The Trumpeter Swan by Bailey, Temple, -1953 - CHAPTER IV

The Trumpeter Swan

CHAPTER IV

RAIN AND RANDY'S SOUL

Madge came down the next morning dressed for her journey. “Oscar and Flora are going to take me as far as Washington in their car. They want you to make a fourth, Georgie.”

Dalton was eating alone. Breakfast was served at small tables on the west terrace. There was a flagged stone space with wide awnings overhead. Except that it overlooked a formal garden instead of streets, one might have been in a Parisian café. The idea was Oscar's. Dalton had laughed at him. “You'll be a _boulevardier_, Oscar, until you die.”

Oscar had been sulky. “Well, how do you want me to do it?”

“Breakfast in bed--or in a breakfast room with things hot on the sideboard, luncheon, out here on the terrace when the weather permits, tea in the garden, dinner in great state in the big dining-room.”

“I suppose you think you know all about it. But the thing that I am always asking myself is, were you born to it, Dalton?”

“I've been around a lot,” Dalton evaded. “Of course if you don't want me to be perfectly frank with you, I won't.”

“Be as frank as you please,” Oscar had said, “but it's your air of knowing everything that gets me.”

Dalton's breakfast was a hearty one--bacon and two eggs, and a pile of buttered toast. There had been a melon to begin with, and there was a pot of coffee. He was eating with an appetite when Madge came down.

“I had mine in bed,” Madge said, as George rose and pulled out a chair for her. “Isn't this the beastliest fashion, having little tables?”

“That's what I told Oscar.”

“Oscar and Flora will never have too much of restaurants. They belong to the class which finds all that it wants in a jazz band and scrambled eggs at Jack's at one o'clock in the morning. Georgie, in my next incarnation, I hope there won't be any dansants or night frolics. I'd like a May-pole in the sunshine and a lot of plump and rosy women and bluff and hearty men for my friends--with a fine old farmhouse and myself in the dairy making butter----”

George smiled at her. “I should have fancied you an Egyptian princess, with twin serpents above your forehead instead of that turban.”

“Heavens, no. I want no ardours and no Anthonys. Tell me about the new little girl, Georgie.”

“How do you know there is a--new little girl?”

“I know your tricks and your manners, and the way you managed to meet her at the Horse Show. And you saw her last night.”

“How do you know?”

“By the light in your eyes.”

“Do I show it like that? Well, she's rather--not to be talked about, Madge----”

She was not in the least affronted. “So that's it? You always begin that way--putting them on a pedestal---- If you'd only keep one of us there it might do you good.”

“Which one--you?” he leaned a little forward.

“No.” Indignation stirred within her. How easy it was for him to play the game. And last night she had lain long awake, listening for the sound of his motor. She had seen the moon set, and spectral dawn steal into the garden. “No, I'm running away. I am tired of drifting always on the tides of other people's inclination. We have stayed down here where it is hot because Oscar and Flora like it, yet there's all the coolness of the North Shore waiting for us----”

She rose and walked to the edge of the terrace. The garden was splashed now with clear color, purple and rose and gold. The air was oppressive, with a gathering haze back of the hills.

“I'm tired of it. Some day I'm going to flap my wings and fly away where you won't be able to find me, Georgie. I'd rather be a wild gull to the wind-swept sky, than a tame pigeon--to eat from your hand----” She said it lightly; this was not a moment for plaintiveness.

There was a dancing light in his eyes. “You're a golden pheasant--and you'll never fly so far that I shan't find you.”

Oscar arriving at this moment saved a retort. “Flora's not well. We can't motor up, Madge.”

“I am sorry but I can take a train.”

“There's one at three. I don't see why you are going,” irritably; “Flora won't stay here long after you leave.”

“I am not as necessary as you think, Oscar. There are plenty of others, and I must go----”

“Oh, very well. Andrews will drive you down.”

“I'll drive her myself,” said Dalton.

Aunt Claudia was going to Washington also on the three o'clock train. She had had a wireless from Truxton who had sailed from Brest and would arrive at New York within the week.

“Of course you'll go and meet him, Aunt Claudia,” Becky had said; “I'll help you to get your things ready.”

