"n.o.body like me," Jerry repeated. "It"s a good thing I"m the only one of the kind. You"d say so if you knew what Aunt Jerry thinks of me. She has been a.n.a.lyzing me and filing me away in sections this afternoon."
"What"s on her mind now?" Eugene Wellington asked, as he leaned easefully back in his chair.
"She says I am heir--" Jerry always wondered what made her pause there.
Years afterward, when this June evening came back in memory, she could not account for it.
"Heir to what?" the young artist inquired, a faint, shadowy something sweeping his countenance fleetly.
"To all the sphere, To the seven stars and the solar year;
also to my father"s entire estate that"s left after some two years of litigation. I hate litigations."
"So do I, Jerry. Let"s forget them. Isn"t "Eden" beautiful? I"m so glad to be back here again." Eugene Wellington looked out at the idyllic loveliness of the place which the rose-arbor was built especially to command. "n.o.body could sin here, for there are no serpents busy-bodying around in such a dream of a landscape as this. I"m glad I"m an artist, if I never become famous. There"s such a joy in being able to see, even if your brush fails miserably in trying to make others see."
Again the man"s shapely hand fell gently on the girl"s hand, and this time it stayed there.
"You love it all as much as I do, don"t you, Jerry?" The voice was deep with emotion. "And you feel as I do, how this lifts one nearer to G.o.d.
Or is it because you are here with me that "Eden" is so fair to-night?
May I tell you something, Jerry? Something I"ve waited for the summer and "Eden" to give me the hour and the place to say? We"ve always known each other. We thought we did before, but a new knowing came to me the day your father left us. Look up, little cousin. I want to say something to you."
June-time, and youth, and roses, and soft, sweet air, and n.o.body there but blossoms, and whispering breezes, and these two. And they had known each other always. Oh, always! But now--something was different now, something that was grander, more beautiful in this place, in this day, in each other, than had ever been before--the old, old miracle of a man and a maid.
Suddenly something whizzed through the air and a snakelike streak of shadow cut the light of the doorway. Out in the open, Uncle Cornie came slowly stepping off the s.p.a.ce to where his discus lay beside the rose-arbor--one of the good little snakes. Every Eden has them, and some are much better than others.
The discus-ground was out on a lovely stretch of shorn clover sod. Why the discus should wander from the thrower"s hand through the air toward the rose-arbor no wind of heaven could tell. Nor could it tell why Uncle Cornie should choose to follow it and stand in the doorway of the arbor until the "Eden" dinner-hour called all three of the dwellers, Adam and Eve and this good little snake, to the cool dining-room and what goes with it.
Twilight and moonlight were melting into one, and all the sweet odors of dew-kissed blossoms, the good-night twitter of homing birds, the mists rising above the Winnowoc Valley, the shadows of shrubbery on the lawn, and the darkling outline of the tall maples made "Eden" as beautiful now as in the full sunlight.
Jerry Swaim sat in the doorway of the rose-arbor, watching Uncle Cornie throwing his discus again along the smooth white clover sod. Aunt Jerry had trailed off with Eugene to the far side of the s.p.a.cious grounds to see the lily-ponds where the pink lotuses were blooming.
"Young folks mustn"t be together too much. They"ll get tired of each other too quickly. I used to get bored to death having Cornelius forever around." Aunt Jerry philosophized, considering herself as wise in the affairs of the heart as she was shrewd in affairs of the pocketbook. She would make Jerry and Gene want to be together before they had the chance again.
So Jerry Swaim sat alone, watching the lights and shadows on the lawn, only half conscious of Uncle Cornie"s presence out there, until he suddenly followed his discus as it rolled toward the arbor and lay flat at her feet. Instead of picking it up, he dropped down on the stone step beside his niece and sat without speaking until Jerry forgot his presence entirely. It was his custom to sit without speaking, and to be forgotten.
Jerry"s mind was full of many things. Life had opened a new door to her that afternoon, and something strange and sweet had suddenly come through it. Life had always opened pleasant doors to her, save that one through which her father and mother had slipped away--a door that closed and shut her from them and G.o.d, whose Providence had robbed her so cruelly of what was her own. But no door ever showed her as fair a vista as the one now opening before her dreamy gaze.
