Glasgow Ellen Anderson Gholson
The Builders
CHAPTER II
Readjustments
IN Letty's nursery the next afternoon, Blackburn came at last to know Caroline without the barrier of her professional manner. The child was playing happily with her paper dolls in one corner, and while she marched them back and forth along a miniature road of blocks, she sang under her breath a little song she had made.
Oh, my,
I'd like to fly
Very high
In the sky,
Just you and I.
"I am very cold," said Blackburn, as he entered. "Mammy Riah has promised me a cup of tea if I am good."
"You are always good, father," replied Letty politely, but she did not rise from the floor. "I'm sorry I can't stop, but Mrs. Brown is just taking her little girl to the hospital. If I were to get up the poor little thing might die on the way."
"That must not happen. Perhaps Miss Meade will entertain me?"
"I will do my best." Caroline turned from her writing and took up a half-finished sock. "If you had come an hour earlier you might have seen some of Mrs. Blackburn's lovely clothes. She was showing us the dress she is going to wear to dinner to-night."
"You like pretty clothes." It was a careless effort to make conversation, but as he dropped into the armchair on the hearthrug, his face softened. There was a faint scent of violets in the air from a half-faded little bunch in Caroline's lap.
She met the question frankly. "On other people."
"Do you like nothing for yourself? You are so impersonal that I sometimes wonder if you possess a soul of your own."
"Oh, I like a great many things." Mammy Riah had brought tea, and Caroline put down her knitting and drew up to the wicker table. "I like books for instance. At The Cedars we used to read every evening. Father read aloud to us as long as he lived."
"Yet I never see you reading?"
"Not here." As she shook her head, the firelight touched her close, dark hair, which shone like satin against the starched band of her cap. Almost as white as her cap seemed her wide forehead, with the intense black eyebrows above the radiant blue of her eyes. "You see I want to finish these socks."
"I thought you were doing a muffler?"
"Oh, that's gone to France long ago! This is a fresh lot Mrs. Blackburn has promised, and Mrs. Timberlake and I are working night and day to get them finished in time. We can't do the large kind of work that Mrs. Blackburn does," she added, "so we have to make up with our little bit. Mrs. Timberlake says we are hewers of wood and drawers of water."
"You are always busy," he said, smiling. "I believe you would be busy if you were put into solitary confinement."
To his surprise a look of pain quivered about her mouth, and he noticed, for the first time, that it was the mouth of a woman who had suffered. "It is the best way of not thinking – " She ended with a laugh, and he felt that, in spite of her kindness and her capability, she was as elusive as thistle-down.
"I can knit a little, father," broke in Letty, looking up from her dolls. "Miss Meade is teaching me to knit a muffler – only it gets narrower all the time. I'm afraid the soldiers won't want it."
"Then give it to me. I want it."
"If I give it to you, you might go to fight, and get killed." As the child turned again to her dolls, he said slowly to Caroline, "I can't imagine how she picks up ideas like that. Someone must have talked about the war before her."
"She heard Mrs. Blackburn talking about it once in the car. She must have caught words without our noticing it."
His face darkened. "One has to be careful."
"Yes, I try to remember." He was quick to observe that she was taking the blame from Angelica, and again he received an impression that she was mentally evading him. Her soul was closed like a flower; yet now and then, through her reserve and gravity, he felt a charm that was as sweet and fresh as a perfume. She was looking tired and pale, he thought, and he wondered how her still features could have kindled into the beauty he had seen in them on that snowy afternoon. It had never occurred to him before, accustomed as he was to the formal loveliness of Angelica, that the same woman could be both plain and beautiful, both colourless and vivid.
This was perplexing him, when she clasped her hands over her knitting, and said with the manner of quiet confidence that he had grown to expect in her, "I have always meant to tell you, Mr. Blackburn, that I listened to everything you said that day on the terrace – that afternoon when you were talking to Colonel Ashburton and Mr. Sloane. I didn't mean to listen, but I found myself doing it."
"Well, I hope you are not any the worse for it, and I am sure you are not any the better."
"There is something else I want to tell you." Her pale cheeks flushed faintly, and a liquid fire shone in her eyes. "I think you are right. I agree with every word that you said."
"Traitor! What would your grandmother have thought of you? As a matter of fact I have forgotten almost all that I said, but I can safely assume that it was heretical. I think none of us intended to start that discussion. We launched into it before we knew where we were going."
Her mind was on his first sentence, and she appeared to miss his closing words. "I can't answer for my grandmother, but father would have agreed with you. He used to say that the State was an institution for the making of citizens."
