01 The Building of Jalna (21 page)

“I should not be telling you all this.”

“And why not? What else is friendship for?”

“You despise me.”

“Could I despise my friend? You are my only friend in all this country, James Wilmott.” She spoke fondly, cherishing his friendship and his ambition. Then she added quickly — “But is that your real name?”

He nodded.

“Are you sure you’re not lying again?” She smiled at him coaxingly, as though to worm the truth out of him.

“I deserve that,” he said. “But this time I am telling you the truth. Perhaps I should have changed my name, as I ran away from her.”

“You ran away! Good for you! Ah, I’m glad you left her — the nagging woman! How did you leave her?”

He did not answer for a moment. His thoughts had flown backward. Then he said composedly: —

“I knew for five years that I was going to do it. But I made up my mind that I would not leave her badly off. I can tell you, I did not spare myself. I never was anything but tired and tense — in all that five years.… At last I had my affairs as I wanted them. Henrietta would own the house, have a respectable income. I made over everything into her name. Then I wrote her a letter telling her
that I was going to the East to spend the rest of my life and that she would never hear from me again. I got leave from the office to go for a week to Paris. I bought a ticket to Paris. Then I went to Liverpool, took a boat for Ireland, and you know the rest … You don’t thinks she can trace me, do you?”

“Never. She’ll never trace you. But — I wish you had changed your name.”

“Somehow I could not think of myself except as James Wilmott.” He got up and paced the room. “If you knew the pleasure I’ve had in this new life! In being free and
alone
! Sometimes I deliberately leave the place in complete disorder — just to prove to myself that I’m free. I’m like a prisoner released. I no longer have to concentrate. As I sit fishing in my river my mind is a delicious blank — for hours at a time. My past begins to seem like a dream.”

“We all are going to be happy here,” said Adeline. “I love this country. Come and show me your cow. And the young Indian who is working for your cow. I must see him — and the pigs — and the great fish you caught.”

A
S THE SUMMER
sped on, the walls of the house rose from the foundation in solid strength. Philip, acting on the advice of David Vaughan, had offered wages which had attracted good masons and carpenters. The best quality of brick had been ordered, built on a foundation of stone. The brick was of a fine red that would mellow to the colour of a dark dahlia. The basement was paved with bricks and contained the large kitchen, two servants’ bedrooms, pantries, coal and wine cellars. Not a house in the neighborhood had a wine cellar and Philip affirmed that this was to be well-stocked. He had studied the catalogues of dealers and had already placed a respectable order with the most reliable firm. Not that he was a hard drinker. He had never drunk himself under the table as some of his ancestors had done, in a day when it was quite the thing for a gentleman to do. Philip, in fact, was careful of his health and had no wish to become gouty and irascible as his grandfather had been.

While the walls were rising from the foundation, an army of axemen were clearing the land. Noble timber was being swept away to make room for fields of grain. As there was no space in which to preserve all this timber or use for it if it were preserved, much of it was to be burned. It lay awaiting this end which would
be accomplished in the autumn when danger of forest fires was past. The great green branches were struck from the trunks and mounded in piles by themselves, birds’ nests flying in all directions, leaves crushed, the vines which had draped themselves in profligate luxuriance along the boughs, torn up the roots and going down to disaster with the rest. Honeysuckle and wild grapes with clinging tendrils wilted and sank in the heat. As for the great trunks of the trees, their wounds bled resin, filling the air with pungent odour, while woodpeckers ran up and down them glutting themselves on the myriad insects that had made their home in the bark. Rabbits and groundhogs hid in the mounded boughs and at the noon hour the workmen amused themselves by discovering these and killing them. Some made catapults and became expert at shooting birds and squirrels, though if caught by Adeline in this pastime they tasted the sting of her anger. So, building up, tearing down, killing for the lust of killing, the days passed in bright succession.

The red plumes of the sumach turned to brown, the clusters of chokeberries ripened to blackness but still hung secure from birds because of their bitter flavor. Mushrooms sprang up in hordes on the cleared ground: meaty meadow mushrooms of a delicate brownish pink beneath; pretty parasol mushrooms with fringed edges; the destroying angel, set in its snow-white cup, and in the woods mushrooms of crimson and purple, pretty as flowers. Of the meadow mushrooms many a good dish was made for the table at Vaughanlands. Adeline never before had had such an appetite.

