Authors: Mazo de la Roche
Tags: #FIC045000 – FICTION / Sagas
Finch began to walk up and down the room, his arms tense at his sides. “I tell you, Wake, it’s no use. I know what I’ve got to do. It’s not a moment’s madness. It’s going back to where I dropped the thread of my life and picking it up again. It’s finishing a composition I threw down in despair but now know has got to be finished or I am lost.”
“There’s no truth in this and no balance. Sarah is not the woman for you. Just now she’s made you feel that she is. She’s got a kind of hypnotic influence over you. If she hadn’t, you wouldn’t have begged Renny to keep her away from you when you were ill. You were afraid of what she’d do to you. I tell you, Finch, I shall look on this visit as one of our greatest misfortunes, if it gives you back to Sarah!”
The door opened and she stood before them.
“I’ve been listening,” she said.
“Very well,” said Wakefield. “I’m glad. You know what I feel without my telling you.”
“I also know what Finch feels and that means infinitely more to me — to hear from his own lips — in confidence to you — that life is meaningless to him — if I am not with him.” She entered and closed the door, standing against it, as though in a frame. “You loved a girl once and broke off your engagement to go into a monastery. What can a man of your type know of a great passion such as Finch and I know! There’s nothing of the monk about him! He’s flesh and fire. And if he and I separated once, it was because our love had consumed us and we parted to gain more fuel for it.”
As she spoke, Wakefield’s features had taken on a chiselled severity. “Finch left you,” he said, “because he was exhausted spiritually. He wasn’t seeking fresh fuel for passion but forgetfulness of the harm it had done him. And it’s not only a matter of passion, Sarah, it’s just you — the woman that you are. There’s something in you that cannot be accepted — perhaps that’s not the right word but it’s the best I can think of — it cannot be accepted. It’s as though your soul were a pillar of salt. No man could be happy with you. Finch least of all.”
She brought her hands from where they had rested against the door, and clapped them before her. “Ask Finch! Ask Finch if he was happy last night! Ask him if there was anything in me he could not accept.”
“Finch is not in his sane mind this morning.” Wakefield’s voice softened persuasively. “Can’t you see, Sarah, that, as an artist, he’s got to be his own man? He’s got to respect the thing in him that makes him able to play?”
She laughed triumphantly. “Finch told me last night that the sight of my violin on the piano had filled him with a strange joy.”
Wakefield spoke with solemnity. “Yes, Sarah. I don’t doubt it. A
strange
joy. That’s what you would inspire. But Finch needs normality. He needs naturalness and all that’s wholesome and sane.”
“You sound like a preacher,” sneered Sarah.
“I am preaching. I’m preaching what’s right and true.”
Finch broke out, “I’ve had enough of this! There’s no use in your trying to stop me. I don’t want your interference. Sarah and I —”
He was interrupted by a knocking on the door. Paris called out, “Hullo, in there! May I come in?”
Sarah moved from the door and he threw it open. He stood astonished. “Why — why —” he stammered.
She smiled. “I suppose you are Paris. I’m your fourth or fifth cousin — Sarah Whiteoak. Haven’t your parents mentioned me?”
He came to her and took her hand. “My mother did tell me that a distant cousin was here but —” his eyes swept over her admiringly — “I never thought of anyone so charming.”
“Sarah is my wife,” said Finch. “I’ve told you of her.”
“Yes, but upon my word, Sarah, he didn’t give me any idea of your looks. I expect he’s jealous.” Paris wondered greatly what the raised voices had signified. He suspected that Sarah had been brought there in the hope of a reconciliation between her and Finch. He thought what a fool Finch was to have parted with a woman of such wealth and such looks. His candid face expressed this as he turned to Wakefield when they were alone together.
“What a sweet face!” he exclaimed. “Oh, I could love that girl! Surely you are mistaken about her temper. Do you think she and Finch are going to come together again? God, I hope not!”
