Book: Rainbow Valley

L >> Lucy Maud Montgomery >> Rainbow Valley




Carl was talking the matter over in the graveyard with Faith and
Una, who had just come home. They were horrified at the idea of
his being whipped--and by father, who had never done such a
thing! But they agreed soberly that it was just.

"You know it was a dreadful thing to do," sighed Faith. "And you
never owned up in the club."

"I forgot," said Carl. "Besides, I didn't think any harm came of
it. I didn't know she jarred her legs. But I'm to be whipped
and that will make things square."

"Will it hurt--very much?" said Una, slipping her hand into
Carl's.

"Oh, not so much, I guess," said Carl gamely. "Anyhow, I'm not
going to cry, no matter how much it hurts. It would make father
feel so bad, if I did. He's all cut up now. I wish I could whip
myself hard enough and save him doing it."

After supper, at which Carl had eaten little and Mr. Meredith
nothing at all, both went silently into the study. The switch
lay on the table. Mr. Meredith had had a bad time getting a
switch to suit him. He cut one, then felt it was too slender.
Carl had done a really indefensible thing. Then he cut
another--it was far too thick. After all, Carl had thought the
eel was dead. The third one suited him better; but as he picked
it up from the table it seemed very thick and heavy--more like a
stick than a switch.

"Hold out your hand," he said to Carl.

Carl threw back his head and held out his hand unflinchingly.
But he was not very old and he could not quite keep a little fear
out of his eyes. Mr. Meredith looked down into those eyes--why,
they were Cecilia's eyes--her very eyes--and in them was the
selfsame expression he had once seen in Cecilia's eyes when she
had come to him to tell him something she had been a little
afraid to tell him. Here were her eyes in Carl's little, white
face--and six weeks ago he had thought, through one endless,
terrible night, that his little lad was dying.

John Meredith threw down the switch.

"Go," he said, "I cannot whip you."

Carl fled to the graveyard, feeling that the look on his father's
face was worse than any whipping.

"Is it over so soon?" asked Faith. She and Una had been holding
hands and setting teeth on the Pollock tombstone.

"He--he didn't whip me at all," said Carl with a sob, "and--I
wish he had--and he's in there, feeling just awful."

Una slipped away. Her heart yearned to comfort her father. As
noiselessly as a little gray mouse she opened the study door and
crept in. The room was dark with twilight. Her father was
sitting at his desk. His back was towards her--his head was in
his hands. He was talking to himself--broken, anguished words--
but Una heard--heard and understood, with the sudden illumination
that comes to sensitive, unmothered children. As silently as she
had come in she slipped out and closed the door. John Meredith
went on talking out his pain in what he deemed his undisturbed
solitude.



CHAPTER XXXIV. UNA VISITS THE HILL

Una went upstairs. Carl and Faith were already on their way
through the early moonlight to Rainbow Valley, having heard
therefrom the elfin lilt of Jerry's jews-harp and having guessed
that the Blythes were there and fun afoot. Una had no wish to
go. She sought her own room first where she sat down on her bed
and had a little cry. She did not want anybody to come in her
dear mother's place. She did not want a stepmother who would
hate her and make her father hate her. But father was so
desperately unhappy--and if she could do any anything to make him
happier she MUST do it. There was only one thing she could
do--and she had known the moment she had left the study that she
must do it. But it was a very hard thing to do.

After Una cried her heart out she wiped her eyes and went to the
spare room. It was dark and rather musty, for the blind had not
been drawn up nor the window opened for a long time. Aunt Martha
was no fresh-air fiend. But as nobody ever thought of shutting a
door in the manse this did not matter so much, save when some
unfortunate minister came to stay all night and was compelled to
breathe the spare room atmosphere.

There was a closet in the spare room and far back in the closet a
gray silk dress was hanging. Una went into the closet and shut
the door, went down on her knees and pressed her face against the
soft silken folds. It had been her mother's wedding-dress. It
was still full of a sweet, faint, haunting perfume, like
lingering love. Una always felt very close to her mother
there--as if she were kneeling at her feet with head in her lap.
She went there once in a long while when life was TOO hard.