"And he talked to you about such things?" It had never occurred to him that a woman could become companionable on intellectual grounds, yet while she sat there facing him, with the light on her brow and lips, and her look of distinction and remoteness as of one who has in some way been set apart from personal joy or sorrow, he realized that she was as utterly detached as Sloane had been when he discoursed on the functions of government.
"Oh, we talked and talked on Sunday afternoons, a few neighbours, old soldiers mostly, and father and I. I wonder why political arguments still make me think of bees humming?"
He laughed with a zest she had never heard in his voice before. "And the smell of sheepmint and box!"
"I remember – and blackberry wine in blue glasses?"
"No, they were red, and there was cake cut in thin slices with icing on the top of it."
"Doesn't it bring it all back again?"
"It brings back the happiest time of my life to me. You never got up at dawn to turn the cows out to pasture, and brought them home in the evening, riding the calf?"
"No, but I've cooked breakfast by candlelight."
"You've never led a band of little darkeys across a cornfield at sunrise?"
"But I've canned a whole patch of tomatoes."
"I know you've never tasted the delight of stolen fishing in the creek under the willows?"
Her reserve had dropped from her like a mask. She looked up with a laugh that was pure music. "It is hard to believe that you ever went without things."
"Oh, things!" He made a gesture of indifference. "If you mean money – well, it may surprise you to know that it has no value for me to-day except as a means to an end."
"To how many ends?" she asked mockingly.
"The honest truth is that it wouldn't cost me a pang to give up Briarlay, every stock and stone, and go back to the southside to dig for a living. I made it all by accident, and I may lose it all just as easily. It looks now, since the war began, as if I were losing some of it very rapidly. But have you ever noticed that people are very apt to keep the things they don't care about – that they can't shake them off? Now, what I've always wanted was the chance to do some work that counted – an opportunity for service that would help the men who come after me. As a boy I used to dream of this. In those days I preferred William Wallace to Monte Cristo."
"The opportunity may come now."
"If we go into this war – and, by God, we must go into it! – that might be. I'd give ten – no, twenty years of my life for the chance. Life! We speak of giving life, but what is life except the means of giving something infinitely better and finer? As if anything mattered but the opportunity to speak the thought in one's brain, to sing it, to build it in stone. There is a little piece of America deep down in me, and when I die I want to leave it somewhere above ground, embodied in the national consciousness. When this blessed Republic leaves the mud behind, and goes marching, clean and whole, down the ages, I want this little piece of myself to go marching with it."
So she had discovered the real Blackburn, the dreamer under the clay! This was the man Mrs. Timberlake had described to her – the man whose fate it was to appear always in the wrong and to be always in the right. And, womanlike, she wondered if this passion of the mind had drawn its strength and colour from the earlier wasted passion of his heart? Would he love America so much if he loved Angelica more? As she drew nearer to the man's nature, she was able to surmise how terrible must have been the ruin that Angelica had wrought in his soul. That he had once loved her with all the force and swiftness of his character, Caroline understood as perfectly as she had come to understand that he now loved her no longer.
"If I can cast a shadow of the America in my mind into the sum total of American thought, I shall feel that life has been worth while," he was saying. "The only way to create a democracy, – and I see the immense future outlines of this country as the actual, not the imaginary democracy, – after all, the only way to create a thing is to think it. An act of faith isn't merely a mental process; it is a creative force that the mind releases into the world. Germany made war, not by invading Belgium, but by thinking war for forty years; and, in the same way, by thinking in terms of social justice, we may end by making a true democracy." He paused abruptly, with the glow of enthusiasm in his face, and then added slowly, in a voice that sounded curiously restrained and distant, "I must have been boring you abominably. It has been so long since I let myself go like this that I'd forgotten where I was and to whom I was talking."
It was true, she realized, without resentment; he had forgotten that she was present. Since she had little vanity, she was not hurt. It was only one of those delicious morsels that life continually offered to one's sense of humour.
"I am not quite so dull, perhaps, as you think me," she responded pleasantly. After all, though intelligence was sometimes out of place, she had discovered that pleasantness was always a serviceable quality.
At this he rose from his chair, laughing. "You must not, by the way, get a wrong impression of me. I have been talking as if money did not count, and yet there was a time when I'd willingly have given twenty years of my life for it. Money meant to me power – the kind of power one could grasp by striving and sacrifice. Why, I've walked the streets of Richmond with five cents in my pocket, and the dream of uncounted millions in my brain. When my luck turned, and it turned quickly as luck runs, I thought for a year or two that I'd got the thing that I wanted – "
"And you found out that you hadn't?"
