Book: Rainbow Valley

L >> Lucy Maud Montgomery >> Rainbow Valley




"She would likely turn Presbyterian if she married Mr. Meredith,"
retorted Susan.

Miss Cornelia shook her head. Evidently with her it was, once a
Methodist, always a Methodist.

"Sarah Kirk is entirely out of the question," she said
positively. "And so is Emmeline Drew--though the Drews are all
trying to make the match. They are literally throwing poor
Emmeline at his head, and he hasn't the least idea of it."

"Emmeline Drew has no gumption, I must allow," said Susan. "She
is the kind of woman, Mrs. Dr. dear, who would put a hot-water
bottle in your bed on a dog-night and then have her feelings hurt
because you were not grateful. And her mother was a very poor
housekeeper. Did you ever hear the story of her dishcloth? She
lost her dishcloth one day. But the next day she found it. Oh,
yes, Mrs. Dr. dear, she found it, in the goose at the
dinner-table, mixed up with the stuffing. Do you think a woman
like that would do for a minister's mother-in-law? I do not.
But no doubt I would be better employed in mending little Jem's
trousers than in talking gossip about my neighbours. He tore
them something scandalous last night in Rainbow Valley."

"Where is Walter?" asked Anne.

"He is up to no good, I fear, Mrs. Dr. dear. He is in the attic
writing something in an exercise book. And he has not done as
well in arithmetic this term as he should, so the teacher tells
me. Too well I know the reason why. He has been writing silly
rhymes when he should have been doing his sums. I am afraid that
boy is going to be a poet, Mrs. Dr. dear."

"He is a poet now, Susan."

"Well, you take it real calm, Mrs. Dr. dear. I suppose it is the
best way, when a person has the strength. I had an uncle who
began by being a poet and ended up by being a tramp. Our family
were dreadfully ashamed of him."

"You don't seem to think very highly of poets, Susan," said Anne,
laughing.

"Who does, Mrs. Dr. dear?" asked Susan in genuine astonishment.

"What about Milton and Shakespeare? And the poets of the Bible?"

"They tell me Milton could not get along with his wife, and
Shakespeare was no more than respectable by times. As for the
Bible, of course things were different in those sacred days--
although I never had a high opinion of King David, say what you
will. I never knew any good to come of writing poetry, and I
hope and pray that blessed boy will outgrow the tendency. If he
does not--we must see what emulsion of cod-liver oil will do."



CHAPTER VIII. MISS CORNELIA INTERVENES

Miss Cornelia descended upon the manse the next day and
cross-questioned Mary, who, being a young person of considerable
discernment and astuteness, told her story simple and truthfully,
with an entire absence of complaint or bravado. Miss Cornelia
was more favourably impressed than she had expected to be, but
deemed it her duty to be severe.

"Do you think," she said sternly, "that you showed your gratitude
to this family, who have been far too kind to you, by insulting
and chasing one of their little friends as you did yesterday?"

"Say, it was rotten mean of me," admitted Mary easily. "I dunno
what possessed me. That old codfish seemed to come in so blamed
handy. But I was awful sorry--I cried last night after I went to
bed about it, honest I did. You ask Una if I didn't. I wouldn't
tell her what for 'cause I was ashamed of it, and then she cried,
too, because she was afraid someone had hurt my feelings. Laws,
_I_ ain't got any feelings to hurt worth speaking of. What
worries me is why Mrs. Wiley hain't been hunting for me. It
ain't like her."

Miss Cornelia herself thought it rather peculiar, but she merely
admonished Mary sharply not to take any further liberties with
the minister's codfish, and went to report progress at Ingleside.

"If the child's story is true the matter ought to be looked
into," she said. "I know something about that Wiley woman,
believe ME. Marshall used to be well acquainted with her when he
lived over-harbour. I heard him say something last summer about
her and a home child she had--likely this very Mary-creature. He
said some one told him she was working the child to death and not
half feeding and clothing it. You know, Anne dearie, it has
always been my habit neither to make nor meddle with those
over-harbour folks. But I shall send Marshall over to-morrow to
find out the rights of this if he can. And THEN I'll speak to
the minister. Mind you, Anne dearie, the Merediths found this
girl literally starving in James Taylor's old hay barn. She had
been there all night, cold and hungry and alone. And us sleeping
warm in our beds after good suppers."

"The poor little thing," said Anne, picturing one of her own dear
babies, cold and hungry and alone in such circumstances. "If she
has been ill-used, Miss Cornelia, she mustn't be taken back to
such a place. _I_ was an orphan once in a very similar
situation."

