Soldiers Pay Part 11

"Yes, indeed. He is Cecily's father."

"Then you must come up by all means." She put her hand on his elbow.

"No, no, ma'am. Don't you think it would be better Dot to disturb him now, Doctor?" he appealed to the rector.

"Well, perhaps so. You and Mrs. Saunders are coming this afternoon, then?"

But she was obdurate. "Hush, Doctor. Surely Donald can see Miss Saunder's father at any time." She firmly compelled him through the door, and he and the divine followed her up the stairs. To her knock, Gilligan's voice replied and she opened the door.

"Here is Cecily's father to see Donald, Joe," she said, standing aside. The door opened and flooded the narrow pa.s.sage with light, closing, it reft the pa.s.sage of light again, and moving through a walled twilight, she descended the stairs again slowly. The lawn mower was long since stilled and beneath a tree she could see the rec.u.mbent form and one propped knee of its languid conductor lapped in slumber. Along the street pa.s.sed slowly the hourly quota of negro children who, seeming to have no arbitrary hours, seemingly free of all compulsions of time or higher learning, went to and from school at any hour of a possible lighted eight, carrying lunch pails of ex-mola.s.ses and lard tins. Some of them also carried books. The lunch was usually eaten on the way to school, which was conducted by a fattish negro in a lawn tie and an alpaca coat who could take a given line from any book from the telephone directory down and soon have the entire present personnel chanting it after him, like Vachel Lindsay. Then they were off for the day.

The clouds had piled higher and thicker, taking a lavender tinge, making bits of sky laked among them more blue. The air was becoming sultry, oppressive; and the church spire had lost perspective until now it seemed but two dimensions of metal and cardboard.

The leaves hung lifeless and sad, as if life were being re-called from them before it was fully given, leaving only the ghosts of young leaves. As she lingered near the door, she could hear Emmy clas.h.i.+ng dishes in the dining room and at last she heard that for which she waited.

"-expect you and Mrs. Saunders this afternoon, then," the rector was saying as they appeared.

"Yes, yes," the caller answered with detachment. His eyes met Mrs. Powers's. How like her he is! she thought, and her heart sank. Have I blundered again? She examined his face fleetingly and sighed with relief.

"How do you think he looks, Mr. Saunders?" she asked.

"Fine, considering his long trip, fine."

The rector said happily: "I had noticed it myself this morning. Didn't you also, Mrs. Powers?" His eyes implored her and she said yes. "You should have seen him yesterday, to discern the amazing improvement in him. Eh, Mrs. Powers?"

"Yes, indeed, sir. We all commented on it this morning."

Mr. Saunders, carrying his limp panama hat, moved toward the steps. "Well. Doctor, it's fine having the boy home again. We are all glad for our own sakes as well as yours. If there is anything we can do--" he added with neighbourly sincerity.

"Thank you, thank you. I will not hesitate. But Donald is in a position to help himself now, provided be gets his medicine often enough. We depend on you for this, you know," the rector answered with jovial innuendo.

Mr. Saunders added a complement of expected laughter. "As soon as she is herself again we, her mother and I, expect it to be the other way; we expect to be asking you to lend us Cecily occasionally."

"Well, that might be arranged, I imagine-especially with a friend." The rector laughed in turn and Mrs. Powers, listening, exulted. Then she knew a brief misgiving. They are so much alike! Will they change his mind for him, those women? She said: "I think I'll walk as far as the gate with Mr. Saunders, if he doesn't mind."

"Not at all, ma'am. I'll be delighted."

The rector stood in the door and beamed upon them as they descended the steps. "Sorry you cannot remain to dinner," he said.

"Some other time, Doctor. My missus is waiting for me today."

"Yes, some other time," the rector agreed. He entered the house again, and they crossed gra.s.s beneath the imminent heavens. Mr. Saunders looked at her sharply. "I don't like this," he stated. "Why doesn't someone tell him the truth about that boy?"

"Neither do I," she answered. "But if they did, would he believe it? Did anyone have to tell you about him!"

"My G.o.d, no! Anybody could look at him. It made me sick. But, then, I'm chicken-livered, anyway," he added with mirthless apology. "What did the doctor say about him?"

"Nothing definite, except that he remembers nothing that happened before he was hurt. The man that was wounded is dead and this is another person, a grown child. It's his apathy, his detachment, that's terrible. He doesn't seem to care where he is nor what he does. He must have been pa.s.sed hand to hand, like a child."

"I mean, about his recovery."

She shrugged. "Who can tell? There is nothing physically wrong with him that surgeons can remedy, if that's what you mean.

He walked on in silence. "His father should be told, though," he said at last.

"I know, but who is to do it? Besides, he is bound to know someday, so why not let him believe as he wishes as long as he can? The shock will be no greater at one time than at another. And he is old, and so big and happy now. And Donald may recover, you know," she lied.

"Yes, that's right. But do you think he will?"

"Why not? He can't remain forever as he is now." They had reached the gate. The iron was rough and hot with sun under her hand, but there was no blue anywhere in the sky.