Aunt Claudia, quite white and inwardly shaken by the thought of the happiness which was on its way to her, murmured her thanks.

Becky, divining something of the tumult which was beneath that outward show of serenity, patted the cushions of the couch in Mrs. Beaufort's bedroom. “Lie down here, you darling dear. It was such a surprise, wasn't it?”

“Well, my knees are weak,” Mrs. Beaufort admitted.

The nuns had taught Becky nice ways and useful arts, so she folded and packed under Aunt Claudia's eye and was much applauded.

“Most girls in these days,” said Mrs. Beaufort, “throw things in. Last summer I stayed at a house where the girls sat on their trunks to shut them, and sent parcel-post packages after them of the things they had left out.”

“Sister Loretto says that I am not naturally tidy, so she keeps me at it. I used to weep my eyes out when she'd send me back to my room---- But crying doesn't do any good with Sister Loretto.”

“Crying is never any good,” said Aunt Claudia. She was of Spartan mold. “Crying only weakens. When things are so bad that you must cry, then do it where the world can't see.”

Becky found herself thrilled by the thought of Aunt Claudia crying in secret. She was a martial little soul in spite of her distinctly feminine type of mind.

Aunt Claudia's lingerie, chastely French-embroidered in little scallops, with fresh white ribbons run in, was laid out on the bed in neat piles. There was also a gray corduroy dressing-gown, lined with silk.

“This will be too warm,” Becky said; “please let me put in my white crepe house-coat. It will look so pretty, Aunt Claudia, when Truxton comes in the morning to kiss you----”

Aunt Claudia had been holding on to her emotions tightly. The thought of that morning kiss which for three dreadful years had been denied her--for three dreadful years she had not known whether Truxton would ever breeze into her room before breakfast with his “Mornin' Mums.” She felt that if she allowed herself any softness or yielding at this moment she would spoil her spotless record of self-control and weep in maudlin fashion in Becky's arms.

So in self-defense, she spoke with coldness. “I never wear borrowed clothes, my dear.”

Becky, somewhat dishevelled and warm from her exertions, sat down to argue it. “I haven't had it on. And I'd love to give it to you----”

“My dear, of course not. It's very generous of you--very----” Aunt Claudia buried her face suddenly in the pillows and sobbed stormily.

Becky stood up. “Oh, Aunt Claudia,” she gasped. Then with the instinctive knowledge that silence was best, she gave her aunt a little pat on the shoulder and crept from the room.

She crept back presently and packed the crepe house-coat with the other things. Then, since Aunt Claudia made no sign, she went down-stairs to the kitchen.

Mandy, the cook, who had a complexion like an old copper cent, and who wore a white Dutch cap in place of the traditional bandana, was cutting corn from the cob for fritters.

“If you'll make a cup of tea,” Becky said, “I'll take it up to Aunt Claudia. She's lying down.”

“Is you goin' wid her?” Mandy asked.

“To New York? No. She'll want Truxton all to herself, Mandy.”

“Well, I hopes she has him,” Mandy husked an ear of corn viciously. “I ain' got my boy. He hol's his haid so high, he ain' got no time fo' his ol' Mammy.”

“You know you are proud of him, Mandy.”

“I ain' sayin' I is, and I ain' sayin' I isn't. But dat Daisy down the road, she ac' like she own him.”

“Oh, Daisy? Is he in love with her?”

“Love,” with withering scorn, “_love_? Ain' he got somefin' bettah to do than lovin' when he's jes' fit and fought fo' Uncle Sam?” She beat the eggs for her batter as if she had Daisy's head under the whip. “He fit and fought fo' Uncle Sam,” she repeated, “and now he comes home and camps hisse'f on Daisy's do'-step.”

Against the breeze of such high indignation, any argument would be blown away. Becky changed the subject hastily. “Mandy,” she asked, “are you making corn fritters?”

“I is----”

“What else for lunch?”

“An omlec----”

“Mandy, I'm so hungry I could eat a house----”

“You look it,” Mandy told her; “effen I was you, I'd eat and git fat.”

“It isn't fashionable to be fat, Mandy.”