"We'll have to consult the Hopetown asylum folks," said Miss
Cornelia. "Anyway, she can't be left at the manse. Dear knows
what those poor children might learn from her. I understand that
she has been known to swear. But just think of her being there
two whole weeks and Mr Meredith never waking up to it! What
business has a man like that to have a family? Why, Anne dearie,
he ought to be a monk."

Two evenings later Miss Cornelia was back at Ingleside.

"It's the most amazing thing!" she said. "Mrs. Wiley was found
dead in her bed the very morning after this Mary-creature ran
away. She has had a bad heart for years and the doctor had
warned her it might happen at any time. She had sent away her
hired man and there was nobody in the house. Some neighbours
found her the next day. They missed the child, it seems, but
supposed Mrs. Wiley had sent her to her cousin near Charlottetown
as she had said she was going to do. The cousin didn't come to
the funeral and so nobody ever knew that Mary wasn't with her.
The people Marshall talked to told him some things about the way
Mrs. Wiley used this Mary that made his blood boil, so he
declares. You know, it puts Marshall in a regular fury to hear
of a child being ill-used. They said she whipped her mercilessly
for every little fault or mistake. Some folks talked of writing
to the asylum authorities but everybody's business is nobody's
business and it was never done."

"I am sorry that Wiley person is dead," said Susan fiercely. "I
should like to go over-harbour and give her a piece of my mind.
Starving and beating a child, Mrs. Dr. dear! As you know, I hold
with lawful spanking, but I go no further. And what is to become
of this poor child now, Mrs. Marshall Elliott?"

"I suppose she must be sent back to Hopetown," said Miss
Cornelia. "I think every one hereabouts who wants a home child
has one. I'll see Mr. Meredith to-morrow and tell him my opinion
of the whole affair."

"And no doubt she will, Mrs. Dr. dear," said Susan, after Miss
Cornelia had gone. "She would stick at nothing, not even at
shingling the church spire if she took it into her head. But I
cannot understand how even Cornelia Bryant can talk to a minister
as she does. You would think he was just any common person."

When Miss Cornelia had gone, Nan Blythe uncurled herself from the
hammock where she had been studying her lessons and slipped away
to Rainbow Valley. The others were already there. Jem and Jerry
were playing quoits with old horseshoes borrowed from the Glen
blacksmith. Carl was stalking ants on a sunny hillock. Walter,
lying on his stomach among the fern, was reading aloud to Mary
and Di and Faith and Una from a wonderful book of myths wherein
were fascinating accounts of Prester John and the Wandering Jew,
divining rods and tailed men, of Schamir, the worm that split
rocks and opened the way to golden treasure, of Fortunate Isles
and swan-maidens. It was a great shock to Walter to learn that
William Tell and Gelert were myths also; and the story of Bishop
Hatto was to keep him awake all that night; but best of all he
loved the stories of the Pied Piper and the San Greal. He read
them thrillingly, while the bells on the Tree Lovers tinkled in
the summer wind and the coolness of the evening shadows crept
across the valley.

"Say, ain't them in'resting lies?" said Mary admiringly when
Walter had closed the book.

"They aren't lies," said Di indignantly.

"You don't mean they're true?" asked Mary incredulously.

"No--not exactly. They're like those ghost-stories of yours.
They weren't true--but you didn't expect us to believe them, so
they weren't lies."

"That yarn about the divining rod is no lie, anyhow," said Mary.
"Old Jake Crawford over-harbour can work it. They send for him
from everywhere when they want to dig a well. And I believe I
know the Wandering Jew."

"Oh, Mary," said Una, awe-struck.

"I do--true's you're alive. There was an old man at Mrs. Wiley's
one day last fall. He looked old enough to be ANYTHING. She was
asking him about cedar posts, if he thought they'd last well.
And he said, 'Last well? They'll last a thousand years. I know,
for I've tried them twice.' Now, if he was two thousand years
old who was he but your Wandering Jew?"

"I don't believe the Wandering Jew would associate with a person
like Mrs. Wiley," said Faith decidedly.

"I love the Pied Piper story," said Di, "and so does mother. I
always feel so sorry for the poor little lame boy who couldn't
keep up with the others and got shut out of the mountain. He
must have been so disappointed. I think all the rest of his life
he'd be wondering what wonderful thing he had missed and wishing
he could have got in with the others."

"But how glad his mother must have been," said Una softly. "I
think she had been sorry all her life that he was lame. Perhaps
she even used to cry about it. But she would never be sorry
again--never. She would be glad he was lame because that was why
she hadn't lost him."

