CHAPTER IV—THE TRUTH ABOUT HER

Thar, lad, lie still. Yow’ll be ’ome direc’ly.”

The gray-bearded man at the tiller smiled to me in a friendly manner. He didn’t seem at all excited, but took all that had happened stoically, as part of the day’s work. Seeing me gaze round questioningly, he added, “The lassie’s well enough, Mr. Cardover. She’ll come round. A mouthful o’ salt water won’t ’urt ’er.”

I wondered vaguely how he knew my name. Then, as my brain cleared, I remembered him as one of the fishermen who called in at my grandmother’s shop for an occasional chat, seated on a barrel.

I raised myself on my elbow. We were rounding the pier-head, running into the harbor. I was in a little shrimping-boat. The nets hung out over the stern. The old man at the tiller was in oilskins and a younger man was shortening sail.

I felt sick, and giddy, and stiff. A tarpaulin was thrown over me. I tried to recollect how I came there. Then I saw Vi lying near me in the bows. A sailor’s coat was wrapped about her. Her hair lay piled in a golden heap over her white throat and breast. Her eyes were closed. The blueness of the veins about her temples enhanced her pallor. I made an effort to crawl towards her; but the motion of the boat and my own weakness sent me sprawling.

People from the pier-head had seen us. As we stole up the harbor, questions were shouted to the man at the tiller and answers shouted back. When we drew in at the quayside an excited crowd had gathered. To every newcomer the account was given of how Joe Tuttle, as ’e war a-beat-ing up to the ’arbor, comed across them two a-driftin’ off the nor’ beach, ’alf a mile or so from land.

Coats were torn off and folded round us. Someone was sent ahead to warn neighbor Cardover of what she must expect. Vi was tenderly lifted out and carried down the road in the arms of Joe Tuttle. I was hoisted like a sack across the shoulders of our younger rescuer. Accompanying us was a shouting, jabbering, eager crowd, anxious to tell everyone we passed what had happened. My most distinct recollection is the shame I felt of the bareness of my dangling legs.

The tramp of heavy feet invaded the shop. I heard the capable voice of Grandmother Cardover getting rid of sightseers. “Now then, my good people, there’s nothing ’ere for you. Out you go; you’re not wanted in my shop. Thank goodness, we can worry along without your ’elp.” Then I heard her in a lower voice giving directions for us to be carried upstairs.

Hot blankets, brought from the bake-house oven, were soon about me and I was tucked safe in bed. I have a faint recollection of the doctor coming and of hot spirits being forced down my throat. Then they left me alone and I fell into the deep sleep of utter weariness.

When I awoke, the room was in darkness and a fire was burning. I felt lazy and comfortable. I turned on my side and found that I was alone. I began to think back. The thought that filled my mind seemed a continuation of what I had been dreaming. I was in the trough of a wave, the sea was washing over me, Vi’s arm was heavy about my neck, and her lips were kissing my shoulder. I looked round; her eyes shone into mine, and her hair swayed loose about her like the hair of a mermaiden. I listened. There were footsteps on the stair. The door opened and my grandmother tiptoed to the bed.

I raised myself up. The torpor cleared from my brain. Before the question could frame itself, my grandmother had answered it. “She’s all right, Dante; she’s in the spare bedroom and sleeping soundly.”

She seated herself beside me and slipped her wrinkled old hand into mine beneath the bed-clothes. She sat in silence for some minutes. The light from the street-lamp shining in at the window, fell upon her. I could see her gray curls wabbling, the way they always did when she was agitated. At last she spoke. “How did it ’appen, Dante?”

I told her.

“Then you knowed ’er before?”

Little by little I gave her all the story.

“A nice young rascal you are,” she said; “and a pretty way you’ve got o’ love-making. You beat your own father, that you do. And what’s her name?”

“I don’t know.”

“He doesn’t know!” She laughed till the tears ran down her face. “And I suppose you think you’re goin’ to marry ’er?”

“I know I am.”

“Well, the sooner the better I say. Judging by her looks, you might ’ave chose worse. When it comes to wimmen, the Evrards and the Cardovers are mad.”

She went downstairs to get me some supper. I had given her Vi’s address, that she might send off a message to Vi’s landlady. Poor little Dorrie must be beside herself by now, wondering what had happened.

While I ate my supper, my grandmother kept referring to what I had told her. She was very proud and happy. Her eyes twinkled behind her spectacles. I had added an entirely original chapter to the history of our family’s romance. “I keep wishin’,” she said, “that your dear ma ‘ad been alive. It would just ‘a’ suited her.”

The morning broke bright and sunny. I insisted on getting up to breakfast. I was a trifle stiff, but apart from that none the worse for my experience. It was odd to think that Vi was sleeping in the same house—Vi, who had passed me in the streets without seeing me, Vi from whom I had hidden myself, Vi who at this time yesterday morning had seemed so utterly unattainable. The sense of her nearness filled me with wild enthusiasm. I hummed and whistled while I dressed. I wondered how long she would make me wait before we were married. She was mine already. Why should we wait? I was impatient to go to her, I could feel the close embrace of her long white arm about my neck. I was quite incurious as to who she was or where she came from. Life for me began when I met her.

