Renny

“ Well, Renny, congratulate me, my boy. She’s mine, and I’m hers—which are two ways of stating the same delightful fact. I’m up in a balloon, Renny. I’m engaged to the prettiest, sweetest, and most delightful girl there is from the Atlantic to the Pacific. What d’ye think of that? Say, Renmark, there’s nothing on earth like it. You ought to reform and go in for being in love. It would make a man of you. Champagne isn’t to be compared to it. Get up here and dance, and don’t sit there like a bear nursing a sore paw. Do you comprehend that I am to be married to the darlingest girl that lives? ”

“ Renny scarcely seemed to hear him, seemed hardly aware of his presence. Finch moved closer, with a dim idea of absorbing some of his strength by mere proximity. In the shadow of that unique magnificence he did not feel quite so frightened. ”

“ Wake laid the bugle on the table at the head of the bed and flung himself down into the bedclothes. He burrowed against Renny, putting his arms about his neck.
"Oh! I'm so happy," he breathed. "A picnic to-day if you please. The first of the season. It's June. The first of June! My birthday!" His eyes were two narrow slits. "Renny, have you a—you know what?"
Renny yawned prodigiously, showing two rows of strong teeth. "Well, I guess I'll get up."
"Renny, Renny!" He bumped and struggled against his elder's chest. "Oh, Renny, I could kill you!"
"Why?" ”

“ Finch had never been able to find out who that woman was, though he had looked eagerly in the faces of all the women he had met for a long time. He had even gone to the pine grove and lain there motionless for hours, hoping, yet fearing, that she and Renny would return, his heart beating expectantly at every sound; but they had never come. He often gazed with envious curiosity into Renny's lean red face, wondering what thoughts were in his head. Piers had observed once to him that women always "fell" for Renny. ”

“ Renny rubbed his legs and patted his back as a mother might have done. In fact, in his love for his little brother he combined the devotion of both father and mother. Meg was all grown-up sister.
Wake, drowsy at last, curled up against Renny's chest and murmured: "I believe I could go to sleep more quickly if we'd pretend we were somebody else, Renny please."
"Do you? All right. Who shall we be? Living people or people out of the books? You say."
Wake thought a minute, getting sleepier with each tick of Renny's watch beneath the pillow; then he breathed: "I think we'll be Eden and Alayne." ”

“ Finch rolled over, disclosing a distorted red face.
"Is there no place I can be let alone?" he bawled. "Have I got to go to the end of the world to be let alone? All I ask is to be let alone, in peace here, and you all come prodding me up!"
"Stay alone, then, you little idiot!" Renny tossed away the cigarette he was smoking and strode to the water's edge.
All very well, Finch thought, for a lordly being like Renny, safe, always sure of himself, unmenaced by dreadful thoughts and bewitchment, of whom even Piers stood in some awe. ”

“ An old square piano, the top of which was littered with pipes, several decanters and a mixer, medicine bottles,—he was always dosing himself for gout,—and music, stood by the window.
Nip, the Yorkshire terrier, had a bone on the hearth-rug when Renny entered. Hearing the step, he darted forward, nipped Renny on the ankle, and darted back to his bone, snarling as he gnawed. Nicholas, his bad leg stretched on the ottoman, looked up from his book with a lazy smile.
"Hullo, Renny! Come for a chat? Can you find a chair? Throw those slippers on to the floor. ”

“ Then she tossed up her arms and, drooping her head, once more fell to a passion of weeping.
“Zyp,” I said, quietly, when she could hear me, “what is it you want me to do?”
“We want money, Renny——” she gasped, still with fluttering sobs, drying her eyes half-fiercely as if in resentment of that brief self-abandonment. “He has no spirit to make it now as he used. We have escaped to Southampton, intending to go abroad somewhere, and lose ourselves and be lost. We fled in a fright, unthinking, and now we can get no further. You’ll help us, Renny, won’t you?” ”

“ She looked more like a parrot than ever. "Let him off, indeed!" she cried. "There's too much letting off here. That's what's the matter. I say flog him. Do you hear, Renny? Flog him well. I want to see it done. Get a cane and flog him."
With a terrified scream, Wakefield threw his arms about Renny's waist and hid his face against him. "Don't whip me, Renny!" he implored.
"I'll do it myself," she cried. "I've flogged boys before now. I've flogged Nicholas. I've flogged Ernest. I'll flog this spoiled little rascal. Let me have him!" She shuffled toward him, eager with lust of power. ”

