Jupiter Lights Part 2

Then Eve wrote, for the first time, to Cicely.

In reply she received a long letter from Cicely's aunt, Sabrina Abercrombie, giving, with real grief, the particulars of Jack's last hours. He had died of the horrible yellow-fever. Eve was ill when the letter reached her; her illness lasted many months, and kind-hearted Mrs. Ashley took her, almost by force, to her place in the country, beautiful Hayling Hall, in Warwicks.h.i.+re. When at last she was able to hold a pen, Eve wrote again to Cicely; only a few lines (her first epistle had not been much longer); still, a letter. The reply was again from Miss Abercrombie, and, compared with her first communication, it was short and vague. The only definite sentences were about the child; "for _he_ is the one in whom you are most interested, _naturally_," she wrote, under-scoring the "he" and the "naturally" with a pale line; the whole letter, as regards ink, was very pale.

And now Eve Bruce had this child. And she determined, with all the intensity of her strong will, of her burning, jealous sorrow, that he should be hers alone. With such a mother as Cicely there was everything to hope.

III.

While the meal, which Cicely had announced as supper, was going on in the dining-room, Meadows was occupying herself in her accustomed evening effort to bring her mistress's abiding-place for the night, wherever it might happen to be, into as close a resemblance to an English bedroom as was, under the circ.u.mstances, possible. The resemblance had not been striking, so far, with all her toil, there having been something fundamentally un-English both in the cabins of the _Ville de Havre_ and in the glittering salons which served as bedrooms in the Hotel of the Universe in New York. The Savannah boat had been no better, nor the shelf with a roof over it of the little _Altamaha_; on the steamer of the Inland Route her struggle had been with an apartment seven feet long; here at Romney it was with one which had six times that amount of perspective.

A fire, freshly lighted, flared on the hearth, the spicy odor of its light wood still filling the air. And there was air enough to fill, for not one of the doors nor of the row of white windows which opened to the floor fitted tightly in its casing; there were wide cracks everywhere, and Meadows furthermore discovered, to her horror, that the windows had sashes which came only part of the way down, the lower half being closed by wooden shutters only. She barred these apertures as well as she could (some of the bars were gone), and then tried to draw the curtains; but these muslin protections, when they reached the strong current of air which came through the central crack of the shutters, were blown out towards the middle of the room like so many long white ghosts. Meadows surveyed them with a sigh; with a sigh she arranged the contents of Miss Bruce's dressing-bag on the outlandish bare toilet-table; she placed the slippers by the fire and drew forward the easiest chair. But when all was done the room still remained uncomfortably large, and uncomfortably empty. Outside, the wind whistled, the near sea gave out a booming sound; within, the flame of the candle flared now here, now there, in the counter-draughts that swept the room.

"It certainly is the farawayest place!" murmured the English girl.

There came a sound at the door; not a knock, but a rub across the panels. This too was alarming. Meadows kept the door well bolted, and called fearfully, "Who's there?"

"It's ony me--Powlyne," answered a shrill voice. "I's come wid de wines; Miss S'breeny, she sont me."

The tones were unmistakably feminine; Meadows drew back the bolt and peeped out. A negro girl of twelve stood there, bearing a tray which held a decanter and winegla.s.s; her wool was braided in little tails, which stood out like short quills; her one garment was a calico dress, whose abbreviated skirt left her bare legs visible from the knees down-ward.

"Do you want to come in?" said Meadows. "I can take it." And she stretched out her hand for the tray.

"Miss S'breeny she done tole me to put 'em myse'f on de little table close ter der bed," answered Powlyne, craning her neck to look into the room.

Meadows opened the door a little wider, and Powlyne performed her office. Seeing that she was very small and slight, the English girl recovered courage.

"I suppose you live here?" she suggested.

"Ya.s.s, 'm."

"And when there isn't any one else 'andy, they send you?"

"Dey sonds me when dey wanster, I's Miss S'breeny's maid," answered Powlyne, digging her bare heel into the matting.

"Her maid?--for gracious sake! What can _you_ do?"

"Tuckenoffener shoes. _En_ stockin's."

"Tuckenoffener?"

"Haul'em off. Ya.s.s,'m."

"Well, if I hever!" murmured Meadows, surveying this strange coadjutor, from the erect tails of wool to the bare black toes.

There was a loud groan in the hall outside. Meadows started.

"Unc' Abram, I spec, totin' up de wood," said Powlyne.

"Is he ill?"

"Ill!" said the child, contemptuously. "He's dat dair sa.s.sy ter-night!"

"Is he coming in here? Oh, don't go away!" pleaded Meadows. She had a vision of another incursion of black men in bathing costumes.

But Uncle Abram was alone, and he was very polite; he bowed even before he put the wood down, and several times afterwards. "Dey's cookin'

suppah for yer, miss," he announced, hospitably. "Dey'll be fried chickens en fixin's; en hot biscuits; en jell; en coffee."

"I should rather have tea, if it is equally convenient," said Meadows, after a moment's hesitation.

"Dere, now, doan yer _like_ coffee?" inquired Uncle Abram, looking at her admiringly. For it was such an extraordinary dislike that only very distinguished people could afford to have it. "Fer my part," he went on, gazing meditatively at the fire which he had just replenished, "I 'ain't nebber had 'nuff in all my borned days--no, not et one time. Pints wouldn't do me. Ner yet korts. I 'ain't nebber had a gallion."

Voices were now heard in the hall. Cicely entered, followed by Eve Bruce.

"All the darkies on the island will be coming to look at her to-morrow,"

said Cicely, after Meadows had gone to her supper; "they'll be immensely stirred up about her. She's still afraid--did you see?--she kept as far away as she could from poor old Uncle Abram as she went down the hall.

The field hands will be too much for her; some of the little nigs have no clothes at all."

"She won't see them; she goes to-morrow."

"That's as you please; if I were you, I would keep her. They will bring a mattress in here for her presently; perhaps she has never slept on the floor?"

"I dare say not. But she can for once."

Cicely went to one of the windows; she opened the upper half of the shutter and looked out. "How the wind blows! Jupiter Light s.h.i.+nes right into your room."

"Yes, I can see it from here," said Eve. "It's a good companion--always awake." She was speaking conventionally; she had spoken conventionally through the long supper, and the effort had tired her: she was not in the least accustomed to concealing her thoughts.

"Always awake. Are _you_ always awake?" said Cicely, returning to the fire.

"I? What an idea!"

"I don't know; you look like it."

"I must look very tired, then?"

"You do."

"Fortunately you do not," answered Eve, coldly. For there was something singularly fresh about Cicely; though she had no color, she always looked fair and perfectly rested, as though she had just risen from a refres.h.i.+ng sleep. "I suppose you have never felt tired, really tired, in all your life?" Eve went on.

"N--no; I don't know that I have ever felt _tired_, exactly," Cicely answered, emphasizing slightly the word "tired."

"_You_ have always had so many servants to do everything for you," Eve responded, explaining herself a little.

"We haven't many now; only four. And they help in the fields whenever they can--all except Dilsey, who stays with Jack."

Again the name. Eve felt that she must overcome her dread of it. "Jack is very like his father," she said, loudly and decidedly.