laceys, whose late father had been a retired Admiral, and the elder of whom had been after Nicholas forty-seven years ago. After these Miss Pink, the organist, prematurely aged by being rushed, year in and year out, through the hymns and psalms by the combined impetuosity of the Whiteoaks at a speed which she thought little short of blasphemous. She was in a flurry at exposing her shoulders in a seldom worn evening gown, and had veiled them by a scarf, though they were, in truth, the best part of her. These were the old, old friends and neighbours.
Considerably later, and from Town, came the Leighs. They were mere acquaintances to the rest of the family, but Finch thought of Arthur Leigh as his best friend. Mother and daughter in their sheathlike gowns of delicate green had the appearance of sisters. He could scarcely wait to have Arthur
alone that he might tell him of his contemplated trip, with all the more eagerness because Arthur himself had spoken of spending that summer in England.
The party was now complete except for two people. These were neighbours, living in a small, rather isolated house, but comparative strangers. About a year and a half before, Antoine Lebraux had brought his wife and daughter from Quebec and acquired this place with the object of going into the breeding of silver foxes. He had been in the Civil Service, and, his health having broken down, he was advised to turn to an outdoor life. His wife, who had relations in Upper Canada, wished to be near them, and, within fifty miles of a brother, she had discovered this small and neglected property for sale. Lebraux, with the enthusiasm of his race, had thrown himself heart and soul into the new life. Reliable parent foxes had been bought, and he had read every book obtainable on the subject of their breeding and care.
Renny had met and liked him. He had ridden over frequently to see how the foxes were progressing. The first litters were admirable. The change of climate had done Lebraux good, and his malady had shown signs of improvement. But good luck did not follow in good luck’s train. His most valuable vixen had somehow dug her way out and was never seen again. The later litters were weakly, a vixen died, then, when fresh stock had been bought in the hope of raising the stamina, thieves had broken in and stolen the best of them. The bodies of the foxes had been found less than a mile away, stripped of their pelts. All this told on the health of Lebraux. He had become so irritable that Renny’s heart had gone out to his wife and daughter. When Lebraux had at last been confined to the house he had begged Renny to come to him as often as possible. He could forget his sense of disappointment,
of failure, of impending disaster in Renny’s presence. “I like you!” he had often exclaimed. “I like you to be near me. You and I have an appreciation of the fine and sensitive things of life.” Renny had never been told this before, and it pleased him. And so they had talked of horses and foxes and women.
Lebraux had taken to drinking brandy. He had had uncontrollable outbreaks of despair, during which he would threaten to do away with himself. Only the presence of Renny would calm him. Often Mrs. Lebraux had sent her young daughter all the way to Jalna with a note for Renny, begging him to go to her help. When, in January, Lebraux had died, Renny had spent half his time in the house. Her brother had kept out of the way as much as possible, for he shirked the responsibility that he felt was moving toward him.
It had been Renny’s idea to invite the mother and daughter, an idea that had not met with much favour from the rest of the family. Mrs. Lebraux had called on Alayne soon after her marriage. The call had been returned, and there had been an end to intimacy. Alayne had felt pity and, at the same time, had been repelled by the family. The uncles had agreed with her that they were strange people. “Not at all the sort of people who
used
to settle here.” Meggie had not called. Piers was contemptuous of Lebraux, his failures and, what Piers considered, his spinelessness. He made fun of Mrs. Lebraux’s thick yellow hair, that was turning dark in streaks, her round, light-lashed eyes, and red hands. But Renny had his way. The poor woman had never been anywhere since her husband’s death, and the little girl would keep Wake in countenance.
If Mrs. Leigh and Ada had looked like sisters as they entered the drawing-room, Mrs. Lebraux and little Pauline
seemed of no relation to each other. She had a blonde, hardy, wholesome look, was the daughter of a Newfoundlander who had made a good deal of money in the fisheries, and somehow lost it, and she resembled him. Pauline was like Lebraux, a thin, dark child of fifteen, in white, with the promise of some beauty. Her parents had met on the great toboggan slide by the Chateau Frontenac, and had precipitately slid into matrimony.
It was an odd, mixed party, Alayne thought, as they filed in to dinner, but it was the first time she had entertained since her marriage, and she was rather wrought up over it, fearful lest all should not go well. But she need not have had any apprehension on that score. Where there were Whiteoaks gathered there was no danger of dullness. The family was all talking at once, as a garden of hardy flowers might burst into vigorous bloom at the first encouragement of the sun. A festive occasion, the prospect of a good dinner with plenty to drink with it, was sun enough for them. Ernest took in Mrs. Leigh; Nicholas, his old flame, Miss Lacey; Vaughan, Mrs. Fennel; Finch, Ada Leigh; Renny, Mrs. Lebraux, with the others distributing as congenially as possible down to the two youngest, who came last, smiling gravely at each other, she half a head taller than he.
Whatever Mrs. Wragge’s faults might be, it would never be said of her that she was not a good cook. Fowls, under her hand, shed their earthly plumage and turned into glistening forms of celestial sweetness. Her vegetables were drained at the critical moment, the pastry was light. Only her pudding was heavy, and there was no pudding tonight. Wakefield could scarcely credit his own senses when he saw all the best china and silver on the table at once. Things that usually lived in cabinets, behind glass, were now on the table looking
as though they were used every day. Several wineglasses were clustered at each place, even his own and Pauline’s.
“Have you ever been to anything like this before?” he asked her, trying to feel not too important.
“No; isn’t it lovely?” She smiled, and he thought how prettily her lip curled from her little white teeth. He noticed her long white hands, then stared at her mother across the table.
