“Who is talking scandal now?” asked Gilbert.
“A thing that is so old ceases to be scandal and becomes history. Well, I must go and placate Susan and get this cake in the oven. It’s for Kenneth Ford’s birthday ... they’ll be at the House of Dreams Wednesday, you know.”
“Have you got reconciled to exchanging the House of Dreams for Ingleside?”
“Long ago,” said Anne. But she sighed. After all, there would never be any place for her quite like the House of Dreams.
Meanwhile Clarissa Wilcox walked along the road to Lowbridge with the step of a young girl. Her dark hair, as the doctor had said, had few grey hairs in it, but looked rather unnatural around her wrinkled face. It was covered by a crocheted fascinator, as it used to be called, which Blanche had made for her long ago. She seldom went anywhere so it had lasted well. She never cared ... now ... what she wore. She had a long, thin mouth and a dreadful smile when she smiled at all. Very few people, if they had thought about it, had ever seen Clarissa Wilcox smile.
But she was smiling now. David Anderson was sick ... sick unto death ... and her hour had come. The Wilcoxes had always hated the Bakers but Clarissa forgave them everything now, for the sake of what Susan had told her. In Clarissa’s eyes Susan Baker was a young upstart, who put on silly airs because she was employed at Ingleside ... “Quite a step up in the world for a Baker,” thought Clarissa scornfully ... but she forgave her for being a Baker. If she had not told her she might not have known till it was too late that David Anderson was sick or dying.
The magic light of a long, blue evening was sifting in from the Four Winds Harbour but the wind was rising rapidly. It sighed in the tall old spruces along the road and it seemed to Clarissa that ghostly years were calling to her in its voice. It was not an ordinary wind ... it was a wind of death blowing for David Anderson. What if he died before she got to him? Susan Baker had said he might pass out any minute. She hurried faster along the road to Lowbridge.
In the distance two ships were sailing out of the Four Winds Harbour ... likely his ships, she thought, forgetting that David Anderson had retired from business years ago. To be sure, some nephews of his carried it on. Where were they going? Ceylon ... Singapore ... Mandalay? Once the names would have thrilled her ... once she had longed to see those alluring places.
But it was Rose who saw them with him ... Rose instead of Blanche as it should have been ... and Rose was dead, too. But the ships still went out, although David Anderson, who had been a shipbuilder and owner all his life, carrying on trade in ports all over the world, had long ceased to go in them.
He left that to his son. His son! Perhaps!
Clarissa did not even know that his son was a ship surgeon and seldom was ever seen in Lowbridge.
Lowbridge was before her ... and David. There on the Main Street was David Anderson’s rich, splendid house, where Rose had queened it for years. It was still rich and splendid in Clarissa Wilcox’s eyes, although the younger generation were beginning to call it old-fashioned and out-of-date. Little white cherry blossoms were fluttering down on the walks through the cool spring air.
The wide door was open and she went in unseen ... across the hall ... up the wide, velvet stairs where her footsteps made no sound. All about her were empty rooms. Dr. Blythe had just made his last call on David Anderson and now he was standing at the gate talking to the white-garbed nurse whom both he and Dr. Parker wanted at the same time.
“I really think I ought to go to Dr. Parker’s case,” she was saying slowly. She would really much rather have taken on Dr. Blythe’s. He was much more reasonable than Dr. Parker, who, for instance, would have disapproved of her leaving David Anderson for a moment, as long as the breath was in his body. As if it made any difference now!
“Go to Parker’s, by all means,” said Dr. Blythe. “I can get Lucy Marks, who is on a visit with her mother over at Mowbray Narrows. You will not be needed here much longer,” he added significantly.
“Young fools,” thought Clarissa. “She is trying to get up a flirtation with Dr. Blythe.”
To old Clarissa Wilcox both of them seemed mere children. But she did not care what they did. The only thing that mattered to her was that she was alone with David Anderson ... her longed-for chance had come at last, after years of waiting. All about her were empty rooms ... the dead and the dying were soon forgotten, she reflected bitterly. Even the nurse had left the dying man alone. Blanche, she thought, should have reigned in those rooms. She would not have left her husband to die alone. It did not occur to Clarissa that Blanche might have died before him as Rose had done. The Wilcoxes had good constitutions, she reflected proudly.