"Some day," said Walter dreamily, looking afar into the sky, "the
Pied Piper will come over the hill up there and down Rainbow
Valley, piping merrily and sweetly. And I will follow
him--follow him down to the shore--down to the sea--away from you
all. I don't think I'll want to go--Jem will want to go--it will
be such an adventure--but I won't. Only I'll HAVE to--the music
will call and call and call me until I MUST follow."

"We'll all go," cried Di, catching fire at the flame of Walter's
fancy, and half-believing she could see the mocking, retreating
figure of the mystic piper in the far, dim end of the valley.

"No. You'll sit here and wait," said Walter, his great, splendid
eyes full of strange glamour. "You'll wait for us to come back.
And we may not come--for we cannot come as long as the Piper
plays. He may pipe us round the world. And still you'll sit
here and wait--and WAIT."

"Oh, dry up," said Mary, shivering. "Don't look like that,
Walter Blythe. You give me the creeps. Do you want to set me
bawling? I could just see that horrid old Piper going away on,
and you boys following him, and us girls sitting here waiting all
alone. I dunno why it is--I never was one of the blubbering
kind--but as soon as you start your spieling I always want to
cry."

Walter smiled in triumph. He liked to exercise this power of his
over his companions--to play on their feelings, waken their
fears, thrill their souls. It satisfied some dramatic instinct
in him. But under his triumph was a queer little chill of some
mysterious dread. The Pied Piper had seemed very real to him--as
if the fluttering veil that hid the future had for a moment been
blown aside in the starlit dusk of Rainbow Valley and some dim
glimpse of coming years granted to him.

Carl, coming up to their group with a report of the doings in
ant-land, brought them all back to the realm of facts.

"Ants ARE darned in'resting," exclaimed Mary, glad to escape the
shadowy Piper's thrall. "Carl and me watched that bed in the
graveyard all Saturday afternoon. I never thought there was so
much in bugs. Say, but they're quarrelsome little cusses--some
of 'em like to start a fight 'thout any reason, far's we could
see. And some of 'em are cowards. They got so scared they just
doubled theirselves up into a ball and let the other fellows bang
'em. They wouldn't put up a fight at all. Some of 'em are lazy
and won't work. We watched 'em shirking. And there was one ant
died of grief 'cause another ant got killed--wouldn't work--
wouldn't eat--just died--it did, honest to Go--oodness."

A shocked silence prevailed. Every one knew that Mary had not
started out to say "goodness." Faith and Di exchanged glances
that would have done credit to Miss Cornelia herself. Walter and
Carl looked uncomfortable and Una's lip trembled.

Mary squirmed uncomfortably.

"That slipped out 'fore I thought--it did, honest to--I mean,
true's you live, and I swallowed half of it. You folks over here
are mighty squeamish seems to me. Wish you could have heard the
Wileys when they had a fight."

"Ladies don't say such things," said Faith, very primly for her.

"It isn't right," whispered Una.

"I ain't a lady," said Mary. "What chance've I ever had of being
a lady? But I won't say that again if I can help it. I promise
you."

"Besides," said Una, "you can't expect God to answer your prayers
if you take His name in vain, Mary."

"I don't expect Him to answer 'em anyhow," said Mary of little
faith. "I've been asking Him for a week to clear up this Wiley
affair and He hasn't done a thing. I'm going to give up."

At this juncture Nan arrived breathless.

"Oh, Mary, I've news for you. Mrs. Elliott has been over-harbour
and what do you think she found out? Mrs. Wiley is dead--she was
found dead in bed the morning after you ran away. So you'll
never have to go back to her."

"Dead!" said Mary stupefied. Then she shivered.

"Do you s'pose my praying had anything to do with that?" she
cried imploringly to Una. "If it had I'll never pray again as
long as I live. Why, she may come back and ha'nt me."

"No, no, Mary," said Una comfortingly, "it hadn't. Why, Mrs.
Wiley died long before you ever began to pray about it at all."

"That's so," said Mary recovering from her panic. "But I tell
you it gave me a start. I wouldn't like to think I'd prayed
anybody to death. I never thought of such a thing as her dying
when I was praying. She didn't seem much like the dying kind.
Did Mrs. Elliott say anything about me?"

"She said you would likely have to go back to the asylum."

"I thought as much," said Mary drearily. "And then they'll give
me out again--likely to some one just like Mrs. Wiley. Well, I
s'pose I can stand it. I'm tough."

"I'm going to pray that you won't have to go back," whispered
Una, as she and Mary walked home to the manse.

"You can do as you like," said Mary decidedly, "but I vow _I_
won't. I'm good and scared of this praying business. See what's
come of it. If Mrs. Wiley HAD died after I started praying it
would have been my doings."

