Mary E. Waller

“ I listened to their tales whene'er the camp-fire crackled and the snow, the feather-snow that melted from the pines, fell hissing on the glowing arch of logs."
How André loved that sound! How dear to him was that one time in all the year's full round, when freeze the nights, the sap grows chill and numb; when warms the rising sun at early dawn and that sweet ichor runs! It kept him young; within him stirred his youthful forest hopes and joys with that first mounting life. And loud he laughed, nor gave the secret of his youth, his woodsman's lasting joys. ”

“ I was sitting beside as good a man, as fine a man, one more than that other's equal in achievement, as the world counts achievement. I was groping for a solution when the Doctor exclaimed: "There's the manor!"
The white walls and snow-covered roof stood out boldly against the black massed background of spruce, hemlock and pine. The yellow chintz curtains were drawn apart, showing us both the gleam of lamplight and the leaping firelight. At the windows in the living-room were Jamie and his mother; at those of the dining-room both Angélique and Marie were visible for a moment. ”

“ Cale, listen. For twenty-six years I was in this world, and four men—the one people call my father, you, my uncle-in-law who loved your wife, my mother's sister, Doctor Rugvie who brought me into this world and made but two attempts to find me, Mr. Ewart who as George Jackson brought me home in his arms, a baby three days old, and left me for good and all, worse than orphaned—all four of you, how much have you cared for me in reality? ”

“ In a way, what people are apt to consider a birthright depended on his answer.
Again and again during that hour of concentrated thought, there surged up into consciousness, like a repeating wave of undertone, the realization that all that belonged to a quarter of a century ago, all, all past; done with; their accounts settled. They were forgotten, mostly, by everyone; forgiven, perhaps, by the few, including Cale. Why should what my mother did, or did not do, figure as a factor in my present and future life? I determined to take my stand with Mr. Ewart on this, and this alone. ”

“ But just my own, mine, Marcia Farrell's, here, from day to day in Lamoral; a life lived in thankfulness of spirit for a shelter that is a home; in thankfulness for the modicum of intellect—with its accompanying physical fitness—that enables me to earn my living; in thankfulness for friends; in thankfulness—yes, I dare say it, even in the shadow of Cale's story of my mother's short life—that I love, that I can love. ”

“ What do I care if, millions of years ago when things on this earth were stickier and hotter than the worst dog-day in New York, this thing that has, in the end, become Marcia Farrell, this half-perfected mechanism of body and mind, had gills like a fish? What do I care if it had?
This "I" of me is distinct from every other "I" on this inhabited globe. This "I" of me has its special work to do, not another's, not my ancestors'. Humble enough it is. It has to feed and clothe my body by labor, the brain regulating the handicraft. It has eyes to see all the beauty, all the ugliness of Life ”

“ I was happy! If Cale had called me by that name at this time I would have welcomed it. It applied to me. It was good to be alive; good to be out in such a world of natural glory; good to have, in the night and the silence, such companionship that understood my own silence of enjoyment.
I was happy at the prospect of the Doctor's coming. The thought of the future removal to the farm no longer filled me with misgivings. "I shall still be near the manor, it will not be banishment in any sense." So I comforted myself.
I turned to get a look over the ridge of fur at the man beside me. ”

“ We understood each other. We were man and woman, not boy and girl. We recognized what each of us was becoming to the other in the daily intimate household ways of life—an enduring test; in the community of our human interests, in the common wealth of our friends, of our books. His best friends were mine; mine were his—all except Delia Beaseley; sometime I intended he should know her.
I thought at first that would come about through the farm project; but Mrs. Macleod, Jamie and I had to acknowledge, soon after the Doctor returned, that the development of this plan was at a standstill. ”

“ It was just the time in the evening when the men flock to the cabaret. As I drew near it, I heard the sound of the graphophone. I listened, not stopping in my walk.
"O Canada, pays de mon amour!"
I stopped then; and it seemed as if my heart stopped at the same time.
Oh, it had been "Canada, land of my love" in the deepest sense—and now!
I went on to the boat; crossed the trestle. At the sound of my footstep on the deck, the woman put her head up the companionway.
"Who 's there?"
"Some one who wishes to speak with you alone; I was here the other day." ”

