Jane Helen Findlater

“ Mrs. de Tracy was in her usual chair, knitting; Miss Smeardon sat by the table with a piece of fancy-work; Robinette had pulled a foot-stool to the hearthrug and sat as near the flames as she conveniently could. She shielded her face with the last copy of Punch, and let her shoulders bask in the warmth of the fire, which made flickering shadows on her creamy neck. Her white skirts swept softly round her feet, and her favourite turquoise scarf made a note of colour in her lap. She was one of those women who, without positive beauty, always make pictures of themselves. ”

“ Affairs of the heart are like thunderstorms; the atmosphere may sometimes seem charged with electricity, and yet circumstances, like a sudden wind that sweeps the clouds away before they break, may cause the lovers to drift apart. Or all in a moment may come thunder, lightning, and rain from a clear sky, and there is nothing that is apt to precipitate matters like an unexpected parting.
When Lavendar announced that he had 182 to leave Stoke Revel, two pairs of eyes, Miss Smeardon’s and Carnaby’s, instantly looked at Robinette to see how she received the news, but she only smiled at the moment. ”

“ Then the tiny green globes began to appear on every branch and twig; crowding, crowding, crowding till it seemed as if there could never be room for so many to grow; but the weaker ones fell from the boughs or were blown away when the wind was fierce, so the Plum Tree felt no anxiety, knowing that it was built for a large family! The little green globes grew and grew, and drank in sweet mother-juices, and swelled, and when the summer sun touched their cheeks all day they flushed and reddened, till when August came the tree was laden with purpling fruit ”

“ His sense of time must have suffered some strange confusion; in one way it seemed only an hour ago that he had arrived from the clangour and darkness of London to the silence of the country, the cuckoos calling across the river between the wooded hills, and the April sunshine on the orchard trees; in another, years might have passed since the moment when he first saw Robinette Loring sitting under Mrs. Prettyman’s plum tree. ”

“ Carnaby handled a boat well, for he had been born a sailor, as it were, and his long, powerful strokes took him along at a fine pace. But although he was going to look for Robinette and Mark, he was rather angry with both of them, and in no hurry. He rested on his oars indifferently and let the tide carry him up as it liked, while, with infinite zest, he unearthed a cigarette case from the recesses of his person, lit a cigarette, and smoked it coolly. ”

“ The axe had assumed a personality to him and was “she,” not “it.” “She makes no more noise than a pair of scissors cutting flowers; not half so much!” he said proudly. Branch after branch fell down and lay about the tree like the discarded garments of a bathing 282 nymph. The petals fell upon Carnaby’s face, upon his hair and shoulders; he was a white figure as he toiled. Frightened birds and bats flew about, but he did not notice them. His only care was the cottage itself and its inmate. If she should awake! ”

“ See to the fine stock of ’im; firm as a rock in the good ground! And the roots, they be sound and fresh. ’E’ll grow again, Missy; never you cry!”
Robinette looked so beautiful as she lifted her luminous eyes and parted lips to old Darke, and then turned to him with a gesture of hope and joy, that again Lavendar could hardly keep from avowing his love; but the remembrance of the old nurse’s still shape in the little cottage hushed the words that trembled on his lips. ”

“ You must not be too hard on Carnaby!” pleaded Lavendar. “He would not touch the money that was to come from the sale of Mrs. Prettyman’s cottage under the circumstances, so it seemed best to him that the sale should not take place, and he prevented it in the directest and simplest way that occurred to him. It’s like some of the things that men have done to please God, Mrs. Robin,” Mark added, smiling, “and thought they were doing it, too! But Carnaby only wanted to please you!”
“To please me!” exclaimed Robinette, looking round her at the ruin before them. “Oh dear!” ”

“ Stoke Revel is as it was and ever will be, world without end; only Aunt de Tracy is crosser than when you are here and life is not as gay, although Carnaby does his dear, cubbish best. If ever you desire your mental jewels to shine at their brightest; if ever you wish a tolerably good disposition to seem like that of an angel; if ever, in a fit of vanity, you would like to appear as a blend of Apollo, Lancelot, Demosthenes, Prince 215 Charlie, Ajax, and Solomon, just fly to Stoke Revel and become part of the household. ”

