Rilla of Ingleside Page 12

  CHAPTER XII

  IN THE DAYS OF LANGEMARCK

  "How can spring come and be beautiful in such a horror," wrote Rilla inher diary. "When the sun shines and the fluffy yellow catkins arecoming out on the willow-trees down by the brook, and the garden isbeginning to be beautiful I can't realize that such dreadful things arehappening in Flanders. But they are!

  "This past week has been terrible for us all, since the news came ofthe fighting around Ypres and the battles of Langemarck and St. Julien.Our Canadian boys have done splendidly--General French says they 'savedthe situation,' when the Germans had all but broken through. But Ican't feel pride or exultation or anything but a gnawing anxiety overJem and Jerry and Mr. Grant. The casualty lists are coming out in thepapers every day--oh, there are so many of them. I can't bear to readthem for fear I'd find Jem's name--for there have been cases wherepeople have seen their boys' names in the casualty lists before theofficial telegram came. As for the telephone, for a day or two I justrefused to answer it, because I thought I could not endure the horriblemoment that came between saying 'Hello' and hearing the response. Thatmoment seemed a hundred years long, for I was always dreading to hear'There is a telegram for Dr. Blythe.' Then, when I had shirked for awhile, I was ashamed of leaving it all for mother or Susan, and now Imake myself go. But it never gets any easier. Gertrude teaches schooland reads compositions and sets examination papers just as she alwayshas done, but I know her thoughts are over in Flanders all the time.Her eyes haunt me.

  "And Kenneth is in khaki now, too. He has got a lieutenant's commissionand expects to go overseas in midsummer, so he wrote me. There wasn'tmuch else in the letter--he seemed to be thinking of nothing but goingoverseas. I shall not see him again before he goes--perhaps I willnever see him again. Sometimes I ask myself if that evening at FourWinds was all a dream. It might as well be--it seems as if it happenedin another life lived years ago--and everybody has forgotten it but me.

  "Walter and Nan and Di came home last night from Redmond. When Walterstepped off the train Dog Monday rushed to meet him, frantic with joy.I suppose he thought Jem would be there, too. After the first moment,he paid no attention to Walter and his pats, but just stood there,wagging his tail nervously and looking past Walter at the other peoplecoming out, with eyes that made me choke up, for I couldn't helpthinking that, for all we knew, Monday might never see Jem come offthat train again. Then, when all the people were out, Monday looked upat Walter, gave his hand a little lick as if to say, 'I know it isn'tyour fault he didn't come--excuse me for feeling disappointed,' andthen he trotted back to his shed, with that funny little sidelongwaggle of his that always makes it seem that his hind legs aretravelling directly away from the point at which his forelegs areaiming.

  "We tried to coax him home with us--Di even got down and kissed himbetween the eyes and said, 'Monday, old duck, won't you come up with usjust for the evening?' And Monday said--he did!--'I am very sorry but Ican't. I've got a date to meet Jem here, you know, and there's a traingoes through at eight.'

  "It's lovely to have Walter back again though he seems quiet and sad,just as he was at Christmas. But I'm going to love him hard and cheerhim up and make him laugh as he used to. It seems to me that every dayof my life Walter means more to me.

  "The other evening Susan happened to say that the mayflowers were outin Rainbow Valley. I chanced to be looking at mother when Susan spoke.Her face changed and she gave a queer little choked cry. Most of thetime mother is so spunky and gay you would never guess what she feelsinside; but now and then some little thing is too much for her and wesee under the surface. 'Mayflowers!' she said. 'Jem brought memayflowers last year!' and she got up and went out of the room. I wouldhave rushed off to Rainbow Valley and brought her an armful ofmayflowers, but I knew that wasn't what she wanted. And after Waltergot home last night he slipped away to the valley and brought motherhome all the mayflowers he could find. Nobody had said a word to himabout it--he just remembered himself that Jem used to bring mother thefirst mayflowers and so he brought them in Jem's place. It shows howtender and thoughtful he is. And yet there are people who send himcruel letters!

  "It seems strange that we can go in with ordinary life just as ifnothing were happening overseas that concerned us, just as if any daymight not bring us awful news. But we can and do. Susan is putting inthe garden, and mother and she are housecleaning, and we Junior Redsare getting up a concert in aid of the Belgians. We have beenpractising for a month and having no end of trouble and bother withcranky people. Miranda Pryor promised to help with a dialogue and whenshe had her part all learnt her father put his foot down and refused toallow her to help at all. I am not blaming Miranda exactly, but I dothink she might have a little more spunk sometimes. If she put her footdown once in a while she might bring her father to terms, for she isall the housekeeper he has and what would he do if she 'struck'? If Iwere in Miranda's shoes I'd find some way of managingWhiskers-on-the-moon. I would horse-whip him, or bite him, if nothingelse would serve. But Miranda is a meek and obedient daughter whosedays should be long in the land.

  "I couldn't get anyone else to take the part, because nobody liked it,so finally I had to take it myself. Olive Kirk is on the concertcommittee and goes against me in every single thing. But I got my wayin asking Mrs. Channing to come out from town and sing for us, anyhow.She is a beautiful singer and will draw such a crowd that we will makemore than we will have to pay her. Olive Kirk thought our local talentgood enough and Minnie Clow won't sing at all now in the chorusesbecause she would be so nervous before Mrs. Channing. And Minnie is theonly good alto we have! There are times when I am so exasperated that Ifeel tempted to wash my hands of the whole affair; but after I danceround my room a few times in sheer rage I cool down and have anotherwhack at it. Just at present I am racked with worry for fear the IsaacReeses are taking whooping-cough. They have all got a dreadful cold andthere are five of them who have important parts in the programme and ifthey go and develop whooping-cough what shall I do? Dick Reese's violinsolo is to be one of our titbits and Kit Reese is in every tableau andthe three small girls have the cutest flag-drill. I've been toiling forweeks to train them in it, and now it seems likely that all my troublewill go for nothing.

