Authors: Mazo de la Roche
Tags: #FIC045000 – FICTION / Sagas
“I did, and I still may, but, as I said, there is much against the place — against the whole country, for that matter. The winters are too cold, too long. Look at this for April! They say you live ten years longer if you go to California. There is a lot in that country to attract a man of my age and my temperament.”
“Hollywood?” she asked.
“No. Not Hollywood.” He was displeased and fixed her with a stern eye. “I don’t quite know what you mean by that remark.”
“Nothing. I was just wondering. It is the only place in California I’ve heard about.”
“Well, your education leaves a good deal to be desired. There are lots of interesting places there. There are lots of people that would be congenial to a man of enquiring mind who likes to look into the heart of things and try to find out what is beyond the materialism of our times.” He was pleased by this speech. He looked searchingly at her to see what she thought of it. She looked impressed, he thought. He added:
“There’s also a beautiful climate. What would you say to such a move, Gem?”
“what about Althea?”
“She would come, of course.”
“And her Great Dane?”
“He could come too, if he wanted to.” Eugene Clapperton felt exhilarated by the thought of going to California. He felt kind and generous.
“It is good of you to say that, Tiddledy-winks,” she exclaimed. “And would you sell this property?”
“I think not. I think I’d like to keep a hold on all my property here. It would give me a good deal of interest to come back now and then and see how my factory and my little village were getting on.
“And this house?” she asked, her eyes shining. She could not help thinking what fun it would be to go away. She had seen so little of the world.
He pursed his lips. “Well, I think I’d probably let this house to the manager of the factory. I know the very man. A rough diamond but as honest as they make them: Oh, don’t you worry, girlie. I’ll fix everything so it will be watertight!”
Upstairs the Great Dane began to bark.
“He wants me to bring Althea’s tray,” Gem cried. “Poor dear, she’s lying there neglected in the dark!”
“Raikes will carry it up for you, Gem. I hear him in the kitchen whistling. I must ask him not to whistle in the house. His is a particularly penetrating one.”
“But so sweet.” She bent her head to listen.
Left to himself Eugene Clapperton took the chair in which he was sitting by the arms and walked, dragging it after him, to face the oil painting of the shipwreck. He settled himself comfortably to gaze at it. At the first shadow of dusk he had turned on the electric light beneath it. Now, with almost ceremonial gravity, he raised his eyes to it. The thunderous clouds, the lurid lightning, the ship staggering toward the black menace of the rocks, enthralled him. How much longer had the ship lasted, he wondered. How many of the sailors clinging to the rigging had survived? Not many, he was sure of that. What a wonderful thing it was, he thought, to be able to lose oneself in that pictured struggle — to absorb the elemental grandeur of the scene! There were few business men who had the imagination to do it, few whose minds ever strayed from the mundane, the materialistic…. And it never had done him any harm. Only good. Consciously he relaxed, letting his mind swim in the roaring terror of the scene, hearing the pounding of the waves, the reverberation of the thunder.
In the kitchen Raikes was still whistling. Gem had prepared a tray for Althea and he had carried it up for her. Now he leant against the sink watching the Great Dane eat its supper of dog biscuit. Earlier in the day it had had its meal of meat and vegetables. Now it was not very hungry and chewed the hard morsels as if only to oblige. Raikes watched it kindly while he awaited Gem’s return. His thoughts moved forward to the hour when the Clappertons would be in bed — to the moment when he would gently open the door of the garage, take out the Cadillac, and drive to the club.
