A Dozen Ways Of Love Part 14

Armand, which lies half a mile away. The hotel itself is the same, but in those days it was not painted yellow, as it is now, and was not half so well kept. The world has progressed by twenty years since mam'selle was a girl, and, also, she owns the place herself now, and is a much better inn-keeper than was her father.

Mam'selle Chaplot is a very active person, tall, and somewhat stout. Her complexion is brown; her eyes are very black; over them there is a fringe of iron-grey hair, which she does up in curl-papers every night, and which, in consequence, stands in very tight little curls all day.

Mam'selle Chaplot minds her affairs well; she has a keen eye to the main chance. She is sometimes sharp, a trifle fiery, but on the whole she is good-natured. There are lines about the contour of her chin, and also where the neck sweeps upward, which suggest a more than common power of satisfaction in certain things, such as dinners and good sound sleep, and good inn-keeping--yes, and in spring flowers, and in autumn leaves and winter sunsets. Zilda Chaplot was formed for pleasure, yet there is no tendency latent in her which could have made her a voluptuary. There are some natures which have so nice a proportion of faculties that they are a law of moderation to themselves. They take such keen delight in small pleasures that to them a little is enough.

The world would account Mam'selle Chaplot to have had a life of toil and stern limitations; a prosperous life, truly, for no one could see her without observing her prosperity, but still a hard dry life. Even her neighbours, whose ideas of enjoyment do not soar above the St. Armand level, think that her lot would be softer if she married. Many of the men have offered marriage, not with any disinterested motive, it is true, but with kindly intent. They have been set aside like children who make requests unreasonable, but so natural for them to make that the request is hardly worth noticing. The women relatives of these rejected suitors have boasted to mam'selle of their own domestic joys, and have drawn the contrast of her state in strong colour. Zilda only says 'Chut!' or she lifts her chin a little, so that the pretty upward sweep of the neck is apparent, and lets them talk. Mam'selle is not the woman to be turned out of her way by talk.

The way of single blessedness is not chosen by Zilda Chaplot because of any fiction of loyalty to a quondam lover. Her mind is such that she could not have invented obligations for herself, because she has not the inventive faculty. No, it is simply this: Mam'selle Chaplot loved once, and was happy; her mind still hugs the memory of that happiness with exultant reserve; it is enough; she does not desire other happiness of that sort.

When she looks out on the little station platform and sees the loungers upon it, once and again she lets her busy mind stop in its business to think of some one else she was once accustomed to see there. When she looks with well-practised critical eye down the hotel dining-room, which is now quite clean and orderly, when she is scolding a servant, or serving a customer, her mind will revert to the room in its former rough state, and she will remember another customer who used to eat there.

When the spring comes, and far and near there is the smell of wet moss, and shrubs on the wide flat land shoot forth their leaves, and the fields are carpeted with violets, then mam'selle looks round and hugs her memories, and thinks to herself, 'Ah! well, I have had my day.' And because of the pleasant light of that day she is content with the present twilight, satisfied with her good dinners and her good management.

This is the story of what happened twenty years ago.

St. Armand is in the French country which lies between the town of Quebec and the townships where the English settlements are. At that time the railway had not been very long in existence; two trains ran southward from the large towns in the morning, and two trains ran northward to the large towns in the evening; besides these, there was just one local train which came into St. Armand at noon, and pa.s.sengers arriving at noon were obliged to wait for the evening train to get on farther.

There were not many pa.s.sengers by this short local line. Even on the main line there was little traffic that affected St. Armand. Yet most of the men of the place found excuse of business or pleasure to come and watch the advent of the trains. The chief use of the station platform seemed to be for these loungers; the chief use of the bar at the hotel was to slake their thirst, although they were not on the whole an intemperate lot. They stood about in homespun clothes and smoked. A lazy, but honest set of humble-minded French papists were the men at St.

Armand.

It was on the station platform that Zilda Chaplot came out in society, as the phrase might be. She was not a child, for when her father took the place she was twenty-four. There was red in her cheeks then, and the lashes of her eyes were long; her hair was not curled, for it was not the fashion, but brushed smoothly back from broad low brows. She was tall, and not at all thin. She was very strong, but less active in those days, as girls are often less active than women. When Zilda had leisure she used to stand outside the hotel and watch the men on the platform.

She was always calm and dignified, a little stupid perhaps. She did not attract a great deal of attention from them.