  "Jims cut his first tooth today. I am very glad, for he is nearly ninemonths old and Mary Vance has been insinuating that he is awfullybackward about cutting his teeth. He has begun to creep but doesn'tcrawl as most babies do. He trots about on all fours and carries thingsin his mouth like a little dog. Nobody can say he isn't up to scheduletime in the matter of creeping anyway--away ahead of it indeed, sinceten months is Morgan's average for creeping. He is so cute, it will bea shame if his dad never sees him. His hair is coming on nicely too,and I am not without hope that it will be curly.

  "Just for a few minutes, while I've been writing of Jims and theconcert, I've forgotten Ypres and the poison gas and the casualtylists. Now it all rushes back, worse than ever. Oh, if we could justknow that Jem is all right! I used to be so furious with Jem when hecalled me Spider. And now, if he would just come whistling through thehall and call out, 'Hello, Spider,' as he used to do, I would think itthe loveliest name in the world."

  Rilla put away her diary and went out to the garden. The spring eveningwas very lovely. The long, green, seaward-looking glen was filled withdusk, and beyond it were meadows of sunset. The harbour was radiant,purple here, azure there, opal elsewhere. The maple grove was beginningto be misty green. Rilla looked about her with wistful eyes. Who saidthat spring was the joy of the year? It was the heart-break of theyear. And the pale-purply mornings and the daffodil stars and the windin the old pine were so many separate pangs of the heart-break. Wouldlife ever be free from dread again?

  "It's good to see P.E.I. twilight once more," said Walter, joining her."I didn't really remember that the sea was so blue and the roads so redand the wood nooks so wild and fairy haunted. Yes, the fairies stillabide here. I vow I could find scores of them under the violets inRainbow Valley." />
  Rilla was momentarily happy. This sounded like the Walter of yore. Shehoped he was forgetting certain things that had troubled him.

  "And isn't the sky blue over Rainbow Valley?" she said, responding tohis mood. "Blue--blue--you'd have to say 'blue' a hundred times beforeyou could express how blue it is."

  Susan wandered by, her head tied up with a shawl, her hands full ofgarden implements. Doc, stealthy and wild-eyed, was shadowing her stepsamong the spirea bushes.

  "The sky may be blue," said Susan, "but that cat has been Hyde all dayso we will likely have rain tonight and by the same token I haverheumatism in my shoulder."

  "It may rain--but don't think rheumatism, Susan--think violets," saidWalter gaily--rather too gaily, Rilla thought.

  Susan considered him unsympathetic.

  "Indeed, Walter dear, I do not know what you mean by thinking violets,"she responded stiffly, "and rheumatism is not a thing to be jokedabout, as you may some day realize for yourself. I hope I am not of thekind that is always complaining of their aches and pains, especiallynow when the news is so terrible. Rheumatism is bad enough but Irealize, and none better, that it is not to be compared to being gassedby the Huns."

  "Oh, my God, no!" exclaimed Walter passionately. He turned and wentback to the house.

  Susan shook her head. She disapproved entirely of such ejaculations. "Ihope he will not let his mother hear him talking like that," shethought as she stacked the hoes and rake away.

  Rilla was standing among the budding daffodils with tear-filled eyes.Her evening was spoiled; she detested Susan, who had somehow hurtWalter; and Jem--had Jem been gassed? Had he died in torture?

  "I can't endure this suspense any longer," said Rilla desperately.

  But she endured it as the others did for another week. Then a lettercame from Jem. He was all right.

  "I've come through without a scratch, dad. Don't know how I or any ofus did it. You'll have seen all about it in the papers--I can't writeof it. But the Huns haven't got through--they won't get through. Jerrywas knocked stiff by a shell one time, but it was only the shock. Hewas all right in a few days. Grant is safe, too."

  Nan had a letter from Jerry Meredith. "I came back to consciousness atdawn," he wrote. "Couldn't tell what had happened to me but thoughtthat I was done for. I was all alone and afraid--terribly afraid. Deadmen were all around me, lying on the horrible grey, slimy fields. I waswoefully thirsty--and I thought of David and the Bethlehem water--andof the old spring in Rainbow Valley under the maples. I seemed to seeit just before me--and you standing laughing on the other side ofit--and I thought it was all over with me. And I didn't care. Honestly,I didn't care. I just felt a dreadful childish fear of loneliness andof those dead men around me, and a sort of wonder how this could havehappened to me. Then they found me and carted me off and before long Idiscovered that there wasn't really anything wrong with me. I'm goingback to the trenches tomorrow. Every man is needed there that can begot."

  "Laughter is gone out of the world," said Faith Meredith, who had comeover to report on her letters. "I remember telling old Mrs. Taylor longago that the world was a world of laughter. But it isn't so any longer."

  "It's a shriek of anguish," said Gertrude Oliver.

  "We must keep a little laughter, girls," said Mrs. Blythe. "A goodlaugh is as good as a prayer sometimes--only sometimes," she addedunder her breath. She had found it very hard to laugh during the threeweeks she had just lived through--she, Anne Blythe, to whom laughterhad always come so easily and freshly. And what hurt most was thatRilla's laughter had grown so rare--Rilla whom she used to thinklaughed over-much. Was all the child's girlhood to be so clouded? Yethow strong and clever and womanly she was growing! How patiently sheknitted and sewed and manipulated those uncertain Junior Reds! And howwonderful she was with Jims.

  "She really could not do better for that child than if she had raised abaker's dozen, Mrs. Dr. dear," Susan had avowed solemnly. "Little did Iever expect it of her on the day she landed here with that soup tureen."