GOODBYE
On the last day of April the onrush of spring was able to defeat even the iron will of that winter. With glittering force the sun pushed back the heavy vapours and gave his fervent attention to land and rivers and lakes. With equal fervour they sought to make up for the delay in their reunion. Lake steamers began to nose their way through the spongy ice. The first captain to make the trip was presented as always with a top hat. The rivers, as though roaring with laughter in their freedom, piled up great blocks of broken ice, broke down bridges, overflowed their banks, brought floods, drowned people and cattle, showed themselves brown and menacing. In the woods catkins appeared, in the gardens crocus and scilla smiled gold and blue. The stems of the willows turned glossy yellow. Sap moved in the maples and came oozing down their trunks. Gnats, bugs, and worms appeared as though from nowhere and sunned themselves according to their pleasure, observed by Noah Binns with gloomy forecast. Piers’ cows, ewes, and sows gave themselves up to the bliss of having young. Hens ran cackling from the streaming barnyard and flopped into their nests just in time to lay an egg there. Piers’ little daughter Mary was given her first skipping rope and spent long, panting hours in trying to achieve one successful hop over it. The grass that covered the graves of all the Whiteoaks in the churchyard turned a delicate green and the sound of the church bell came sweet on the air.
The windows at Jalna were thrown open and the sunshine discovered fresh worn spots and cracks in the furnishings. But the old house bore the inspection well. Behind the rosy leaf buds of the Virginia creeper the rosy brick showed solid and strong. Woodwork and shutters had been freshly painted the year before and still looked fresh.
“You stand the racket pretty well, don’t you?” said Renny Whiteoak, addressing himself to the house from where he stood on the gravel drive. “You’ll soon be celebrating your centenary. Lord, what a party we’ll have for you!”
In his mind he went over the list of those of the family who would come to the party. His sister Meg and her daughter, Roma and Dennis, Piers and Pheasant and their children — young Maurice must come over from Ireland. Finch and Wakefield certainly, whatever distance they might have to travel. Perhaps they might be married by then, Finch for the second time. The right sort of wife would be good for him — he’d had bad luck in his first marriage. And Wakefield, God knew, had had bad luck in his first love. Well, better luck for them both next time, he hoped…. By that time Piers’ two younger sons would be grown up. Nooky was already as tall as Piers, and Philip a strapping fellow at fifteen. Mentally he added up the total number of the family who would be present at that party. Eighteen, if the two old uncles survived so long. Would it be possible? He sincerely hoped so. His mind shied away from the thought of their death. He would not consider it. Their mother had lived to be over a hundred, why not they? He raised his eyes confidently to the house, sunning itself after the long winter. How almost knowing it looked! How benign! He would protect it against all encroachments. It would remain as a fortress guarding the traditions of his forebears. He thought of Clapperton and gave a wry smile. He’d always be up to some mischief. But he felt himself a match for Clapperton. The day would come when he would put Clapperton permanently in his place — keep him there.
He heard a quick step and Adeline appeared from the darkness of the evergreens and came to him. She hooked an arm about his shoulder and looked up into his face.
“Daddy,” she said, “I want to ask you a very serious question.”
Before he spoke he studied that youthful face, in a moment’s delight, so warmly alive, so full of character as yet untried. Then he asked:
“Well, what is it?”
“It’s this. Can you really afford this trip for me? I know it’s terribly expensive.”
“Now, look here,” he spoke in some exasperation, “if I can’t afford a sea voyage and a visit to Ireland and London for my only daughter, things have reached a pretty low level with me.”
“That’s all very well, Daddy, but everything costs so terribly nowadays. Why — when Maurice told me the cost of the mere passage there and back I was shocked to the marrow. That’s to say nothing of the hotel bill in London!” Breathlessly she hurried on. “I know how the men’s wages are twice what they used to be and that the horses we’ve sold haven’t brought what we hoped they’d bring. I do think that perhaps I’d better give up the idea.”
“Too late. Your passage is bought and paid for.”
“Not really?”
“Yes, really. So stop worrying your head about cost.”
Still she was not satisfied. “But, Daddy, why have you refused to come? If you can afford it why won’t you come?”
“I have things to do at home.”
“Nothing that Uncle Piers can’t attend to, I’m very sure.”
“He can’t attend to Clapperton.”
“Are you joking?”
“No.”
“what a menace that man is!” she exclaimed.
“He is indeed…. Well, by next year I hope to settle him. Then we shall go to Ireland together.”
“I will hold you to that,” she said sternly.
