Nobody's Child Part 13

He came to her, for Ann stood rooted; no volition of hers could have brought her an inch nearer to that look of her grandfather, covered by that painful smile. "So you came to meet me?" He put his hands on her shoulders. "It's fourteen years since I saw you--you have grown up--child."

There was all the sorrow of the forsaken in the dazed shrinking look Ann gave him. "Yes, I've grown up," she said in tones as colorless as her face. "But I know you--you look like grandpa."

He bent and kissed her cheek, then took his hands from her shoulders, and he said what Sue had said: "And you are a Penniman, too, Ann--we're all Pennimans--we'll never outgrow that.... How are you, child?"

"I am well, suh."

"And Cousin Sue and Uncle Will?"

"They are well--they are expectin' you."

Coats Penniman took up his bag and they turned into the woods. Ann's eyes were fixed straight before her. Things looked curiously white and unreal, as they do after a shock. Her father looked at her as they went on, at her proud brow and eyes, then at her softly-rounded chin and warm mouth, reminders of her mother, and, again, the deepening lines in his face made him look old. "I'm glad you came to meet me," he said kindly.

And Ann answered to the note of kindness, just as she had always answered to the same note in Sue's voice, by an offer of service. "Can't I carry your satchel for you, father? You've walked so far."

"No, Ann, I've not come home to be waited on.... There're going to be better times at the farm, now I have come home. Until the last year I haven't had the means to make it easier for you all. For fourteen years I've prayed to make money, and then, all at once, when I'd given up hope, it came. For your sake, and for Sue's sake, I wish it had come sooner." He spoke with a deep note of feeling.

"It has been hard for Aunt Sue," Ann said tonelessly.

She felt numb and sick; she was more conscious of a feeling of illness than of anything else. The necessity of walking steadily on when she wanted simply to hide herself somewhere, was infinitely painful. Sue had said, "If Coats seems like a stranger to you, don't you feel hard to him." He did not seem like a stranger to her, any more than her grandfather did, or even her aunt did, at times. But he did not seem like her father, any more than they did. From the height of her isolation, Ann could even look at him calmly.

His dark face had lighted, now that he was looking about him. "Uncle Will has not cut down the trees--every tree is here--just as it used to be," he said with deep satisfaction. "I was afraid he'd had to make cord-wood of them.... How well I remember it all!" he added, half eagerly, half sadly. He walked faster, until they reached the open, and then he stopped. "The house and the barn ... and the spring-house!" he said. "Not a stick or a stone changed! My, my!... And fourteen long years!... When I went, I never wanted to see it again, but it has pulled at me, just the same. It's brought me back."

He turned slowly, half circled to look about him, his eyes finally fixed on the n.o.bly solemn line of cedars. He looked at them long and steadily; he lifted his hat and took it off. "'For better or for worse' ... and so it has been--" His face was wiped of expression; his momentary excitement gone.

"He is thinking of my mother," Ann thought.

He stood a moment longer, motionless, then put on his hat, drawing the brim low over his eyes, and went on, forgetful of his surroundings, and of Ann. Perhaps it was habit that guided him, for he took the usual way, across the field and up the path between the grapevines, and Ann dropped behind; when he went into the house, she could escape.

But Sue had seen them coming. Sue who never ran, who was wont to go about wearily, ran down the kitchen stairs and her father followed, slowly, holding to the stair-rail. Sue sped across the few yards that separated them. "Coats!" she said, "oh, _Coats_!" and Coats Penniman dropped his bag and opened his arms to her.

Ann stood on the path and watched them, Sue's arms about Coats' neck, his arms holding her--and then her grandfather's welcome. The two men clasped hands, the three stood, held together in their joy, then went on slowly, her father helping her grandfather up the stairs.

Ann slipped in between the grapevines, skirted the barn enclosure, then ran like a hunted thing for the shelter of the woods; not to the hollow through which the road came, but up higher, to the group of pines that edged the woods. There was neither road nor path there; the pines were clothed and would hide her.

She stumbled as she ran, for she could not see; her sobs were blinding and strangling her. She crept beneath the sheltering branches and clung to the earth, the only mother she had ever known, beat upon the breast to which she clung, and clung the tighter.

In that hour of anguish, Ann parted with her childhood, the blessed capacity to weep one moment and laugh the next with sorrow and pain forgotten. The collie had lost his playmate, the birds a fellow-songster. Ann had not lost spirit, nor the power to endure which is a woman's heritage; but a hurt to a child is a scar carried through life, and Ann had been ineradicably branded.