They were all French at St. Armand, but most of the strangers which chance brought that way spoke English, so that the St. Armand folks could speak English also.

Anything which is repeated at appreciable intervals has to occur very often before the unscientific mind will perceive the law of its repet.i.tion. There was a little red-haired Englishman, John Gilby by name, who travelled frequently that way. It was a good while before the loungers at the station remarked that upon a certain day in the week he always arrived by the local train and waited for the evening train to take him on to Montreal. It was, in fact, Gilby himself who pointed out to them the regularity of his visits, for he was of a social disposition, and could not spend more than a few afternoons at that dull isolated station without making friends with some one. He travelled for a firm in Montreal; it was his business to make a circuit of certain towns and villages in a certain time. He had no business at St. Armand, but fate and the ill-adjusted time-table decreed that he should wait there.

This little red-haired gentleman--for gentleman, in comparison with the St. Armand folk he certainly was--was a thorough worldling in the sense of knowing the world somewhat widely, and corresponding to its ways, although not to its evil deeds. Indeed, he was a very good sort of man, but such a worldling, with his thick gold chain, and jaunty clothes, and quick way of adjusting himself to pa.s.sing circ.u.mstances, that it was some time before his good-natured sociableness won in the least upon the station loungers. They held aloof, as from an explosive, not knowing when it would begin to emit sparks. He was short in stature, much shorter than the hulking fellows who stood and surveyed him through the smoke of their pipes, but he had such a c.o.c.ky little way with him that he overawed them much more than a big man would have done. Out of sheer dulness he took to talking to Zilda.

Zilda stood with her back against the wall.

'Fine day,' said Gilby, stopping beside her.

'Oui, monsieur.'

Gilby had taken his cigar from his mouth, and held it between two fingers of his right hand. Her countrymen commonly held their pipes between their thumb and finger. To Zilda, Gilby's method appeared astonishingly elegant, but she hardly seemed to observe it.

'You have a flat country here,' said he, looking round at the dry summer fields; 'rather dull, isn't it?'

'Oui, monsieur.'

'Don't you speak English?'

'Yes, sir,' said Zilda.

This was not very interesting for Gilby. He had about him a good deal of the modern restlessness that cannot endure one hour without work or amus.e.m.e.nt. He made further efforts to make up to the men; he asked them questions with patronising kindness, he gave them sc.r.a.ps of information upon all subjects of temporary interest, with a funny little air of pompous importance. When by mere force of habit they grew more familiar with him, he would strut up and engage them in long conversations, listen to all they said with consummate good nature, giving his opinion in return. He was wholly unconscious that he looked like a bantam crowing to a group of larger and more sleepy fowls, but the Frenchmen perceived the likeness.

As the months wore on he did them good. They needed waking up, those men who lounged at the station, and he had some influence in that direction; not much, of course, but every traveller has some influence, and his was of a lively, and, on the whole, of a beneficial sort. The men brought forth a mood to greet him which was more in correspondence with his own.

When winter came the weather was very bleak; deep snow was all around.

Gilby disliked the closeness of the hotel, which was sealed to the outer air.

'Whew!' he would say, 'you fellows, let us do something to keep ourselves warm.' And after much exercise of his will, which was strong, he actually had the younger men all jumping with him from a wood pile near the platform to see who could jump farthest. He was not very young himself; he was about thirty, and rather bald; the men who were with him were much younger, but he thought nothing of that. He led them on, and incited them to feats much greater than his own, with boisterous challenges and loud bravos. Before he jumped himself he always made mock hesitation for their amus.e.m.e.nt, swinging his arms, and apparently bracing himself for the leap. Perhaps the deep frost of the country made him frisky because he was not accustomed to it; perhaps it was always his nature to be noisy and absurd when he tried to be amusing. Certain it was that it never once occurred to him that under the French politeness with which he was treated, under the sincere liking which they really grew to have for him, there was much quiet amus.e.m.e.nt at his expense. It was just as well that he did not know, for he would have been terribly affronted; as it was, he remained on the best of terms with them to the end.

The feeling of amus.e.m.e.nt found vent in his absence in laughter and mimicry. Zilda joined in this mimicry; she watched the Frenchmen strut along the platform in imitation of Gilby, and smiled when their imitation was good. When it was poor she cried, 'Non, ce n'est pas comme ca,' and she came out from the doorway and showed them how to do it. Her imitation was very good indeed, and excited much laughter. This showed that Zilda had been waked into greater vivacity. Six months before she could not have done so good a piece of acting.

