CHAPTER XXVI
Natalie and her mother were sitting on the west veranda of ConsolationCottage at the evening hour. Just within the open door of thedining-room mammy swayed to and fro in a vast rocking-chair that lookedtoo big for her.
The years had not dealt kindly with the three. Years in the tropicsnever do deal kindly with women. Mammy had grown old and thin. Herclothes, frayed, but clean, hung loosely upon her. Her hair was turninggray. She wore steel-rimmed glasses. Mrs. Leighton's face, while it hadnot returned to the apathy of the years of sorrow at Nadir, was stilldeeply lined and of the color and texture of old parchment. The blue ofher eyes had paled and paled until light seemed to have almost gone fromthem. To Natalie had come age with youth. She gave the impression of afreshly cut flower suddenly wilted by the sun.
In Mrs. Leighton's lap lay two letters. One had brought the news thatNatalie had inherited from a Northern Leighton aunt an old property on aNew England hillside. The other contained the third offer from adevelopment company that had long coveted the grounds about ConsolationCottage.
"It's a great deal of money, dear," said Mrs. Leighton to Natalie. "Whatshall we do?"
For a moment Natalie did not reply, and when she spoke, it was not inanswer. She said:
"Mother, where is Lew? I want him." Her low voice quivered with desire.
Mrs. Leighton put her fingers into Natalie's soft hair and drew thegirl's head against her breast. A lump rose in her throat. She longed tomurmur comfort, but she had long since lost the habit of words. What waslife worth if she could not buy with it happiness for this her onlyremaining love?
"Darling," she whispered at last, "whatever you wish, whatever you say,we'll do. Do you think--would you like to go back to--to Nadir--and lookfor Lewis?"
Natalie divined the sacrifice in those halting words. Her thin arms wentup around Ann Leighton's neck. She pressed her face hard against hermother's shoulder. She wanted to cry, but could not. Without raising herface, she shook her head and said:
"No, no. I don't want ever to go back to Nadir. Lew is not there. Thatnight--that night after we buried father I went out on the hills andcalled for Lew. He did not answer. Suddenly I just knew he wasn't there.I knew that he was far, far away."
Ann Leighton did not try to reason against instinct. She softly rockedNatalie to and fro, her pale eyes fixed on the setting sun. Graduallythe sunset awoke in her mind a stabbing memory. Here on this bench shehad sat, Natalie, a baby, in her lap, and in the shelter of her armslittle Lewis and--and Shenton, her boy. By yonder rail she had stoodwith her unconscious boy in her arms, and day had suddenly ceased asthough beyond the edge of the world somebody had put out the lightforever. Her pale eyes grew luminous. The unaccustomed tears welled upin them and trickled down the cheeks that had known so long a drought.They rained on Natalie's head.
"Mother!" cried Natalie, looking up--"Mother!" Then she buried her faceagain in Ann's bosom, and together they sobbed out all the oppressingpain and grief of life's heavy moment. Not by strength alone, but alsoby frailty, do mothers hold the hearts of their children. Natalie,hearing and feeling her mother sob, passed beyond the bourn ofgenerations and knew Ann and herself as one in an indivisible, quiveringhumanity.
Mammy's chair stopped rocking. She listened; then she got up and cameout on the veranda. Her eyes fell upon mother and daughter huddledtogether in the dusk. She hovered over them. Her loose clothes made herseem ample, almost stolid.
"Wha' fo' you chilun's crying?" she demanded.
"We're _not_ crying," sobbed Natalie.
"Huh!" snorted mammy. "Yo' jes come along outen this night air, bof ofyo', an' have yo' suppah. Come on along, Miss Ann. Come on along, yo'young Miss Natalie."
"Just a minute, mammy; in just a minute," gasped Natalie. "You go putsupper on the table." Then she rose to her feet, and drew her mother upto her. "Kiss me," she said and smiled. She was suddenly strong againwith the strength of youth.
Ann kissed her and she, too, almost smiled.
"Well, dear?" she said.
"We're going away," said Natalie, holding protecting arms around hermother. "We're going to sell this place, and then we're just going awayinto another world. This one's too rough for just women. We'll go seethat old house Aunt Jed left to me. I want to live just once in a housethat has had more than one life."
Day after day the ship moved steadily northward on an even keel. Uponmammy, Natalie, and Mrs. Leighton a miracle began to descend. Years fellfrom their straightening shoulders. At the end of a week, Ann Leighton,kneeling alone in her cabin, began her nightly devotions with a paeanthat sounded strangely in her own ears: "Oh, Thou Who hast redeemed mylife from destruction, crowned me with loving-kindness and tendermercies, Who hast satisfied my mouth with good things so that my youthis renewed like the eagle's!"