“Skeletums may be in style,” said Mandy, breaking eggs for the omelette, “but I ain' ever found good looks in bones.”

“Don't you like _my_ bones, Mandy?”

“You ain't got none, honey.”

“You called me a skeleton.”

The kettle boiled. “Effen I called you a skeletum,” Mandy said as she placed a cup and saucer on a small napkined tray, “my min' was on dat-ar Daisy. You ain' got no bones, Miss Becky. But Daisy, she's got a neck like a picked tukkey, and her shoulder-blades stan' out like wings.”

III

Becky went to the train with her aunt. George Dalton drove Madge down and passed the old surrey on the way.

Later Madge met Mrs. Beaufort and Becky on the station platform, and it was when Dalton settled her in her chair in the train that she said, “She's a darling. Keep her on a pedestal, Georgie----”

“You're a good sport,” he told her; “you know you'd hate it if I did.”

“I shouldn't. I'd like to think of you on your knees----”

It was time for him to leave her. She gave him her hand. “Until we meet again, Georgie.”

Her eyes were cool and smiling. Yet later as she looked out on the flying hills, there was trouble in them. There had been a time when Dalton had seemed to square with her girlish dreams.

And now, there was no one to warn this other girl with dreams in her eyes. George was not a vulture, he was simply a marauding bee----!

Becky was already in the surrey when George came back, and Calvin was gathering up his reins.

“Oh, look here, I wish you'd let me drive you up, Miss Bannister,” George said, sparkling; “there's no reason, is there, why you must ride alone?”

“Oh, no.”

“Then you will?”

Her hesitation was slight. “I should like it.”

“And can't we drive about a bit? You'll show me the old places? It is such a perfect day. I hope you haven't anything else to do.”

She had not. “I'll go with Mr. Dalton, Calvin.”

Calvin, who had watched over more than one generation of Bannister girls, and knew what was expected of them, made a worried protest.

“Hit's gwine rain, Miss Becky.”

Dalton dismissed him with a wave of the hand. “I won't let her get wet,” he lifted Becky from the surrey and walked with her to his car.

Kemp, who had come down in the house truck with Madge's trunks, stood stiff and straight by the door. Being off with Miss MacVeigh he was on with Miss Bannister. Girls might come and girls might go in his master's life, but Kemp had an air of going on forever.

When he had seated Becky, Dalton stepped back and gave hurried instructions.

“At four, Kemp,” he said, “or if you are later, wait until we come.”

“Very well, sir.” Kemp stood statuesquely at attention until the car whirled on. Then he sat down on the station platform, and talked to the agent. He was no longer a servant but a man.

As the big car whirled up the hill, Becky, looking out upon the familiar landscape, saw it with new eyes. There was a light upon it which had never been for her on sea or land. She had not believed that in all the world there could be such singing, blossoming radiance.

They drove through the old mill town and the stream was bright under the willows. They stopped on the bridge for a moment to view the shining bend.

“There are old chimneys under the vines,” Becky said; “doesn't it seem dreadful to think of all those dead houses----”

George gave a quick turn. “Why think of them? You were not made to think of dead houses, you were made to live.”

On and on they went, up the hills and down into the valleys, between rail fences which were a riot of honeysuckle, and with the roads in places rough under their wheels, with the fields gold with stubble, the sky a faint blue, with that thick look on the horizon.

George talked a great deal about himself. Perhaps if he had listened instead to Becky he might have learned things which would have surprised him. But he really had very interesting things to tell, and Becky was content to sit in silence and watch his hands on the wheel. They were small hands, and for some tastes a bit too plump and well-kept, but Becky found no fault with them. She felt that she could sit there forever, and watch his hands and listen to his clear quick voice.

At last George glanced at the little clock which hung in front of him. “Look here,” he said, “I told Kemp to have tea for us at a place which I found once when I walked in the woods. A sort of summer house which looks towards Monticello. Do you know it?”

“Yes. Pavilion Hill. It's on Randy Paine's plantation--King's Crest.”

“Then you've been there?”

“A thousand times with Randy.”

“I thought it was Waterman's. We shan't be jailed as trespassers, shall we?”