As she had come up the stairs she had glanced through the portieres of dull gold velvet that hung in the library doorway. They were old and worn but to Clarissa they seemed as splendid as ever. She saw the portrait of Rose hanging over the fireplace ... where Blanche’s should have hung.
Rose had been painted in her wedding gown of ivory satin. David Anderson had had it painted by a visiting artist and Clarissa well remembered the local sensation it had made in Lowbridge, which was just a small village then where even photographs were taken once in a lifetime. When it was painted and hung David Anderson had given a party to celebrate it. It was talked of for months.
Although Clarissa saw nobody it seemed to her that whispers seemed to haunt the house. It was full of shadows ... shadows that seemed to grasp at you. They must be shadows that had come to attend David Anderson into eternity. Rose and Blanche and Lloyd Norman ... and who knew who else. But she would not be daunted by them. She had things to say ... things to say that would astonish them all except Blanche ... and perhaps ... who knew? ... Lloyd Norman. And the time was getting short. At any moment that gossiping nurse might return.
Ah, here was his room at last ... a long, feline room with a little fire at the end of it, like the red tongue of a cat. The room he had shared with Rose!
And there was nobody in it except the dying David Anderson. What a piece of good fortune! She had been afraid that the nurse might have called in the housekeeper to keep watch while she talked at the gate with Dr. Blythe. There was not even a light and the crowding trees outside made it dimmer still. Of course it did not matter to David, who could no longer see ... but still it gave Clarissa a feeling of horror she could not have explained. The ghosts would have it all their own way in the dimness. She knew people did not believe in ghosts nowadays. She had heard both Dr. Blythe and Dr. Parker telling ghost stories and laughing over them. When they reached her age they would be wiser. And what an assemblage of ghosts must be crowding about David Anderson’s bed!
The perfume of the lilac hedge below came up through the window heavily. Clarissa had never liked the scent of lilac blossoms. They always made her think of some secret, too-sweet thing ... perhaps like the love between David Anderson and Blanche Wilcox. Or ... again, who knew ... between Rose Anderson and Lloyd Norman. Again, for the thousandth time, Clarissa wished she knew the whole truth about that matter.
There was a vase on the table full of some white flowers that glimmered spectrally through the dusk. That was amusing. David Anderson had never cared for flowers. She supposed the nurse thought it part of her duties. Or maybe somebody had sent them in. She remembered a rose Blanche had given him and which he had dropped carelessly on the garden walk. Had he cared more for Rose’s flowers? She, Clarissa, had picked up that rose and had it somewhere yet ... only she could not remember where. In some old dusty, faded volume of poems, she thought.
On the wall above the flowers hung a miniature of Rose. It had been painted while they were away on one of their visits. Clarissa hated the portrait in the library but she hated the miniature still more. It was so intimate and possessive ... as if it slyly flaunted its complete ownership of David Anderson.
Clarissa hated everything about it. She hated the pale, shining golden curls on either side of the vivid rose-and-white face ... Blanche had had black hair ... the larg
e, round blue eyes, the rosebud mouth ... rosebud mouths were in fashion then. Who ever saw one now? ... the sloping shoulders ... they had gone out, too. The nurse had shoulders square as a man’s.
The frame was of gold with a golden bowknot atop. Rose, she knew, had given it to David on one of his birthdays ... after she had begun carrying on with Lloyd Norman, too. Well, Blanche would have been true to him, at least. The Wilcoxes were always true to their husbands, even when they hated them.
After all, Clarissa was glad the room was dim. She did not want to say what she had to say to David Anderson with Rose smiling down triumphantly at her.
After one glance of hatred Clarissa thought no more of it ... or of anything but David Anderson. He was lying in the old-fashioned, canopy-top bed which had been his father’s and mother’s and in which he and Rose had slept all their married life.