"Oh, no, it wouldn't," said Una. "I wish I could explain things
better--father could, I know, if you'd talk to him, Mary."

"Catch me! I don't know what to make of your father, that's the
long and short of it. He goes by me and never sees me in broad
daylight. I ain't proud--but I ain't a door-mat, neither!"

"Oh, Mary, it's just father's way. Most of the time he never
sees us, either. He is thinking deeply, that is all. And I AM
going to pray that God will keep you in Four Winds--because I
like you, Mary."

"All right. Only don't let me hear of any more people dying on
account of it," said Mary. "I'd like to stay in Four Winds fine.
I like it and I like the harbour and the light house--and you and
the Blythes. You're the only friends I ever had and I'd hate to
leave you."



CHAPTER IX. UNA INTERVENES

Miss Cornelia had an interview with Mr. Meredith which proved
something of a shock to that abstracted gentleman. She pointed
out to him, none too respectfully, his dereliction of duty in
allowing a waif like Mary Vance to come into his family and
associate with his children without knowing or learning anything
about her.

"I don't say there is much harm done, of course," she concluded.
"This Mary-creature isn't what you might call bad, when all is
said and done. I've been questioning your children and the
Blythes, and from what I can make out there's nothing much to be
said against the child except that she's slangy and doesn't use
very refined language. But think what might have happened if
she'd been like some of those home children we know of. You know
yourself what that poor little creature the Jim Flaggs' had,
taught and told the Flagg children."

Mr. Meredith did know and was honestly shocked over his own
carelessness in the matter.

"But what is to be done, Mrs. Elliott?" he asked helplessly. "We
can't turn the poor child out. She must be cared for."

"Of course. We'd better write to the Hopetown authorities at
once. Meanwhile, I suppose she might as well stay here for a few
more days till we hear from them. But keep your eyes and ears
open, Mr. Meredith."

Susan would have died of horror on the spot if she had heard Miss
Cornelia so admonishing a minister. But Miss Cornelia departed
in a warm glow of satisfaction over duty done, and that night Mr.
Meredith asked Mary to come into his study with him. Mary
obeyed, looking literally ghastly with fright. But she got the
surprise of her poor, battered little life. This man, of whom
she had stood so terribly in awe, was the kindest, gentlest soul
she had ever met. Before she knew what happened Mary found
herself pouring all her troubles into his ear and receiving in
return such sympathy and tender understanding as it had never
occurred to her to imagine. Mary left the study with her face
and eyes so softened that Una hardly knew her.

"Your father's all right, when he does wake up," she said with a
sniff that just escaped being a sob. "It's a pity he doesn't
wake up oftener. He said I wasn't to blame for Mrs. Wiley dying,
but that I must try to think of her good points and not of her
bad ones. I dunno what good points she had, unless it was
keeping her house clean and making first-class butter. I know I
'most wore my arms out scrubbing her old kitchen floor with the
knots in it. But anything your father says goes with me after
this."

Mary proved a rather dull companion in the following days,
however. She confided to Una that the more she thought of going
back to the asylum the more she hated it. Una racked her small
brains for some way of averting it, but it was Nan Blythe who
came to the rescue with a somewhat startling suggestion.

"Mrs. Elliott might take Mary herself. She has a great big house
and Mr. Elliott is always wanting her to have help. It would be
just a splendid place for Mary. Only she'd have to behave
herself."

"Oh, Nan, do you think Mrs. Elliott would take her?"

"It wouldn't do any harm if you asked her," said Nan. At first
Una did not think she could. She was so shy that to ask a favour
of anybody was agony to her. And she was very much in awe of the
bustling, energetic Mrs. Elliott. She liked her very much and
always enjoyed a visit to her house; but to go and ask her to
adopt Mary Vance seemed such a height of presumption that Una's
timid spirit quailed.

When the Hopetown authorities wrote to Mr. Meredith to send Mary
to them without delay Mary cried herself to sleep in the manse
attic that night and Una found a desperate courage. The next
evening she slipped away from the manse to the harbour road. Far
down in Rainbow Valley she heard joyous laughter but her way lay
not there. She was terribly pale and terribly in earnest--so
much so that she took no notice of the people she met--and old
Mrs. Stanley Flagg was quite huffed and said Una Meredith would
be as absentminded as her father when she grew up.

Miss Cornelia lived half way between the Glen and Four Winds
Point, in a house whose original glaring green hue had mellowed
down to an agreeable greenish gray. Marshall Elliott had planted
trees about it and set out a rose garden and a spruce hedge. It
was quite a different place from what it had been in years agone.
The manse children and the Ingleside children liked to go there.
It was a beautiful walk down the old harbour road, and there was
always a well-filled cooky jar at the end.

