GI Brides (15 page)

Elaine turned and looked at the woman.

“Haven’t I seen you before?” she said. “What’s your name?”

It was just at that moment that Lexie arrived at the back door, and Cinda turned and hurried away.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I think I hear somebody at the kitchen door,” and she vanished from the room, leaving Elaine’s question hanging in midair.

Then Lexie breezed in quietly and pleasantly, bearing in her countenance enough of the cheer from her hour with the judge to give her an appearance of authority.

“Oh Elaine,” she said in an interested tone, “you’ve had a nice long sleep, haven’t you? Do you feel better? I hope you do, and that you’re going to be able to eat a little supper. You’ve scarcely eaten a thing since you came.”

“There hasn’t been anything fit to eat!” said Elaine grumpily. “It does seem to me that you had time enough after my telegram arrived to get some decent food in the house, when I took all that trouble to let you know I was coming.”

Lexie drew a deep breath and tried to smile.

“Sorry, Elaine, but I didn’t dare do anything about it until I was sure you were going to stay more than an hour or two. I didn’t think you would be satisfied with a closed-up house and everything packed away, and I thought it best to wait till I could talk to you about it. You see, I didn’t understand that you would feel you had to stay here when you found that I was not living here.”

“No,” said Elaine. “I didn’t figure on anything like that, but I knew you would
have
to stop college when I got here and you found what you were up against.”

“I see,” said Lexie, refusing to argue the matter. “Well, now suppose we put the matter aside and try to see what we can make out of things as they are. It really isn’t worthwhile to argue about it. Are you ready for something to eat yet, or do you want me to go and get the children? It seems they must be tired and hungry by this time, and I think the new nurse has dinner almost ready, if I may judge by the nice pleasant odors that are filling the house. I think I’d better go out and see if she found everything, or maybe needs my help in anything. I’ll look for the children, too, and bring them back with me. I’ll be back in a minute!” And Lexie vanished, not heeding her sister’s fretful, insistent call.

She soon came back with the three children trooping after her and escorted them to the dining room, where their mother heard them clamoring happily that they wanted “some o’ that, an’ that, an’ a
lot
of real honey.” Real honey in a honeycomb, Lexie had bought the last time she went to the store, and it went well with the hot biscuits Cinda had made and the milk that filled their glasses.

So Elaine called in vain for her sister, and finally started to rise and find out why Lexie didn’t answer her call, but came face-to-face with Cinda and such a tempting-looking tray that she suffered herself to be arranged with a table by her side and a napkin tucked in at her neck and a plate put within her reach. There was a cup of real coffee filling the room with its delicate aroma. For Cinda had some precious coffee from her own rationing, which she had brought with her, and had used a tiny bit of it to “work her lady” as she told herself grimly. She wanted with all her might to help Lexie, brave little Lexie, and she determined if good food and giving up her own cup of coffee now and then would help, she would do it. Lexie wasn’t going to be the only one to sacrifice.

So Elaine ate her supper quiet, interestedly, and Lexie and the children ate theirs in comparative peace, save for the gossip that Angelica and Gerald retailed from time to time, concerning the misdeeds of “that bad old lawyer” who had come to see their mother that morning and of whom they had that afternoon overheard not a little that was not intended for their ears.

But Lexie managed those children into bed very soon, for they were really tired from hard play, climbing trees and digging in gardens where they shouldn’t have been, and piling wood by other people’s back doors where it wasn’t intended to be. They were tired and dirty. So Lexie, tired as she was, managed a bath apiece and got them into bed, one at a time, and they were very soon all three sound asleep. The mother none the wiser. Perhaps that was one secret of their subjection, for they and their mother did not seem to get on at all well together.

Very tired, at last Lexie responded to an angry call from Elaine and went in to sink in a chair and let Elaine complain.

“Lexie, did you know that maid out in the kitchen isn’t a trained nurse at all? She says she is something special, but I know better. She hasn’t even a uniform. At least she says she left them all packed up at home, but I’m inclined to think she never had any. She hasn’t the least sign of real training, and I told you I wouldn’t have any other.”

“I know, Elaine,” said Lexie wearily, “but there really wasn’t anybody else to be had.”

“Fiddlesticks! I’ll wager
I
can find somebody when I get well enough to take over the matter. However, she brought me a very creditable supper when you consider what she had to make it with. But Lexie, did you know she was the old woman who used to live down the lane behind the mulberry bushes? She says her name is Lucinda, and I began to remember about her. I should have thought you would have known she never would do. She was half-crazy or something, wasn’t she?”

