The Steadfast Heart/Chapter 30
CHAPTER THIRTY
Lydia Canfield was in Paris with her great-aunt Margaret. Paris had not been her destination when she left Rainbow—in fact she had had no definite objective, except that of escape. Where she went she did not care, so long as she was putting miles between her and her home. She was fleeing in a panic—she did not dare look behind her…. Lydia could see nothing, could think of nothing but Titus Burke; the man obsessed her; his every word, his every feature, every shambling movement of his unsightly body was engraved upon her memory…. But above all other things was one more dreadful than the rest: in Titus Burke she had seen, unmistakably, undeniably, a physical resemblance to Angus….
Her great-aunt, a stately, severe old lady who had lived abroad these forty years, received her when at last she came to France, and took her home. She did not ask questions, needed to ask none to be certain that Lydia had sought her as a refuge from disaster…. And so, being a splendid, firm-minded, understanding old lady, she welcomed Lydia casually, made her comfortable, and did not allude in any way to the strangeness of her niece’s coming for many days.
Great-aunt Margaret was one of those abrupt, sententious, masterful women, not a little eccentric, who impress one with their high vitality and their capacity to command anything from a dining room to a man-of-war. She was a lady of a sort we seldom see to-day, but that was more prone to show itself in the eighties. She was of the stock of women who had crossed the mountains into the wilderness of Kentucky or of Ohio, hardy, capable, lofty of character. She was a gentlewoman—not of the people; yet she did not look down upon the recent developments of science and of society as might have been expected. She was not conservative, but rather an enthusiast—remaining herself always original, individual. However much she may have approved of innovation, changes, inventions for others, they were not for her—that passed her without touching the hem of her skirt….
“Lydia Canfield,” she said abruptly when, one day, they were seated in the library overlooking the Pare Monceau, “tell me about it.”
Lydia looked up quickly; her hand fluttered to her heart and then dropped to her lap; she lowered her face to hide from her aunt the tautening of her features. In a moment she replied so faintly her voice scarcely reached Miss Canfield’s ears. “Not now…. Not now….”
“You’ve got to talk pretty soon. It’s bound to come out of you. Things can’t be kept pent up…. Just start in—like that!”
Still Lydia could not bring herself to speak.
“The usual thing, I suppose—man!” said Miss Canfield, clipping her words.
“It’s— Oh, it’s not what you think… no fault of his. He was good—good…. I—” Lydia caught herself, raised her eyes, and Aunt Margaret saw in them startled surprise. With a little gasp Lydia continued, “I love him—even now.”
“H’m—most do,” said Aunt Margaret, “whether they deserve it or not.”
Then the story came, came easily, rapidly, pell-mell as the relief of expression, of putting her woes into words, overcame Lydia—it came in a torrent of words, sobs, exclamations, which jostled, tumbled, hurried each other to be out. It was as if the walls of some reservoir had collapsed, suddenly releasing a flood which nothing could stop or turn aside. Aunt Margaret listened unemotionally, now and again tapping the arm of her chair with a thimble.
“So I couldn’t stay,” Lydia finished. “I couldn’t bear to see him again… I couldn’t stay another hour in the town with that awful man…. I came away—without saying—good-by….”
She buried her face in the cushions of the sofa and sobbed—sobbed. It was the first time, since leaving Rainbow, that she had given way to her grief.
Presently great-aunt Margaret, after puckering her brows and drumming on her chair-arm with ever-present thimble, said abruptly:
“You’re a fool…. You’re unstrung, and no woman in love has sense anyhow…. I’ll keep you in Paris a while and—and then maybe I’ll tinker with things…. I’ll see what’s best to be done.”
The old lady did not allude to the matter again for weeks, nor did Lydia. However great-aunt Margaret wrote a long letter to Craig Browning and had, in due course, a reply, giving her a faithful history of Angus Burke, together with such summing up of his character as might have been expected from a friend who loved and admired. She read it carefully, not once but several times—and concealed the fact of its receipt from Lydia…. She was considering what was best to be done; how to act herself; how to advise Lydia. Great-aunt Margaret’s mental processes were deliberate, and a certain problem was involved, a certain course of action under consideration, which she could not solve without grave and prolonged reflection…. She was not one to reach an important conclusion in a day.
Lydia was not happy; she was not even contented. Life held no interest for her, and it was with the greatest difficulty her aunt persuaded her to go abroad at all in the most fascinating city in the world. If Lydia had been permitted her own way, she would have seen no more of Paris than was visible from the window of her bedroom. She was, to tell the truth, homesick—homesick for Rainbow—and heartsick, soul-sick for Angus Burke….
Her case seemed hopeless to her, as hopeless as if she were a prisoner in Paris and Angus a prisoner in Rainbow…. Titus Burke was the jailer who kept them apart with bolts and bars; kept them apart more inexorably than stone walls could have done…. The sight of Burke, his vague, but none the less dreadful resemblance to his son, arose before her hourly…. It made Angus repugnant to her, and yet she was sick for the want of him. It was a paradox. She loved Angus, yet the very thought of committing her life to his hands, of living with him under the same roof, in the full knowledge of Rainbow, filled her with sickening aversion…. It was not logical, not rational, perhaps…. Her great-aunt saw that something must be done, and done quickly….