Zilda's exhibition would go further than this. Excited by success, she would climb the wood pile, large and heavy as she was, and, standing upon its edge, would flap her arms and flutter back in a frightened manner and brace herself to the leap, as Gilby had done. She was aided in this representation by her familiarity with the habits of chickens when they try to get down from a high roost. The resemblance struck her; she would cry aloud to the men--

'Voici Monsieur Geelby, le poulet qui a peur de descendre!'

The fact that at the thought of mimicking Gilby Zilda was roused to an unwarranted glow of excitement showed, had any one been wise enough to see it, that she felt some inward cause of pleasurable excitement at the mention of his name. A narrow nature cannot see absurdity in what it loves, but Zilda's nature was not narrow. She had learnt to love little Gilby in a fond, deep, silent way that was her fashion of loving.

He had explained to her the principles of ventilation and why he disliked close waiting-rooms. Zilda could not make her father learn the lesson, but it bore fruit afterwards when she came into power. Gilby had explained other things to her, small practical things, such as some points in English grammar, some principles of taste in woman's dress, how to choose the wools for her knitting, how to make m.u.f.fins for his tea. It was his kindly, conceited, didactic nature that made him instruct whenever he talked to her. Zilda learned it all, and learned also to admire and love the author of such wisdom.

It was not his fault; it was not hers. It was the result of his gorgeous watch-chain and his fine clothes and his worldly knowledge, and also of the fact that because of his strict notions and conceited pride it never occurred to him to be gallant or to make love to her. Zilda, the hotel-keeper's daughter, was accustomed to men who offered her light gallantry. It was because she did not like such men that she learned to love--rather the better word might be, to adore--little John Gilby. From higher levels of taste he would have been seen to be, in external notions, a common little man, but from Zilda's standpoint, even in matters of outward taste he was an ideal; and Zilda, placed as she was, quickly perceived, what those who looked down upon him might not have discovered, that the heart of him was very good. 'Mon Dieu, but he is good!' she would say to herself, which was simply the fact.

All winter long Gilby came regularly. Zilda was happy in thinking of him when he was gone, happy in expecting him when he was coming, happy in making fun of him so that no one ever suspected her affection. All that long winter, when the snow was deep in the fields, and the engines carried snow-ploughs, and the loungers about the station wore buffalo coats, Zilda was very happy. Gilby wore a dogskin cap and collar and cuffs; Zilda thought them very becoming. Then spring came, and Gilby wore an Inverness cape, which was the fashion in those days. Zilda thought that little Gilby looked very fascinating therein, although she remarked to her father that one could only know he was there because the cape strutted. Then summer came and Gilby wore light tweed clothes. The Frenchmen always wore their best black suits when they travelled. Zilda liked the light clothes best.

Then there came a time when Gilby did not come. No one noticed his absence at first but Zilda. Two weeks pa.s.sed and then they all spoke of it. Then some one in St. Armand ascertained that Gilby had had a rise in the firm in which he was employed, that he sat in an office all day and did not travel any more. Zilda heard the story told, and commented upon, and again talked over, in the way in which such matters of interest are slowly digested by the country intellect.

Alas! then Zilda knew how far she had travelled along a flowery path which, as it now seemed to her, led to nowhere. It was not that she had wanted to marry Gilby; she had not thought of that as possible; it was only that her whole nature summed itself up in an ardent desire that things should be as they had been, that he should come there once a week, and talk politics with her father and other men, and set the boys jumping, and eat the m.u.f.fins he had taught her to make for his tea. And if this might not be, she desired above all else to see him again, to have one more look at him, one more smile from him of which she could take in the whole value, knowing it to be the last. How carelessly she had allowed him to go, supposing that he would return! It was not her wish to express her affection or sorrow in any way; it was not her nature to put her emotions into words; but ah, holy saints! just to see him again, and at least take leave of him with her eyes!

It was very sad that he should simply cease to come, yet that she knew was just what was natural; a man does not bid adieux to a railway station, and Zilda knew that she was, as it were, only part of the station furniture. She resented nothing; she had nothing to resent.

So the winter came again, and Christmas, and again the days grew longer over the snowfields. Zilda always looked for the sunsets now, for she had been taught that they were beautiful. She cultivated geraniums and petunias in pots at her windows, just as she had done for many winters, but she would stop oftener to admire the flowers now.

