第74章 V(1)

Claude had been married a year and a half. One December morning he got a telephone message from his father-in-law, asking him to come in to Frankfort at once. He found Mr. Royce sunk in his desk-chair, smoking as usual, with several foreign-looking letters on the table before him. As he took these out of their envelopes and sorted the pages, Claude noticed how unsteady his hands had become.

One letter, from the chief of the medical staff in the mission school where Caroline Royce taught, informed Mr. Royce that his daughter was seriously ill in the mission hospital. She would have to be sent to a more salubrious part of the country for rest and treatment, and would not be strong enough to return to her duties for a year or more. If some member of her family could come out to take care of her, it would relieve the school authorities of great anxiety. There was also a letter from a fellow teacher, and a rather incoherent one from Caroline herself. After Claude finished reading them, Mr. Royce pushed a box of cigars toward him and began to talk despondently about missionaries.

"I could go to her," he complained, "but what good would that do?

I'm not in sympathy with her ideas, and it would only fret her.

You can see she's made her mind up not to come home. I don't believe in one people trying to force their ways or their religion on another. I'm not that kind of man." He sat looking at his cigar. After a long pause he broke out suddenly, "China has been drummed into my ears . It seems like a long way to go to hunt for trouble, don't it? A man hasn't got much control over his own life, Claude. If it ain't poverty or disease that torments him, it's a name on the map. I could have made out pretty well, if it hadn't been for China, and some other things .

. . . If Carrie'd had to teach for her clothes and help pay off my notes, like old man Harrison's daughters, like enough she'd have stayed at home. There's always something. I don't know what to say about showing these letters to Enid."

"Oh, she will have to know about it, Mr. Royce. If she feels that she ought to go to Carrie, it wouldn't be right for me to interfere."

Mr. Royce shook his head. "I don't know. It don't seem fair that China should hang over you, too."

When Claude got home he remarked as he handed Enid the letters, "Your father has been a good deal upset by this. I never saw him look so old as he did today."

Enid studied their contents, sitting at her orderly little desk, while Claude pretended to read the paper.

"It seems clear that I am the one to go," she said when she had finished.

"You think it's necessary for some one to go? I don't see it."

"It would look very strange if none of us went," Enid replied with spirit.

"How, look strange?"

"Why, it would look to her associates as if her family had no feeling."

"Oh, if that's all!" Claude smiled perversely and took up his paper again. "I wonder how it will look to people here if you go off and leave your husband?"

"What a mean thing to say, Claude!" She rose sharply, then hesitated, perplexed. "People here know me better than that. It isn't as if you couldn't be perfectly comfortable at your mother's." As he did not glance up from his paper, she went into the kitchen.

Claude sat still, listening to Enid's quick movements as she opened up the range to get supper. The light in the room grew greyer. Outside the fields melted into one another as evening came on. The young trees in the yard bent and whipped about under a bitter north wind. He had often thought with pride that winter died at his front doorstep; within, no draughty halls, no chilly corners. This was their second year here. When he was driving home, the thought that he might be free of this house for a long while had stirred a pleasant excitement in him; but now, he didn't want to leave it. Something grew soft in him. He wondered whether they couldn't try again, and make things go better. Enid was singing in the kitchen in a subdued, rather lonely voice. He rose and went out for his milking coat and pail. As he passed his wife by the window, he stopped and put his arm about her questioningly.

She looked up. "That's right. You're feeling better about it, aren't you? I thought you would. Gracious, what a smelly coat, Claude! I must find another for you."

Claude knew that tone. Enid never questioned the rightness of her own decisions. When she made up her mind, there was no turning her. He went down the path to the barn with his hands stuffed in his trousers pockets, his bright pail hanging on his arm. Try again--what was there to try? Platitudes, littleness, falseness .

. . . His life was choking him, and he hadn't the courage to break with it. Let her go! Let her go when she would! . . . What a hideous world to be born into! Or was it hideous only for him?

Everything he touched went wrong under his hand--always had.

When they sat down at the supper table in the back parlour an hour later, Enid looked worn, as if this time her decision had cost her something. "I should think you might have a restful winter at your mother's," she began cheerfully. "You won't have nearly so much to look after as you do here. We needn't disturb things in this house. I will take the silver down to Mother, and we can leave everything else just as it is. Would there be room for my car in your father's garage? You might find it a convenience."

"Oh, no! I won't need it. I'll put it up at the mill house," he answered with an effort at carelessness.

All the familiar objects that stood about them in the lamplight seemed stiller and more solemn than usual, as if they were holding their breath.

"I suppose you had better take the chickens over to your mother's," Enid continued evenly. "But I shouldn't like them to get mixed with her Plymouth Rocks; there's not a dark feather among them now. Do ask Mother Wheeler to use all the eggs, and not to let my hens set in the spring."

"In the spring?" Claude looked up from his plate.