34
The home to which Allie Lee was brought stood in the outskirts of Omaha upon a wooded bank above the river.
Allie watched the broad, yellow Missouri swirling by. She liked best to be alone outdoors in the shade of the trees. In the weeks since her arrival there she had not recovered from the shock of meeting Neale only to be parted from him.
But the comfort, the luxury of her home, the relief from constant dread, such as she had known for years, the quiet at night—these had been so welcome, so saving, that her burden of sorrow seemed endurable. Yet in time she came to see that the finding of a father and a home had only added to her bitterness.
Allison Lee’s sister, an elderly woman of strong character, resented the home-bringing of this strange, lost daughter. Allie had found no sympathy in her. For a while neighbors and friends of the Lees’ flocked to the house and were kind, gracious, attentive to Allie. Then somehow her story, or part of it, became gossip. Her father, sensitive, cold, embittered by the past, suffered intolerable shame at the disgrace of a wife’s desertion and a daughter’s notoriety. Allie’s presence hurt him; he avoided her as much as possible; the little kindnesses that he had shown, and his feelings of pride in her beauty and charm, soon vanished. There was no love between them. Allie had tried hard to care for him, but her heart seemed to be buried in that vast grave of the West. She was obedient, dutiful, passive, but she could not care for him. And there came a day when she realized that he did not believe she had come unscathed through the wilds of the gold-fields and the vileness of the construction camps. She bore this patiently, though it stung her. But the loss of respect for her father did not come until she heard men in his study, loud-voiced and furious, wrangle over contracts and accuse him of double-dealing.
Later he told her that he had become involved in financial straits, and that unless he could raise a large sum by a certain date he would be ruined.
And it was this day that Allie sat on a bench in the little arbor and watched the turbulent river. She was sorry for her father, but she could not help him. Moreover, alien griefs did not greatly touch her. Her own grief was deep and all-enfolding. She was heart-sick, and always yearning—yearning for that she dared not name.
The day was hot, sultry; no birds sang, but the locusts were noisy; the air was full of humming bees.
Allie watched the river. She was idle because her aunt would not let her work. She could only remember and suffer. The great river soothed her. Where did it come from and where did it go? And what was to become of her? Almost it would have been better—
A servant interrupted her. “Missy, heah’s a gennelman to see yo’,” announced the Negro girl.