Complete weird tales of.., p.1149
Complete Weird Tales of Robert W Chambers, page 1149
“I could not accept,” she said in a low voice, sewing rapidly the while.
“Why not?”
“I scarcely know. It was because of pride, perhaps.... I was his servant. He paid me well. I could not permit him to overpay my poor services.... And he has other children, and grandchildren, with whose proper claims I would not permit myself — or him — to interfere. No, it was unthinkable — however kindly meant — —”
“That,” said I impatiently, “smacks of a too Scotch and stubborn conscience, does it not, Penelope?”
“Stubborn Scotch pride, I fear. For it is not in my Scottish nature to accept benefits for which I never can hope to render service in return.”
“Imaginary obligation!” said I scornfully, yet admiring the independence which, naked and defenceless, prefers to spin its own raiment rather than accept the divided cloak of charity.
And it was plain to me that this girl was no beggar, no passive accepter of bounties unearned from anybody. And now I was secretly chagrined and ashamed that I had so postured before her as My Lord Bountiful, and had offered her the Summer House who had refused a modest fortune from a good old man who loved her and who had some excuse and reason to so deal by one to whom his bodily comfort had long been beholden.
“Few,” said I, “would have put aside so agreeable an opportunity for ease and comfort in life. I fear you were foolish, Penelope.”
She smiled at me: “There is a family saying, ‘A Grant grants but never accepts’.... I have youth, health, two arms, two legs, and a pair of steady eyes. If these can not keep me alive through the world’s journey, then I ought to perish and make room for another.”
“What do you meditate to keep you?” I asked uneasily.
“For the present,” said she, still smiling, “what I am doing is well enough to keep me in food and clothes and lodging.”
At first I did not understand her, then an odd suspicion seized me; for I remembered during the last two weeks, when I lay sick, hearing strange voices in her ante-chamber, and strange people coming and going in the passageway.
Seeing me perplexed and frowning, she laughed and took the empty bowl from my hands, and set it aside. Then she smoothed my pillow.
“I am employed by the garrison,” said she, “to work for them with needle and shears. I do their mending; I darn, stitch, sew, and alter. I patch shirts and under-garments; I also make shirts, and devise officers’ neck-cloths, stocks, and wrist-bands at request.
“Also, I now employ a half-breed Oneida woman as tailoress; and she first measures and then I cut out patterns of coats, breeches, rifle-frocks, and watch-coats, which she then takes home and sews, then tries on her customers, and finally finishes, — I sewing on all galons, laces, and braids.... And so you see I pay my way, Mr. Drogue, and am in no stress for the present at any rate.”
“Good heavens!” said I amazed, “I never dreamed that you were so employed!”
“But I am obliged to eat, John Drogue!”
“I have sufficient for both,” I muttered. “I thought it was understood — —”
“That I should live on your bounty, my lord?”
“Will you ever have done with lording me?” I said angrily. “I think you do it to plague me.”
“I ask forgiveness,” she murmured, still smiling. “Also, I crave pardon for refusing to live on your kind bounty.”
“I do not mean it that way!” said I sharply. “Besides, you kept Summer House for us, and did all things indoors and most things outdoor; and had no pay for the labour — —”
“I had food and a bed. And your protection.... And most excellent company,” she added, smiling saucily upon me. “You owe me nothing, John Drogue. Nor do I mean to owe you, — or any man, — more than that proper debt of kindness which kindness to me begets.”
I lay back on my pillows, not knowing whether to laugh or scowl. That Penelope had become a tailoress and sempstress to the garrison did not pleasure me at all; and it was as though I had lost some advantage or influence over this girl, whose present situation and whose future did now considerably begin to concern me.
Yet, what was I to say against this business, or what offer make her that her modesty and pride could consider?
It was perfectly clear to me that she never had intended to be obliged to me for anything, and never would be. And now her saucy smile and gentle mockery confirmed this conclusion and put me out of countenance.
