V
It was a good season. The days were bright, the nights brought plentiful showers, everything throve at the fruit farm, and at midsummer Ezra Tolford found that he had outdone his best expectations.
Other things prospered besides the products of the soil. Andrea was her plump, rosy self again, radiant with happiness and energy. The life she led was that for which she was born, the life that countless generations of her kindred had lived before her. She loved the daily round of labour, loved to cook, to keep the house neat. She loved the breath of the rich earth, when the plough rent the furrows. She loved the simple gossip of the neighbours, who ran in to consult with bated breath the wearing possibilities of a dress pattern or a new stitch in knitting. She had no doubts or fears, but was contented.
When she first met Gurth, his world seemed so far from hers, so much above and apart, that she listened to all he said with silent acquiescence, yielding always to his judgment, and never presuming to discuss matters of which she could have no knowledge, all the while adoring him with the idealizing passion of first love.
Now this was changed; he was no longer a knight from dreamland, but a fellow-worker, with whom she might discuss plans into which she had a far more practical insight than he. She loved him as devotedly, but on a rational plane.
As for Gurth, did he like this reversal? He was often worried by his own state of mind. Physically he was well, and, though rather thin, his face wore a healthy sun bronze. All his plans were going forward smoothly, the Hill Farm was nearly ready for its autumn planting of small fruits, and there would be money enough left over to bridge the way for the little household, until the soil yielded its crops,—yet he was not wholly contented.
Andrea’s complete satisfaction and identification with her work seemed a reproach to him. Was this vigorous woman the same being as the girl who a year before stood blushing and silent, or else was moved to tears when he read aloud or played his violin to her? She seemed no longer to need protection, but rather to protect him.
His violin, could he have dreamed that he should ever become estranged from it? As his fingers grew stiff from contact with the soil, they stumbled over the strings insensibly, and the vibrating instrument seemed to grow shrill and wail in grief at the rough touch.
Then he would try again and play something more simple with a legato movement, when, perhaps, Andrea would frankly say, “What ails your violin, dearest? It seems out of tune, you do not play it as you used.” Then he would put it by.
As for books, there was no time for them, no time for study and dreams. During the early spring he had read almost nightly to Margaret, and often Ezra Tolford joined in the talk that followed. Now Andrea nodded laughingly if he merely suggested reading, and asked him if he supposed she could keep awake to hear him, when she must churn to-morrow. As he rose to go, perhaps, to his attic for a quiet hour, she would twine her arms around his neck and tell him it was not good to spoil his eyes with books on summer nights, and so the days went by.
Gradually it seemed to him that Margaret was the one link that held before him what he used to be. She said but very little to him usually, but went on with her daily life, keeping herself as ever refined and self-contained. It was through her only now that Waldsen knew that the world still rolled on. It was from her conversation that he gained scraps from books, magazines, and even the daily news, as she talked to interest Andrea as they worked and chatted together. In music, too, it was the same. With exquisite tact she would choose some song that Andrea knew and could sing correctly and ask Gurth to accompany them.
Waldsen went to church with his betrothed every Sunday evening, and all the neighbours found it most right and proper; but it was not prayer or sermon or even the companionship of Andrea that held him through the long session, but Margaret’s voice leading the simple hymns. It seemed as if, in singing, she was speaking to him alone, and Gurth was both moved and puzzled by the transformation of her features.
One Sunday she chanced to look in his direction as she was singing and caught his expression as he gazed at her. Next day she told her father that she must rest her voice, and asked him to let Andrea supply her place in the choir for a while. She would like, she said, if possible to go to Glen Village for a week or so to stay with Mrs. Watson, an old friend of her mother’s, who was quite ill and needed friendly care. All this seemed most natural to the Deacon, who was quite satisfied that Andrea could manage for that length of time.
Margaret imagined that she was doing a wise thing in going away and leaving the pair wholly to themselves. On the contrary it opened Waldsen’s eyes to the position in which he stood, which to be perhaps brutally direct was this—the two women had changed places. He loved Andrea as a merry companion, but through her new competence and force she had lost her hold upon his mystic inner nature, that valued the ideal above the real. The two had not developed in unison and, practically, she had outstripped him. It was to Margaret that his spirit clung. Margaret, the woman he thought without emotion, as distant from him as the evening star, the reticence of whose nature fascinated him.
Waldsen was not morally inconstant. He was paying the penalty of a joint heritage of romance and hot-headed impulse. The blood of his parents did not mingle but contended in his veins.
Acadia was fading in a mist; love for love’s sake, the thrill of music and the ideal in Nature were passing away, yet he never for a moment entertained the slightest thought of turning backwards. The soil was there grasping and swallowing; he had pledged his future to wrestling with it for his bread; if he conquered, it might yield him food, and finally—peace. Andrea would be happy, and doubtless he should be content when his neck had become accustomed to the yoke; for, after all, his student philosophy aided him, and he realized that there is much in habit.