“No, she wasn’t crazy. She’s a very wise old woman, and very kindly if you don’t antagonize her. But Elaine, she was the only one I knew to go after. You know I’ve been away from this region for almost four years, and it isn’t easy now to pick up anybody to do anything. Besides, she was just about moving, and it meant something to her to have a room at once; that was the only reason she was willing to come. That and because she knew us. And besides, I had to tell her we hadn’t anything to pay her with at present, and most people wouldn’t come to a place like that anyway. And by the way, Elaine, we’ve simply got to talk about money. Have you enough to pay the grocery bill while I’m gone away to see how I can get my affairs straightened out? Because I have hardly anything left, and I’m not sure there is enough food in the house to last more than a couple of days. But if you say your ration books are in your trunk, why, we ought to be able to get things as soon as they come, but they will have to be paid for at once. They have no charge accounts at any of our stores out here anymore, and even the larger stores in the city insist on having charge accounts paid up every month or you have to give up the account.”

“How perfectly horrid!” said Elaine. “I’ll speak to my lawyer and see what can be done about that. I simply won’t buy where I can’t have things charged.”

“But you don’t understand.
All
the stores are that way now.
Everybody
is obliged to pay, no matter how wealthy they are.”

“Well, we’ll see. Bettinger will be out in the morning. He telegraphed a little while ago and said he would, and if he can’t make some arrangement with a store near here, I’ll just borrow some money from him, that’s all.”

“Borrow of
him
! Oh Elaine!” cried Lexie in despair. Please,
please,
don’t do that! You just don’t understand. It is all wrong.”

“Nonsense! It’s you that does not understand, my prissy little sister. I’ve always known how to get what I wanted from any man, and I shall get it this time, too! I’d thank you not to say any more such things about my lawyer, and not to poison the minds of my innocent little children about him either. I mean that! And what’s more, if you don’t stop this nonsense, I’ll tell him what you are saying about him, and I’ll tell him
right before you,
too! It’s time you stopped passing on such slanderous gossip. Do you understand?”

Lexie caught her breath and closed her eyes for an instant.

“I understand that I’m very tired, and I’ve simply
got
to go to bed or I won’t be fit to get up in the morning,” she answered desperately. “Can I help you any before I go, Elaine, or can you manage alone?”

“No, you needn’t help me. I don’t care for such unwilling assistance as I get from you anyway. You can send that so-called nurse in to help me to bed. If she’s a nurse she ought to be able to do that at least.”

Lexie looked at her sister aghast for a minute. Would Cinda be willing to perform menial services for Elaine, or not? Then she turned and went softly out to consult with Lucinda.

But before she could say anything to Lucinda, that dignitary spoke first in an indignant whisper: “Sure I’ll do it. This once, anyhow. Yes, I heard every blessed word she said, and it’s no more’n I expected. If I was you I’d go your journey the first thing in the morning and not let her know you’re going till you’re gone. That way you’ll be out of the house when that dratted lawyer comes, and you won’t have to bother with him. And you leave the rest to me. Them childer’ll be all right. I can get on with ’em, an’ ef I can’t I know how to spank good and proper, and keep their mammy from finding out about it, too. So you don’t need to fret. I’ll carry on till you come back, anyway, and if it gets so bad I have to quit after that, why I’ll just quit. That is, if you say so. You’re my real boss, you know. Not
her
.”

Lexie smiled a tired little smile.

“All right! Thank you, Cinda. I’ll go as you suggest. Early. You’ll know how to order and save points, won’t you? And if I find I can’t return at once, at least I can send you a check for five dollars right away when I get my checkbook, and perhaps that’ll go till I can send you more. Though
perhaps
my sister will have
some
money to pay for things. I don’t know. You might ask her, if you need anything very badly. I do hope she won’t borrow of that terrible man, but I’m afraid I can’t do anything about it, not till I can get some money that some people owe me, anyway.”

“Now, Miss Lexie, you go right along, and I’ll manage somehow. There’s canned goods in this house enough to keep from starving for a long time, and if your sister wants something better, let her get it! Doesn’t she get something off the government of her husband being in the army? Or doesn’t she? She oughtta, I should think.”

“I don’t know, Cinda. She doesn’t tell me things like that. Even if I ask her she doesn’t tell me. She’s got an idea in her head that our father left some money for her and that my mother and I used it up, and she’s trying to get it out of me somehow. I don’t know how she ever got that notion. But she has it, and unless she can find out the truth about it and know there never was any, I’m sure I don’t see how I’m ever going to get along with her.”

