Her mother came there, too. Hourly now she stepped down from the frame above the mantel and walked through the rooms, twitching a curtain into place, setting a picture at a different angle, drawing a finger across a polished surface to make sure that no particle of dust had settled there.
In those days when winter was the coldest and the storms raged outside, and the amount of physical exercise required to keep her in good health was difficult to obtain, Mahala paced the rooms of the little house, and beside her walked another of her dead. Jason was there—thoughtful, kind, always taking care of her, always watching that she should be sheltered, that she should be comfortable—but he was a dead Jason. There was no life in him. The living part of him belonged to Ellen. The mouthing little pink bundle lying on Ellen’s breast very shortly would be on his feet, holding Jason’s hands, making demands of him.
The one thing for which Mahala tried to be thankful in those days was the steady round of duties entailed by living. After Mrs. Ford had gone home, there were days when Ellen was feeling badly and the baby cried, that Mahala went down to Jason’s home, and with light step and skilful fingers, straightened out problems that were too much for Ellen, taught her patience and forbearance and the love that ministers, that expends itself and demands little. Then she went back to her house and during the long nights she deliberately turned her pillow where she could look through the window at the storm-whipped arms of the old orchard and watch the elements having their way with the world, rolling on its age-old route around its orbit.
In these days Mahala found that, in her own home, life had simmered to the asking of one question. She did not ask it of God. She had stopped praying when she had been overwhelmed. She asked it of her mental vision of her father: “Why?” She faced the skilfully painted portrait of her mother, and with stiff lips cried to her: “Why?” She asked the walls of each room in the house. She asked the authors of the books she tried to read. She looked from the windows and asked the winds raging past. She asked the moon of night and the first red rays of morning. “Why?” Eternally, “Why?”
When spring had come again and all the world was busy with the old miracle of rejuvenation, when the apple orchard was sweetest and the lilacs were a benediction and the star flowers were shining, when the doors were opened and Nature was trying with all her might to rejuvenate the hearts of men as easily as she pushed welling sap into bud and bloom, one day when Mahala’s lips had cried “Why?” to the white pigeons and the bluebirds of the orchard, her question was answered.
A livery conveyance from the village stopped at her door, and in wonderment she watched Albert Rich and the town sheriff, the Presbyterian minister and dear old Doctor Grayson alight from it. She took one swift look at the party as they were coming through the gate, and then, without stopping for thought, she flew to the back door and gave the bell one violent spang. A pause, and then another. It was her pre-arranged call for Jason to come with all speed.
Hearing, Jason said to Ellen: “Something has gone wrong with Mahala. She never rang like that before. I must go.”
He dropped a rake that he was mending at the back door, raced across the yard, sprang over the fence, crossed the road, and leaping another fence, took a short cut toward Mahala’s back door. As he ran, he could see the carriage, he could see the men going up the walk and crossing the porch, and without knowing why, a sick apprehension sprang in his heart.
He entered the back door and came through the kitchen. He reached the door of the living room as Mahala was offering her guests seats. His first glance was for her. He saw that her face lacked all natural colour and he noticed that she was perfectly controlled, that she was greeting her guests with the graciousness of the lady she had been born to be.
As she returned from laying aside their hats, Albert Rich went to meet her. He deliberately put his arm around her. Then he said: “Mahala, dear, Rebecca Sampson made trouble in the bank to-day. She may have slipped or they may have been rough in putting her out, at any rate, she fell and struck her head a severe blow. She’s now lying on the couch in the directors’ room and every one agrees that she’s quite sane. Her first conscious words were to ask if you found the money that Junior Moreland told her to take from their parlour table and hide in your house for you when no one would see her.”