Mr. Saunders fumbling with his hat, said: "But suppose he-he does not recover?"

She gave him a direct look. "Dies, you mean?" she asked brutally.

"Well, yes. Since you put it that way."

"Now that's what I what to discuss with you. It is a question of strengthening his morale, of giving him some reason to-well, buck up. And who could do that better than Miss Saunders?"

"But, ma'am, ain't you asking a lot, asking me to risk my daughter's happiness on such a poor bet as that?"

"You don't understand. I am not asking that the engagement be insisted upon. I mean, why not let Cecily-Miss Saunders-see him as often as she will, let her be sweethearts with him if necessary until he gets to know her again and will make an effort for himself. Time enough then to talk of engagements. Think, . Mr. Saunders: suppose he were your son. That wouldn't be very much to ask of a friend, would it?"

He looked at her again in admiration, keenly, "You've got a level head on your shoulders, young lady. So what I'm to do is to prevail on her to come and see him, is it?"

"You must do more than that: you must see that she does come, that she acts just as she acted toward him before." She gripped his arm. "You must not let her mother dissuade her. You must not. Remember, he might have been your son."

"What makes you think her mother might object?" he asked in amazement.

She smiled faintly. "You forget I'm a woman, too," she said. Then her face became serious, imminent. "But you mustn't let that happen, do you hear?" Her eyes compelled him. "Is that a promise?"

"Yes," he agreed, meeting her level glance. He took her firm, proffered hand and felt her clean, muscular clasp.

"A promise, then," she said as warm great drops of rain dissolving from the fat, dull sky splashed heavily. She said good-bye and fled, running across the lawn toward the house before a.s.saulting grey battalions of rain. Her long legs swept her up and onto the veranda as the pursuing rain, foiled, whirled like cavalry with silver lances across the lawn.

V.

Mr. Saunders, casting an uneasy look at the dissolving sky, let himself out the gate and here, returning from school, was his son, saying: "Did you see his scar, daddy? Did you see his scar?"

The man stared at this troublesome small miniature of himself, and then he knelt suddenly, taking his son into his arms, holding him close.

"You seen his scar," young Robert Saunders accused, trying to release himself as the rain galloped over them, through the trees.

VI.

Emmy's eyes were black and shallow as a toy animal's and her hair was a sun-burned shock of no particular colour. There was something wild in Emmy's face: you knew that she out-ran, out-fought, out-climbed her brothers: you could imagine her developing like a small but st.u.r.dy greenness on a dunghill. Not a flower. But not dung, either.

Her father was a house painter, with the house painter's inevitable penchant for alcohol, and he used to beat his wife. She, fortunately, failed to survive the birth of Emmy's fourth brother, whereupon her father desisted from the bottle long enough to woo and wed an angular shrew who, serving as an instrument of retribution, beat him soundly with stove wood in her lighter moments.

"Don't ever marry a woman, Emmy," her father, maudlin and affectionate, advised her. "If I had it to do all over again I'd take a man every time."

"I won't never marry n.o.body," Emmy had promised herself pa.s.sionately, especially after Donald had gone to war and her laboriously worded letters to him had gone unanswered. (And now he don't even know me, she thought dully.) "I won't never marry n.o.body," she repeated, putting dinner on the table. "I think I'll just die," she said, staring through a streaming window into the rain, watching the gusty rain surge by like a grey yet silver s.h.i.+p crossing her vision, nursing a final plate between her hands. She broke her reverie, and putting the plate on the table she went and stood without the study door where they were sitting watching the streaming window panes, hearing the grey rain like a million little feet across the roof and in the trees.

"All right, Uncle Joe," she said, fleeing kitchenward.

Before they were halfway through lunch the downpour had ceased, the s.h.i.+ps of rain had surged onward, drawing before the wind, leaving only a whisper in the wet green waves of leaves, with an occasional gust running in long white lines like elves holding hands across the gra.s.s. But Emmy did not appear with dessert.

"Emmy!" called the rector again.

Mrs. Powers rose. "I'll go see," she said.

The kitchen was empty. "Emmy?" she called quietly. There was no reply, and she was on the point of leaving when an impulse bade her look behind the open door. She swung it away from the wall and Emmy stared at her dumbly.

"Emmy, what is it?" she asked.

But Emmy marched wordless from her hiding place, and taking a tray she placed the prepared dessert on it and handed it to Mrs. Powers.

"This is silly, Emmy, acting this way. You must give him time to get used to us again."

But Emmy only looked at her from behind the frontiers of her inarticulate despair, and the other woman carried the tray in to the table. "Emmy's not feeling well," she explained.

"I am afraid Emmy works too hard," the rector said. "She was always a hard worker, don't you remember, Donald?"

Mahon raised his puzzled gaze to his father's face. "Emmy?" he repeated.

"Don't you remember Emmy?"

"Yes, sir," he repeated tonelessly.

VII.