"Mother," she whispered to the gray silk gown, "_I_ will never
forget you, mother, and I'll ALWAYS love you best. But I have to
do it, mother, because father is so very unhappy. I know you
wouldn't want him to be unhappy. And I will be very good to her,
mother, and try to love her, even if she is like Mary Vance said
stepmothers always were."

Una carried some fine, spiritual strength away from her secret
shrine. She slept peacefully that night with the tear stains
still glistening on her sweet, serious, little face.

The next afternoon she put on her best dress and hat. They were
shabby enough. Every other little girl in the Glen had new
clothes that summer except Faith and Una. Mary Vance had a
lovely dress of white embroidered lawn, with scarlet silk sash
and shoulder bows. But to-day Una did not mind her shabbiness.
She only wanted to be very neat. She washed her face carefully.
She brushed her black hair until it was as smooth as satin. She
tied her shoelaces carefully, having first sewed up two runs in
her one pair of good stockings. She would have liked to black
her shoes, but she could not find any blacking. Finally, she
slipped away from the manse, down through Rainbow Valley, up
through the whispering woods, and out to the road that ran past
the house on the hill. It was quite a long walk and Una was
tired and warm when she got there.

She saw Rosemary West sitting under a tree in the garden and
stole past the dahlia beds to her. Rosemary had a book in her
lap, but she was gazing afar across the harbour and her thoughts
were sorrowful enough. Life had not been pleasant lately in the
house on the hill. Ellen had not sulked--Ellen had been a brick.
But things can be felt that are never said and at times the
silence between the two women was intolerably eloquent. All the
many familiar things that had once made life sweet had a flavour
of bitterness now. Norman Douglas made periodical irruptions
also, bullying and coaxing Ellen by turns. It would end,
Rosemary believed, by his dragging Ellen off with him some day,
and Rosemary felt that she would be almost glad when it happened.
Existence would be horribly lonely then, but it would be no
longer charged with dynamite.

She was roused from her unpleasant reverie by a timid little
touch on her shoulder. Turning, she saw Una Meredith.

"Why, Una, dear, did you walk up here in all this heat?"

"Yes," said Una, "I came to--I came to--"

But she found it very hard to say what she had come to do. Her
voice failed--her eyes filled with tears.

"Why, Una, little girl, what is the trouble? Don't be afraid to
tell me."

Rosemary put her arm around the thin little form and drew the
child close to her. Her eyes were very beautiful--her touch so
tender that Una found courage.

"I came--to ask you--to marry father," she gasped.

Rosemary was silent for a moment from sheer dumbfounderment. She
stared at Una blankly.

"Oh, don't be angry, please, dear Miss West," said Una,
pleadingly. "You see, everybody is saying that you wouldn't
marry father because we are so bad. He is VERY unhappy about it.
So I thought I would come and tell you that we are never bad ON
PURPOSE. And if you will only marry father we will all try to be
good and do just what you tell us. I'm SURE you won't have any
trouble with us. PLEASE, Miss West."

Rosemary had been thinking rapidly. Gossiping surmise, she saw,
had put this mistaken idea into Una's mind. She must be
perfectly frank and sincere with the child.

"Una, dear," she said softly. "It isn't because of you poor
little souls that I cannot be your father's wife. I never
thought of such a thing. You are not bad--I never supposed you
were. There--there was another reason altogether, Una."

"Don't you like father?" asked Una, lifting reproachful eyes.
"Oh, Miss West, you don't know how nice he is. I'm sure he'd
make you a GOOD husband."

Even in the midst of her perplexity and distress Rosemary
couldn't help a twisted, little smile.

"Oh, don't laugh, Miss West," Una cried passionately. "Father
feels DREADFUL about it."

"I think you're mistaken, dear," said Rosemary.

"I'm not. I'm SURE I'm not. Oh, Miss West, father was going to
whip Carl yesterday--Carl had been naughty--and father couldn't
do it because you see he had no PRACTICE in whipping. So when
Carl came out and told us father felt so bad, I slipped into the
study to see if I could help him--he LIKES me to comfort him,
Miss West--and he didn't hear me come in and I heard what he was
saying. I'll tell you, Miss West, if you'll let me whisper it in
your ear."

Una whispered earnestly. Rosemary's face turned crimson. So
John Meredith still cared. HE hadn't changed his mind. And he
must care intensely if he had said that--care more than she had
ever supposed he did. She sat still for a moment, stroking Una's
hair. Then she said,

"Will you take a little letter from me to your father, Una?"

