Carnival Part 76

"You ought to be ashamed, you foolish man," said Granfa. "You ought to be ashamed to leave the poor animal die. Darn 'ee, I believe the devil _will_ have 'ee!"

"What's a cow," said Trewh.e.l.la somberly, "beside my own scarlet sins?"

"'Tis one of the worst of 'em," said Granfa positively. "'Tis so scarlet as wool. Get up, and leave be all your praying and sweating, you foolish man. You do drive me plum mad with your foolishness. How don't 'ee do your own work fittee and leave the dear Lord mind his own business? He don't want to be told at his time of life what to do. Oh, you do drive me mad."

"Another lost lamb," groaned Trewh.e.l.la. "Another soul in the pit. Oh, I do pray wi' all my heart that my poor lill son may find favor in the Lord's eyes and become a child of grace to preach the Word and confound the Gentiles."

"Did ever a man hark to such nonsense in his life?" exclaimed Granfa.

"I shouldn't argue with him in one of his moods," advised Jenny, looking at her husband coldly and distastefully.

"Oh, dear Lord, give me strength to heal the blindness of my family and make my poor lill son a sword in the side of unbelievers."

Then presently the gloom would pa.s.s; he would go out silently to the fields, and after a day's work come back in a fever of earthly desires to his wife.

There were shadows in Bochyn, for all the sunlight and birdsong and sweetpeas blossom.

Chapter XLIII: _Bow Bells_

Summer went by very quickly in the deserted orchard, and in fine September weather young Frank's first birthday was celebrated with much goodwill by everybody. Zachary, with the successful carrying of a rich harvest, ceased to brood so much on the failure of humanity. He became his own diligent self, ama.s.sing grain and gold and zealously expurgating for reproduction in bleak chapels that winter a volume of sermons by an Anglican bishop. Young Frank began to show distinct similarities of feature to Jenny, similarities that not even the most critical observer could demolish. He showed, too, some of her individuality, had a temper and will of his own, and seemed like his mother born to inherit life's intenser emotions. Jenny was not yet inclined to sink herself in him, to transfer to the boy her own activity of sensation. Mrs. Raeburn was thirty-three when Jenny was born: young Frank arrived when his mother was ten years younger than that. It was not expected that she should feel the gates of youth were closed against her. Moreover, Jenny, with all the fullness of her experience, was strangely young on the eve of her twenty-fourth birthday, still seeming, indeed, no more than eighteen or nineteen. There was a divine youthfulness about her which was proof against the Furies, and, since the diverting absurdities of young Frank, laughter had come back. Those deep eyes danced again for one who from alt.i.tudes of baby ecstasies would gloriously respond. May was another triumph for affection. There was joy in regarding that little sister, once wan with Islington airs, now happy and healthy and almost as rose-pink as Jenny herself. How pleased her mother would have been, and, in retrospect, how skeptical must she have felt of Jenny's ability to keep that promise always to look after May.

Life was not so bad on her birthday morning, as, with one eye kept continuously on young Frank, Jenny dressed herself to defy the bl.u.s.terous jolly October weather. She thought how red the apples were in the orchard and with what a plump they fell and how she and May had laughed when one fell on young Frank, who had also laughed, deeming against the evidence of his surprise that it must be matter for merriment.

The postman came that morning, and Granfa, waving his arms, brought the letters up to the orchard--two letters, both for Jenny. He watched for a minute her excitement before he departed to a pleasant job of digging in the champagne of October sunlight.

"Hullo," cried Jenny, "here's a letter from Maudie Chapman."

26 ALVERTON STREET,

PIMLICO.

Dear old Jenny,

Suddenly remembered it was your birthday, old girl. Many Happy Returns of The Day, and hope you're in the best of pink and going on fine the same as I am. We have got a new stage manager who you would laugh to see all the girls think. We have been rehearsing for months and I'm sick of it--You're well out of the Orient I give you my word. Its a dogs' Island now and no mistake. Walter sends his love. I have got a little girl called Ivy. She is a love. Have you?

With heaps of love

from your old chum, Maudie.

Irene's gone off with that fellow Danbie and Elsie had twins. Her Artie was very annoyed about it. Madge Wilson has got a most glorious set of furs. No more from Maudie--Write us a letter old girl.

"Fancy," said Jenny. "Elsie Crauford's had twins."

This letter, read in the open air, with a sea wind traveling through the apple trees, with three hundred miles of country between the sender and the receiver, was charged with London sorcery. It must have been posted on the way to the theater. Incredible thought! Jenny visualized the red pillar-box into which it might have slipped, a pillar-box station by a crowded corner, splashed by traffic and jostled by the town. On the flap was a round spot of London rain, and pervading all the paper was a faint theater scent. The very ink was like eye-black, and Maudie must have written every word laboriously between two glittering ballets.

"I wonder if I could do a single beat now?" said Jenny. "I wish I hadn't given my new ballet shoes to Gladys West."

Then as once she danced under the tall plane tree of Hagworth Street to a sugared melody of "Cavalleria," so now she danced in an apple orchard, keeping time to the wind and the waving boughs. Young Frank quivered and kicked with joy to see the twirling of his mother's skirts. May cried, "You great tomboy!" but with robin's eyes and slanting head watched her sister.

Had she been a poet, Jenny would have sung of London, of the thunder and grayness, of the lamps and rain, of long irresistible rides on the top of swaying tramcars, of wild roars through the depth of the earth past the green lamps flashing to red. She danced instead about the sea-girt orchard-close all that once her heart had found in London. She danced the hopes of many children of Apollo, who work so long for so little.

She danced their disillusions, their dreams of immortality, their lives, their marriages, their little houses. She danced their fears of poverty and starvation, their work and effort and strife, their hurrying home in the darkness. She danced their middle age of growing families and all their renewed hopes and disappointments and contentments. She danced a little of the sorrow and all the joy of life. She danced old age and the breathing night of London and the sparrow-haunted dawn. She danced the silly little shillings which the children of Apollo earn. Fifteen pirouettes for fifteen shillings, fifteen pirouettes for long rehearsals and long performances, fifteen pirouettes for a week, fifteen pirouettes for no fame, fifteen pirouettes for fifteen shillings, and one high beat for the funeral of a marionette.

And all the time the gay October leaves danced with her in the gra.s.s.

"Well, I hope you've enjoyed yourself," said May. Jenny threw herself breathless on the outspread rug and kissed young Frank.

"I don't suppose I shall ever dance again."

"What about the other letter?" asked May.

"There, if I didn't forget all about it," cried Jenny. "But who's it from? What unnatural writing! Like music."

She broke the seal.

PUMP COURT, TEMPLE.

My dear Jenny,

I think I've been very good not to worry you long before this; but I do want to write and wish you many happy returns. Will you accept my thoughts? I got your address and history from Maudie Chapman whom I met last week. I wonder if I came down to Cornwall for a few days, if you would let me call on you. If you're annoyed by this letter, just don't answer. I shall perfectly understand.

Yours ever,

Frank Castleton.

"Fancy," said Jenny. "I never knew his name was Frank. How funny!"

"Who is this Frank?" May inquired.

"A friend of mine I knew once--getting on for nearly four years ago now.

Where could anyone stay here?"

"There's an hotel in Trewinnard," said May.

Jenny looked at young Frank.

"I don't see why I shouldn't," she said.

"Shouldn't what?"

"Have a friend come and see me," Jenny answered.