Chapter 8

________________________________________________
_ Chapter VIII

That evening Lyman Risley came to see Cynthia. He looked at her anxiously and scrutinizingly when he entered the room, and did not respond to her salutation.

"Well, I have seen the child," he said, in a hushed voice, with a look towards the door as he seated himself before the fire and spread out his hands towards the blaze. He looked nervous and chilly.

"How did she look?" asked Cynthia.

"Why in the name of common-sense, Cynthia," he said, abruptly, without noticing her query, "if you had to give that child china for a souvenir, didn't you give her something besides Royal Sevres?" Lyman Risley undoubtedly looked younger than Cynthia, but his manner even more than his looks gave him the appearance of comparative youth. There was in it a vehemence and impetuosity almost like that of a boy. Cynthia, with her strained nervous intensity, seemed very much older.

"Why not?" said she.

"Why not? Well, it is fortunate for you that those people have a knowledge for the most part of the fundamental properties of the drama of life, such as bread-and-butter, and a table from which to eat it, and a knife with which to cut it, and a bed in which to sleep, and a stove and coal, and so on, and so on, and that the artistic accessories, such as Royal Sevres, which is no better than common crockery for the honest purpose of holding the tea for the solace of the thirsty mouth of labor, is beneath their attention."

"How does the child look, Lyman?" asked Cynthia Lennox. She was leaning back in a great crimson-covered chair before the fire, a long, slender, graceful shape, in a clinging white silk gown which was a favorite of hers for house wear. The light in the room was subdued, coming mostly through crimson shades, and the faint, worn lines on Cynthia's face did not show; it looked, with her soft crown of gray hair, like a cameo against the crimson background of the chair. The man beside her looked at her with that impatience of his masculine estate and his superior youth, and yet with the adoration which nothing could conquer. He had passed two-thirds of his life, metaphorically, at this woman's feet, and had formed a habit of admiration and lovership which no facts nor developments could ever alter. He was frowning, he replied with a certain sharpness, and yet he leaned towards her as he spoke, and his eyes followed her long, graceful lines and noted the clear delicacy of her features against the crimson background. "How the child looked--how the child looked; Cynthia, you do not realize what you did. You have not the faintest realization of what it means for a woman to keep a lost child hidden away as you did, when its parents and half the city were hunting for it. I tell you I did not know what the consequences might be to you if it were found out. There is wild blood in a city like this, and even the staid old New England stream is capable of erratic currents. I tell you I have had a day of dreadful anxiety, and it was worse because I had to be guarded. I dared scarcely speak to any one about the matter. I have listened on street corners; I have made errands to newspaper offices. I meant to get you away if-- Well, never mind--I tell you, you do not realize what you did, Cynthia."

Cynthia glanced at him without moving her head, then she looked away, her face quivering slightly, more as if from a reflection of his agitation than from her own. "You say you saw her," she said.

"This afternoon," the man went on, "I got fairly desperate. I resolved to go to the fountain-head for information, and take my chances. So down I went to Maple Street, where the Brewsters live, and I rang the front-door bell, and the child's aunt, a handsome, breathless kind of creature, came and ushered me into the best parlor, and went into the next room--the sitting-room--to call the others. I caught sight of enough women for a woman's club in the sitting-room. Then Andrew Brewster came in, and I offered my legal services out of friendly interest in the case, and in that way I found out what I wanted to. Cynthia, that child has not told."

Cynthia raised herself and sat straight, and her face flashed like a white flame. "Were they harsh to her?" she demanded. "Were they cruel? Did they question her, and were they harsh and cruel because she would not tell? Why did you not tell them yourself? Why did you not, Lyman Risley? Why did you not tell the whole story rather than have that child blamed? Well, I will go myself. I will go this minute. They shall not blame that darling. What do you think I care for myself? Let them lynch me if they want to. I will go this minute!" Cynthia sprang to her feet, but Risley, with a hoarse shout under his breath, caught hold of her and forced her back.

"For God's sake, sit down, Cynthia!" he said. "Didn't you hear the door-bell? Somebody is coming."