As Wakefield went down to breakfast his mind was deeply disturbed. He had looked forward to the visit to Ireland as a happy adventure. But this meeting with Sarah, her recapture of Finch, for Wakefield looked on it as nothing but a shameless recapture, had darkened his sky. What was going to happen? Would she return to London with them? It was impossible to think of living with her in the house in Gayfere Street. If she came, he would go. He would find other lodgings. Then anger against Finch flamed up in him. He hesitated, his hand on the banister, almost ready to go back and begin the feverish discussion once more. But he knew that would be hopeless. There had been a light in Finch’s eyes that told of an invincible resolve to go his own way at this moment. Well — let him go his own way! It would ruin him but let him go! What would Renny say? He would be furious, that was certain. Wakefield turned again down the stairway. Now the thought of the horse troubled him. Had he any right to encourage Renny to take such a risk? He was easily excited about a horse. An enthusiastic letter about this one would probably result in his moving heaven and earth to acquire it; Renny’s wife, Alayne, would feel that his family had little to do to encourage him in such a risk. The buying of a race horse was only the beginning of the outlay it would entail. He had a mind to tell Cousin Malahide that he would not even look at the horse.
He found the family collected in the dining room. Mrs. Court asked him kindly how he had slept. Sarah sat close beside her, as though trying to hide behind the coffee urn.
“She was brazen enough,” thought Wakefield, “up in my room. Now she’s being demure. She’s as two-faced as the devil.”
“What a nice morning,” said Malahide. He wore riding things and was helping himself to sausages and bacon from a dish on the sideboard. “Do have some of this, Wakefield.”
Finch, on Wakefield’s other side, said in a low voice: —
“Don’t look as though the end of the world had come, Wake. I don’t know when I’ve felt so happy as I do this morning. So don’t worry!”
“I’m thinking about the horse, too.” Wakefield felt sudden embarrassment. “I think we ought to back down before it’s too late.”
“After coming over here?”
“Yes. There was ill luck in it.”
Finch gave a sudden relentless grin at him. “You call it ill luck! Not I. Let’s have the horse! All omens are good. He’ll win the Grand National, you’ll see!” He lifted the dish cover and disclosed two sausages and a lonely rasher of bacon. “Here, you have them, Wake! I’ll take some of that cold meat.”
Wakefield gave him a look of hurt. “I’m not hungry. I want only some coffee.”
“Tck!” said Malahide, as Wakefield returned to the table. “No appetite! What a pity! But you’ll enjoy your lunch all the more. Now look at Parry, how he fills himself up.”
He beamed at his son, who had a large dish of porridge before him, his mother having the same.
Finch and Paris were laughing and talking as they ate. Finch’s eyes were bright and he had a fair colour in his cheeks. His unruly lock hung across his forehead. Sarah sat demure, speaking to no one. She seemed hungry.
The pale sunlight slanted across the room. The bleating of newborn lambs came from the meadow.
“To me there is no sweeter sound,” said Malahide. “The dear little lambs!” He placed a scrap of bread on his fork and collected on it the bacon gravy from his plate.
“Do you remember my pet lamb?” asked Paris.
“Can I ever forget her?” answered his mother. “We couldn’t keep her out of the house when she’d grown to a sheep. She was devoted to Parry and would follow him upstairs to his room, bunting her head against the door and bleating till he opened it. Eventually we all hated her.”
Wakefield’s eyes met Sarah’s.
“Poor lamb!” she exclaimed.
“It ended by my sending her to the butcher,” said Malahide.
“The proper place for her,” said Wakefield, grimly.
At eleven o’clock Malahide was waiting in the hall for the young men. In his riding clothes he had a look of vitality in contrast to his white hair and sallow, sunken cheeks. Wakefield and Paris were riding with him but Finch and Sarah were going in the car with Mrs. Court.
Malahide rode a good bay mare but the other horses were old and the one ridden by Wakefield was stiff in the hindquarters. He rode side by side with Paris, seeing, as in a dream, the new tender greenness of the countryside, the white thatched cottages with women standing in the doorways and little children and hens in and out of the doors. A delicate mist still hung in the hills and in the hollows and here and there was the silver flash of a pond with ducks on it.
“I can tell you, Paris,” said Wakefield, in a low voice, “this is one of the unhappiest days of my life.”
“I think I can guess why.” Paris threw him a sympathetic look. “It’s the reconciliation between those two. I can see through her, I think. But how I wish she’d taken a fancy to me! Oh, I could love her fierce enough to satisfy even her! Do you think maybe I could cut Finch out?”
“Never. He fascinates her. Everything he does or says is wonderful to her. She told me so herself. Years ago.”
“Well, well,” said Paris, “that’s queer. Now I should say that you’d be far more fascinating to a woman.”