“You don’t look a bit like your mother,” he remarked, settling his chin above his Eton collar.
“No, I look like my daddy.” She stopped eating, and withdrew into herself, a look of sad remoteness shadowing her small face.
“
My
father,” he observed, looking hard at her, “died before I was born.”
She was startled into regarding him with an almost fearful interest. “Did he really? I didn’t know they
could.
I always thought you had to have both father and mother when you were born.”
“I didn’t. My father was dead and my mother died
when
I was born.”
She breathed—“How awful for you!”
He agreed.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m what is called a posthumous child. I think it has preyed on my mind. I think it is what has made me so delicate. I’m not able to go to school, you know. I go to Mr. Fennel for lessons, but I haven’t been for weeks because of the weather.”
“I wish I could go to him, too. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?”
He looked dubious.
“Yes... but you’re a Catholic, aren’t you?”
She nodded. “But Mother isn’t. I don’t believe she’d mind. Do you think he’d have me?”
“Well, he might. If you’d promise not to try to convert me or anything. He’d not like to risk that.”
“Oh, I’d promise!”
Around the table conversation flowed easily Alayne perhaps was less at ease than the others. She was so anxious that things should go well, especially because of the Leighs. Rags was a constant irritation to her. His shabby trigness, his air of anxiety over the two hired maids, his bending over Renny to whisper to him with an expression of portentous significance. And why did Renny grin up at him in that way? She did wish that Renny wouldn’t talk to Rags at mealtime. Rags seemed always to be hovering behind his chair like an evil genius, and Renny never looked more like his grandmother than when he was grinning up at Rags. What was he saying to that Mrs. Lebraux? She strained her ears to catch the words.
He was saying—“Well, I’ll be very grateful if you will let me have the use of your stable. I could keep two horses there. We’re terribly short of room, as it is.”
Mr. Fennel, on the other side of Mrs. Lebraux, joined in. “I am glad to hear that you are staying on in your house, Mrs. Lebraux. I do hope you are comfortable.”
She turned her round pale-lashed eyes on him. “Comfortable! No, I’m not very comfortable. But I’m getting along somehow—”
Then Ernest’s musical voice came to Alayne. He was saying to Mrs. Leigh:
“Yes, I’m doing a work on Shakespeare. I’ve been working on it for many years now. One can’t hurry with that sort of thing. But I do feel that the result will be...”
Nicholas was booming to his old flame, Miss Lacey:
“He’s never talked since she died. Isn’t it extraordinary? There he sits on his perch, in her room, just brooding.”
Then came Meg’s voice, as she claimed Mr. Fennel’s attention. “You’d never believe the things she does and says. Sometimes she quite frightens me. Only this morning, she said—’Mummy, I want to see God!’”
Pheasant and Arthur Leigh were laughing together. She was saying—“But, truly, I know a man who saw a two-headed foal...”
Finch’s head was inclined toward Ada Leigh. Alayne caught just a snatch: “Oh, I dare say I’ll travel round a bit. You can’t stick in one place forever.”
How the Whiteoaks loved to talk, she thought. From all about her their voices came, and yet their plates were the first to be swept clean of each course. They seldom asked a question. They took their world as they found it, without curiosity. Only Piers and Miss Pink, whom he had taken in, did not trouble to speak, but were devoting themselves to the business of eating and drinking. She lived alone, and her great economy was food. Now she had allowed her gauze scarf to slide from her shoulders, for even it had seemed to impede her progress toward repletion. Piers was drinking a good deal. His lips were taking on that sweet, mysterious curve they had when he was becoming oblivious of his surroundings, and only wished to be left alone that he might give his full attention to the pleasant phenomenon that was taking place inside him.
There was champagne. Nicholas had seen to that. Rags could not have been more solemn about the drawing of the corks if he had bought and paid for it out of his own savings. Something intangible but vital drew them all nearer each other. The fingers of their spirits touched.
Mr. Fennel rose, glass in hand, to propose Finch’s health. Finch saw it coming, and drooped still closer to Ada Leigh for support. His hour had struck. He was twenty-one and Mr. Fennel was going to propose his health.
The confusion of voices sank into a gentle sigh. All eyes, made brighter or dreamier by wine, were turned on the Rector. All eyes, with the exception of Piers’s, which were looking into a tranced and pleasing space. Mr. Fennel said:
“What I am about to do is very agreeable to me. That is to propose the health of a member of this household who today has reached the estate of manhood. It is not easy for me to believe this, because it seems only a few years ago since I held him in my arms at the font and baptized him in the church his grandfather had built. His grandfather had built the church in what was at that time a sparsely settled community. He established there the religion of his fathers. And his descendants have never failed in their support of that church. At Jalna he established a family which preserves today the traditions of a fine old English family, as few families do in these times of standardisation and irreverence for tradition... The memory of his devoted wife—whose presence I seem to feel among us tonight—will long remain fresh in the minds of all who knew her. Her faults—for none of us are perfect— were far outshone by her virtues... This member of her family who has just attained the age of twenty-one—an age that seems quite unbelievably fresh and glowing to me—has been the companion of my sons all his life. With them he has run
in
and out of the Rectory a thousand times on the mysterious quests of boyhood. In their room they have held with him innumerable conferences on the mysterious business of youth. He has enlivened many an evening for us with his music. We have known him in many moods, but none of us
have ever known him to do a cruel or shabby thing. I wish him well from the bottom of my heart. I know you will all join me in this. I give you the toast—Finch Whiteoak!”