In early September young Robert Vaughan and Adeline set out together along the path which that summer had been made from Vaughanlands to the new estate. It led across a level field, red with the stubble of a fine crop of barley, through a wood of oaks and pines, then down steeply into the ravine where the stream which, in those days, almost merited the name of river, ran swiftly over shimmering sand and flat stones. In one place it narrowed between its banks and here a temporary bridge of logs had been thrown across. The pungent smell from their resin-oozing wood mingled with the cool damp earthy smell from the ravine. Adeline never
set her foot on this path without a sense of adventure. She had pride in realizing that this path, now well-cleared of undergrowth and showing a decided depression where feet had many times trodden it, was the print of her own and Philip’s passage. It had been virgin, untouched, but she and Philip had, as it were, made it a link between their old life and the new. She had trodden it in all sorts of weather and often alone. Now on this September day she thought she had never seen it so inviting. The season of mosquitoes was past, the air was of almost palpable sweetness and full of renewed bird song, for now the young could fly. The stream made a steady murmuring.

As they crossed the bridge of logs young Vaughan took her arm to guide her. Adeline was well able to cross the logs unaided and had done so many a time when they were slippery with rain. But now she leant against Robert’s shoulder as though timidly and her fingers clasped his.

“We shall have a rustic bridge here, later on,” she said.

He pressed her arm a little. “Then you won’t need my help.”

“Now I’m very glad of it.”

“If you knew what it has been to me,” he said, flushing, “to have you here. Before you came I never knew what to do with myself. You know, I’m not really acquainted with my parents yet. The truth is I feel that I know you better than I do them.”

“Ah, I’m easy to get on with.”

“It’s not that. But I feel you understand me and you are the only one who does.”

“You’re very sweet, Bobby.”

It was a real irritation to Robert’s parents to hear Adeline call him Bobby. They tried to intimate their disapproval by pronouncing his name very distinctly when they addressed him. But Adeline was oblivious to this or took, as they thought, pleasure in opposing them. The two began to mount the opposite side of the ravine.

“My mother is rather upset this morning,” said the boy.

“I hope it’s nothing I’ve done — or Philip or the children — or our dog or our goat.”

“No — nothing of that sort. It’s about a cousin of mine, Daisy Vaughan. She’s coming to visit us and Mother wishes she wouldn’t, just now.”

“Then why doesn’t she write and tell her not to?” asked Adeline.

“She can’t very well, as Father thinks we should have Daisy. She is his only brother’s child and an orphan. She’s been staying with relatives on her mother’s side, in Montreal. She’s had a falling-out with them and written a pathetic letter to Father and he’s inviting her to spend some months with us.”

“I declare,” said Adeline, “this is a nuisance! The house is full enough already, what with me and mine. No wonder your mother is vexed.”

“Oh, she’ll manage. Mother always does.”

“Do you know this Daisy?”

“Yes, I’ve been to her aunt’s house in Montreal. There were daughters in the house. I don’t think she got on very well with them.”

“Is she forward, then — or pert? If she is, I’ll take her down.”

“She’s almost as old as you. About twenty-five. Quite dashing, too, but not at all interesting to me. In fact, the thought of her coming bores me excessively. I hate the thought that college will soon open and I must go.” He looked into her eyes, his sensitive boy’s face troubled.

“Don’t worry, Bobby. We’re friends and always shall be.”

“I am not thinking of the future,” he said. “It’s the present that interests me. You make light of my feelings. You don’t care a tuppence, really.”

“I care a great deal. I am a stranger here. You have helped to make me happy.”

“You are lucky to be able to settle down so quickly. I don’t belong anywhere.”

Adeline opened her brown eyes wide at him. “Why, Bobby, what a way to talk! When you’ve had more experience of life you’ll not worry about belonging places.”

He answered gloomily — “That’s the trouble. I have no experience. You are only interested in men who have had experience. Your stiff-necked friend, Wilmott, for example.”

“What do you know about him?” she asked sharply.