"Oh, yes, I found out that I hadn't," he rejoined drily, as he moved toward the door, "and I've been making discoveries like that ever since. To-day I might tell you that work, not wealth, brings happiness, but I've been wrong often enough before, and who knows that I am not wrong about this." It was the tone of bitterness she had learned to watch for whenever she talked with him – the tone that she recognized as the subtle flavour of Angelica's influence. "Now I'll find Mary," he added, "and ask her if she saw the doctor this morning. The reading I heard as I came up, I suppose was for her benefit?"
"I don't know," replied Caroline, wondering if she ought to keep him from interrupting a play of Alan's. "I think Mr. Wythe had promised to read something to Mrs. Blackburn."
"Oh, well, Mary must be about, and I'll find her. She couldn't sleep last night and I thought her looking fagged."
"Yes, she hasn't been well. Mrs. Timberlake has tried to persuade her to take a tonic."
For a minute he hesitated. "There hasn't been any trouble, I hope. Anything I could straighten out?" He looked curiously young and embarrassed as he put the question.
"Nothing that I know of. I think she feels a little nervous and let-down, that's all."
The hesitation had gone now from his manner, and he appeared relieved and cheerful. "I had forgotten that you aren't the keeper of the soul as well as the body. It's amazing the way you manage Letty. She is happier than I have ever seen her." Then, as the child got up from her play and came over to him, he asked tenderly, "Aren't you happy, darling?"
"Yes, I'm happy, father," answered Letty, slowly and gravely, "but I wish mother was happy too. She was crying this morning, and so was Aunt Mary."
A wine-dark flush stained Blackburn's face, while the arms that had been about to lift Letty from the floor, dropped suddenly to his sides. The pleasure his praise had brought to Caroline faded as she watched him, and she felt vaguely disturbed and apprehensive. Was there something, after all, that she did not understand? Was there a deeper closet and a grimmer skeleton at Briarlay than the one she had discovered?
"If your mother isn't happy, Letty, you must try to make her so," he answered presently in a low voice.
"I do try, father, I try dreadfully hard, and so does Miss Meade. But I think she wants something she hasn't got," she added in a whisper, "I think she wants something so very badly that it hurts her."
"And does your Aunt Mary want something too?" Though he spoke jestingly, the red flush was still in his face.
Letty put up her arms and drew his ear down to her lips. "Oh, no, Aunt Mary cries just because mother does."
"Well, we'll see what we can do about it," he responded, as he turned away and went out of the door.
Listening attentively, Caroline heard his steps pass down the hall, descend the stairs, and stop before the door of the front drawing-room. "I wonder if Mr. Wythe is still reading," she thought; and then she went back to her unfinished letter, while Letty returned cheerfully to her play in the corner.
This is an ugly blot, mother dear, but Mr. Blackburn came in so suddenly that he startled me, and I almost upset my inkstand. He stayed quite a long time, and talked more than he had ever done to me before – mostly about politics. I have changed my opinion of him since I came here. When I first knew him I thought him wooden and hard, but the more I see of him the better I like him, and I am sure that everything we heard about him was wrong. He has an unfortunate manner at times, and he is very nervous and irritable, and little things upset him unless he keeps a tight grip on himself; but I believe that he is really kind-hearted and sincere in what he says. One thing I am positive about – there was not a word of truth in the things Mrs. Colfax wrote me before I came here. He simply adores Letty, and whatever trouble there may be between him and his wife, I do not believe that it is entirely his fault. Mrs. Timberlake says he was desperately in love with her when he married her, and I can tell, just by watching them together, how terribly she must have made him suffer. Of course, I should not say this to any one else, but I tell you everything – I have to tell you – and I know you will not read a single word of this to the girls.
I used to hope that Letty's illness would bring them together – wouldn't that have been just the way things happen in books? – but everybody blamed him because she went to the tableaux, and, as far as I can see, she lets people think what is false, without lifting a finger to correct them. It is such a pity that she isn't as fine as we once thought her – for she looks so much like an angel that it is hard not to believe that she is good, no matter what she does. If you haven't lived in the house with her, it is impossible to see through her, and even now I am convinced that if she chose to take the trouble, she could twist everyone of us, even Mr. Blackburn, round her little finger. You remember I wrote you that Mr. Wythe did not like her? Well, she has chosen to be sweet to him of late, and now he is simply crazy about her. He reads her all his plays, and she is just as nice and sympathetic as she can be about his work. I sometimes wish Miss Blackburn would not be quite so frank and sharp in her criticism. I have heard her snap him up once or twice about something he wrote, and I am sure she hurt his feelings. One afternoon, when I took Letty down to the drawing-room to show a new dress to her mother, he was reading, and he went straight on, while we were there, and finished his play. I liked it very much, and so did Mrs. Blackburn, but Miss Blackburn really showed some temper because he would not change a line when she asked him to. It was such a pity she was unreasonable because it made her look plain and unattractive, and Mrs. Blackburn was too lovely for words. She had on a dress of grey crêpe exactly the colour of her eyes, and her hair looked softer and more golden than ever. It is the kind of hair one never has very much of – as fine and soft as Maud's – but it is the most beautiful colour and texture I ever saw.