“ Loring know of his arrival, as they had agreed he should do, he went along the flagged pathway into the garden, and sat down on the edge of the low wall that divided it from the river. Just in front of him was the little worn bench where he had first seen Robinette as she sat beside her old nurse with the tiny shoe on her lap. It was scarcely a fortnight ago; yet it seemed to him that he could hardly remember the kind of man he had been that afternoon; a new self, full of a new purpose, and at that moment of a new hope, had taken the place of the objectless being he had been before. ”

“ I like Carnaby, if he could get it into his thick head that his presence isn’t always necessary; it must bother Mrs. Loring too; he’s quite off his head about her if she only knew it. However, it’s my last day very likely, and if I have to outwit Machiavelli I’ll manage it somehow! Surely one lame old woman, and a torpid machine for knitting and writing notes like Miss Smeardon, can’t want to be out of doors all day. ”

“ He said them now, and the results seemed likely to be fatal to a dropsical animal so soon after a full meal.
“You’ll kill him!” whispered Robinette as they left the dining room.
“I mean to!” was the calm reply. “I’d like to wring old Smeardon’s neck too!” but the broad good humour of the rosy face, the twinkling eyes, belied these truculent words. In spite of infinite powers of mischief, there was not an ounce of vindictiveness in Carnaby de Tracy, though there might be other qualities difficult to deal with.
“There’s a man to be made there––or to be marred!” said Robinette to herself. ”

“ Carnaby, my dear Mrs. Loring, belongs to you. Do you want to give him up? He adores you and you will have an unbounded influence on him, if you choose to exercise it.”
“How can I influence Carnaby––in America?”
This was a blow, but Lavendar made no sign. “You may not always be in America,” he said. “Now why not let Mrs. de Tracy sell the land and cottage and plum tree in the ordinary course of things? Oh, how I wish I could buy the blessed thing!” he exclaimed, parenthetically.
“Oh! how I wish I could buy the plum tree, and keep it, always blossoming, in my morning-room!” sighed Robinette. ”

“ Robinette had seated herself on a low wall beside him. Her little embroidered futility of a handkerchief was in her hand once more. “A rose and a smile! that’s all we could give it,” she said; “and we would either of us share some of that burden if we only could.” She watched the merry, healthy children playing beside them, and added, “After all let us comfort ourselves that brown cheeks and fat legs are in the majority. Rightness somehow or other must be at the root of things, or we shouldn’t be a living world at all.” ”

“ Some one perhaps would come out and welcome her, she thought for a brief moment, but only the butler appeared, who, with the formal announcement of her name, ushered her into a long, low room with a row of windows on one side and a pleasant old-fashioned look of comfort and habitation. She caught a glimpse of a tea-table with a steaming urn upon it, heard the furious barking of a little dog, saw that there were two figures in the room and moved instinctively towards the one beside the window, the figure in weeds, neither very tall nor very imposing, yet somehow formidable. ”

“ A few white petals from the blossoming plum tree, scattered by the breeze, fell upon her black bonnet and shoulders. A faint scent of honey came from it and the hum of bees, for the day was warm. The tumble-down condition of the cottage engaged Mrs. de Tracy’s attention.
“And for this,” she thought scornfully, “a man will give hundreds of pounds! There’s truth in the adage that a fool and his money are soon parted!” ”

“ There they lay in a kind of fairy ring, as if there had been a shower of mother-of-pearl in the April night; and no human creature would have dared set a vandal foot on that magic circle, and mar the perfection of its beauty. All the same the Plum Tree had lost its petals, and that was hard to bear at first. But though its Wittisham neighbours often said to summer trippers, “I wish you could have seen it in blossom!” the Plum Tree did not repine, because of the secrets––the thousand, thousand secrets––it held under its leaves. ”

“ It’s cool in the shadow,” said Robinette. She leaned on the wall and looked out at the shining reaches of the river. “The swelling of Jordan is over now,” she said with a little smile and a sigh. “The tide has come up, and how quiet everything is!”
The water mirrored the hills and the ships and the gracious sky above them. There was scarcely a sound in the air. At the point where they stood, the Manor House was 326 hidden from view, and only the squat old tower of the church was visible, and the yew tree rising above the wall against the golden field. ”