As I passed her door I halted, listening. I could hear my grandmother talking inside, but in such a low voice that I could catch nothing of what was said. She was bustling about, beating up the pillows and, as I judged, making Vi tidy. Hearing her coming towards the door, I hurried down the stairs. The stairs entered into the keeping-room. When she came down, she carried an empty breakfast-tray in her hand. I noticed that she had on her Sunday best: a black satin dress, a white lace apron trimmed with black ribbon, and her finest lace cap spangled with jet.

“She’s been askin’ for you.”

I jumped up from my chair.

“But she won’t see you until you’ve breakfasted.”

While I hastened through the meal, my grandmother chattered gaily. She quite approved my choice of a wife and had drawn from Vi one fact, of which I was unaware—that she was an American. She was burning with curiosity to learn more about her and was full of the most rosy conjectures. She was quite sure that Vi was an heiress—all American women who traveled alone were.

She went up to see that all was ready; then she came to the top of the stairs and beckoned.

“I’m goin’ to leave you alone,” she whispered, taking my face between her hands. “God bless you, my boy.” Then she vanished all a-blush and a-tremble into the keeping-room.

The blood was surging in my brain. I felt weak from too much happiness. Opening the door slowly, I entered.

I scarcely dared look up at first. The room swam before me. The old-fashioned green and red flowers in the carpet ran together. I raised my eyes to the large four-poster mahogany bed—it seemed too large to hold such a little person. I could see the outline of her figure, but the heavy crimson curtains, hanging from the tester, hid her face from me.

“Vi, darling!”

She sat up, with her hands pressed against her throat. The sunlight, shining in at the window, poured down upon her, burnishing her two long plaited ropes of hair. She turned towards me; her eyes were misty, her bosom swelling. She seemed to be calling me to her, and yet pushing me back. I felt my knees breaking under me, and the sob beginning in my throat. I ran towards her and knelt down at the bedside, placing my arms about her and drawing her to me. For an instant she resisted, then her body relaxed. I looked, up at her, pouring out broken sentences. I felt that the tears were coming through excess of gladness and bowed my head.

She was bending over me, so near she stooped that her breath was in my hair. The sweet warmth of her was all about me. Her lips touched my forehead. I held her more closely, but I would not meet her eyes. I dared not till my question was answered. The silence between us stretched into an eternity. Her hands wandered over me caressingly; it seemed a child comforting a man. “Poor boy,” she whispered over and over, “God knows, neither of us meant it.”

When I lifted my face to hers, the tenderness in her expression was wiped out by a look of wild despair. She tore my hands from about her body and tumbled her head back into the pillows with her face turned from me, shaken by a storm of sobbing. Muttered exclamations rose to her lips—things and names were mentioned which I only half heard, the purport of which I could not understand. I tried to gather her to me, but she broke away from me. “Oh, you mustn’t,” she sobbed, “you mustn’t touch me.”

With her loss of self-control my strength returned. I sat beside her on the bed, stroking her hand and trying to console her—trying to tell myself that this was quite natural and that everything was well.

Gradually she exhausted herself and lay still. “You’ ought to go,” she whispered; but when I rose to steal away, her hand clutched mine and drew me back. In a slow, weary voice she began to speak to me. “I can’t do what you ask me; I’m already married. I thought you would have guessed from Dorrie.”

She paused to see what I would say or do. When I said nothing, but clasped her hand more firmly, she turned her face towards me, gazing up at me from the pillow. “I thought you would have left me after that,” she said. “It’s all my fault; I saw how things were going.”

“Dearest, you did your best.”

“Yes, I did my best and hurt you. When I told you that I was done yesterday, why didn’t you let me go? It would all have been so much easier.”

“Because I wanted you,” I said, “and still want you.” The silence was so deep that I could hear the rustle of the sheets at each intake of her breath.

“You can’t have me.”

Her voice was so small that it only just came to me. “I belong to Dorrie’s father. He’s a good man and he trusts me, though he knows I don’t love him.”

She sat up, letting go my hand. I propped the pillows under her. She signed to me to seat myself further away from her.

“She is mine. She is mine,” I kept thinking to myself. “We belong to one another whatever she says.”

“I shall be better soon,” she said; “then I can go away. You must try to forget that you ever knew me.”

“I can never forget. I shall wait for you.” Then the old treacherous argument came to me, though it was sincerely spoken. “Why need we go out of one another’s lives? Vi dearest, can’t we be friends?”

She hesitated. “I was thinking of you when I said it. For me it would be easier; I have Dorrie to live for. It would be more difficult for you—you are a man.”

“Can’t you trust me, Vi? You told me that he trusted you just now.”

Her voice was thin and tired. “Could we ever be only friends?”

“We must try—we can pretend.”

“But such trials all have one ending.”

“Ours won’t.”

Her will was broken and her desire urged it. She held out her hand. “Then let’s be friends.”

I took it in mine and kissed it. Even then, I believe, we doubted our strength.