“Well, Miss Lexie, you just run along to your college and get your matters straightened out, and then if you want you can telegraph me what you want I should do, and I’ll do it. You trust me. I can hannell things all right. Now go right to bed, an’ I’ll wake you up in plenty o’ time in the mornin’.”

So Lexie finally went to bed, creeping in softly beside the sleeping Bluebell and praying that God would somehow bring her affairs out right, thinking with great gratitude of Judge Foster as she fell asleep.

But Judge Foster was lying at that very moment in a hospital bed, unconscious, as a result of an automobile accident.

Lexie, happily ignorant of this, went on her cautious way the next morning, rejoicing that she had so strong and wise a friend as Judge Foster, who had made her see so plainly that she need not be frightened but might go safely on in the right way.

L
ater in the day, after Lexie had had a long talk with the dean of her college, and he had given her two propositions to choose from, she went to her old room and sat down in perplexity. Should she try to stay here in college now for three months more, and get through with her examinations before she went home, trusting that she could get another job at home afterward? Or should she accept the dean’s offer to make arrangements with the university in the city near home to let her finish her course and take examinations with them? Or what would be best? At last she went to the telephone and called up Judge Foster’s office to ask his advice. He had told her to do so if she felt at all worried about anything. But when she finally succeeded in getting the judge’s office, what was her dismay to be told by that cold-voiced secretary of his that Judge Foster was unable to talk with her as he was lying unconscious in the hospital and they were not even sure he would recover.

She hung up the receiver and sat limply down in a chair in the quiet office room where she was phoning. Not only was she filled with sorrow because this dear old friend of the years was in danger of his life, but she was also overcome with a great dismay. This newly found old friend was gone again, taken away from her need, and she had to go on
without
his help, at least until he got well. Perhaps he might
never
get well and she would have to go on through her sea of perplexities alone! Suddenly Lexie put her head down on her folded arms on the desk and wept.

“Oh God! You’ll have to take over for me! I haven’t any other friend to guide me, and I don’t know what to do. Should I stay here and finish and let Elaine see what a mess she’s made of things, or should I go home and try to help and see this thing through? Is this something You are expecting—wanting me to do for You? For righteousness? Won’t You please show me right away?”

It was just then that the telephone girl from the dean’s office opened the door and said: “Oh, you’re still here, aren’t you, Miss Kendall? I was afraid you had gone. There is someone calling you from your hometown. They want to speak with you right away. They say it’s very important. Will you take it on this phone?”

Lexie sat up and looked at the girl in amazement. It seemed so much like an answer to her prayer, that call from home. For of course no one would have called her unless something had happened. Or would they? She tried to summon up reasons, but her tired brain could think of nothing but that this message would decide one way or the other what she must do.

Yes, it was Lucinda’s unmistakable voice.

“Miss Lexie, that you? Now ain’t that somethin’, to think I could get you right away! Miss Lexie, I’m that sorry, but things has been happenin’ thick an’ fast ever since you left this mornin’, an’ I’m sorry, but I guess you gotta come back right away. First, Elaine she took on somethin’ terrible when she found you’d left without tellin’ her, an’ she cried herself sick. An’ then her lawyer, he sent a message he couldn’t come out today, ‘count of a court case he hadta try, an’ that angered her. An’ then Miss Angelica had a fistfight with that boy that’s visitin’ acrost the road, an’ got herself a black eye, an’ Miss Elaine went out an’ give that boy a regular jawin’ an’ finally hit him with a broom when he was sassy. Then his aunt come out an’ give back words an’ threatened to send fer the p’loice. An’ then while that was goin’ on, Gerry, he went out an’ monkeyed with the neighbor’s lawn mower an’ cut his foot bad, an’ I hadta send for the doctor. An’ whiles he was comin’, Bluebell, she went out, an’ got stung by a big bumblebee in the clover, an’ she was crying fit ta raise the dead, an’ her mamma all in hystericks when the doctor come. An’ meself that near crazy I wasn’t knowin’ which ta do first. An’ then ta crown all, that Elaine went up ta the attic and pulled out every blessed thing from the boxes an’ trunks and bureaus an’ left ’em all strewed around the floor. She told me she was looking among your mother’s things for some very important papers she needed for evidence, an’ she claimed to have found what she wanted in your mother’s diary book. So I guess you better come back an’ set things goin’ straight. I’m awful sorry ta havta call you, but it’s me that don’t know what to do first.”