“ Robinette answered thoughtfully, looking into the fire. “Yes; I dare say there is, but I’m afraid there are social and mental dangers involved in not being afraid of it, too!” Her mischievous eyes swept the room, with Mrs. de Tracy’s solemn figure and Miss Smeardon’s 107 for its bright ornaments. “The moment a person or a nation allows itself to be too dull, it ceases to be quite alive, doesn’t it? But as to us Americans, Mr. Lavendar, bear with us for a few years, we are so ridiculously young! It is our growing time, and what you want in a young plant is growth, isn’t it?” ”

“ This afternoon her rheumatism had been specially bad: she had an inclination to cry out when she rose from her chair, and every step was an effort. Yet the sunshine was tempting; it warmed old and aching bones through and through as no fire could do; and Mrs. Prettyman thought she must make the effort to go out.
She had just arrived at this conclusion, when a tap came to the door.
“That you, Mrs. Darke?” she called out in her piping old voice. “Come in, me dear, I’m that stiff with me rheumatics to-day I can’t scarce rise out of me chair.” ”

“ In the hall, she came face to face with Lavendar, who had just left the dining room.
“Mr. Lavendar!” she cried. “Do go into the drawing room and speak to my aunt. Preach to her! Argue with her! Convince her that she can’t and mustn’t act in this way; can’t go and turn Mrs. Prettyman out, and rob her of the plum tree, and leave her with hardly a penny in the world or a roof over her head!”
“It’s not a very pretty or a very pleasant business, Mrs. Loring, I admit,” said Lavendar quietly.
“Is it English law?” cried Robinette with indignation. “If it is, I call it mean and unjust!” ”

“ I wish every one would try to look at it in that light,” said Robinette with a slight flush of earnestness.
“What do you mean by a venture?” asked Mrs. de Tracy.
“The experiment we’re making in democracy,” answered Robinette. “It’s fallen to 110 us to try it, for of course it simply had to be tried. It is thrillingly interesting, whatever it may turn out, and I wish I might live to see the end of it. We are creating a race, Aunt de Tracy; think of that!”
“It’s as difficult for nations as for individuals to hit the happy medium,” said Lavendar, stirring the fire. ”

“ Robinette stared at the stretches of ooze, 166 and then stole a look at Mark Lavendar. “The idea of calling that man a jilt,” she thought. “Look at his eyes; look at his mouth; listen to his voice; there is truth in them all. Oh for a sight of the girl he jilted! How much it would explain! No, not altogether, because the careless making of his engagement would have to be accounted for, as well as the breaking of it. Unless he did it merely to oblige her––and men are such idiots sometimes,––then he must have fancied he was in love with her. ”

“ Prettyman’s wrongs. Besides, he did not wish Robinette to be banished from the drawing room for a whole interminable evening. He contrived to silence Carnaby for the time being.
“Let’s bury the hatchet for a little while,” he suggested. “Have you forgotten, Mrs. Loring, that I made Mrs. de Tracy promise to show off the Stoke Revel jewels for your benefit this very night?”
“O! but now I’m in disgrace, she won’t!” said Robinette.
“Yes, she will!” said Carnaby. “Nothing puts the old lady in such a heavenly temper as showing off the jewels. Don’t you miss it, Cousin Robin! ”

“ I’d wait a lifetime! There never was anybody like you in the world!”
The words were said half under the boy’s breath and the emotion in his tone was a complete and disagreeable surprise. Here was something that must be nipped in the bud, instantly and courageously. Robinette dropped Carnaby’s arm and said: “We’ll talk that over at once, Middy dear, but first you shall race me to the top of the twisting path, down past the tulip beds, to the seat under the big ash tree.––Come on!” ”

“ Loring will carry no tales, I am sure,” said Lavendar. “But tell me, my dear fellow, did you imagine that Mrs. Prettyman would be a gainer by your action?”
“Well, why not?” answered the boy. “Didn’t you tell me yourself that Waller R. A. wouldn’t look at the cottage without the tree? What’s to prevent the old woman living on where she is? Do you think there’ll be a rush of new tenants for that precious old hovel? Go on! You know better than that!”
“But the tree, Carnaby, the plum tree!” cried Lavendar. “My young Goth, hadn’t you a moment’s compunction? ”