There were moments, almost happy moments, when Lydia persuaded herself that nothing mattered save Angus and her love for him; that nothing in the world could embitter the joy of seeing him again, of being with him, touching him, caressing him—of mothering and of comforting him…. But these periods were brief, to be followed by long days of depression and heartache.
Poor Lydia ! She was caught in a net not of her own weaving. The knife which cuts the meshes of such a net must ofttimes wound the prisoner it releases. For weeks great-aunt Margaret had been debating the advisability of inflicting such a wound. The knife was ready to her hand, but what use to free the prisoner if the freeing left her maimed forever?… She reached her decision only after sleepless nights and troubled days. She believed in the efficacy of prayer and in the sturdiness of the blood which flowed in Lydia’s veins. Because Lydia was a Canfield Aunt Margaret dared to use the knife. Perhaps an element of fatality entered into the matter.
“If she’s any good,” Aunt Margaret said to herself, “she’ll come through it. If she isn’t—” She shrugged her shoulders mentally… and called Lydia to her.
“My dear,” she said more abruptly even than was her ordinary habit, “sit down—there. You have been in my mind constantly. I have taken steps… done what I thought best. Your young man, I learn, is all that can be desired—personally. The thing which keeps you from him is his father…. A father who may be dead and out of the way before you can get home again. Am I right? Answer me.”
“Oh, Auntie, let’s not speak of it…. It’s all over…. Oh, I’m so miserable….”
“Maybe we can mend that. We’ll see. Because Angus Burke has a degraded father you can’t live with him. He’s tainted. Something must be wrong with him…. Criminal father—Canfield pride. Um…. I knew your grandmother well. Paris was none too distant from her and her family, family, family—always family. Now think, do you feel anything wrong with you? Is there any flaw in you, any defect that makes you unfit to marry any man in the world?”
“I—I don’t understand.”
“Any—er—hereditary defect? Like this Burke boy’s?”
“How could there be?”
“Umph!… Well, my dear, you’re in for a shock, so you might as well get it and have it over with…. I’m old enough to know things. Iv’e learned. One thing I know is that every man should stand, and should be allowed to stand on his own feet, by himself, to be judged on his own showing. It is what a man is that matters, not what his father was nor his grandfather. Father might be a saint—son a reprobate. This Burke boy, from what I can learn, is all man…. I only hope he’s big enough to take you back…. I wouldn’t….”
“I—can’t go back…. You can’t make me go back.”
“Little idiot!… You’re going back because you have no reason for staying—not on the score of fathers, anyway. What do you know about your father?”
The question startled Lydia. What did she know about her father? He was only a vague memory to her, seen in earliest childhood, absent thenceforward, and mysterious until the day of his death…. What did she know of him?
“Nothing,” she answered faintly.
“Hum…. No…. Well, I’m going to tell you something about him. I’m going to drag out the family skeleton—just to show you that your flesh is human flesh and not made of some ethereal stuff that lifts you up close to the angels…. Your grandfather and his wife contrived to keep it a secret from that miserable little town.”
Lydia was sitting stiffly erect, lips parted, fists clenched in her lap. She was frightened, and her eyes were fearfully upon her great-aunt Margaret’s eyes….
“Your father,” said her aunt in a dry, crackling voice, “was an habitual criminal… incorrigible. He died in prison—in California….”
“Oh!…” said Lydia. She stood up swaying. “Oh!… Oh!…” She swayed toward great-aunt Margaret, sank to her knees before the old lady and buried her face in that ample lap. The old lady sat motionless, her hand resting on Lydia’s head—praying for the successful outcome of her operation….
The vagaries, the phenomena, of the mind and heart are amazing, beyond comprehension. Every day we are astounded by some prank of our psychic mechanism—and now Lydia was amazed, confused, nonplussed, ashamed to discover that after the impact had been sustained, her sensations were not of horror, of shame, of self-detestation, but of joy…. Of joy! Her world was tumbled about her ears; the teachings upon which the philosophy of her life was based were a mass of lies…. Family—there had been no family. She had been brought up on lies—on lies which had concealed the family’s shame…. After a time—in quieter mood—she would be hurt, grieved, might even weep for a father whose misfortunes, whose very self had been unknown to her—but now she could not grieve…. But never, and she knew it with a definiteness which nothing could shake, never would she be ashamed…. She was herself, for herself, of herself—nothing could touch her which had not its source in her own soul…. It was a truth which burst upon her, a truth without which life would have been impossible to her…. She knew herself; knew she was worthy; knew no defilement had passed on to her from acts of her forebears…. If this were true of herself, then it was true of Angus Burke…. She lifted her face, and it was radiant. Great-aunt Margaret gasped in astonishment…. Lydia spoke, “I’m going back…. I’m going back to him,” she said….
That very hour Lydia and her aunt commenced their preparations to return to Rainbow. “I won’t tell him I’m coming,” Lydia said joyfully again and again. “I’m a surprise…. I’ll—I’ll come as a surprise….”
Great-aunt Margaret only wrinkled her patrician nose and wondered.