“ Then she said:
"I don't think you realize, Renny, how strange your attitude toward Alayne is becoming. You have almost a possessive air. Sometimes I think it would be better if Eden had never brought her here. I've tried to like her, but—"
"Oh, my God!" said Renny, wheeling, and beginning to stride away. "You women make me sick. There's no peace with you. Imagine the entire family by the ears because of a kid's music lessons!" He gave a savage laugh.
Meg, watching him flounder, was aware of depths she had only half suspected. ”

“ Now, Renny, I’ll tell you what you need. You need a good, sensible wife worse than any man I know. It is not yet too late to save you, but it soon will be. You will, before long, grow a crust on you like a snail, or a lobster, or any other cold-blooded animal that gets a shell on itself. Then nothing can be done for you. Now, let me save you, Renny, before it is too late. ”

“ With Renny it was very different. A man who had loved women both casually and licentiously, who could not speak their language, who had thought to have and craved to have no other sort of feelings toward them, he felt himself betrayed by this new and subtle passion that went deeper than mere possession, that could not be gratified and forgotten. ”

“ Thus far had his existence, emerging from profoundest gloom, run a straight and uneventful course—but before?
Into what deadly corner of a great city’s most secret burrows his young life had been first hemmed and then crushed out of shape who may say? When I had got him down again, unnerved but quiet now and wistful with apology over his outburst, he told me all that he knew.
“Thunder always seems to turn my brain a little, Renny, perhaps because it is associated in the depths of my mind with that strange young experience. ”

“ Zyp—“Why have you been different to me of late, Renny? Aren’t you fond of me now?”
Renny—“My good little Zyp, the fact is I have tired a bit of the novelty. It has been my first experience of the society of a girl, you know, and very pleasant while it lasted; but I confess to a little longing for a resumption of the old independence and freedom. Perhaps some day again we will walk and converse together as of old.” ”

“ When the others had plunged into the lake, and Wake was already screaming with delight and terror at Piers's hands, Renny returned to Finch and said with a fatherly air: "Better come in, Finch; it'll do you good. You've been studying too much."
"No. I d' want to," mumbled the boy against his arm.
"Don't be a duffer," said Renny, poking him with his bare foot. "The more Piers sees he can rattle you the more he'll do it." ”

“ Renny, poor Zyp is so unhappy!”
“Does this look like it?”
“The elves caught me. It was so lovely to shake off all the weight and the misery and the womanliness.”
“Are you tired of being a woman, Zyp?”
“Tired? My heart aches so that I could die. Oh, I hate it all! No, no, Renny, don’t believe me! My little child! My little, little child! How can I have her and not be a woman!”
“Get up, Zyp, and let’s find our way out of this.”
“Not till you’ve promised me. Where can we talk better? The foolish people never dare to walk here at night. You love the woods, too, Renny. ”

“ Renny, I think Jason will die of that face.”
I remembered Duke’s words and was silent.
“It comes upon us in all places and at all hours. Wherever we go he finds means to track us and to follow—in the streets; in churches, where we sometimes sit now; at windows, staring in and never moving. Renny,” she came close up against me to whisper in my ear, and put her arm round my neck like the Zyp of old. Perhaps she was half-changeling again in that atmosphere of woodland leafiness. “Renny—once he tried to poison Jason!” ”

“ The foal's eyes were half closed, but when Renny put his hand on its tawny flank, they flew wide open, and a shiver slid beneath his palm. He felt its legs. Warmer. He was going to save it. He was going to save it! It wanted to rise. He put his arms about it. "There—up she comes now!" It was on its feet, its eyes blazing with courage, its neck ridiculously arched, its legs stiffly braced. Clattering her hoofs, Cora rose, whinnying, and looked over the partition at her offspring. ”

“ Perhaps the boy's a genius, Renny."
"Lord! I hope not."
Nicholas made the subterranean noises that were his laughter. "You're a perfect Court, Renny. No wonder Mamma is partial to you."
"Is she? I'd never noticed it. I thought Eden was her pet. He has a way with women of all ages. Well, I'm off. Hobbs, up Mistwell way, is having a sale of Holsteins. I may buy a cow or two."
"I should go with you if it were horses, in spite of my knee, but I can't get worked up over cows. Never liked milk."
Renny had got to the door when Nicholas asked suddenly: "How about Piers? ”