“No. But how could you tell your man to have tea for us when you didn't know that I'd be--willing?”

“But I did--know----”

A little silence, then “How?”

“Because when I put my mind on a thing I usually get my way.”

She sat very still. He bent down to her. “You're not angry?”

“No.” Her cheeks were flaming. She was thrilled by his masterfulness. No man had ever spoken to her like that. She was, indeed, having her first experience of ardent, impassioned pursuit. So might young Juliet have given ear to Romeo. And if Romeo had been a Georgie-Porgie, then alas, poor Juliet!

The Pavilion had been built a hundred and fifty years before of cedar logs. There had been a time when Thomas Jefferson had walked over to drink not tea, but something stronger with dead and gone Paines. Its four sides were open, but the vines formed a curtain which gave within a soft gloom. They approached it from the east side, getting out of their car and climbing the hill from the roadside. They found Kemp with everything ready. The kettle was boiling, and the tea measured into the Canton teapot which stood in its basket----

“Aren't you glad you came?” Dalton asked. “Kemp, when you've poured the tea, you can look after the car.”

The wind, rising, tore the dry leaves from the trees. Kemp, exiled, as it were, from the Pavilion, sat in the big car and watched the gathering blackness. Finally he got out and put up the curtains. Everything would be ready when Dalton came. He knew better, however, than to warn his master. George was apt to be sharp when his plans were spoiled.

And now throughout the wooded slope there was the restless movement of nature disturbed in the midst of peaceful dreaming. The trees bent and whispered. The birds, flying low, called sharp warnings. A small dog, spurning the leaves, as she followed a path up the west side of the hill, stopped suddenly and looked back at the man who followed her.

“We'll make the Pavilion if we can, old girl,” he told her, and as if she understood, she went up and up in a straight line, disregarding the temptation of side tours into bush and bramble.

George and Becky had finished their tea. There had been some rather delectable sweet biscuit which Kemp kept on hand for such occasions, and there was a small round box of glacé nuts, which George had insisted that Becky must keep. The box was of blue silk set off by gold lace and small pink roses.

“Blue is your color,” George had said as he presented it.

“That's what Randy says.”

“You are always talking of Randy.”

She looked her surprise. “I've always known him.”

“Is he in love with you?”

She set down the box and looked at him. “Randy is only a boy. I am very fond of him. But we aren't either of us--silly.”

She brought the last sentence out with such scorn that George had a moment of startled amaze.

Then, recovering, he said with a smile, “Is being in love silly?”

“I think it's rather sacred----”

The word threw him back upon himself. Love was, you understand, to George, a game. And here was Becky acting as if it were a ritual.

Yet the novelty of her point of view made her seem more than ever adorable. In his heart he found himself saying, “Oh, you lovely, lovely little thing.”

But he did not say it aloud. Indeed he, quite unaccountably, found himself unable to say anything, and while he hesitated, there charged up the west hill a panting dog with flapping ears. At the arched opening of the Pavilion she paused and wagged a tentative question.

“It's Nellie Custis----” Becky rose and ran towards her. “Where's your master, darling? _Randy_----”

In response to her call came an eerie cry--the old war cry of the Indian chiefs. Then young Paine came running up. “Becky! Here? There's going to be a storm. You better get home----”

He stopped short. Dalton was standing by the folding table.

“Hello, Paine,” he said, with ease. “We're playing 'Babes in the Wood.'”

“You seem very comfortable,” Randy was as stiff as a wooden tobacco sign.

“We are,” Becky said. “Mr. Dalton waved his wand like the Arabian nights----”

“My man did it,” said Dalton; “he's down there in the car.”

Randy felt a sense of surging rage. The Pavilion was his. It was old and vine-covered, and hallowed by a thousand memories. And here was Dalton trespassing with his tables and chairs and his Canton teapot. What right had George Dalton to bring a Canton teapot on another man's acres?

Becky was pouring tea for him. “Two lumps, Randy?”

“I don't want any tea,” he said ungraciously. His eyes were appraising the flame of her cheeks, the light in her eyes. What had Dalton been saying? “I don't want any tea. And there's a storm coming.”