I cast a troubled glance at her from my pillow, where she sat by my bed sewing on a pair of wrist-bands for some popinjay of the garrison — God knew who he might be! — and, as I regarded her, further and further she seemed to be slipping out of my influence and out of the care which, mentally at least, I had felt it my duty to give to her.
She troubled me. She troubled me deeply. Her independence, her sufficiency, her beauty, her sly and pretty mockery of me, all conspired to give me a new concern for her, and I had not experienced the like since Steve Watts kissed her by the lilacs.
I had seen her in many phases, but never before in this phase, and I knew not what face to put on such a disturbing situation.
* * *
For a while I lay there frowning and sulky, and spoke not. She tranquilly finished her wrist-bands, went to her chamber, returned with a dozen stocks, all cut out and basted, and picked up one to fit a plain military frill to it.
From my window, near where my head rested, I saw a gold sunset between the maple trees and the roofs across the street. Birds sang their evening carols, — robins on every fence post, orioles in the elms, and far away a wood-thrush filled the quiet with his liquid ecstasies.
And suddenly it seemed to me horrible and monstrous that this heavenly tranquillity should be shattered by the red blast of war! — that men could actually be planning to devastate this quiet land where already the new harvest promised, tender and green; where cattle grazed in blossoming meadows; where swallows twittered and fowls clucked; where smoke drifted from chimneys and the homely sights and sounds of a peaceful town sweetened the evening silence.
Then the thought of my own helplessness went through me like a spear, and I groaned, — not meaning to, — and turned over on my pillow.... And presently felt her hand lightly on my shoulder.
“Is it pain?” she asked softly.
“No, only the weariness of life,” I muttered.
She was silent, but presently her hand smoothed back my hair, and passed in a sort of gentle rhythm across my forehead and my hair.
“If I lie here long enough,” said I bitterly, “I may have to beg a crust of you. So get you to your sewing and see that you earn enough against a beggared cripple’s need.”
“You mock me,” she said in a low voice.
“Why, no,” said I. “If I am to remain crippled my funds will dwindle and go, and one day I shall sit in the sun like any poor old soldier, with palm lifted for alms — —”
“I beg — I beg you — —” she stammered; and her hand closed on my lips as though to stifle the perverse humour.
“Would you offer me charity if I remain crippled?” I managed to say.
“Hush. You sadden me.”
“Would you aid me?” I insisted.
She drew a long, deep breath but made no answer.
“Tell me,” I repeated, taking her by the hand, “would you aid me, Penelope Grant?”
“Why do you ask?” she protested. “You know I would.”
“And yet,” said I, “although I am in funds, you refuse aid and choose rather to play the tailoress! Is that fair?”
“But — I am nothing to you — —”
“Are you not? And am I then more to you than are you to me, that you would aid me in necessity?”
She drew her hand from mine and went back to her chair.
“That is my fate,” said she, smiling at me. “I was born to give, not to receive. I can not take; I can not refuse to give.”
“Yes,” said I, “you even gave me your lips once.”
She blushed vividly, her eyes hard on her sewing.
“I shall not do the like again,” said she, all rosy to the roots of her gold hair.
“And why, pray?”
“Because I know better now.”
After a silence I turned me on my pillow and sighed heavily.
“John?” she inquired in gentle anxiety, “are you in great pain?”
I groaned.
She came to me again and laid her cool, soft hand on my head; and I caught it in both of mine and drew her down to me.
“I am a cripple and a beggar for your kindness, Penelope,” I said. “I ask alms of you. Will you kiss me?”
“Oh,” she exclaimed, “you have deceived me! Let me go! Loose me instantly!”
“Will you kiss me out of that charity which you say you practice?”
“That is not charity! — —”
“What is begged for is charity. And you say you are made to give.”
“But you taught me otherwise! And now you undo your own schooling! — —”
“But I owe it you — this kiss!”
