CHAPTER IX—THE SNOW LADY

My father never asked me why I had run away or where I had gone. His tongue was ever stubborn at loving with words. With Hetty it was different. When my father had wakened and let me out of his arms to go upstairs and dress, she caught me into her bosom and half-smothered me, scolding and comforting by turns. Her corsets hurt me and her starched print-dress was harsh; I was glad when she left off and set me down on the bed.

“And who ever ’eard the likes o’ that,” she said: “a little boy to run away from his dear Pa and take with ’im a little sweet-’eart as we never knew ’e ’ad. Oh, the deceit of children for all they looks so h’innercent! And ’ere was your dear Pa a-tearin’ all the ’air out of ’is ’ead. And ’ere was me and John—we couldn’t do no work and we couldn’t do nothin’ for thinkin’ where you’d went. And there was you a-livin’ with those dirty gipsies and wearin’ their dirty rags———-”

“They’re not dirty,” I interrupted, “and I shan’t like you if you talk like that.”

“Well, I’m only tellin’ you the truth; you was always perwerse and ’eadstrong.”

“You didn’t tell me the truth when you told me about marriage,” I said. “Everything’s just the same as when we left. We ar’n’t any taller, and we hav’n’t got a little house, and——”

She sat back on her heels and stared at me. “Oh, Lor,” she burst out, “was that why you did it?” And then she began to laugh and laugh. Her face grew red and again she fell upon me, until her corsets cut into me to such an extent that I called to her to leave off.

“What I told you was gorspel true,” she said solemnly, “but you didn’t understand. That’s wot ’appens to wimmen when they goes away with men. I wasn’t speakin’ of little boys and girls. But it’ll never ’appen to you when you grow up if you tell anybody wot I said.”

That morning after breakfast, instead of going into his study to work, my father led me round to the Favarts’. As we came up the path I saw Ruthita at the window watching for us. Monsieur Favart opened the door to our knock. He said something to my father in French, shook me by the hand gravely, and led the way upstairs. We entered a room at the back of the house, overlooking the garden. A lady, almost as small as Ruthita, was lying on a couch with cushions piled behind her head. She was dressed completely in white; she had dark eyes and white hair, and a face that somehow surprised you because it was so young and little. From the first I called her the Snow Lady to myself.

She held out her hand to me and then, instead, put her arm about my waist, smiling up at me. “So you are Dante, the little boy who wanted to marry my little girl?”

Her voice was more soft and emotional than any voice I had ever heard. It held me, and kept me from noticing anything but her. It seemed as though all the eagerness of living, which other people spend in motion, was stored up in that long white throat of hers and delicate scarlet mouth.

“You can’t marry Ruth yet, you know,” she said; “you hav’n’t any money. But if you like, you may go and kiss her.”

She turned me about and there was Ruthita standing behind me. I did what I was told, shyly and perfunctorily. There was no sense of pleasure in doing what you were ordered to do just to amuse grown people. The Snow Lady laughed gaily. “There, take him out into the garden, Ruthita, and teach him to do it properly.”

As I left the room, I saw that my father had taken my place by the couch. Monsieur Favart was looking out of the window, his hands folded on the head of his cane and his chin resting on them.

We played in the garden together, but much of the charm had gone out of our playing now that it was allowed. The game we played was gipsies in the forest. We gathered leaves and made a fire, pretending we were again in camp. I was G’liath; Ruthita was sometimes the gaudy woman and sometimes Lilith telling fortunes. But the pretense was tame after the reality.

“Ruthie,” I said, “we ar’n’t married. What Hettie told me was all swank. It’s only true of men and women, and not of boys and girls.”

“But we can grow older.”

“Yes. But it’ll take ages.”

She folded her hands in her pinafore nervously.

“We can go on loving till then,” she said.

On the way home my father told me that he liked Ruthita—liked her so much that he had arranged with Madam Favart to have a door cut in the wall between the two gardens so that we could go in and out. I didn’t tell him that I preferred climbing over; he could scarcely guess it for himself. There was no excitement in being pushed into the open and told to go and play with Ruthita. It was all too easy. The fun had been in no one knowing that I did play with such a little girl—not even knowing that there was a Ruthita in the world. We tried to overcome this by always pretending that we were doing wrong when we were together. We would hide when we heard anybody coming. I despised the door and only went through it when a grown person was present, otherwise I entered by way of the apple-tree and the wall. My father caught me at it, and couldn’t understand why I did it. Hetty said it was because I liked being grubby.

Through the gray autumn months I wandered the garden, listening to the dead leaves whispering together. “They’ll take you from me, but your heart will never be theirs,” Lilith had said, and I tried to fancy that the rustling of leaves was Lilith’s voice calling. It was curious how she had plucked out my affections and made them hers.

Often I would steal into the tool-house and tell the white hen all about it. But she also was a source of disillusionment. After long waiting I found one egg in her nest. I thought she must be as glad about it as I was, so left it there a little while for her to look at. I thought the sight of it would spur her on to more ambitious endeavors. But when I came back her beak was yellowy and the egg had vanished. After this unnatural act of cannibalism I told her no more secrets; she had proved herself unworthy. Shortly afterwards she died—perhaps of remorse. I made my peace with her by placing her in a cardboard shoe-box for a coffin and giving her a most handsome funeral.