All her life Becky had been terrified in a storm. She had cowered and shivered at the first flash of lightning, at the first rush of wind, at the first roll of thunder. And now she sat serene, while the trees waved despairing arms to a furious sky, while blackness settled over the earth, while her ears were assailed by the noise of a thousand guns.

What had come over her? More than anything else, the thing that struck against Randy's heart was this lack of fear in Becky!

Of course it was Dalton who took Becky home. There had been a sharp summons to Kemp, who came running up with raincoats, a rush for the car, a hurried “Won't you come with us, Randy?” from Becky, and Randy's curt refusal, and then the final insult from Dalton.

“Kemp will get you home, Paine, when he takes the tea things.”

Randy wanted to throw something after him--preferably a tomahawk--as Dalton went down the hill, triumphantly, shielding Becky from the elements.

He watched until a curtain of rain shut them out, but he heard the roar of the motor cutting through the clamor of the storm.

“Well, they're off, sir,” said Kemp cheerfully.

He was packing the Canton teapot in its basket and was folding up the chairs and tables. Randy had a sense of outrage. Here he was, a Randolph Paine of King's Crest, left behind in the rain with a man who had his mind on--teapots---- He stood immovable in the arched opening, his arms folded, and with the rain beating in upon him.

“You'll get wet,” Kemp reminded him; “it's better on this side, sir.”

“I don't mind the rain. I won't melt; I've had two years in France.”

“You have, sir?” something in Kemp's voice made Randy turn and look at him. The little man had his arms full of biscuit boxes, and he was gazing at Randy with a light in his eyes which had not been for Dalton.

“I had three years myself. And the best of my life, sir.”

Randy nodded. “A lot of us feel that way.”

“The fighting,” said Kemp, “was something awful. But it was--big--and after it things seem a bit small, sir.” He drew a long breath and came back to his Canton teapot and his folding table and his plans for departure.

“I'll be glad to take you in the little car, Mr. Paine.”

“No,” said Randy; “no, thank you, Kemp. I'll wait here until the storm is over.”

Kemp, with a black rubber cape buttoned about his shoulders and standing out over his load like a lady's hoopskirts, bobbed down the path and was gone.

Randy was glad to be alone. He was glad to get wet, he was glad of the roar and of the tumult which matched the tumult in his soul.

Somehow he had never dreamed of this--that somebody would come into Becky's life and take her away----

Nellie Custis shivered and whined. She hated thunder-storms. Randy sat down on the step and she crept close to him. He laid his hand on her head and fear left her--as fear had left Becky in the presence of Dalton.

After that the boy and the dog sat like statues, looking out, and in those tense and terrible moments a new spirit was born in Randolph Paine. Hitherto he had let life bring him what it would. He had scarcely dared hope that it would bring him Becky. But now he knew that if he lost her he would face--chaos----

Well, he would not lose her. Or if he did, it would not be to let her marry a man like Dalton. Surely she wouldn't. She _couldn't_---- But there had been that light in her eyes, that flame in her cheek--that lack of fear--Dalton's air of assurance, the way she had turned to him.

“Oh, God,” he said suddenly, out loud, “don't let Dalton have her.”

He was shaken by an emotion which bent his head to his knees. Nellie Custis pressed close against him and whined.

“He shan't have her, Nellie. He shan't----”

He burned with the thought of Dalton's look of triumph. Dalton who had carried Becky off, and had left him with Kemp and a Canton teapot.

He recalled Kemp's words. “After it things seem a bit small, sir.”

Well, it shouldn't be small for him. It had seemed so big--over there. So easy to--carry on.

If he only had a fighting chance. If he had only a half of Dalton's money. A little more time in which to get on his feet.

But in the meantime here was Dalton--with his money, his motors, and his masterfulness. And his look of triumph----

In a sudden fierce reaction he sprang to his feet. He stood in the doorway as if defying the future. “Nobody shall take her away from me,” he said, “she's mine----”

His arms were folded over his chest, his wet black locks almost hid his eyes. So might some young savage have stood in the long ago, sending his challenge forth to those same hills.

Table to Contents

<< CHAPTER III CHAPTER V >>