The misty sea was lapping softly far down on the sands. Three
big boats were skimming down the harbour like great white
sea-birds. A schooner was coming up the channel. The world of
Four Winds was steeped in glowing colour, and subtle music, and
strange glamour, and everybody should have been happy in it. But
when Una turned in at Miss Cornelia's gate her very legs had
almost refused to carry her.

Miss Cornelia was alone on the veranda. Una had hoped Mr.
Elliott would be there. He was so big and hearty and twinkly
that there would be encouragement in his presence. She sat on
the little stool Miss Cornelia brought out and tried to eat the
doughnut Miss Cornelia gave her. It stuck in her throat, but she
swallowed desperately lest Miss Cornelia be offended. She could
not talk; she was still pale; and her big, dark-blue eyes looked
so piteous that Miss Cornelia concluded the child was in some
trouble.

"What's on your mind, dearie?" she asked. "There's something,
that's plain to be seen."

Una swallowed the last twist of doughnut with a desperate gulp.

"Mrs. Elliott, won't you take Mary Vance?" she said
beseechingly.

Miss Cornelia stared blankly.

"Me! Take Mary Vance! Do you mean keep her?"

"Yes--keep her--adopt her," said Una eagerly, gaining courage now
that the ice was broken. "Oh, Mrs. Elliott, PLEASE do. She
doesn't want to go back to the asylum--she cries every night
about it. She's so afraid of being sent to another hard place.
And she's SO smart--there isn't anything she can't do. I know
you wouldn't be sorry if you took her."

"I never thought of such a thing," said Miss Cornelia rather
helplessly.

"WON'T you think of it?" implored Una.

"But, dearie, I don't want help. I'm quite able to do all the
work here. And I never thought I'd like to have a home girl if I
did need help."

The light went out of Una's eyes. Her lips trembled. She sat
down on her stool again, a pathetic little figure of
disappointment, and began to cry.

"Don't--dearie--don't," exclaimed Miss Cornelia in distress. She
could never bear to hurt a child. "I don't say I WON'T take
her--but the idea is so new it has just kerflummuxed me. I must
think it over."

"Mary is SO smart," said Una again.

"Humph! So I've heard. I've heard she swears, too. Is that
true?"

"I've never heard her swear EXACTLY," faltered Una uncomfortably.
"But I'm afraid she COULD."

"I believe you! Does she always tell the truth?"

"I think she does, except when she's afraid of a whipping."

"And yet you want me to take her!"

"SOME ONE has to take her," sobbed Una. "SOME ONE has to look
after her, Mrs. Elliott."

"That's true. Perhaps it IS my duty to do it," said Miss
Cornelia with a sigh. "Well, I'll have to talk it over with Mr.
Elliott. So don't say anything about it just yet. Take another
doughnut, dearie."

Una took it and ate it with a better appetite.

"I'm very fond of doughnuts," she confessed "Aunt Martha never
makes any. But Miss Susan at Ingleside does, and sometimes she
lets us have a plateful in Rainbow Valley. Do you know what I do
when I'm hungry for doughnuts and can't get any, Mrs. Elliott?"

"No, dearie. What?"

"I get out mother's old cook book and read the doughnut
recipe--and the other recipes. They sound SO nice. I always do
that when I'm hungry--especially after we've had ditto for
dinner. THEN I read the fried chicken and the roast goose
recipes. Mother could make all those nice things."

"Those manse children will starve to death yet if Mr. Meredith
doesn't get married," Miss Cornelia told her husband indignantly
after Una had gone. "And he won't--and what's to be done? And
SHALL we take this Mary-creature, Marshall?"

"Yes, take her," said Marshall laconically.

"Just like a man," said his wife, despairingly." 'Take her'--as
if that was all. There are a hundred things to be considered,
believe ME."

"Take her--and we'll consider them afterwards, Cornelia," said
her husband.

In the end Miss Cornelia did take her and went up to announce her
decision to the Ingleside people first.

"Splendid!" said Anne delightedly. "I've been hoping you would
do that very thing, Miss Cornelia. I want that poor child to get
a good home. I was a homeless little orphan just like her once."

"I don't think this Mary-creature is or ever will be much like
you," retorted Miss Cornelia gloomily. "She's a cat of another
colour. But she's also a human being with an immortal soul to
save. I've got a shorter catechism and a small tooth comb and
I'm going to do my duty by her, now that I've set my hand to the
plough, believe me."

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