“How do you owe it me?”
“You kissed me in the snow, and left me in your debt.”
“Oh, goodness! That frolic! Have you not long ago forgotten our winter madness — —”
“Like you,” said I, “I must pay my just debts and owe nobody.” And I drew her nearer, all flushed with protest, firm to escape, yet gentle in her supple, pretty way lest she hurt me.
I laughed, and saw my gaiety reflected in her eyes an instant.
Then, of a sudden, she put one arm around my neck and rested her lips on mine. And so I kissed her, and she suffered it, resting so against me with lowered eyes.
The flower-sweetness of her mouth bewildered me, and I was confused by it and by the stifled tumult of my heart, so that I scarce had sense enough to detain her when she drew away.
She sat at my side, the faint smile still stamped on her lips, but her brown eyes seemed a little frightened, and her breast rose and fell like a scared bird’s under the snowy kerchief.
“Well — and well,” says she in her pretty, breathless way— “I am overpaid, I think, and you are now acquitted of your debt. And so — and so our folly ends ... and now is finally ended.”
She took her sewing. A golden light was in the room; and she seemed to me the loveliest thing I had ever looked upon. I realized it. I knew she was loveliest of all. And the swift knowledge seemed to choke me.
After a little while she stole a look at me, met my eyes, laughed guiltily.
“You!” said she, “a schoolmaster! You teach me one thing and would have me practice another. What confidence can I entertain for such wisdom as is yours, John Drogue?”
“Rules,” said I, “are made to be proven by their more interesting exceptions. However, in future you are to endure no kiss and no caress — unless from me.”
“Oh. Is that the new lesson I am to learn and understand?”
“That is the lesson. Will you remember it when I am gone?”
“Gone?”
“Yes. When I am gone away on duty. Will you remember, Penelope?”
“I am like to,” she said under her breath, and sewing rapidly.
She stitched on in silence for a while; but now the light was dimming and she moved nearer the window, which was close by my bed head.
After a while her hands dropped in her lap; she looked out into the twilight. I took her tired little hand in mine, but she did not turn her head.
“I have,” said I, “two thousand pounds sterling at my solicitor’s in Albany. I wish you to have it if any accident happens to me.... And my glebe in Fonda’s Bush.... I shall so write it in my will.”
She shook her head slightly, still gazing from the window.
“Will you accept?” I asked.
“What good would it do me? If I accept it I should only divide it among the needy — in memory of — of my dear boy friend — Jack Drogue — —”
She rose hastily and walked to the door, then very slowly retraced her steps to my bedside.
“You are so kind to me,” she murmured, touching my forehead.
“You are so different to other men, — so truly gallant in your boy’s soul. There is no evil in you, — no ruthlessness. Oh, I know — I know — more than I seem to know — of men.... And their importunities.... And of their wilful selfishness.”
I sat up straight. “Has any man made you unhappy?” I demanded in angry surprise.
She seated herself and looked at me gravely.
“Do you know,” she said, “men have courted me always — even when I was scarce more than a child? And mine is a friendly heart, Mr. Drogue. I have a half shy desire to please. I am loath to inflict pain. But always my kindness seems like to cost me more than I choose to pay.”
“Pay to whom?”
“To any man.... For example, I would not elope with Stephen Watts when he begged me at Caughnawaga. And Walter Butler addressed me also — in secret — being a friend of the Fondas and so free of the house.... And was ever stealthily importuning me to a stolen rendezvous which I had sense enough to refuse, knowing him to be both married and a rake, and cruel to women.
“Oh, I tell you that they all courted me, — not kindly, — for ever there seemed to me in their ardent gaze and discreet whisperings something vaguely sinister. Not that it frightened me, nor did I take alarm, being too ignorant — —”
She folded her hands and looked down at them.
