A dram of poison (8 page)

While he pondered ways and means of rebellion, with only half a heart that ached obscurely but all the time, Mrs. Violette was dusting. (Both Ethel and Rosemary had asked him whether he minded, and he had said of course he did not mind.) He watched her swift coordinated motion with a little idle pleasure. There was no air of good will about Mrs. Violette particularly. She did her job, in her cool silent way, not caring whether he minded. She rather refreshed him. She was shifting the ornaments on the mantelpiece when she suddenly seemed to become aware of something behind her. She jerked her head around

and with that abrupt movement the cloth in her hand flicked out at a small blue vase and it fell. It smashed.

"Oh dear," said Ethel, who had come in on quiet feet, "and that belongs to Mr. Townsend."

"We can find another," said Mr. Gibson automatically.

Mrs. Violette ducked down and began to pick up the pieces. He noted the easy crouch of the knee, the slim straight back.

Ethel said, "Such a lovely blue! Didn't I speak of that only yesterday?"

"I didn't mean to do it," spat Mrs. Violette with an astonishing burst of anger.

"Of course you didn't mean to do it," said Ethel soothingly. "You couldn't help it."

Mr. Gibson watching Mrs. Violette's face found himself beginning to blink. Why was she so furious?

Rosemary came, called from her bedroom by the noise, "Oh, too bad ... I don't suppose it costs much, do you?"

Ethel said, "No, no, I've seen them in the dime store. It's not expensive."

"Please don't worry about it, Mrs. Violette," said Rosemary at once. "I just hope you haven't cut yourself."

"No ma'am," said Mrs. Violette, rising. She looked boldly at Ethel for a moment. "I'll pay for it." she said contemptuously. She walked across the room with the bits of pottery in her hand and disappeared into the kitchen.

"We can't let her pay for it," said Mr. Gibson, "when it was just an accident."

Ethel was smiling a peculiar smile. "She seems to know it was no accident," she said musingly. "How odd!"

"What do you mean, no accident?" said Mr. Gibson in surprise.

"She did it because she dislikes me, of course."

"Ethel . . . !"

"She does, you know. And I did admire the color of that vase in her hearing only yesterday. She dislikes me because I check up on her, which is more than either of you seem to do."

"But . . . what need . . . ?" he said bewildered.

"What need? Oh me," sighed Ethel seating herself. "I believe a servant could steal you blind and you'd never know, either of you."

Mr. Gibson felt like a Babe-in-the-Wood. Such a thought had never occurred to him.

"I don't think she'd steal," said Rosemary in a low voice, hesitantly. "Do you, Kenneth?"

"Of course not!" he exploded.

"Of course not," mocked Ethel. "No ' of course ' not' about it. These foreigners don't have the same ideas of honesty as you do. She wouldn't call it stealing . . . but you would, and so would I."

"What has she stolen?" said Rosemary, looking a bit flushed.

"She takes food," said Ethel, looking mysterious. "All foreigners take food. They don't think of it as property."

"She eats," said Rosemary. "That is true."

They were in conflict. Mr. Gibson held his guilty delighted breath.

"Nor any small loose-lying thing," Ethel went on, drawling. "Don't you ever take precautions, you dear sheltered people? Don't you believe in the fact of theft? I hate to think what would happen to you in less bucolic places. There is wickedness in this world."

"Really," said Mr. Gibson much annoyed. "I see no more reason to believe that Mrs. Violette would steal than to believe she broke that vase on purpose. And I was right here, Ethel. I saw what happened."

"You think you did," said Ethel, as to a very young child.

He felt shaken.

"It's the first thing she has broken," began Rosemary. "She's been quite remarkable . . ."

"Quite so," said Ethel with satisfaction. "Of course, it is the first thing. Don't you se© she resents me, and has, since the moment I came? So she breaks something I liked. I'm not blaming her. I merely understand."

Mr. Gibson had a faint sense of something fading out of his peripheral vision. "For heaven's sakes, Ethel," he sputtered. "Anyone can have an accident!" • "There is no such thing as an accident," said Ethel calmly. "Honestly, Ken, you are ignorant in some fields. Subconsciously she wanted to spite me. She likes to be let entirely alone the way you let her be. But, of course, I am not such an easy mark."

"What on earth are you saying?" said Mr. Gibson in amazement. "Of course, there is such a thing as an accident. She turned to look because you startled her . . . and then her hand . . ."