She glanced unseeingly at the old man sitting beside her. Then across her memory Aunt Jerry"s words came drifting, "Being twenty-one doesn"t make you too old to listen to me--and your uncle Cornie," and, "You"ll appreciate what I--and Uncle Cornie--can do for you."
Uncle Cornie was looking at her with a face as expressionless as if he were about to say, "The bank doesn"t make loans on any such security,"
yet something in his eyes drew her comfortably to him and she mechanically put her shapely little hand on his thin yellow one.
"I want to talk to you before anything happens, Jerry," he began, and then paused, in a confused uncertainty that threatened to end his wanting here.
And Jerry, being a woman, divined in an instant that it was to talk to her before anything happened that he had thrown that discus out of its way when she and Gene had thought themselves alone in the arbor before dinner. It was to talk to her that the thing had been rolled purposely to her feet now. Queer Uncle Cornie!
"I"m not too old to listen to you. I appreciate what you can do for me."
Jerry was quoting her aunt"s admonitions exactly, which showed how deeply they had unconsciously impressed themselves on her mind. Her words broke the linen bands about Uncle Cornie"s glazed jaws, and he spoke.
"Your estate is all settled now. What"s left to you after that rascally John--I mean after two years of pulling and hauling through the courts, is a "claim," as they call it, in the Sage Brush Valley in Kansas. It has never been managed well, somehow. There"s not been a cent of income from it since Jim Swaim got hold of it, but that"s no fault of the man who is looking after it--a York Macpherson. He"s a gentleman you can trust anywhere. That"s all there is of your own from your father"s estate."
Jerry Swaim"s dark-blue eyes opened wide and her face was lily white under the shadow of dull-gold hair above it.
"You are dependent on your aunt for everything. Well, she"s glad of that. So am I, in a way. Only, if you go against her will you won"t be her heir any more. You mightn"t be, anyhow, if she--went first. The Darby estate isn"t really Jerusha Swaim"s; it"s mine. But she thinks it"s hers and it"s all right that way, because, in the end, I do control it." Uncle Cornie paused.
Jerry sat motionless, and, although it was June-time, the little white hand on the speaker"s thin yellow one was very cold.
"If you are satisfied, I"m glad, but I won"t let Jim Swaim"s child think she"s got a fortune of her own when she hasn"t got a cent and must depend on the good-will of her relatives for everything she wants. Jim would haunt me to my grave if I did."
Jerry stared at her uncle"s face in the darkening twilight. In all her life she had never known him to seem to have any mind before except what grooved in with Aunt Jerry"s commanding mind. Yet, surprised as she was, she involuntarily drew nearer to him as to one whom she could trust.
"We agreed long ago, Jim and I did, when Jim was a rich man, that some day you must be shown that you were his child as well as Lesa"s--I mean that you mustn"t always be a dependent spender. You must get some Swaim notions of living, too. Not that either of us ever criticized your mother"s sweet spirit and her ideal-building and love of adventure.
Romance belongs to some lives and keeps them young and sweet if they live to be a million. I"m not down on it like your Aunt Jerry is."
Romance had steered wide away from Cornelius Darby"s colorless days. And possibly only this once in the sweet stillness of the June twilight at "Eden" did that hungering note ever sound in his voice, and then only for a brief s.p.a.ce.
"Jim would have told you all this himself if he had got his affairs untangled in time. And he"d have done that, for he had a big brain and a big heart, but G.o.d went and took him. He did. Don"t rebel always, Jerry.
G.o.d was good to him--you"ll see it some day and quit your ugly doubting."
Who ever called anything ugly about Jerry Swaim before? That a creature like Cornelius Darby should do it now was one of the strange, unbelievable things of this world.
"I just wanted to say again," Uncle Cornie continued, "if I go first you"d be Jerusha"s heir. We agreed to that long ago. That is, if you don"t cross her wishes and start her to make a will against you, as she"d do if you didn"t obey her to the last letter in the alphabet. If I go after she does, the property all goes by law to distant relatives of mine. That was fixed before I ever got hold of it--heirs of some spendthrifts who would have wasted it long ago if they"d lived and had it themselves."