The window panes had cleared, though it yet rained. She sat after the men had left the table and at last Emmy peered through the door, then entered. She rose and to get her the two of them cleared the table, over Emmy's mild protest, and carried the broken meal to the kitchen. Mrs. Powers turned back her sleeves briskly.

"No, no, lemme do it," Emmy objected. "You'll spoil your dress."

"It's an old one: no matter if I do."

"It don't look old to me. I think it's right pretty. But this is my work. You go on and lemme do it."

"I know, but I've got to do something or I'll go wild. Don't you worry about this dress: I don't."

"You are rich, you don't have to, I guess," Emmy answered coldly, examining the dress.

"Do you like it?" Emmy made no reply. "I think clothes of this sort suit people of your and my type, don't you?"

"I dunno. I never thought about it," splas.h.i.+ng water in the sink.

"I tell you what," said Mrs. Powers, watching Emmy's firm, st.u.r.dy back. "I have a new dress up in my trunk that doesn't suit me, for some reason. When we get through, suppose you come up with me and we'll try it on you. I can sew a little, and we can make it fit you exactly. What about it?"

Emmy thawed imperceptibly. "What use would I have for it? I don't go anywhere, and I got clothes good enough to wash and sweep and cook in."

"I know, but it's always well to have some dress-up things. I will lend you stockings and things to go with it, and a hat, too."

Emmy slid dishes into hot water and steam rose about her reddened arms. "Where's your husband?" she asked irrelevantly.

"He was killed in the war, Emmy."

"Oh," she said. Then, after a while: "And you so young, too." She gave Mrs. Powers a quick, kind glance: sisters in sorrow. (My Donald was killed, too.) Mrs. Powers rose quickly. "Where's a cup towel? Let's get done so we can try that dress."

Emmy drew her hands from the water and dried them on her ap.r.o.n. "Wait, lemme get an ap.r.o.n for you, too."

A bedraggled sparrow eyed her from the limp, glistening morning-glory vine, and Emmy dropped the ap.r.o.n over her head and knotted the cords at the back. Steam rose again about Emmy's forearms, wreathing her head, and the china was warm and smooth and sensuous to the touch; gla.s.s gleamed under Mrs. Power's towelling and a dull parade of silver took the light mutely, hus.h.i.+ng it as like two priestesses they repeated the orisons of Clothes.

As they pa.s.sed the study door they saw the rector and his son gazing quietly into a rain-perplexed tree, and Gilligan sprawled on his back upon a battered divan, smoking and reading.

VIII.

Emmy, outfitted from head to heel, thanked her awkwardly.

"How good the rain smells!" Mrs. Powers interrupted her. "Sit down a while, won't you?"

Emmy, admiring her finery, came suddenly from out her Cinderella dream. "I can't. I got some mending to do. I nearly clean forgot it."

"Bring your mending in here, then, so we can talk. I haven't had a women to talk to in months, it seems like. Bring it in here and let me help you."

Emmy said, flattered: "Why do you want to do my work?"

"I told you if I don't have something to do I'll be a crazy woman in two days. Please, Emmy, as a favour. Won't you?"

"All right. Lemme get it." She gathered up her garments and leaving the room she returned with a heaped basket. They sat on either side of it.

"His poor huge socks," Mrs. Powers raised her encased hand. "Like chair covers, aren't they?"

Emmy laughed happily above her needle; and beneath swooning gusts of rain across the roof the pile of neatly folded and mended garments grew steadily.

"Emmy," Mrs. Powers said after a time, "what was Donald like before? You knew him a long time, didn't you?"

Emmy's needle continued its mute, tiny flas.h.i.+ng, and after a while Mrs. Powers leaned across the basket and putting her hand under Emmy's chin, raised her bent face. Emmy twisted her head aside and bent again over her needle. Mrs. Powers rose and drew the shades, darkening the room against the rain-combed afternoon. Emmy continued to peer blindly at her darning until the other woman took it from her hand, then she raised her head and stared at her new friend with beast-like, unresisting hopelessness.

Mrs. Powers took Emmy's arms and drew her erect. "Come, Emmy," she said, feeling the bones in Emmy's hard, muscular arms. Mrs. Powers knew that lacking a bed any reclining intimacy was conducive to confidence, so she drew Emmy down beside her in an ancient obese armchair. And with heedless rain filling the room with hushed monotonous sound, Emmy told her brief story.

"We was in school together-when he was there at all. He never came, mostly. They couldn't make him. He'd just go off into the country by himself, and not come back for two or three days. And nights, too. It was one night when he-when he-"

Her voice died away and Mrs. Powers said: "When he what, Emmy? Aren't you going too fast?"

"Sometimes he used to walk home from school with me. He wouldn't never have a hat or a coat, and his face was like-it was like he ought to live in the woods. You know: not like he ought to went to school or had to dress up. And so you never did know when you'd see him. He'd come in school at almost any time and folks would see him way out in the country at night. Sometimes he'd sleep in folks' houses in the country and sometimes n.i.g.g.e.rs would find him asleep in sand ditches. Everybody knew him. And then one night--"

"How old were you then?"