XIV

THE MISFITS

The sun, well on its way to the west, reddened the bald peak above Crest Cave and shot its rays through the screen of pines on the ledge below, mottling the bed of pine-needles at the mouth of the cave. The midday sun had warmed them; they were still warm and resinous, a comfortable resting place.

Garvin Westmore lay full length on the sweet-scented bed, motionless, except when he lifted to his elbow to look out at the country below.

His, or some other hand, had cut away the branches that hid the view; one could sit at the mouth of the cave and see, as through a tunnel, the slope of grain-land, the winding creek, the pastures and the Back Road; and, beyond the semicircle of woods, the roof of the Penniman house, and beyond that, open country stretching into blue distance.

Garvin was keeping watch. He quickly singled out Ann's brown cape from the browns and duns of the woods. He sat up and watched each step of her approach. He had not been at all certain that she would come; she was a resolute little thing to brave discovery in this fashion--and both ignorant and innocent ... and vastly trustful. Nevertheless, it was the eternal attraction that was bringing her--and leading him into deep waters as well. There would be all h.e.l.l to pay--if he were not careful.

He sprang up, more to get away from his thoughts than to be able to see better. He had searched about the Banks and had made sure, and had watched the open country--there was no one about. And she was well away from the woods now, following the creek; its undergrowth would hide her from any one who might turn in from the Post-Road.

She did not leave the shelter of the creek until where it curved away from the Mine Banks. She was just below him now. Then she crossed the open s.p.a.ce quickly and was lost in the trees that edged the Westmore Road. Garvin knew that she would come up behind the Crest.

They were safe from observation now, and he circled the Crest and started down the path which was more an animal trail leading through the bushes, than a path. He heard Ann's approach before he saw her, the rustle of sear leaves, and he stopped on one of the bare red patches that the noise of his approach might not startle her. The bushes parted presently, and Ann looked out. Then she looked up and saw him, and smiled. She was lovely as she stood there, half screened, flushed and doubtful and faintly smiling.

Garvin hurried down to her. "It's all right," he said. "I've been watching.... My, but the bushes have pulled you to pieces!"

They had; her cape was off, her hair loose on her shoulders, her breath short. "It's--more grown up--than it used to be," she complained.

"And so are you.... Don't pin up your hair, Ann--it's beautiful that way: I love your hair."

She did not give him the merry glance that was her usual answer to such speeches. She gave him the cape to hold and resolutely gathered up her hair. "Now!" she said, when it was in place.

Garvin had watched her in silence. Her decision had checked him; it was unlike her usual manner. "We'll go up to the cave," he said. "You can rest there."

"I can take my cape now."

"No, I'll carry it.... You're tired, aren't you?"

"A little," she answered quietly.

She let him help her up, her hand in his, her lowered eyelids his to read. He could find nothing there, except that they were darker-tinged than usual--and her lips grave. He decided that she was frightened.

"It was a shame for me, to bring you all this way," he said, with the gentleness which he usually had at command. "I wanted so much really to talk to you, and I couldn't think of a better place."

"I wanted to come," Ann returned. "I wanted to see the Mine Banks again--"

"And to see me, too, Ann?"

"Yes." She gave him a half-questioning, half-appealing glance. "I wanted to talk to you, too." The laughter that usually danced in her eyes was not there.

Garvin was still certain that she was frightened, at her own temerity, and doubtful of him. "Well, we can talk all we want to here, dear. No one will disturb us, and you are safe with me.... See, isn't this perfect?"

They had come to the ledge. Ann looked into the umbrella-like cave with the yawning hole at the back, the burrow of some animal; then at the screen of pines. The place was shut in, warm and restful. "It's lovely,"

she said softly, "an' I'm not afraid of it now. I came up here once, when I was little, an' something moved in the hole, an' I was scared. I ran, and I never did come back--I imagined it was a lion.... That's why it was fun to come to the Banks--I could have such fearful imaginings--imaginings are fun." She was more like herself now, laughing softly and coquetting with the hole in the cave.

"It's nothing but a fox-hole, Ann. I used to let them have it in the winter and then trap them. When I got to coming here often, I didn't like the smell of them about, and I have made it too hot for them. I let the rabbits have it now--I don't mind their scuttling about while I lie here."

"You talk as if you lived here. It is a peaceful, far-away place to live." She was looking through the tunnel and had lost her smile.

Garvin had a sudden remembrance of some of the scenes the place had harbored, and he turned away from it, impatiently. "Let's sit under the pines, where we can look out," he suggested. He took her cape and spread it close to one of the trees. "How do you like that?"

Ann had not heard him. She was looking steadily at the roof of the Penniman house. She turned sharply, turned her back on it, sat so she could lean against the tree-trunk.