"Oh, are you going to marry him, Miss West?" asked Una eagerly.

"Perhaps--if he really wants me to," said Rosemary, blushing
again.

"I'm glad--I'm glad," said Una bravely. Then she looked up, with
quivering lips. "Oh, Miss West, you won't turn father against
us--you won't make him hate us, will you?" she said beseechingly.

Rosemary stared again.

"Una Meredith! Do you think I would do such a thing? Whatever
put such an idea into your head?"

"Mary Vance said stepmothers were all like that--and that they
all hated their stepchildren and made their father hate them--she
said they just couldn't help it--just being stepmothers made them
like that"--

"You poor child! And yet you came up here and asked me to marry
your father because you wanted to make him happy? You're a
darling--a heroine--as Ellen would say, you're a brick. Now
listen to me, very closely, dearest. Mary Vance is a silly
little girl who doesn't know very much and she is dreadfully
mistaken about some things. I would never dream of trying to
turn your father against you. I would love you all dearly. I
don't want to take your own mother's place--she must always have
that in your hearts. But neither have I any intention of being a
stepmother. I want to be your friend and helper and CHUM. Don't
you think that would be nice, Una--if you and Faith and Carl and
Jerry could just think of me as a good jolly chum--a big older
sister?"

"Oh, it would be lovely," cried Una, with a transfigured face.
She flung her arms impulsively round Rosemary's neck. She was so
happy that she felt as if she could fly on wings.

"Do the others--do Faith and the boys have the same idea you had
about stepmothers?"

"No. Faith never believed Mary Vance. I was dreadfully foolish
to believe her, either. Faith loves you already--she has loved
you ever since poor Adam was eaten. And Jerry and Carl will
think it is jolly. Oh, Miss West, when you come to live with us,
will you--could you--teach me to cook--a little--and sew--and--
and--and do things? I don't know anything. I won't be much
trouble--I'll try to learn fast."

"Darling, I'll teach you and help you all I can. Now, you won't
say a word to anybody about this, will you--not even to Faith,
until your father himself tells you you may? And you'll stay and
have tea with me?"

"Oh, thank you--but--but--I think I'd rather go right back and
take the letter to father," faltered Una. "You see, he'll be
glad that much SOONER, Miss West."

"I see," said Rosemary. She went to the house, wrote a note and
gave it to Una. When that small damsel had run off, a
palpitating bundle of happiness, Rosemary went to Ellen, who was
shelling peas on the back porch.

"Ellen," she said, "Una Meredith has just been here to ask me to
marry her father."

Ellen looked up and read her sister's face.

"And you're going to?" she said.

"It's quite likely."

Ellen went on shelling peas for a few minutes. Then she suddenly
put her hands up to her own face. There were tears in her
black-browed eyes.

"I--I hope we'll all be happy," she said between a sob and a
laugh.

Down at the manse Una Meredith, warm, rosy, triumphant, marched
boldly into her father's study and laid a letter on the desk
before him. His pale face flushed as he saw the clear, fine
handwriting he knew so well. He opened the letter. It was very
short--but he shed twenty years as he read it. Rosemary asked
him if he could meet her that evening at sunset by the spring in
Rainbow Valley.



CHAPTER XXXV. "LET THE PIPER COME"

"And so," said Miss Cornelia, "the double wedding is to be
sometime about the middle of this month."

There was a faint chill in the air of the early September
evening, so Anne had lighted her ever ready fire of driftwood in
the big living room, and she and Miss Cornelia basked in its
fairy flicker.

"It is so delightful--especially in regard to Mr. Meredith and
Rosemary," said Anne. "I'm as happy in the thought of it, as I
was when I was getting married myself. I felt exactly like a
bride again last evening when I was up on the hill seeing
Rosemary's trousseau."

"They tell me her things are fine enough for a princess," said
Susan from a shadowy corner where she was cuddling her brown boy.
"I have been invited up to see them also and I intend to go some
evening. I understand that Rosemary is to wear white silk and a
veil, but Ellen is to be married in navy blue. I have no doubt,
Mrs. Dr. dear, that that is very sensible of her, but for my own
part I have always felt that if I were ever married _I_ would
prefer the white and the veil, as being more bride-like."