But whether Renny was to accompany her or not, her pleasure in her preparations for the voyage made her days and even her dreams at night joyful. She went about the house singing, in a good voice but never in tune for more than six bars. She had a remarkable gift for starting on one tune and ending on another. It was impossible to discover why or on what note the change was made. For one thing she never sang the words but tra-la-la-ed her way in happy ignorance of her destination. This fascinated Finch. “
Pomp and Circumstance!
” he would shout, and then, after a few more bars, — “
Rule, Britannia!
How on earth do you do it?”
“It’s easy,” she would answer. “We learned them at school.”
She would, had she been allowed, have done all her shopping and packing in two days; but Alayne was fastidious as to buying and to the careful packing of the clothes — “Though what your things will look like by the time you return I can’t imagine!”
“If only I could do as Uncle Finch does! Packing is simple for him. Oh, I wish I were a boy!”
“Girls do practically everything today that boys do. They wear their clothes, take up their professions, or business.”
“It isn’t the same. Even if a girl becomes a gangster she never would be as dangerous as one.”
“You’re being really silly, Adeline.”
“Of course I am,” cried Adeline. “To tell the truth I hardly know what I’m doing these days. I live in a delicious haze. When I went to Ireland before I was a child. It was wonderful going with Daddy, but — I was too young to appreciate travel as I can now. You remember how you felt when you went to Italy, when you were a girl.”
“Indeed I do … It was another world then.”
“Yes, I know. But even if travel and life and everything have deteriorated — as I’m sure they have — still, life seems pretty good to me.”
There were certain things to be done before she sailed and two of the most important of these were bidding goodbye to her cousins and her brother who were at boarding school. To be sure she had seen them not long ago in the Easter holidays but she had promised all four that she would make a special journey, at the very last, to their schools. What pleased her most about these goodbyes was that, in each case, Renny was to drive her to the schools. That meant two whole days in his company. So soon they would be far apart — the ocean rolling between.
They motored first to Roma’s school. She was younger than Adeline, the daughter of Renny’s brother Eden who had died when she was a baby. She was an odd child whom Alayne had always disliked and, because of something Roma had done, now almost hated. Adeline had not much love for her cousin, holding the same act against her, but Renny loved the girl, and she, in her cool fashion, was attached to Adeline.
As the car drew near the school Adeline leant forward in pleasurable anticipation. She savoured her freedom from rules and regulations. How hard she had found it to conform to them! The very core of her had rebelled at doing everything in unison with fifty others. Yet on the surface she had not been rebellious. She had a sense of duty implanted in her chiefly by her two great-uncles. Even when she was very small it had been — “You owe this to your father — you must behave in a way to please your mother — remember, you are a Whiteoak!” when she did disobey rules it had not been in little ways but in larger matters that had occasionally shaken the school. Roma, on the other hand, was constantly evading rules but in such a way that she was seldom found out. Yet Roma clung to the school, felt a little dread of the time when she must leave it.
Now Renny and the two girls were in the reception room together, the headmistress having given her greetings, exclaimed at Adeline’s growth and exchanged a look with Renny in silent commentary on her beauty.
Roma’s beauty, thought Renny, was her hair, of an odd shade of gold that had an almost greenish cast. It was Eden’s hair, he thought, and he searched her face for a resemblance to Eden. But, if it were there, it was no more than a fleeting shadow in her smile. Her eyes and cheekbones were those of her mother, Minny Ware.
Roma said, — “Aren’t you a lucky thing! Going off on an ocean voyage and all of us here swotting away with never any fun.”
“Your last letter,” answered Adeline, “was full of the fun you’d been having.”
“Oh, that was nothing. I’ve forgotten it.”
Renny said, — “Your time will come, Roma.”
She smiled at him. “Will it? when?”
“Well, perhaps next year or the year after — when I go across with Adeline.”
Roma’s narrow eyes were hard with jealousy. “She again — so soon?”
“He’s just talking,” put in Adeline, her spirit in arms against the thought of Roma’s going with them. “Goodness knows when I shall travel again.”