The door-bell had in fact rung, and Cynthia had not noticed it. She lay back in her chair as the door opened, and Mrs. Norman Lloyd entered. "Good-evening, Cynthia," she said, beamingly. "I thought I would stop a few minutes on my way to meeting. I'm rather early. No, don't get up," as Cynthia rose. "Don't get up; I can only stay a minute. Never mind about giving me a chair, Mr. Risley--thank you. Yes, this is a real comfortable chair." Mrs. Lloyd, seated where the firelight played over her wide sweep of rich skirts, and her velvet fur-trimmed cloak and plumed bonnet, beamed upon them with an expansive benevolence and kindliness. She was a large, handsome, florid woman. Her grayish-brown hair was carefully crimped, and looped back from her fat, pink cheeks, a fine shell-and-gold comb surmounted her smooth French twist, and held her bonnet in place. She unfastened her cloak, and a diamond brooch at her throat caught the light and blazed red like a ruby. She was the wife of Norman Lloyd, the largest shoe-manufacturer in the place. There was between her and Cynthia a sort of relationship by marriage. Norman Lloyd's brother George had married Cynthia's sister, who had died ten years before, and of whose little son, Robert, Cynthia had had the charge. Now George, who was a lawyer in St. Louis, had married again. Mrs. Norman had sympathized openly with Cynthia when the child was taken from Cynthia at his father's second marriage. "I call it a shame," she had said, "giving that child to a perfect stranger to bring up, and I don't see any need of George's marrying again, anyway. I don't know what I should do if I thought Norman would marry again if I died. I think one husband and one wife is enough for any man or woman if they believe in the resurrection. It has always seemed to me that the answer to that awful question in the New Testament, as to whose wife that woman who had so many husbands would be in the other world, meant that people who had done so much marrying on earth would have to be old maids and old bachelors in heaven. George ought to be ashamed of himself, and Cynthia ought to keep that child."

Ever since she had been very solicitously friendly towards Cynthia, who had always imperceptibly held herself aloof from her, owing to a difference in degree. Cynthia had no prejudices of mind, but many of nerves, and this woman was distinctly not of her sort, though she had a certain liking for her. Every time she was brought in contact with her she had a painful sense of a grating adjustment as of points of meeting which did not dovetail as they should. Norman Lloyd represented one of the old families of the city, distinguished by large possessions and college training, and he was the first of his race to engage in trade. His wife came from a vastly different stock, being the daughter of a shoe-manufacturer herself, and the granddaughter of a cobbler who had tapped his neighbor's shoes in his little shop in the L of his humble cottage house. Mrs. Norman Lloyd was innocently unconscious of any reason for concealing the fact, and was fond, when driving out to take the air in her fine carriage, of pointing out to any stranger who happened to be with her the house where her grandfather cobbled shoes and laid the foundation of the family fortune. "That all came from that little shop of my grandfather," she would say, pointing proudly at Lloyd's great factory, which was not far from the old cottage. "Mr. Lloyd didn't have much of anything when I married him, but I had considerable, and Mr. Lloyd went into the factory, and he has been blessed, and the property has increased until it has come to this." Mrs. Lloyd's chief pride was in the very facts which others deprecated. When she considered the many-windowed pile of Lloyd's, and that her husband was the recognized head and authority over all those throngs of grimy men, walking with the stoop of daily labor, carrying their little dinner-boxes with mechanical clutches of leather-tanned fingers, she used to send up a prayer for humility, lest evil and downfall of pride come to her. She was a pious woman, a member of the First Baptist Church, and active in charitable work. Mrs. Norman Lloyd adored her husband, and her estimate of him was almost ludicrously different from that of the grimy men who flocked to his factory, she seeing a most kindly spirited and amiable man, devoting himself to the best interests of his employes, and striving ever for their benefit rather than his own, and the others seeing an aristocrat by birth and training, who was in trade because of shrewd business instincts and a longing for wealth and power, but who despised, and felt himself wholly superior to, the means by which it was acquired.

"We ain't anything but the rounds of the ladder for Norman Lloyd to climb by, and he only sees and feels us with the soles of his patent-leathers," one of the turbulent spirits in his factory said. Mrs. Norman Lloyd would not have believed her ears had she heard him.

Mrs. Lloyd had not sat long before Cynthia's fire that evening before she opened on the subject of the lost child. "Oh, Cynthia, have you heard--" she began, but Risley cut her short.

"About that little girl who ran away?" he said. "Yes, we have; we were just talking about her."

"Did you ever hear anything like it?" said Mrs. Lloyd. "They say they can't find out where she's been. She won't tell. Don't you believe somebody has threatened her if she does?"

Cynthia raised herself and began to speak, but a slight, almost imperceptible gesture from the man beside her stopped her.

"What did you say, Cynthia?"

"There is no accounting for children's freaks," said Risley, shortly and harshly. Mrs. Lloyd was not thin-skinned; such a current of exuberant cordiality emanated from her own nature that she was not very susceptible to any counter-force. Now, however, she felt vaguely and wonderingly, as a child might have done, that for some reason Lyman Risley was rude to her, and she had a sense of bewildered injury. Mrs. Lloyd was always, moreover, somewhat anxious as to the relations between Cynthia and Lyman Risley. She heard a deal of talk about it first and last; and while she had no word of unkind comment herself, yet she felt at times uneasy. "Folks do talk about Cynthia and Lyman Risley keeping company so long," she told her husband; "it's as much as twenty years. It does seem as if they ought to get married, don't you think so, Norman? Do you suppose it is because the property was left that way--for you know Lyman hasn't got anything besides what he earns--or do you suppose it is because Cynthia doesn't want to marry him? I guess it is that. Cynthia never seemed to me as if she would ever care enough about any man to marry him. I guess that's it; but I do think she ought to stop his coming there quite so much, especially when people know that about her property."