A vision of Susan in "white and a veil" presented itself before
Anne's inner vision and was almost too much for her.

"As for Mr. Meredith," said Miss Cornelia, "even his engagement
has made a different man of him. He isn't half so dreamy and
absent-minded, believe me. I was so relieved when I heard that
he had decided to close the manse and let the children visit
round while he was away on his honeymoon. If he had left them
and old Aunt Martha there alone for a month I should have
expected to wake every morning and see the place burned down."

"Aunt Martha and Jerry are coming here," said Anne. "Carl is
going to Elder Clow's. I haven't heard where the girls are
going."

"Oh, I'm going to take them," said Miss Cornelia. "Of course, I
was glad to, but Mary would have given me no peace till I asked
them any way. The Ladies' Aid is going to clean the manse from
top to bottom before the bride and groom come back, and Norman
Douglas has arranged to fill the cellar with vegetables. Nobody
ever saw or heard anything quite like Norman Douglas these days,
believe ME. He's so tickled that he's going to marry Ellen West
after wanting her all his life. If _I_ was Ellen--but then, I'm
not, and if she is satisfied I can very well be. I heard her say
years ago when she was a schoolgirl that she didn't want a tame
puppy for a husband. There's nothing tame about Norman, believe
ME."

The sun was setting over Rainbow Valley. The pond was wearing a
wonderful tissue of purple and gold and green and crimson. A
faint blue haze rested on the eastern hill, over which a great,
pale, round moon was just floating up like a silver bubble.

They were all there, squatted in the little open glade--Faith and
Una, Jerry and Carl, Jem and Walter, Nan and Di, and Mary Vance.
They had been having a special celebration, for it would be Jem's
last evening in Rainbow Valley. On the morrow he would leave for
Charlottetown to attend Queen's Academy. Their charmed circle
would be broken; and, in spite of the jollity of their little
festival, there was a hint of sorrow in every gay young heart.

"See--there is a great golden palace over there in the sunset,"
said Walter, pointing. "Look at the shining tower--and the
crimson banners streaming from them. Perhaps a conqueror is
riding home from battle--and they are hanging them out to do
honour to him."

"Oh, I wish we had the old days back again," exclaimed Jem. "I'd
love to be a soldier--a great, triumphant general. I'd give
EVERYTHING to see a big battle."

Well, Jem was to be a soldier and see a greater battle than had
ever been fought in the world; but that was as yet far in the
future; and the mother, whose first-born son he was, was wont to
look on her boys and thank God that the "brave days of old,"
which Jem longed for, were gone for ever, and that never would it
be necessary for the sons of Canada to ride forth to battle "for
the ashes of their fathers and the temples of their gods."

The shadow of the Great Conflict had not yet made felt any
forerunner of its chill. The lads who were to fight, and perhaps
fall, on the fields of France and Flanders, Gallipoli and
Palestine, were still roguish schoolboys with a fair life in
prospect before them: the girls whose hearts were to be wrung
were yet fair little maidens a-star with hopes and dreams.

Slowly the banners of the sunset city gave up their crimson and
gold; slowly the conqueror's pageant faded out. Twilight crept
over the valley and the little group grew silent. Walter had
been reading again that day in his beloved book of myths and he
remembered how he had once fancied the Pied Piper coming down the
valley on an evening just like this.

He began to speak dreamily, partly because he wanted to thrill
his companions a little, partly because something apart from him
seemed to be speaking through his lips.

"The Piper is coming nearer," he said, "he is nearer than he was
that evening I saw him before. His long, shadowy cloak is
blowing around him. He pipes--he pipes--and we must follow--Jem
and Carl and Jerry and I--round and round the world. Listen--
listen--can't you hear his wild music?"

The girls shivered.

"You know you're only pretending," protested Mary Vance, "and I
wish you wouldn't. You make it too real. I hate that old Piper
of yours."

But Jem sprang up with a gay laugh. He stood up on a little
hillock, tall and splendid, with his open brow and his fearless
eyes. There were thousands like him all over the land of the
maple.

"Let the Piper come and welcome," he cried, waving his hand.
"I'LL follow him gladly round and round the world."

THE END

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