His mother had followed their quick parley with eager looks, as if she were trying to keep her intelligence to its work concerning them. The effort seemed to exhaust her, and when she spoke again her words were so indistinct that even Cynthia could not understand them till she had repeated them several times.
Then the girl was silent, while the invalid kept an eager look upon her.
She seemed to understand that Cynthia did not mean to speak; and the tears came into her eyes.
"Do you want me to know what she said?" asked Jeff, respectfully, reverently almost.
Cynthia said, gently: "She says that then you must show you didn"t mean any harm to me, and that you cared for me, all through, and you didn"t care for anybody else."
"Thank you," said Jeff, and he turned to his mother. "I"ll do everything I can to make Cynthy believe that, mother."
The girl broke into tears and went out of the room. She sent in the night-watcher, and then Jeff took leave of his mother with an unwonted kiss.
Into the shadow of a starlit night he saw the figure he had been waiting for glide out of the glitter of the hotel lights. He followed it down the road.
"Cynthia!" he called; and when he came up with her he asked: "What"s the reason we can"t make it true? Why can"t you believe what mother wants me to make you?"
Cynthia stopped, as her wont was when she wished to speak seriously. "Do you ask that for my sake or hers?"
"For both your sakes."
"I thought so. You ought to have asked it for your own sake, Jeff, and then I might have been fool enough to believe you. But now--"
She started swiftly down the hill again, and this time he did not try to follow her.
L.
Mrs. Durgin"s speech never regained the measure of clearness it had before; no one but Cynthia could understand her, and often she could not. The doctor from Lovewell surmised that she had sustained another stroke, lighter, more obscure than the first, and it was that which had rendered her almost inarticulate. The paralysis might have also affected her brain, and silenced her thoughts as well as her words. Either she believed that the reconciliation between Jeff and Cynthia had taken place, or else she could no longer care. She did not question them again, but peacefully weakened more and more. Near the end of September she had a third stroke, and from this she died.
The day after the funeral Jeff had a talk with Whitwell, and opened his mind to him.
"I"m going over to the other side, and I shan"t be back before spring, or about time to start the season here. What I want to know is whether, if I"m out of the house, and not likely to come back, you"ll stay here and look after the place through the winter. It hasn"t been a good season, but I guess I can afford to make it worth your while if you look at it as a matter of business."
Whitwell leaned forward and took a straw into his mouth from the golden wall of oat sheaves in the barn where they were talking. A soft rustling in the mow overhead marked the remote presence of Jombateeste, who was getting forward the hay for the horses, pushing it toward the holes where it should fall into their racks.
"I should want to think about it," said Whitwell. "I do" know as Cynthy"d care much about stayin"--or Frank."
"How long do you want to think about it?" Jeff demanded, ignoring the possible wishes of Cynthia and Frank.
"I guess I could let you know by night."
"All right," said Jeff.
He was turning away, when Whitwell remarked:
"I don"t know as I should want to stay without I could have somebody I could depend on, with me, to look after the hosses. Frank wouldn"t want to."
"Who"d you like?"
"Well--Jombateeste."
"Ask him."
Whitwell called to the Canuck, and he came forward to the edge of the mow, and stood, fork in hand, looking down.
"Want to stay here this winter and look after the horses, Jombateeste?"
Whitwell asked.
"Nosseh!" said the Canuck, with a misliking eye on Jeff.
"I mean, along with me," Whitwell explained. "If I conclude to stay, will you? Jeff"s goin" abroad."
"I guess I stay," said Jombateeste.
"Don"t strain yourself, Jombateeste," said Jeff, with malevolent derision.
"Not for you, Jeff Dorrgin," returned the Canuck. "I strain myself till I bust, if I want."
Jeff sneered to Whitwell: "Well, then, the most important point is settled. Let me know about the minor details as soon as you can."
"All right."
Whitwell talked the matter over with his children at supper that evening. Jeff had made him a good offer, and he had the winter before him to provide for.
"I don"t know what deviltry he"s up to," he said in conclusion.
Frank looked to his sister for their common decision. "I am going to try for a school," she said, quietly. "It"s pretty late, but I guess I can get something. You and Frank had better stay."
"And you don"t feel as if it was kind of meechin", our takin" up with his offer, after what"s--" Whitwell delicately forbore to fill out his sentence.
"You are doing the favor, father," said the girl. "He knows that, and I guess he wouldn"t know where to look if you refused. And, after all, what"s happened now is as much my doing as his."
"I guess that"s something so," said Whitwell, with a long sigh of relief. "Well, I"m glad you can look at it in that light, Cynthy. It"s the way the feller"s built, I presume, as much as anything."
His daughter waived the point. "I shouldn"t feel just right if none of us stayed in the old place. I should feel as if we had turned our backs on Mrs. Durgin."
Her eyes shone, and her father said: "Well, I guess that"s so, come to think of it. She"s been like a mother to you, this past year, ha"n"t she? And it must have come pootty hard for her, sidin" ag"in" Jeff. But she done it."
The girl turned her head away. They were sitting in the little, low keeping-room of Whitwell"s house, and her father had his hat on provisionally. Through the window they could see the light of the lantern at the office door of the hotel, whose ma.s.s was lost in the dark above and behind the lamp. It was all very still outside.
"I declare," Whitwell went on, musingly, "I wisht Mr. Westover was here."
Cynthia started, but it was to ask: "Do you want I should help you with your Latin, Frank?"
Whitwell came back an hour later and found them still at their books. He told them it was all arranged; Durgin was to give up the place to him in a week, and he was to surrender it again when Jeff came back in the spring. In the mean time things were to remain as they were; after he was gone, they could all go and live at Lion"s Head if they chose.
"We"ll see," said Cynthia. "I"ve been thinking that might be the best way, after all. I might not get a school, it"s so late."