His face on the pillow was a face of yellow wax. His eyes ... his smoky grey eyes, which had been, so they said, an inheritance from his Irish mother ... were hidden under wrinkled lids. His long-fingered, exquisite, rather cruel hands were lying on the spread. She remembered once, long years ago, they had walked home from somewhere ... she could not remember from where, but she remembered the clasp of his hands. But that was before Rose ...
The deep dimple was still in his chin ... Blanche had used to put her finger teasingly into that dimple. No doubt a hundred other girls had, too. What was that old proverb about a sailor with a lass in every port? Why, she had heard Dr. Blythe quote it one day. How proverbs lived while people died! Clarissa wondered who had said it first.
But at least the dimple had not changed. His magnificent white hair swept back from his brow. He was an old man but he did not seem old even as he lay there, dying.
And, thought Clarissa with a shudder, he still gave you the feeling that he was doing you a favour in allowing you to look at him. All the Andersons had it, more or less, but it was most strongly marked in David.
Clarissa sat down on a chair. Her breath came as fast as if she had been running. Only a few seconds had elapsed since she had entered the room but she felt as if she had been there for a century.
And she was surprised ... unpleasantly surprised ... to find that she was still afraid of him. She had always been afraid of him ... she admitted it at last ... but she had never dreamed that she would be afraid of him, now that he was as good as dead.
And she had not expected that he would still be able to make her feel crude ... silly ... always in the wrong. As if the Andersons were so much above the Wilcoxes! But he could ... and did.
She found her thin, veined hands trembling. And she was furious. She had waited a lifetime for this hour ... and she would not be robbed of it. If the nurse or the housekeeper came she would slam the door in their faces.
She fought down her weakness. Her voice was quite steady when she finally spoke ... steady and clear and quite young. Youth seemed to have come back to her. She and David Anderson were both young and it was all nonsense that he was dying ... just gossip that somebody had started. But then Rose must be young, too, and that she would not have. No, they were all old and she must say things quickly, or someone would come in and she would lose her chance.
The old house seemed listening to the cold poison of her words. At times the gusts of wind died away, too, as if the whole world wanted to listen. Dr. Blythe and the nurse were still talking at the gate. Men were all alike. What would Mrs. Blythe say if she knew?
“Tonight I shall rest well for the first time in years, David Anderson. Rest as well as you who will be dead. Dead, David Anderson. You never thought you could die, did you? Perhaps you will not rest ... if it is true that the soul survives the body. But I shall rest ... for I shall have told you what I have always wanted to tell you ... what I have waited years to tell you.
“How I have hated you always ... always! You won’t believe that. You thought nobody could hate you. How I have looked forward to seeing you on your deathbed! My only fear in all these years has been that I might die before you. But I knew Heaven would not allow such an injustice. The world is full of injustice but there are some things that are not allowed. This was one of them. You cannot see me, David Anderson, but you can hear ... at least, Dr. Blythe says you can and he is one of the few honest men I know.
“You ruined and killed my sister Blanche. You knew she died ... but you did not know that her child lived! Ah, if you could move I think you would start at that. Very few people ever knew it ... we Wilcoxes had our pride as well as the proud Andersons. And we could keep a secret.
“You thought her child died with its mother. You thought you were safe. But it did not. A cousin of ours took it. It was a boy, David Anderson. Perhaps your only son. Ah, that should make you flinch if you had any power of movement left. But you never mistrusted Rose, did you? In your eyes she was the perfect wife. And all the time ... well, never mind. Gossip will be gossip, you know. Your son was called John Lovel. When he was seventeen he came back to Lowbridge and you gave him a job in your shipping office ... a poor, underpaid job. Your son, David Anderson. Do you remember? I doubt it. I suppose you have forgotten him long ago.
“I think perhaps I was the only one who knew the secret. But some may have guessed it ... for he was the living image of you. When he had been with you two years he took some money from your safe. Your partner wanted to overlook his fault ... he said he was so young ... and our cousin had not troubled himself much about his bringing up. But you were relentless. Do you remember, David Anderson? Your son ... your son ... went to jail and when he came out five years later he was a criminal. Your son, David Anderson!