With the autumn came the furnishing of the house at the Hill Farm, and it occupied many of the dull days of early November. Andrea was in her element, and in a state of tranquil elation.
Only four rooms were to be used at first; a sunny kitchen, and sitting-room, and two bedrooms above. One of these was to have a blue paper and the other an old-fashioned chintz pattern sprinkled with bunches of poppies. “The poppies are for your room, Margaret—” said Andrea, when they were in the shop at Bridgeton choosing the household goods. “You like red so much, and you will stay with us often, always when your father goes away, you know.”
Margaret smiled at her ardour, but never was impatient or seemed to tire of discussing the little details so dear to the prospective young housekeeper, or of making visits with her to the new home and guiding her somewhat abrupt taste.
As Andrea worked with a will, her enthusiasm infected Waldsen, and he believed himself happy again, until he discovered, as he usually did, that some arrangement which particularly delighted him was a happy thought of Margaret’s.
At this time Margaret was often away from home. After her visit to Mrs. Watson, one of her old schoolmates, who had recently married and settled in Bridgeton, begged her to come there for a visit; and she felt also that she must have change, so she promised to stay two weeks with her friend.
“Send for me if you need me for anything, no matter how trifling,” she said, when she left home.
Margaret had been at Bridgeton about ten days. It was a rainy evening, and she was sitting by the open fire with her friends, talking about school-days.
The dog, who had been sleeping on the hearth-rug, started suddenly, and, after cocking his ears in a listening attitude, rushed to the door, barking violently. Horses’ hoofs sounded on the road with the peculiar sucking thud that rain and mud lend; the gate banged to, and hurried footsteps crossed the piazza. Margaret, without knowing why, went quickly to the door and opened it before her friends comprehended what she was doing, or before any one knocked.
On the threshold, lantern in hand, stood Ezra Tolford. Water was streaming from the limp brim of his felt hat and ran down his rubber coat in little streams.
“I knew it was some one from home! What is it, father?” Margaret cried.
The Deacon had a white, scared look and moistened his lips with his tongue twice before he answered—“Waldsen is very sick; the doctor says it’s pneumonia. A lot of neighbours have come in and upset things under pretext of helping Andrea. Doctor Russell says we must have a nurse if he lasts through to-night, and I thought you’d want to know!”
Margaret did not hear the last words; she was already upstairs and back again, buttoning her thick coat as she came. Her friends protested against her going out on such a night, her father joining them, but not insistently. He seemed ill at ease, as if he had some secret on his mind.
Bidding good-by hastily, in another moment Margaret was in the wagon tucking the wraps around her and trying to hold her umbrella against the wind, while the Deacon turned the horses homeward, so content in having her with him that he forgot to speak. “Tell me all about it, father, and why you did not send for me sooner,” she said in an unsteady voice.
“Well, daughter, it all happened so quickly that there was no time for anything. Three days ago Waldsen went into the village with a load of feed, and it came on to rain heavily. He was all in a sweat handling the bags and got sopping wet driving back,—a thing that has happened to me a dozen times.”
“The next day he was about as usual, but spoke of a catching in his chest. But yesterday he gave up and the doctor came, and he says that the heart has been overstrained somehow, and he doesn’t expect to bring him round!”
“And Andrea, how does she bear it?” whispered Margaret, her throat almost closing when she tried to speak.
“She’s a brave woman. She keeps quite still and heats the poultices and measures the medicines, like a regular nurse. You see she does not believe that he will die because he has a good colour, but that’s the fever. He is delirious and doesn’t know her, and twice he has called for you!”
“For me! Oh, father, when?”
“Last night, but it is nothing but his raving,—he doesn’t know what he says; he thought I was his mother!” and the Deacon eyed Margaret anxiously.
It was eleven o’clock before they reached home, and, leaving her wet garments in the kitchen, where she found a neighbour who set about preparing her a cup of tea, Margaret went softly up the stairs.
The fire in the sitting-room had died down and she stirred it up, adding a fresh log, and resting a moment to collect herself, went to the attic chamber.
Outside the door of Gurth’s room stood a table with a small oil-stove upon it and a dish-pan full of flaxseed meal; great squares of cotton that had made poultices lay about.
Inside the room a bright fire burned, and the screened lamp showed Andrea sitting on one side of the bed, watching the clock, and father on the other side, watching the patient, and combining, as often happens in the calling of the country physician, both doctor and nurse.
Gurth was sleeping, if the uneasy tossing could be called sleep. Father was trying to keep the poultices in place, and now and then moistened the dry lips with a bit of ice. On seeing Margaret, Andrea came to the door, and, without saying a word, put her arms about her and laid her head on her shoulder, with a gesture of entire confidence that said, “Now that you have come, all will be right.” Already Margaret seemed the elder by years.