The men had taken again to congregating in the hot close bar-room, or huddling together in their buffalo coats, smoking in the outer air.

Zilda looked at the wood pile, from which no one jumped now, with weary eyes. It had grown intolerable to her that now no one ever mentioned Gilby; she longed intensely to hear his name or to speak it. She dared not mention him gravely, soberly, because she was conscious of her secret which no one suspected. But it was open to her to revive the mimicry. 'Voici Monsieur Geelby,' she would cry, and pa.s.s along the station platform with consequential gait. A great laugh would break from the station loungers. 'Encore,' they cried, and Zilda gave the encore.

There was only one other relief she found from the horrible silence which had settled down upon her life concerning the object of her affection. At times when she lay awake in the quiet night, or at such times as she found herself within the big stone church of St. Armand, she prayed that the good St. Anne would intercede for her, that she might see 'Monsieur Geelby' once more.

This big church of St. Armand has a great pointed roof of shining tin.

It is a bright and conspicuous object always in that landscape; under summer and winter sun it glistens like some huge lighthouse reflector.

Ever since, whenever Zilda goes out on the station platform, for a breath of air, for a moment's rest and refreshing, or, on business intent, to chide the loungers there, the roof of this church, at a half-mile's distance, twinkles brightly before her eyes, set in green fields or in a snow-buried world; and every time it catches her eye it brings to her mind more or less distinctly that she has in her own way tested religion and found it true, because the particular boon which she had demanded at this time was granted.

It was a happy morn of May; the snow had just receded from the land, leaving it very wet, and Spring was pushing on all the business she had to do with almost visible speed. The early train came in from Montreal as usual, and who should step out of it but Gilby himself! He was a little stouter, a little more bald, but he skipped down upon the platform, radiant as to smile and the breadth of his gold watch-chain, and attired in a check coat which Zilda thought was the most perfect thing in costume which she had ever beheld.

In a flash of thought it came to Zilda that there would be more than a momentary happiness for her. 'Ah, Monsieur Geelby, do you know that the river has cut into the line three miles away, and that this train can go no farther till it is mended.'

Gilby was distinctly annoyed; he had indeed left town by the earlier of the two morning trains in order to stop an hour and take breakfast at St. Armand; he had been glad of the chance of doing that, of seeing Chaplot and his daughter and the others; but to be stopped at St. Armand a whole day--he made exhibition of his anger, which Zilda took very meekly. Why had the affair not been telegraphed? Why were busy men like himself brought out of the city when they could not get on to do their work?

There were other voices besides Gilby's to rail; there were other voices besides Zilda's to explain the disaster. In the midst of the babel Zilda slipped away to make m.u.f.fins hastily for Gilby's breakfast. Her heart was singing within her, but it was a tremulous song, half dazed with delight, half frightened, fearing that with his great cleverness he would see some way to proceed on his journey although she saw none.

When she came out of the kitchen with the m.u.f.fins in her hand her sunshine suddenly clouded. Gilby, unconscious that a special breakfast was preparing for him, had hastily swallowed coffee and walked on to the site of the breakdown to see for himself how long the mending would take.

It was as if one, looking through long hours for the ending of night, had seen the sunrise, only to see the light go out suddenly again in darkness. Zilda felt that her heart was broken. Her disappointment grew upon her for an hour, then she could no longer keep back the tears; because she had no place in which to weep, she began to walk away from the hotel down the line. There was no one to notice her going; she was as free to go and come as the wild canaries that hopped upon the budding bramble vines growing upon the railway embankment, or the blue-breasted swallows that sat on the telegraph wire.

At first she only walked to hide her tears; then gradually the purpose formed within her to go on to the break in the road. There was no reason why she should not go to see the mishap. Truly there had been many a breakdown on this road before and Zilda had never stirred foot to examine them, but now she walked on steadily. Her fear told her that Gilby might find some means of getting on to the next station, some engine laden with supplies for the workmen from the other station might take him back with it. If so, what good would this her journey do? Ah, but perhaps the good G.o.d would allow her to see him first, or--well, she walked on, reason or no reason.

The sun was high, the blue of the sky seemed a hundred miles in depth, and not wisp or feather of cloud in it anywhere! Where the flat fields were untilled they were very green, a green that was almost yellow, it was so bright. Within the strip of railway land a tangle of young bushes grew, and on every twig buds were bursting. About a mile back from the road, on either side, fir woods stood, the trees in close level phalanx.