Cynthia's property was hers on condition that her husband took her name if she married, otherwise it was forfeited to her sister's child. "Catch a Risley ever taking his wife's name!" said Mrs. Lloyd. "Of course Cynthia would be willing to give up the money if she loved him, but I don't believe she does. It seems as if Lyman Risley ought to see it would be better for him not to go there so much if they weren't going to be married."

So it happened when Risley caught up her question to Cynthia in that peremptory fashion, Mrs. Lloyd felt in addition to the present cause some which had gone before for her grievance. She addressed herself thereafter entirely and pointedly to Cynthia. "Did you ever see that little girl, Cynthia?" said she.

"Yes," replied Cynthia, in a voice so strange that the other woman stared wonderingly at her.

"Ain't you feeling well, Cynthia?" she asked.

"Very well, thank you," said Cynthia.

"When did you see her?" asked Mrs. Lloyd. Cynthia opened her mouth as if to speak, then she glanced at Risley, whose eyes held her, and laughed instead--a strange, nervous laugh. Happily, Mrs. Lloyd did not wait for her answer. She had her own important information to impart. She had in reality stopped for that purpose. "Well, I have seen her," she said. "I met her in front of Crosby's one day last summer. And she was so sweet-looking I stopped and spoke to her--I couldn't help it. She had beautiful eyes, and the softest light curls, and she was dressed so pretty, and the flowers on her hat were nice. The embroidery on her dress was very fine, too. Usually, you know, those people don't care about the fineness, as long as it is wide, and showy, and bright-colored. I asked her what her name was, and she answered just as pretty, and her mother told me how old she was. Her mother was a handsome woman, though she had an up-and-coming kind of way with her. But she seemed real pleased to have me notice the child. Where do you suppose she was all that time, Cynthia?"

"She was in some safe place, undoubtedly," said Risley, and again Mrs. Lloyd felt that she was snubbed, though not seeing how nor why, and again she rebelled with that soft and gentle persistency in her own course which was the only rebellion of which she was capable.

"Where do you suppose she was, Cynthia?" said she.

"I think some woman must have seen her, and coaxed her in and kept her, she was such a pretty child," said Cynthia, defiantly and desperately. But the other woman looked at her in wonder.

"Oh, Cynthia, I can't believe that," said she. "It don't seem as if any woman could be so bad as that when the child's mother was in such agony over her." And then she added, "I can't believe it, because it seems to me that if any woman was bad enough to do that, she couldn't have given her up at all, she was such a beautiful child." Mrs. Norman Lloyd had no children of her own, and was given to gazing with eyes of gentle envy at pretty, rosy little girls, frilled with white embroidery like white pinks, dancing along in leading hands of maternal love. "It don't seem to me I could ever have given her up, if I had once been bad enough to steal her," she said. "What put such an idea into your head, Cynthia?"

When the church-bell clanged out just then Lyman Risley had never been so thankful in his life. Mrs. Lloyd rose promptly, for she had to lead the meeting, that being the custom among the sisters in her church. "Well," said she, "I am thankful she is found, anyway; I couldn't have slept a wink that night if I had known she was lost, the dear little thing. Good-night, Cynthia; don't come to the door. Good-night, Mr. Risley. Come and see me, Cynthia--do, dear."

When Mrs. Norman Lloyd was gone, Risley looked at Cynthia with a long breath of relief, but she turned to him with seemingly no appreciation of it, and repeated her declaration which Mrs. Lloyd's coming had interrupted: "Lyman, I am going there to-night--this minute. Will you go with me? No, you must not go with me. I am going!" She sprang to her feet.

"Sit down, Cynthia," said Risley. "I tell you they were not harsh to her. You don't seem to consider that they love the child--possibly better than you can--and would not in the nature of things be harsh to her under such circumstances. Sit down and hear the rest of it."

"But they will be harsh by-and-by, after the first joy of finding her is over," said Cynthia. "I will go and tell them the first thing in the morning, Lyman."