Wakefield turned to look at him in surprise.
“You don’t know Finch. He’s an artist and he has all that implies — where women are concerned. But something happened to him — something went wrong — I don’t know just what it was. It wasn’t altogether marrying Sarah. There have been other things. I think my brother Eden’s death was a great shock to him. Then — when my grandmother died — she left all her money to Finch and the family thought — that is,
some
of them thought — he’d been scheming and underhand about it. That hurt him terribly.”
“What became of the money?” asked Paris. “He doesn’t seem to have much now.”
“He hasn’t. He gave a lot of it away — to different members of the family. He made some bad investments. He has to work hard. Sometimes I think it would have been better for Finch if he’d not been a musician. I mean, not devoted his life to music. What I’m certain of is that he should never have been reconciled to Sarah!”
They rode on in silence for a space, then Parry said: —
“As Sarah is so much in love with Finch maybe she’d like to buy the horse for your eldest brother, as a sort of bid for his good will. What do you think?”
“Renny would never accept it from her. Moreover she’d not raise a finger to help him. She once held a mortgage on Jalna and Renny had the devil’s own time to pay it off. She was going to foreclose. But he got the best of her and she’s hated him ever since.”
“How did he get the best of her?” A subtle resemblance to his father came into Parry’s handsome face.
Wakefield grinned. “With the last of Finch’s fortune!”
Malahide’s horse was trotting on ahead. Now he turned in a gateway almost hidden by tall holly bushes whose prickly leaves glittered in the pale sunlight.
“This is Madigan’s,” said Paris.
They dismounted and a young boy, with a reckless air and his head bandaged, took their horses.
“What’s the matter, Shaun?” asked Parry.
“I was just helpin’ a friend. Mister Parry, and a fella came along and hit me with the tailboard of a cart.”
Paris seemed to consider this a satisfactory explanation. He and Wakefield followed Malahide to the door. He turned to them with a secretive air.
“Now I warn you not to be too enthusiastic about this horse. You especially, Wakefield, must be very knowing and a bit skeptical. It is possible we may get him for even less than I said.”
Wakefield felt as though he were being drawn into a net. He wished with all his heart that Renny were here.
The door opened and a maid, with large staring eyes, gave them one startled look and retreated, showing her bare pink heels at every step through the holes in her stockings.
Wakefield thought he had never felt anything like the frozen mustiness of that hall. A row of muddy boots stood along the wall and a mackintosh and whip lay on the floor beside them.
A short square man came cheerfully from the back premises to meet them. He had a square forehead and a look of spurious intensity in his small eyes.
“Good morning, Mr. Court!” he exclaimed. “And Mr. Paris! Is it come to see Johnny the Bird, ye have?”
“We have,” agreed Malahide languidly. “This young gentleman is our cousin, Mr. Wakefield Whiteoak, from Canada. I’ve had a time to persuade him to come, for he thinks his brother has given up steeplechasing and also he’d not want to buy a horse by proxy.”
Wakefield’s spirits rose and Mr. Madigan’s face fell. He said regretfully, as they shook hands — “Well, your brother is missing the chance of a lifetime. The devil himself couldn’t persuade me to part with this horse but that I’m in desperate need of cash. Will you come along and look at him then?”
“Yes,” agreed Wakefield, “I’d like to see him.” He felt sorry for Mr. Madigan for he knew what it was to be in need of cash and had heard of such need from his earliest days.
Outside, the car had just driven up. Mrs. Court had been to the village to shop. Mr. Madigan greeted her with effusion.
“I’ve been buying a leg of mutton,” she announced, as though it were a piece of news worth repeating.
“Well now,” said Mr. Madigan, “there’s a coincidence! My wife brought some glasses of red currant jelly out from the storeroom this morning, and a bottle of our cherry brandy. I hope you’ll give me the pleasure of accepting one of each — the jelly will go well with the mutton and the brandy will give a fillip to it all.”
“Well, that is kind of you!” said Mrs. Court. She looked much gratified.
Finch and Sarah, after the introduction, followed the others toward the stables, she with her hand in his like a child’s, he giving Wakefield a look of mingled anger and pleading.
“You’d think,” he said, as they jostled each other in the stable doorway, “that I’d committed a crime, when all I’ve done is to return to the woman I love, the woman I need.”