One evening, when I had been put to bed, I stole to the window to gaze into the blackness. I saw a man with a lantern go across our lawn and disappear by the apple-tree through the door in the wall. After that I watched. Nearly every night it happened. I was always too sleepy to stay awake to see at what hour he came back. But I knew that he did come back, for with the first fall of snow I traced his returning footsteps. They came from Monsieur Favart’s door and entered in at our study-window. So I guessed that the man was my father.

Madam Favart seemed to be growing stronger; she was able to get up and walk about. Sometimes I would go into her house for tea, and she would sit by the firelight and tell Ruthita and myself stories. She used to try and get me to climb on her knee while she told them. I always refused, because my mother used to do that. The Snow Lady used to laugh at me and say, “Ruthita, Dante won’t make love to Mother. Isn’t he silly?” Then I would grow sulky and sit as far off as I could.

When Christmas came round, the Favarts were invited over to spend it with us. The Snow Lady brought a bunch of misletoe with her and hung it about our house. After dinner the General fell asleep in his chair, and we children played hide and seek together. I wanted to hide so securely that Ruthita would never catch me. It was getting dark, and I knew that she wouldn’t hunt for me in my father’s study. I was a little awed myself at going there. I pushed open the door. The room was unlighted. I entered, and then halted at the sound of voices whispering. Standing in the window, silhouetted against the snow, were my father and Madam Favart. He was holding a sprig of misletoe over her; his arm was about her, and they were leaning breast to breast. She saw me first and started back from him, just as Hetty had done when I found her with John. Then my father, turning sharply, saw me. He called to me sternly, “Dante, what are you doing, sir?” He sounded almost afraid because I had been watching. Then he called again more softly, “Dante, my boy, come here.”

But a strange rebellious horror possessed me. It seemed as though something were tearing out my heart. I was angry, fiercely angry because he had been disloyal to my mother. At that moment I hated him, but hated Madam Favart much worse. I knew now why she had told me stories, and why she had wanted me to climb on her knee, and why she had tried to force me to make love to her. I rushed from the room and down the passage. Ruthita ran out laughing to catch me, but I pushed her aside roughly and unjustly. I wanted to get away by myself and fled out into the snow-covered garden. My father came to the door and called. But Madam Favart was with him; I could see by the gaslight, which fell behind them, the way she pressed towards him. I could hear her merry contralto laugh, and refused to answer.

“He’ll come by himself,” she said.

When the door closed and they left me, I felt miserably lonely. They had been wicked and they were not sorry. Hetty said that God was twice as angry with you for not being sorry as He was with you for doing wrong. Hetty knew everything about God; she used to hold long conversations with Him every night in her gray flannel nightdress. Soon the snow began to melt into my shoes and the frost to nip’ my fingers. I wished they would come out again and call me.

I became pathetic over the fact that it was Christmas. I pictured to myself a possible death as a result of exposure. I saw myself dying in a beautiful calm, forgiving everybody, and with everybody kneeling by my bedside shaken with sobbing; the sobs of Madam Favart and my father were to be the loudest. I was to be stretching out long white hands, trying to quiet them; but their sense of guilt was to have placed them beyond all bounds of consolation. Every time I tried to comfort them they were to cry twice as hard. Then I saw my funeral and the big lily wreaths: “From his broken-hearted father”; “From Madam Favart with sincere regrets”; “From Hetty who told God untruths about him”; “From Ruthita who loved him.” And in the midst of these tokens of grief I lay fully conscious of everything, arrayed in a gray flannel nightshirt, opening one eye when no one was looking, and winking at Uncle Obad.

I began to feel little pangs of hunger, and my pride gave way before them. Reluctantly I stole nearer the house and peeked into the study. They were all there seated round the fire, callously enjoying themselves. The secret was plainly out—my father was holding Madam Favart’s hand. Ruthita was cuddled against my father’s shoulder; she was evidently reconciled rather more than stoically. I tapped on the pane. The old General saw me. He signed to the others to remain still. He threw up the window and lifted me into the warmth. I believe he understood. Perhaps he felt just as I was feeling. At any rate, when it was decreed that I should go to bed at once and drink hot gruel, he slipped a crown-piece into my hand and looked as though he hadn’t done it.

Within a month the marriage was celebrated, my father being a methodical man who hated delays and loved shortcuts. It was a vicarious affair; Ruthita and I had taken the honeymoon, and our parents were married. If Uncle Obad hadn’t given me the white hen, and the hen hadn’t flown over the wall, and I hadn’t followed, these things would never have happened.

I grew to admire the Snow Lady immensely. She always called me her little lover. She never ordered me to do anything or played the mother, but flirted with me and trusted to my chivalry to recognize her wants. We played a game of pretending. It had only one disadvantage, that it shut Ruthita out from our game, for one couldn’t court two ladies at once. I learnt to kiss Ruthita as a habit and to take her, as boys will their sisters, for granted. It is only on looking back that I realize how beautiful and gentle she really was, and what life would have been without her.

General Favart lived in the other house through the door in the wall. He came to visit us rarely. He leant more heavily on his cane, and his cloak seemed to have become blacker, his hair whiter, and his scar more prominent. He could scarcely speak a word of English, so I never knew what he thought. But it seemed to me he was sorrowing. One day we children were told that he was dead; after that the door between the two gardens was taken down and the hole in the wall bricked up.