"Oh no," said Ethel.

"Wait a minute." Mr. Gibson turned to see what might be on Rosemary's face but Rosemary was no longer in the room. She was gone. It was disconcerting.

Mr. Gibson turned back and said severely, "I don't agree with your suspicions, Ethel."

"Suspicions?" sighed Ethel, "or normal precautions? The fact is, old dear," she continued affectionately, "all of us can't live in a romantic, poetical and totally gentle world. Some of us have to face things as they are." Her bright eyes were direct and honest and he feared they were wise. "Face reality," she said.

"What reality?" he snapped.

"Facts," said Ethel. "Malice, resentment, self-interest— the necessities of the ego—all the real driving forces behind what people do. The conscious mind, old dear, is only the peak of the iceberg. You believe so easily in the pretty surfaces . . ."

"I do!"

"Yes, you," said Ethel kindly. "You don't know a tenth of what goes on, Ken. Your head's in the clouds. Always has been. Of course I love you for it. . . . But for every saint with his head in the clouds," sighed Ethel, "I suppose there has to be somebody to take the brunt of things as they really are."

"I see no reason," said Mr. Gibson with stubborn lips, "to mistrust Mrs. Violette."

"You wouldn't see a reason to mistrust anyone," said Ethel indulgently, "until the deed popped up and hit you in your nice fastidious nose. You have always sidestepped the nasty truths of this earth, brother dear. More power to you."

He stared at her.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said, and she did look sorry, "I shouldn't say these things . . ."

"Why not?" he cried, "if you believe them."

But Ethel evaded and said, "You are a lot like Mama was, you know? I think you should have been the woman, Ken, and I should have been born the man."

"Tell me," he cried. "What are you saying?"

"You musn't pay any attention. Your world of poetry and quixotic goodness and faith and all the rest is a pretty darned nice place. . . ."

"And your world?" he demanded. "I imagine you call it the real world, he said, goaded to some anger.

Ethel responded to the anger. "Mine?" She looked him in the eye. "It happens to be full of knives-in-the-back and all kinds of human meannesses. It cannot help but be. Men are animals, whether you like it or not."

"And you say," he groped back for something solid with which to challenge her, "That Mrs. Violette broke the blue vase deliberately?"

"Of course, she didn't consciously plan it," said Ethel. ' 'You don't understand. But she did break it to displease me, just the same."

"I don't believe itI' said Mr. Gibson. "Don't then," said Ethel. "Stay as sweet as you are . . . that's in a song, isn't it?" She grinned at him and he knew her teasing was a form of apology. "You are a lamb, Ken, and everybody loves a lamb. I cannot help it if I am no lamb, you know. Now, I haven't upset you, have I?"

He thought he felt as upset as he had ever felt in his life. He scarcely knew why, but he was afraid for Rosemary. So he struggled up, and, using his cane, he limped into the kitchen.

Mrs. Violette was briskly washing the counter. Rosemary was there too, just staring out the window. He thought she looked rather lonely.

"Now, Mrs. Violette," he said, "please understand that I will pay for the vase. It wasn't your fault." Mrs. Violette shrugged and said nothing. Rosemary said in a brisk voice, "Mrs. Violette tells me she has to leave us, Kenneth. She's going away with her husband, next week."

"Is that so?" he said unhappily. "Yeah, we're taking off to the mountains," said Mrs. Violette. "He's going after a new job for the both of us. If we get it, we'll stay on up there."

"On a ranch," said Rosemary. "How nice that will be!" She sounded rather desperately cheerful. "But we'll miss you, Mrs. Violette."

Mrs. Violette made no response. She didn't care whether she'd be missed. She wasn't even angry at Ethel any-more, for all Mr. Gibson could see.

"Ought we to try to get somebody else?" said he across to Rosemary worriedly.

"No," she said. "No. I'm able. Ethel and I can manage beautifully." He couldn't read her eyes af all.

"But if one day," he said, "Ethel were to go and live on her own, then . . ."

"Oh, she musn't do that!" cried Rosemary. "That would be a shame! Your only sister, Kenneth, and so good to come ..." He saw her hands on the round wood of the kitchen chair. The knuckles were blue-white. "Such a fine person," Rosemary said. "So wise and so good."