“Oh, nothing — except that he looks unutterable things … I can’t tolerate him.”

They had, somewhat breathless from talking while they climbed, reached the top of the steep. The walls of the house rose before them, roofless, with gaping windows and scantling floors. Great stacks of brick and mounds of gravel flanked it. Piles of sweet-scented lumber lay ready. But the workmen, their lunches eaten, were having their noon-hour relaxation. They lay on the ground or sprawling on the lumber, with the exception of two French Canadians. These were lumbermen who had been attracted by the high wages Philip offered. As though they had not had exercise enough in their work they now were dancing with great vivacity and energy. They leaped, stamped, twirled, with intricate steps, snapping their fingers, their teeth flashing. One was middle-aged, with a red handkerchief tied about a thin corded neck, the other young, handsome but no more agile, indeed not so much so. The music for the dance was supplied by an old man seated on the great stump of a pine tree. He was Fiddling Jock. He had expected to be turned out but the Whiteoaks had been taken by his oddity and allowed him to stay on. Philip had given him shingles to mend his leaky roof and new glass to fill the broken windows. No one knew when the cottage had been built, probably by some settler who long ago had died or found the place too lonely. Adeline had christened it Fiddler’s Hut. Now she sang out: —

“Splendid, Jock! Ah, but that’s a fine tune! Play up! Make ’em dance!”

The old fellow nodded violently. With a flourish of his bow he increased the tempo of the music till the feet of the two dancers seemed possessed of a mad spirit. Robert Vaughan was, as usual, amused and a little embarrassed by her familiarity with the men. He would not have had her different but he resented the fact that her unconventionality gave rise to criticism in the neighborhood.
“Damn their strait-lacedness!” he thought. “She is perfect.” But still she made him feel embarrassed.

The Frenchmen sat down breathless. The old Scot reached for a tin mug of tea and took a swig of it. The mug was held to no visible mouth, for the lower part of his face was hidden by an enormous growth of grizzled beard. He wore a grey jacket and a kilt of Scotch tartan so faded that to which clan it belonged was no longer discernible. His bare knees were thin and hairy. He looked as durable and tough as a tree growing on a stony hillside but there was an appealing, lonely look in his wide-open blue eyes.

Adeline clapped her hands. She exclaimed: —

“You should give them an Irish tune, Jock. If you played an Irish jig for them on Irish pipes they’d not be hopping about in that feeble fashion.”

“There’s nae chunes sae fu’ o’ sperrit as the Scottish chunes,” he answered stoutly. “And as for dancin’, I’ll warrant no Irishman livin’ could beat you Frenchies.”

“Ah, you should see them dance in Galway,” she said. “And their whistling as clear as a pipe!”

“We have two Irishmen here,” said Jock, “and they have no more dance in them than clods.”

“They’re from Belfast. That’s the reason.” She turned to the French Canadians — “
Bon! Vous êtes très agiles. Je vous admire beaucoup.”

“Merci, Madame,”
they said in one voice.

“Wad ye be givin’ a pairty when ye move into your fine hoose?” asked Jock.

“Indeed we shall.”

“I’d like fine tae play ma fiddle for it. D’ye think I micht? I’ll learn an Irish jig for the occasion if ye’ll allow me.”

“I engage you on the spot.”

“It will cost ye naething, mind. I’d like to mak’ a return for a’ ye’ve done for me.”

As they went toward the walls of the house Robert exclaimed — “You can’t have that fellow at your party! It would be the talk of the countryside.”

“But he plays at all the weddings and christenings, doesn’t he?”

“Not of your sort.”

“I’m just an immigrant,” she declared. “I want to be like the other immigrants.”

“Captain Whiteoak will never agree.”

“We shall see.”

They mounted the temporary steps and went in at the doorless door.

But Robert continued to look gloomy. He said — “Women exert too much influence on us men.”

A dimple darted into Adeline’s cheek and away again.

“If she’s the right sort of woman it’s good for you, isn’t it?”

“The right sort of woman could do anything with me.”

“Then we must be on the watch for her. But don’t you ever let her do things to you till I have inspected her … Come along, Bobby, let’s see the house!” She took his hand and led him in. “Isn’t it enchanting?”