“ I heard a heavy long-drawn sigh from the man standing in front of me.
"Does he know?" was my first rational question.
"Ewart know? Marcia, Marcia—think what you are saying! Ewart is a gentleman—the soul of honor—"
"No, of course, he does n't. I did n't think.— Why have n't you told him instead of me?"
"Why? I tell you because you are a woman; because it is your right to withdraw from a situation that is untenable; you must be the first to know." ”

“ The Doctor turned to him.
"How do you look at it, Boy, you, with your twenty-three years? The world where such things happen is n't much like that world of André's Odyssey, is it?"
Jamie answered brightly, but his voice was slightly unsteady:
"Yes, it's the same old world; it's a wilderness, you know, for all of us, only there are so many paths through it, across it, and up and down it—paths and trails and roads that cross and recross; so many that end in swamp and bog; so many that lead nowhither; so many that are lost on the mountain. ”

“ Macleod heard the words, for Jamie had run up to the camp. André took our special suit cases and carried them to the hut.
We took possession and found everything needed for our comfort. Tired as we were, we could not rest until we had unpacked and settled ourselves with something like regularity for the night. And, oh, that first supper in the open! The sun was setting behind the forest; the lake waters, touched with faint color on the farther shore, were without a ripple; the ancient pines above us quiet. And, oh, that first deep sleep on my bed of balsam spruce! ”

“ Nothing that Cale has said shall influence me in this. All that is past—a part of another generation. I have put it all out of my life, once and for all. I live now and here, in Lamoral. I am not my mother; I am Marcia Farrell. I have not her life to answer for, and her life—oh, what she must have suffered!—shall no longer influence mine. ”

“ Thus fortified against the Canadian cold, I went downstairs promptly on time.
Mr. Ewart came out into the passageway; the Doctor was talking with Mrs. Macleod in the living-room.
"Why, Miss Farrell," he exclaimed, "I see you don't realize our climate; you can't go without more wraps—"
He hesitated, grew visibly embarrassed. I knew by his manner he had unwittingly probed my poverty to the quick, and I crimsoned with shame; yes, I was ashamed that my lack should thus be made known to him—ashamed as when Delia Beaseley's keen eyes read my need of money. ”

“ But in and through and above all, it opened to me the high heart of the Canadian, the undaunted faith in established principles, and the patriotism that is a veritable passion.
"O Canada, my Canada!" an old French Canadian once exclaimed to me as we sat by the box-stove in his little "cabin". "There is no land like it; no land where they live at peace as we do here; no land where they are so content by their own fireside." ”

“ I entered, and shut the door softly not to rouse Jamie and Mrs. Macleod. I heard the dog settle on the threshold. Somehow, the sound helped me to bear. It was something belonging to him that was near me in my trouble.
I sat down on the side of my bed—sat there, I think, all night. A round of thought kept turning like a mill-wheel in my head:—"The man I love is my father—Mr. Ewart, my father, is the man I love." ”

“ Jamie showed me the great Gloire de Dijon roses growing on the stone walls of his home, and the ivy covering the gate that gives passage from the lower side of the garden to the meadows and the bright-glancing Earn. Before you step out through it, it frames the misty blue Grampians beyond the river. Jamie used to describe all this to me that winter in Lamoral; but the reality is more beautiful than any description.
The Doctor was with us for three weeks in August. We celebrated Jamie's birthday by repeating Gordon's celebration of it so long ago. ”

“ Macleod and I sewed and stitched, and planned for the various rooms, Jamie smoked and jeered or encouraged, and the four dogs watched every movement on our part, with an ear cocked for little Pete who was cracking butternuts in the kitchen.
The life in the manor was so peaceful, so sheltered, so normal. Every member of the household was busy with work during the day, and the night brought with it well-earned rest, and a sense of comfort and security in the flame-lighted rooms. ”

“ I said, fumbling in my basket for some petty crochet. She said nothing, and in silence we went down stairs together, she little realizing that, in referring to Doctor Rugvie as the one to whom I was indebted for being here, she twisted some fibre in my mental make-up and caused it to vibrate painfully. Had I but known it, I had been keyed to this moment ever since hearing Delia Beaseley's account of my mother's death—keyed too long and at too high a pitch. Something had to give way; hence my mood of apparent revolt, because I could not live in unchanged circumstances in this manor of Lamoral. ”