"You will do nothing so foolish. They are not only not insisting upon her telling her secret, but announced to me their determination not to do so in the future. I wish you could have seen that man's face when he told me what a delicate, nervous little thing his child was, and the doctor said she must not be fretted if she had taken a notion not to tell; and I wish you could have seen the mother and the aunt, and the grandmother, Mrs. Zelotes Brewster. They would all give each other and themselves up to be torn of wild beasts first. It is easy to see where the child got her extraordinary strength of will. They took me out in the sitting-room, and there was a wild flurry of feminine skirts before me. I had previously overheard myself announced as Lawyer Risley by the aunt, and the response from various voices that they were 'goin' if he was comin' out in the sittin'-room.' It always made them nervous to see lawyers. Well, I followed the parents and the grandmother and the aunt out. I dared not refuse when they suggested it, and I hoped desperately that the child would not remember me from that one scared glance she gave at me this morning. But there she sat in her little chair, holding the doll you gave her, and she looked up at me when I entered, and I have never in the whole course of my existence seen such an expression upon the face of a child. Remember me? Indeed she did, and she promised me with the faithfulest, stanchest eyes of a woman set in a child's head that she would not tell; that I need not fear for one minute; that the lady who had given her the doll was quite safe. She knew, and she must have heard what I said to you this morning. She is the most wonderful child I have ever seen."

Cynthia had sank back in her chair. Lyman Risley put his cigar back between his lips; Cynthia was quite still, her delicate profile towards him.

"I assure you there is not the slightest danger of their troubling the child because of her silence, and you would do an exceedingly foolish thing, and its consequences would react not upon yourself only, but--upon others, were you to confess the truth to them," he said after a little. "You must think of others--of your friends, and of your sister's boy, whose loss led you into this. This would--well, it would get into the papers, Cynthia."

"Do you think that the doll continued to please her?" asked Cynthia.

"Cynthia, I want you to promise," said her friend, persistently.

"Very well, I will promise, if you will promise to let me know the minute you hear that they are treating her harshly because of her silence."

Suddenly Cynthia turned her face upon him. "Lyman," said she, "do you think that I could do anything for her--"

"Do anything for her?" he repeated, vaguely.

"Yes; they cannot have money. They must be poor: the father works in the factory. Would they allow me--"

The lawyer laughed. "Cynthia," he said, "you do not realize that pride finds its native element in all strata of society, and riches are comparative. Let me inform you that these Brewsters, of whom this child sprung, claim as high places in the synagogue as any of your Lennoxes and Risleys, and, what is more, they believe themselves there. They have seen the tops of their neighbors' heads as often as you or I. The mere fact of familiarity with shoe-knives and leather, and hand-skill instead of brain-skill, makes no difference with such inherent confidence of importance as theirs. The Louds, on the other side--the handsome aunt is a Loud--are rather below caste, but they make up for it with defiance. And as for riches, I would have you know that the Brewsters are as rich in their own estimation as you in yours; that they have possessions which entirely meet their needs and their aesthetic longings; that not only does Andrew Brewster earn exceedingly good wages in the shop, and is able to provide plenty of nourishing food and good clothes, but even by-and-by, if he prospers and is prudent, something rather extra in the way of education--perhaps a piano. I would have you know that there is a Rogers group on a little marble-topped table in the front window, and a table in the side window with a worked spread, on which reposes a red plush photograph album; that there is also a set of fine parlor furniture, with various devices in the way of silken and lace scarfs over the corners and backs of the chairs and sofa, and that there is a tapestry carpet; that in the sitting-room is a fine crushed-plush couch, and a multiplicity of rocking-chairs; that there is a complete dining-set in the next room, the door of which stood open, and even a side-board with red napkins, and a fine display of glass, every whit as elegant in their estimation as your cut glass in yours. The child's father owns his house and land free of encumbrance. He told me so in the course of his artless boasting as to what he might some day be able to do for the precious little creature of his own flesh and blood; and the grandmother owns her comfortable place next door, and she herself was dressed in black silk, and I will swear the lace on her cap was real, and she wore a great brooch containing hair of the departed, and it was set in pearl. What are you going to do in the face of opulence like this, Cynthia?"

Cynthia did not speak; her face looked as still as if it were carved in ivory.

"Cynthia," said the man, in a harsh voice, "I did not dream you were so broken up over losing that little boy of your sister's, poor girl."

Cynthia still said nothing, but a tear rolled down her cheek. Lyman Risley saw it, then he looked straight ahead, scowling over his cigar. He seemed suddenly to realize in this woman whom he loved something anomalous, yet lovely--a beauty, as it were, of deformity, an over-development in one direction, though a direction of utter grace and sweetness, like the lip of an orchid.

Why should she break her heart over a child whom she had never seen before, and have no love and pity for the man who had laid his best at her feet so long?

He saw at a flash the sweet yet monstrous imperfection of her, and he loved her better for it. _

Read next: Chapter 9

Read previous: Chapter 7

Table of content of Portion of Labor


GO TO TOP OF SCREEN

Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book