“Try to persuade her to lie down an hour, Miss Margaret,” said father; “she has not rested for two days, nor scarcely touched a morsel.” Andrea yielded, upon the promise that she should be called at the slightest change.
Margaret took the chair opposite father, rising at intervals to hand him what he needed. She felt that in being there now she was infringing no law, social or moral, and that she had a right to the moments that were so precious to her. It was almost one o’clock; Gurth stirred and muttered as father gave him some brandy. Suddenly Margaret became conscious that his eyes were open and fixed upon her with a look that was unmistakable. As she leaned forward, not trusting her sight, Gurth suddenly raised himself upon one arm and stretching the other towards her, grasped her hand, crying “Margaret!” in a joyful voice. The delirium began again, in which he seemed to be going through the last interview with his mother. Andrea was called. In vain she begged him to speak to her, to look at her, but he never again became conscious, and at five o’clock he died.
It was the day after Thanksgiving when Gurth was laid away in the hillside burying-ground, where he had so often scattered food for the hungry birds.
A troop of neighbours followed him there, for he had become a favourite through his varied tastes; he had meant to settle at the Glen, so he was one of them, and all the women felt deep pity for Andrea. On the way back much curiosity was expressed as to what disposition she would make of the farm, for they all took it for granted that it would be hers.
For a day or two Andrea stayed in her room alone, refusing all offers of sympathy and barely tasting food. But one morning when Margaret went down, she found her in the kitchen going about her work the same as usual. Her face was pale and drawn, but wore a look of quiet resolution that was unearthly. She did not mention Waldsen, but when the day’s work was done, went silently to his attic and, after feeding the birds, sat looking out, where upon the hillside there was a patch of fresh earth.
Margaret, watching the chance, followed her, and seated herself also by the window. For a moment neither spoke, and then Andrea laid her head in Margaret’s lap and said, great sobs nearly strangling her,—“Love me! Margaret, love me! I have tried not to speak of him and to keep the grief inside, for we have made you so much trouble, but oh, I cannot!” and the two women, clinging to each other, mingled their tears.
When Andrea grew calmer, Margaret spoke of the future, and how she hoped that Andrea would always feel that the Mill Farm was her home.
“It’s very good of you, dear Margaret, to want me, and I should like to stay, but I must finish Gurth’s work and make the fruit farm a success,—I know that he would wish it.
“These last few days and nights I have thought it out all myself, and I have decided. There is some money, you know; enough, he often said, until the fruit yields a return. I shall hire old Mr. and Mrs. Grigs to live with me, and if, in a year or two, I prosper, I will send for my little brothers (Ernest is twelve already), and then I shall have help enough.
“No, do not try to dissuade me, dear Margaret, you do not understand. When a woman has lost the love that bounded her life, the only thing between her and despair is a home!”
It fell to Deacon Tolford, in his legal capacity, as probate judge, to take the steps necessary for the regulation of Waldsen’s affairs. He told Andrea that, as a matter of form, he must look through Waldsen’s papers, and she willingly consented, only asking that any letters from herself be left unread.
The Deacon spent a morning in the attic, then, coming to the sitting-room where Margaret was sewing, closed the door gently, sat down, and began drumming on the table with his fingers, his face wearing a distressed look.
Margaret waited for him to speak, which he soon did, abruptly, as if he was beginning in the middle of his thoughts.
“Daughter, I want you to ask Andrea to stop with us as long as she likes. She can’t well go back to Denmark, and I hate to think of her facing the world so soon after this trouble.”
“I knew you would wish it, father, so I asked her yesterday to live with us; but she has thought out her future carefully, and I do not see any reason for opposing her.” Then she gave the details of Andrea’s plan.
The Deacon sat for some minutes, his head sunk between his shoulders, and then, pulling himself together, said, “I might as well tell you something first as last, Margaret,—a fact that neither of you women seems to think possible. Gurth Waldsen left no will or legal papers of any sort. The farm and money does not belong to Andrea any more than it does to us! More than this, it is my duty to inform his mother of the facts, as she is his only heir, and appoint an administrator to take charge of the estate, pending its settlement!”
Margaret had risen and was standing with dilated eyes and her hands clasped before her. “Father! father! I never thought of this. Can nothing be done? Can we not arrange in some way? Oh! who will tell Andrea?”
“As Waldsen did not have the foresight to protect her, we can do nothing, daughter. She need not be told for a few weeks, though, until I receive some order from his mother,—but know it she must. If they had married last spring, this trouble would have been avoided. Mark my words, daughter, some niceties of feeling are too good for daily use. Gurth was a dreamer, and dreams always end like this.”
“Let us wait a few weeks,” interrupted Margaret, hastily. “As you say, it may seem less brutal than to tell her now, or his mother, who is so rich, may let Andrea keep the land.”