“Do you believe, Judith, that whatever is, is right?”
“I can recall the time, less than six months ago, when I was convinced that whatever is—is wrong,” she answered, mystified.
“And now?” He searched her face, there in the moist dusk of the veranda. When he spoke again, it was with something of Theo’s kindling animation: “I don’t know what you have done to me. A moment ago I was facing a great onrushing wall of black water. And all at once it has broken into ripples of silver joy. Last night I watched a great black and yellow spider, playing with his web in the moonlight. He was such a handsome, capable fellow—and the moth was so blunderingly stupid. I wondered if there were not something to be said in favour of the spider. But—you will think me a fatalist, if I finish the thought I had in mind. You will believe me when I tell you that I am not, in the least?”
“No, Lary, I will not believe you—one whit more than I can believe that it was an empty accident that brought me to Springdale—to Vine Cottage—four months ago. You and Eileen and I are caught in the web. The spider is Fate. I begged the gods to burn my fingers with the fire of life ... and they heard my prayer....”
“You delicious pagan! I might fancy gentle Clotho spinning a silken strand for you. But to sear your fingers—” He caught them and pressed them to his lips. Then he hurried across the lawn in a panic, his bare head wet with the summer rain. Judith looked after him, Sylvia’s best umbrella in her hand. She wanted to call him back, but it would only mean a double wetting. And Sylvia need not know.
She went up to her room but not to sleep. Taking down the thick coils of her pale chestnut hair, she braided it deliberately. A strand, blown across her face by the breeze from the west window, reminded her, all at once, of the web. She relaxed weakly on a hassock, watching the glittering drops on the edge of the awning that shaded her window from the afternoon sun. Was the web inevitable ... Fate? As yet she was free. Could she view with equanimity a future that involved, not Lary and his two young sisters, but those others who were of his flesh? Could she bear the heartache that was David Trench? Could she.... Her head drooped low on the window sill and her mind drifted rudderless on a sea of dreams.
IV
When Hal and Eileen left the stadium it was in accordance with a prearranged plan to meet Ina and Kitten and two of the boys who had contrived the loan of a touring car for the evening. They would drive to Olive Hill for the celebration—the exciting part of it. Competitive drilling, not in gaudy uniforms, but that more useful drilling that had to do with ledges of shale and limestone. It was at best but a poor imitation of the annual drill contest in the gold mining country, where powerful muscles contended with steel bitted drills against the tough impediment of granite. Here the very ledge had to be faked—removed from the nearby hillside with infinite care, and mounted against an improvised wall of mine refuse. It was the best the coal mines of Illinois could afford, but it served its purpose. There were money prizes and lesser trophies—geese, chickens and baskets of provisions.
The contest finished, there was a dance in the pavilion. Hal had parked his roadster where he and Eileen could watch the antics of the dancers. He was not sorry when he learned that the borrowed car must be returned by midnight, and the others must be on their way towards Springdale. He and Eileen would be following in a little while, he said.
“I’ve been trying all evening to dodge them,” he added, as he waved farewell to the departing car. “Some people simply can’t take a hint.”