Well, I thought that Miss Blackburn was right when she said the line was all out of character with the speaker; but Mrs. Blackburn did not agree with us, and when Mr. Wythe appealed to her, she said it was just perfect as it was, and that he must not dream of changing it. Then he said he was going to let it stand, and Miss Blackburn was so angry that she almost burst into tears. I suppose it hurt her to see how much more he valued the other's opinion; but it would be better if she could learn to hide her feelings. And all the time Mrs. Blackburn lay back in her chair, in her dove grey dress, and just smiled like a saint. You would have thought she pitied her sister-in-law, she looked at her so sweetly when she said, "Mary, dear, we mustn't let you persuade him to ruin it." You know I really began to ask myself if I had not been unjust to her in thinking that she could be a little bit mean. Then I remembered that poor old woman in Pine Street – I wrote you about her last autumn – and I knew she was being sweet because there was something she wanted to gain by it. I don't know what it is she wants, nor why she is wasting so much time on Mr. Wythe; but it is exactly as if she had bloomed out in the last month like a white rose. She takes more trouble about her clothes, and there is the loveliest glow – there isn't any word but bloom that describes it – about her skin and hair and eyes. She looks years younger than she did when I came here.
I wanted to write you about Mr. Blackburn, but his wife is so much more fascinating. Even if you do not like her, you are obliged to think about her, and even if you do not admire her, you are obliged to look at her when she is in the room. She says very little – and as she never says anything clever, I suppose this is fortunate – but somehow she just manages to draw everything to her. I suppose it is personality, but you always say that personality depends on mind and heart, and I am sure her attraction has nothing to do with either of these. It is strange, isn't it, but the whole time Mr. Blackburn was in here talking to me, I kept wondering if she had ever cared for him? Mrs. Timberlake says that she never did even when she married him, and that now she is irritated because he is having a good many financial difficulties, and they interfere with her plans. But Mr. Blackburn seems to worry very little about money. I believe his friends think that some day he may run for the Senate – Forlorn Hope Blackburn, Colonel Ashburton calls him, though he says that he has a larger following among the Independent voters than anybody suspects. I shouldn't imagine there was the faintest chance of his election – for he has anything but an ingratiating manner with people; and so much in a political candidate depends upon a manner. You remember all the dreadful speeches that were flung about in the last Presidential elections. Well, Mr. Sloane, who was down here from New York the other day, said he really thought the result might have been different if the campaign speakers had had better manners. It seems funny that such a little thing should decide a great question, doesn't it? I suppose, when the time comes for us to go into this war or stay out of it, the decision will rest upon something so small that it will never get into history, not even between the lines. You remember that remark of Turgot's – that dear father loved to quote: "The greatest evils in life have their rise from things too small to be attended to."
After hearing Mr. Blackburn talk, I am convinced that he is perfectly honest in everything he says. As far as I can gather he believes, just as we do, that men should go into politics in order to give, not to gain, and he feels that they will give freely of themselves only to something they love, or to some ideal that is like a religion to them. He says the great need is to love America – that we have not loved, we have merely exploited, and he thinks that as long as the sections remain distinct from the nation, and each man thinks first of his own place, the nation will be exploited for the sake of the sections. He says, too, and this sounds like father, that the South is just as much the nation as the North or the West, and that it is the duty of the South to do her share in the building of the future. I know this is put badly, but you will understand what I mean.
Now, I really must stop. Oh, I forgot to tell you that Mrs. Blackburn wants to know if you could find time to do some knitting for her? She says she will furnish all the wool you need, and she hopes you will make socks instead of mufflers. I told her you knitted the most beautiful socks.
I am always thinking of you and wondering about The Cedars.
Your loving,CAROLINE.
It looks very much as if we were going to fight, doesn't it? Has the President been waiting for the country, or the country for the President?