Mr. Gibson felt alarmed. Something was wrong with Rosemary. She was a stranger and far away and how could he tell what was the matter when she seemed shut up against him . . . when her eyes seemed to search his so . . . could it be? . . . fearfully. Ethel was right, he conceded. There must be a good deal going on that he missed. He felt lost. What anxiety, what stress could there be, to so inhabit Rosemary's eyes? "Yes," he said absently. "Of course she is."

Meanwhile, Mrs. Violette scrubbed vigorously at the sink there in the small room. Ethel came in and said jauntily, "Lunch, dears? I'll start the vegetables."

Out in the yard, Paul Townsend was working near the low stone wall. He was on vacation. School was out; Jeanie was around and about; Mrs. Pyne sat on the porch. There was no privacy.

Chapter X

MR. Gibson retired to the privacy of his own skull where he made plans.

This mysterious distress in Rosemary was intolerable. Therefore, first, he would find out what troubled her. Then, he would see to it that whatever it was troubled her no more. He felt much better, as soon as this course became plain and imperative.

He was determined, however, that he would not seek this information from. Ethel, although, curiously, he was quite sure Ethel would know all about it, for he conceded that Ethel was wise and much more alert than he. But no. He would find out what bothered Rosemary in the simplest

possible way. He would ask her. But he would do it in private.

Very well, then. This very evening he would struggle out of the hypnosis of routine. When Ethel announced bedtime, as she was so often the one to do (and night falling, and no company coming, the world still) he would not let her "tuck him in," which habit she retained although he no longer needed anyone's help in getting to bed. He would tell Ethel to go to bed herself, but he would ask Rosemary to stay. He would say to Ethel, "Ethel, I want to talk to Rosemary alone. Do you mind?"

She couldn't say she minded. Why should she mind? It would be so simple. Even as he told himself these things Mr. Gibson received a preview in his imagination. He saw Ethel's smile . . . the wise indulgent and rather amused expression she would wear, as she would nod, as she would say, "Of coiu-se I don't mind," and he knew he shrank from the prospect.

She would wear the same look that girl in the hospital had worn. Why was it so "cute" or even a little bit funny that he was fond of his wife? Come now, it was ridiculous to be this sensitive. Well, he would act, then. And when they were alone, how could he reach out to Rosemary, and reachieve her confidence?

He hobbled back into the living room after lunch, busy turning in his mind what words he could say, how gentle he would be, but how insistent. This was the hour of his siesta, but today he did not go at once into his study-bedroom to close the blinds and lie quietly upon the bed for the accustomed period. Today, he stood looking out the east window, across the driveways, seeing, but not noticing, Paul Townsend's bare torso bending and moving there at the edge of his back lawn in some gardening activity—to which he passionately devoted his vacation days.

He could hear, but did not pay attention to, the women's voices in the kitchen. He knew Mrs. Violette was ironing, that Rosemary and Ethel were clearing away the dishes, all in the routine.

He stood in the midst of routine, plotting how he would break it, when he heard Rosemary's voice go suddenly high and full of passion and protest. He heard only the emotion, not the sense of what she said.

Then the kitchen door banged. He saw Paul Townsend straighten and lift his head. He saw Rosemary come stumb-

ling, slowly and distractedly, into as much of the scene as he could see.

Saw Paul drop his long-handled weeder and go quickly toward her.

Saw his head bending solicitously.

Saw that Rosemary was violently weeping.

Saw Paul lift his arms.

Saw her sag, as if it were impossible not to do so, into their embrace.

Mr. Gibson wrenched his head and turned away. He could see nothing. The living room was dark, dark as night, to his light-struck eyes. He must have made some sound, for he heard Ethel say, "What's the matter?" He knew she was there in the room and he knew that she went to look briefly out of the window behind him before he felt her strong hand under his elbow.

She guided him into his own place . . . for he felt so stricken he needed guidance. But after a moment or two Mr. Gibson's sight cleared and he was quite calm and extraordinarily free. He sat down in his leather chair and laid his cane on the floor carefully. "What did you say to make her cry like that?" he asked quietly.

Ethel clamped her mouth tight for a moment. "Never mind, dear. Never mind," she said rather softly. "It's just that Rosemary insists upon misunderstanding some perfectly simple remark of mine. She thinks I meant to reproach her ... as if I would. Of course she's emotional . . ." Ethel touched his knee, "just now. Ah Ken. I'm sorry we saw what we saw. I don't think it meant very much. Not yet."