At that moment they looked like women. Roma went on, — “Everybody says there’ll be another war before long. Then I may never get across — excepting with some horrible women’s auxiliary corps.”
“Nonsense,” said Renny.
“Anyway,” Adeline exclaimed, “that’s all in the future. We’re in the present.”
“I was born in Italy,” said Roma. “I’m longing to see it. It makes you feel different when you’ve been born abroad.”
Adeline considered this one of Roma’s “uncomfortable” remarks. She said tersely, — “You can’t remember anything about it.”
“Oh, yes, I can. I remember a lot.”
“what?” asked Renny. “You were only two when you came to Jalna.”
“I remember cypress trees, and a dark woman and little donkeys, and falling on hard stones and cutting my knee.”
“I wonder who was the dark woman,” said Renny. “Certainly not your mother.”
“I don’t remember her name but I remember her.”
Adeline said, — “I’ll bet you wouldn’t know her today if you met her.”
“Oh, yes, I should. I’d know my father too.”
“You’ve seen very good photographs of him,” said Renny.
“Even if I hadn’t seen them I’d know him. I’d know his voice.”
“You’ve never heard his voice!” exclaimed Adeline.
“I’ve heard it in his poetry.”
Adeline pressed back the hair from her forehead in a gesture of despair. Was Roma going to spend this short time for which they had come so far, in talking in this embarrassing fashion? She appealed to Renny: “Are we going to take Roma out to lunch?”
“Yes. Miss Ellis said we might.” His eyes were on Roma’s face. “I’m glad,” he said gravely, “that you read Eden’s poetry. It is supposed to be very good. It was a pity he died so young.”
“Do you think so?” A faint smile lifted Roma’s lip — “I don’t.”
His eyebrows shot up in his dismay. “what a thing to say, Roma! what do you mean?”
“I think it’s good to die young — before you find out too much.”
“Then he didn’t die young enough.”
“what a pity!”
Adeline sprang up. “I didn’t come here,” she cried, “to talk about death.”
“It’s the first time,” said Renny, “that Roma has spoken to me of her father.” He spoke soothingly, as though to a colt that had shied at something on the road.
“Daddy, she can talk to you about death all the holidays, if she wants.”
Roma stood up. “All right,” she said, “let’s go. Will you come up with me, Adeline, while I get my hat and coat?”
The two girls went up the stairs together. From the classrooms came the hum of voices. Somewhere scales were being practised on the piano. Clean spring air came in at an open window and a tree was seen rustling its half-open leaves in the May breeze. In the room shared by four girls Adeline surveyed the beds, carefully made by the girls themselves. She exclaimed:
“To think that I once slept here! How did I ever bear it!”
“You had fun and so do we. Last night we had a party. I mean just the four of us.”
“I know — buns and chocolate bars and at midnight you crept down to the kitchen and made cocoa!”
“Yes … Adeline.”
“Well?”
“what if … over there … you’d meet someone?”
“what sort of someone?”
“I mean, supposing you fell in love — over in Ireland.”
“Don’t you worry. I shan’t do that.”
“what’s to stop you?”
“Roma, your hair’s lovely.”
“So’s yours.”
“Yours is like greeny gold — not like that pinkish blond stuff they make out of peroxide.”
“Yours is like copper, Adeline … You know, I shan’t be a bit surprised if you have an affair over there. There’s Mooey’s friend Pat Crawshay.”
“And there’s Mooey himself!” cried Adeline. “And a million other Irishmen.” Then she spoke seriously: “Roma, there isn’t a man living I’d leave Jalna for.”
“You should have said — for whom I’d leave Jalna.”
“Roma! Can’t you ever forget you took first prize in English?”
“But seriously, Adeline, you might fall in love.”
“No fear. I’m going to Ireland to enjoy myself.”
“They say being in love is fun.”
“who said?”
“Well, perhaps not actually fun, but exciting.”
“You may have that sort of excitement. Just living is excitement enough for me.”