“ Do you suppose I pay Mr. Fennel to teach you for the fun of it? Just because you're too delicate to go to school isn't any excuse for your being an idle little beast without an idea in your head but play. What have you got in your pockets?"
"Marbles—just a few, Renny."
"Hand them over."
Renny held out his hand while the marbles were reluctantly extracted from the child's pockets and heaped on his own palm. Wakefield did not feel in the least like crying, but his sense of the dramatic prompted him to shed tears as he handed over his treasures. He could always cry when he wanted to. ”

“ As she descended the stairs, she had a glimpse of Piers and Pheasant in a deep window-seat on the landing. They had drawn the shabby mohair curtains before them, but she saw that they were eating a huge red apple, bite about, like children. Outside, the wind was howling and the rain was slashing down the window-pane behind them. They looked very jolly and care-free, as though life were a pleasant game. And yet, she reflected, they had their own troubles.
The front door was standing open, and Renny was in the porch, talking to a man whom Alayne knew to be a horse dealer. ”

“ A man who is unable, or unwilling, to work in the vineyard should not find fault with the pickers. And now, Renny, for the hundredth time of asking, add to the many obligations already conferred, and tell me, like the good fellow you are, what you would do if you were in my place. To which of those two charming, but totally unlike, girls would you give the preference?”
“Damn!” said the professor quietly.
“Hello, Renny!” cried Yates, raising his head. “Have you cut your finger? I should have warned you about using too sharp a knife.” ”

“ It’s the thought—harkee, Renny! It’s the thought that a task I’ve not failed in for twenty years and more must come to be another’s.”
“What task?”
“There are ears in the walls. Closer, my son. The task of oiling the wheel below.”
“Shall I take it up, dad? Is that your wish?”
I answered stoutly, though my heart sunk within me at the prospect.
“You or nobody, it must be. Are you afraid?”
“I wish I could say I wasn’t.”
He clutched my hand in tremulous eagerness.
“Master it! You must, my lad! Much depends on it. They whisper the room is haunted. Not for you, Renalt, if for anybody. ”

“ The little one is wanting dainties, Renny; and we—it is hard to say it—bread sometimes. But she will only eat of the best, and chocalats she loves. I wish you could see her. She is my own fairy. I work the prettiest flowers into samplers, and try to sell them in the shops; but I am not very clever with my needel; and Jason laughs at them, though my feet ake with walking over these endless paving stones. Renny, dear, I must be a beggar, please. Don’t think hardly of me for it, but my darling that’s so pretty and frale! Oh, Renny, help us. Your loving sister,
Zyp. ”

“ Dusky forms stole stealthily along the narrow alleys of the half-deserted city of Thebes. As they hurried past, the paling afterglow reflected upon the low white walls caused their [248] nodding shadows to appear unnaturally enlarged, menacing, terrifying.
Within Renny’s workshop the more immediate shadows were at times revealed by the light from a deep bronze bowl, a brazier filled with glowing incense-wood. The bowl stood upon a low stand immediately in front of Renny’s statue of the Princess Sesen. ”

“ Oh, Renny! Why didn’t you sooner?”
Her anguish—her implied reproach—pierced to my soul.
“Has that been in your mind, Zyp? I never thought—it was always a habit with me to yield the lead to Jason, and you were so strong and independent.”
“Not now for long—a haunted, hunted thing! But I had no right—and then, your father.”
“If I thought I had sacrificed your interests to a mistaken sense of duty to him—ah, Zyp, it would be a very bitter thing.”
“No, no! You’ve always been strong and good and generous. Don’t mind what I say. I’m only desperate with trouble. Hush, little rabbit! ”

“ The armor of his egotism was pierced by a hurt glance from Ernest and he hastened to add, "Of course, Uncle, there's your work on Shakespeare. That will get a lot of attention when it comes out. But Renny won't see anything in either achievement to be proud of. I think he's rather ashamed for us. He thinks a Whiteoak should be a gentleman farmer or a soldier. ”