“I can prove all this ... and when you are dead I shall publish it!
“Everyone will know that you, the just, upright, censorious man ... it was all so long ago that people have forgotten your wild youth ... why, you are even an elder in the church, aren’t you?
“But when you are dead and buried ... beside Rose, David Anderson ... everyone will know that you were the lover of a girl you ruined and the father of an illegitimate son who is a jailbird. I shall see that it is talked about at your funeral. I have proof as I have told you, David Anderson.
“How will the minister feel when he is preaching your funeral sermon? And how I will be laughing to myself. For I will be there, David Anderson. Oh, yes, I will be there. I have not gone anywhere for years but I will go to your funeral. I would not miss it for anything. Think how people will talk. Even the young ones who have forgotten you ... to whom you are only a name. They will talk about it for many a day. The Andersons will try to hush it up but they will not be able to. Oh, no, people love gossip too much, even when it is fifty years old or more. Mrs. Blythe will not say it is history by that time. She will find she is in the wrong.
“I am talking far too much and taking up too much time. Dr. Blythe will have finished his absorbing conversation with your nurse before long and she will come in, pussycat that she is.
“But it is so long since I have had a chance to talk to you, David Anderson. And there is so much I want to say to you before you die.
“You will be buried in the Anderson plot ... beside Rose. The vacant space is left on the gravestone for your name. Did it ever occur to you, David Anderson, that there was another name she might better have liked to have there? No, I don’t think it did. There could be no higher honour than having the name of Anderson on your tombstone, could there? But it should be Blanche, and not Rose, David Anderson.
“And when people pass your grave they will point it out and say, ‘Old David Anderson is buried there. He was a hypocrite.’
“Oh, yes, they will. I will take care they shall not forget. Even the younger ones will not forget. For one person I shall tell is Susan Baker. She will not forget. The Bakers always hated the Andersons. The Andersons did not care ... perhaps they did not know. The Bakers were too humble to be of any importance to an Anderson. I suppose they hated the Wilcoxes, too. People always hate those who are above them
.
“But times have changed, David Anderson. The Bakers have quite an opinion of themselves now. Susan is even proud of working at Ingleside. She would not do a tap of work for anyone else. But she has not forgotten the old feud. She will be glad to hear of your disgrace, David Anderson. And I shall enjoy telling her. She pretends not to like gossip ... she likes to imitate that stuck-up Mrs. Blythe in every way she can. I could tell Mrs. Blythe a few things about Dr. Blythe and his nurses ... yes, and about him and Mrs. Owen Ford if I wanted to. But it is nothing to me. My business is with you, David Anderson.
“Oh, how I shall laugh when I pass your grave! I go through the graveyard every Sunday ... for I still go to church, David Anderson. Going to church seems to be going out of fashion ... but I go every Sunday I can ... and I go by that little path through the graveyard. People think I am a very devoted daughter ... if they think about it at all. But I go through it to laugh ... quietly, to myself ... knowing that if I opened my mouth, I could blacken that spotless reputation of which you were so proud. And now I shall laugh more than ever.
“You were a proud man always, David Anderson ... proud even for an Anderson. Do you remember the time you would not sit beside my cousin in school because he was a Wilcox? And you were prouder as you grew older. Proud of your wife ... of your big business ... of your beautiful ships ... proud of being Captain Anderson ... proud of your rich, fine house ... did it ever occur to you that Rose married you for your house? ... proud of your handsome son.
“Are you sure he was your son, David Anderson?
“Ah, now we come to it. Other people were not quite so sure. Ask Susan Baker’s grandfather when you meet him on the other side.
“Your beautiful Rose had a lover. You didn’t know that ... you never even suspected it. I knew it ... perhaps I was the only one who knew it ... but a good many suspected it. Why, even Susan Baker spoke of it when you had your stroke. She said her grandfather saw your Rose and Lloyd Norman one night. And there were suspicions of you and Blanche, too, though you thought you were so careful.