The sound of voices and Eugene Wellington"s light laughter came faintly from the lily-pond.
"Eugene is a good fellow," Uncle Cornie said, meditatively. "He"s got real talent and he"ll make a name for himself some day that will be stronger, and do more good, and last longer than the man"s name that"s just rated gilt-edged security on a note, and nowhere else. Gene will make a decent living, too, independent of any aunts and uncles. But he"s no stronger-willed, nor smarter, nor better than you are, Jerry, even if he is a bit more religious-minded, as you might say. You try awfully hard to think you don"t believe in anything because just once in your life Providence didn"t work your way. You can"t fool with your own opinions against G.o.d Almighty and not lose in the deal. You"ll have to learn that some time. All of us do, sooner or later."
"But to take my father--all I had--after I had given up mother, I can"t see any justice nor any mercy in it," Jerry broke out.
Uncle Cornie was no comforter with words. He had had no chance to practise giving sympathy either before or after marriage. Mummies are limited, whether they be in sealed sarcophagi or sit behind roller-top desks and cut coupons. Something in his quiet presence, however, soothed the girl"s rebellious spirit more than words could have done. Cornelius Darby did not know that he could come nearer to the true measurement of Jerry"s mind than any one else had ever done. People had pitied her when her mother pa.s.sed away and her father died a bankrupt--which last fact she must not be told--but n.o.body understood her except Uncle Cornie, and he had never said a word until now. He seemed to know now just how her mind was running. The wisdom of the serpent--even the good little snakes, of this "Eden"--is not to be misjudged.
"Jerry"--the old man"s voice had a strange gentleness in that hour, however flat and dry it was before and afterward--"Jerry, you understand about things here."
He waved his hand as if to take in "Eden," Aunt Jerry and Cousin Eugene strolling leisurely away from the lily-pond, himself, the Darby heritage, and the unprofitable Swaim estate in the Sage Brush Valley in far-away Kansas.
"You"ve never been crossed in your life except when death took Jim. You don"t know a thing about business, nor what it means to earn the money you spend, and to feel the independence that comes from being so strong in yourself you don"t have to submit to anybody"s will." Cornelius Darby spoke as one who had dreamed of these things, but had never known the strength of their reality. "And last of all," he concluded, "you think you are in love with Eugene Wellington."
Jerry gave a start. Uncle Cornie and love! Anybody and love! Only in her day-dreams, her wild flights of adventure, up to castles builded high in air, had she really thought of love for herself--until to-day. And now--Aunt Jerry had hinted awkwardly enough here in the late afternoon of what was on her mind. Cousin Gene had held her hand and said, "I want to say something to you." How full of light his eyes had been as he looked at her then! Jerry felt them on her still, and a tingle of joy went pulsing through her whole being. Then the discus had hurtled across the doorway and Uncle Cornie had come, not knowing that these two would rather be alone. At least he didn"t look as if he knew. And now it was Uncle Cornie himself who was talking of love.
"You think you are in love with Eugene Wellington," Uncle Cornie repeated, "but you"re not, Jerry. You"re only in love with Love. Some day it may be with Gene, but it"s not now. He just comes nearer to what you"ve been dreaming about, and so you think you are in love with him.
Jerry, I don"t want you to make any mistakes. I"ve lived a sort of colorless life"--the man"s face was ashy gray as he spoke--"but once in a while I"ve thought of what might be in a man"s days if things went right with him and if he went right with himself."
How often the last words came back to Jerry Swaim when she recalled the events of this evening--"if he went right himself."
"And I don"t want any mistakes made that I can help."
Uncle Cornie"s other hand closed gently about the little hand that lay on one of his. How firm and white and shapely it was, and how determined and fearless the grip it could put on the steering-wheel when the big Darby car skidded dangerously! And how flat and flabby and yellow and characterless was the hand that held it close!
"Come on, folks, we are going to the house to have some music," Aunt Jerry called, as she and Eugene Wellington came across the lawn from the lily-pond.