“ Before six, Cale and Peter were off on their nine mile drive to Richelieu-en-Haut to meet the Quebec express. They drove in a low comfortable double "pung", lined with fur rugs and piled with robes; a skeleton truck trailed behind for luggage. The yoke of bells jangled cheerfully in the dry crisping air, for the Percherons were lively—the French coach horses were not ready for the northern snows—and freely tossed their heads as they played a little before plunging into the light drifts. ”

“ It is long, narrow, winding at its southern extremity; at its northern, it is expanded pool-like among forest-covered heights the reflection of which darkens and apparently deepens it where its waters touch the marginal wilderness! In camp by the margin of the lake, beneath some ancient pines, rare in that region, and surrounded by the spicy fragrance of balsam, spruce and cedar, that came to us warm from the depths of the seemingly illimitable forest behind us! ”

“ Content, satisfied, I began to jest with Jamie. We made and enlarged upon the most ideal plans it ever befell mortals to make. The others listened to our chaffing and found amusement in it, for we tried to outdo each other in camp-hyperbole. The Doctor, Mr. Ewart and Cale, whose presence Mr. Ewart insisted upon having the entire evening, smoked in silence. I knew where the Doctor's thoughts were. I would have given a half-hour of that evening's enjoyment—at least I think I would—to have read Mr. Ewart's.
Late, very late, Cale rose, put a chunk into the soapstone, and said good night. ”

“ As it is, I want to live my life full in my own way, among my own. I want to be in the thick of the fray, even if by being there I should go under a little sooner. I want to mingle with the multitude of men—see into their lives, give them something of mine in reality and through the imagination, and get their point of view into my life. ”

“ Within ten minutes, my clean passageway, laid with the brand-new rag carpet, was piled high with these masculine belongings, and the snow from eight masculine boots was melting and wetting the pretty strip into dismal sogginess! I began to understand why the passageways in the manor were laid with flagging, and I determined I would have the lower carpet taken up in the morning, that Jamie might not laugh at me.
As Cale set down the last chest, he must have taken note of my despair, for he spoke encouragingly:
"Makes a lot of difference in a house havin' so many men folks round." ”

“ The life of the East Side was flooding the streets. He turned to me as he stood on the low step. "I hope it won't be goodby for another six weeks, Marcia."
"Cale, oh, Cale—"
He was off down the court with a long stride peculiar to himself. I saw him step over a bunch of babies playing in the mud at the corner of the court. He turned that corner into the street. I went in and shut the door.
Delia Beaseley was out for the entire forenoon, but Jane, who had returned from her two weeks vacation, was upstairs. I had plenty of time to think, to feel. ”

“ But, suddenly, all the rich robings, opera cloaks, clinging gowns of silk, velvet and chiffon, the diamond tiaras, the jewelled necklaces, the French lingerie even—all dropped from every one in that procession; and there, on a New York sidewalk, in the harsh glare of electric lights, amidst the hiss and cranking of their automobiles, the clank of silver-mounted harness and the champing of bits, the shouts and calls and myriad city noises, I saw them for what they really are:—women, like unto all other women ”

“ Hopes unbounded, if wholly unfounded,—for what had this man ever said to me since his home-coming that he had not said a dozen times to every member of his household?—imagined joys of another, a dual life—
"Yes," I said to myself, giving rein to pleasing fantasy, "a dual life in one—our lives, his and mine, one and inseparable; why not, Marcia Farrell? Why should n't I grasp with both hands outstretched at all life may have to give me? Why not hold it fast even if it have thorns?" ”

“ It may be that she, too, sheltered as she now is, may sometime find herself lost in the wilderness we call Life, may read these life-lines and, hearing her mother's cry, may find by means of it the trail—as her mother found it before her. ”

“ I saw that the car was over full. The platform and steps were black with human beings clinging to the guard rails like swarming bees alight. I saw the man struggle madly to catch the guards and gain a footing on the lower step, the woman still running beside him and holding him by the coat. Then I was aware of a sudden sweeping movement of the man's free arm, the roar of the car as it sped down the incline, and of the woman lying, hatless from the force of the man's blow, on the pavement beside the track. ”