“I like men.... I cared most for Stephen Watts.... Then one day I had a great fright.... Shall I tell it?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, Sir John’s gallantries neither pleased nor flattered me from the first. But he was very cautious what he said and did in Douw Fonda’s house, and never spoke to me save coldly when others were present, or when he was alone with us and Mr. Fonda was awake and not dozing in his great chair.... Well, there came a day when Mr. Fonda went to the house of Captain Fonda, and I was alone in the house....
“And Sir John came.... Shall I tell it?”
“Tell it, Penelope.”
“I’ve had it long in my mind. I wished to ask you if it lessened me in your esteem.... For Sir John was drunk, and, finding me alone, he conducted roughly — and followed me and locked us in my chamber.... I was horribly afraid.... I had never struck any living being before. But I beat his red face with my hands until he became confused and stupid — and there was blood on him and on me.... And my kerchief was torn off and my hair all tangled.... I beat him till he dropped my door key, and so unlocked my door and returned again to him, silent and flaming, and drove him with blows out o’ my chamber and out of the house — all over blood as he was, and stupid and drunk.... His negro man got him on his horse and rode off, holding him on.
“And none knew — none know, save Sir John and you and I.”
After a silence I said in a controlled voice: “If Sir John comes this way I shall hope not to miss him.... I shall pray God not to miss this — gentleman.”
“Do you think meanly of me that he used me so?”
I did not answer.
“I have told you all,” she said timidly. “I am still honest. If I were not I would not have let you touch my lips.”
“Why not?”
“For both our sakes.... I would not do you any evil.”
I said impatiently: “No need to tell me you never had a lover. I never believed it of you from the day I saw you first. And, God willing, I mean to stop a mouth or two in Tryon, war or no war — —”
“John Drogue!” she exclaimed in consternation— “you shall seek no quarrel on my account! Swear to me!”
But I made no reply. Whatever the quarrel, I knew now it was to be on my own account; for whether or no I was falling in love with this girl, Penelope Grant, I realized at all events that I would suffer no other man to interfere, however he conducted, and should hold any man to stern account who would make of this girl a toy and plaything.
And so, all hotly resolved on that point; sore, also, at the knowledge of Sir John’s baseness which seemed to touch my proper honour; and swifter, too, with tenderness in my heart to reassure her, I did exactly that for which I was now prepared to cut the throats of various other gentlemen — I drew her into my arms and held her close, body and lips imprisoned.
She sought her chair and sat there silent and subdued until a maid-servant brought lights and my supper.
In the candle light she ventured to look at me and laugh.
“Such schooling” says she. “I never knew before that there was such a personage as a sweetheart pro tem! But you seem to know the rôle by heart, Mr. Drogue. And so, no doubt, feel warranted to instruct others. But this is the end of it, my friend. For one day you shall have to confess you to your wife! And I think my future Lady Northesk is like to have a pretty temper and will give you a mauvais quart d’heur when she hears of this May day’s folly in a Johnstown public house!”
* * *
CHAPTER XXVI
ORDERS
IN JUNE I was out o’ bed and managed to set foot on ground for the first time since early spring. By the end of the month I had my strength in a measure and was able to hobble about town. Pernicious rheumatism is no light matter, for with the agony, — and weakness afterward, — a dull despair settles upon the victim; and it was mind, not body, that caused me the deeper distress, I think.
Life seemed useless; effort hopeless. Dark apprehensions obsessed me; I despaired of my country, of my people, of myself. And this all was part of my malady, but I did not know it.
All through June and July an oppressive summer heat brooded over Tryon. Save for thunder storms of unusual violence, the heat remained unbroken day and night. In the hot and blinding blue of heaven, a fierce sun blazed; at night the very moon looked sickly with the heat.
Never had I heard so many various voices of the night, nor so noisy a tumult after dark, where the hylas trilled an almost deafening chorus and the big frogs’ stringy croaking never ceased, and a myriad confusion of insects chirred and creaked and hummed in the suffocating dark.
