Patricia (11 page)

The boy was down at once upon his knees digging.

Patricia put her face down and touched the flowers with her lips then with her eyelids. Their coolness against her face seemed like a message from God, as if He knew what thoughts and feelings and hungers and longings had been stirred within her by this visit, and as if they were telling her He understood. She watched John as he dug.

“You are taking a lot of trouble,” she said.

“I like to,” said the boy with a warm smile.

“It's been beautiful, being here,” said Patricia. “I thank you!” And her pleasure shone in her eyes.

They went down the walk together, the tall boy and the young girl, John carrying a goodly clump of lilies in a paper, while the mother stood in the doorway and watched them wistfully.

“Oh, God, my Feyther,” she murmured with her eyes uplifted to the blue above for an instant, “she is lovely! But please don't let my lad be hurt by her, not in
any
way. Please, dear Feyther!”

The two young people reached the gate and turned, as John put out his long arm and swung it open. Then each of them waved at her with a happy little motion, as if she were a part of the pleasant time, before they walked on down the hill and out of sight.

John helped her down the roughness of the path, touching her arm gently with deference. Both of them were conscious that she was going back to her world out of his and that it might be a long time, or forever, before they saw one another again.

“I've had such a lovely time,” said Patricia thoughtfully. “I loved it all. Especially the end. Do you do that every night, or was it just a beautiful courtesy for me?”

He looked down at her from his tall height and smiled. “You mean the family worship? We do that every night and every morning. It is always a part of our day.”

“Is that what you call it? Family worship. I've read of that, but I didn't know people did it anymore. I thought it was something of long ago.”

“I think there are many people who still keep to the custom,” said the boy thoughtfully. “They are Christian people, of course. But I know that many so-called Christians live worldly lives today, because they have gotten away from God.”

“I think perhaps I only know worldly Christians,” said Patricia. “At least, they are the only ones whose home life I know. My relatives and mother's friends. But I think it is a beautiful way to begin and end the day. I wish we did it!” She sighed deeply.

He studied her face furtively, and there was a moment of quietness between them. Then John spoke again.

“Of course, you could do it by yourself,” he said slowly.

Patricia's face was full of brightness as she looked up.

“I will!” she said with sudden resolve. “Of course, I couldn't do it as wonderfully as your father did. He made the reading so plain and understandable. I never thought the Bible sounded like that before. But I could read a chapter. And I could—talk to God—although—I don't know Him intimately, the way your father does.”

“But He knows you,” said John earnestly. “He'll make Himself acquainted with you if you will let Him.”

“Oh I will,” said the girl eagerly. “I'd like to know Him. But I never thought He had time to pay attention to just me. I've always thought of Him as paying attention to just the world at large, wanting everybody to do right, just in a general way.”

“Don't you know what God says? He says, ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love.'”

“But would that mean me?”

“Well, here then: ‘God so loved
the world
, that he gave his only begotten Son'—listen to that! He gave His Son! His
only
son!—‘that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.' Isn't that for you? You belong to ‘the world,' don't you? And you'll find thousands of other verses that tell how He loves you and cares for you. You begin studying the Bible to find that out, and see how many you find.”

“I will!” said Patricia.

They were silent again until they got down the hill and into the broad pasture below, that lay between them and the road. Then the girl spoke again.

“Oh, I know I'm going to be very glad that I ran away from the picnic and you found me and took me to your lovely home!” she said happily with a sigh of pleasure.

“Our house is a very plain, shabby little house beside the grand one where you live,” said the boy thoughtfully.

“But yours is lovely,” said the girl, looking up earnestly. “I think it is wonderful. You have things in your house that our house has not got.”

He looked at her wonderingly. “What, for instance?”

Patricia looked off at the sky thoughtfully, considering.

“Well, you have some lovely old furniture,” she said slowly. “I loved that desk in the room your mother took me to. The wood is just satin-smooth. Of course, we have some handsome furniture, but it's modern, and I don't feel that way toward it, as if it were something precious. It's just furniture, not all full of dear memories like yours.”

The boy looked at her with his eyes suddenly full of something almost like worship.

“Do you feel that way about things,” he said happily. “Just
things
? I do. I always like those old dishes we have. Mother used to tell me about them when I was a little kid. She told me how grandmother bought them and was always so careful of them, saving them for her. It always seemed as if anything tasted better out of those cups with the little blue sprigs on them.”

“Yes,” said the girl understandingly. “I can see how you love them. And then you have pictures!”

“Pictures?” said the boy, puzzled.

“Photographs, I mean, but they are real. Of people, and an old house. I loved the old house. If I ever go abroad, I'd like to see old houses like that. I'd like to see that special one, I think, because it seemed so much like a place where people were happy and where children played.”

The boy smiled. “Oh, those! Yes, they are that way. I love them, of course. I can just remember playing around there myself. But I wouldn't expect a stranger to see that in them.”

“I did,” said the girl thoughtfully. “I thought how nice it would be to live in a place like that with a great big wide yard and mountains in the distance where you could watch them.”

The walk seemed very short, down the road after they climbed the fence from the meadows and John had helped her down the grassy bank to the roadside. They talked of pleasant things, like clouds and flowers and old homes, even the cows and chickens he knew so much about. He could tell so many amusing little stories about them until it seemed as if his cows and chickens had each a personality.

Patricia had never had such a pleasant talk with a boy before. Either they had been shy and silent or else they had been boasters and bullies like Thorny. But now Patricia forgot that she was a high school girl walking with a senior. She had a feeling that she had known him a long time and that they liked the same kind of things and could be real friends if things only were different.

They were coming into the village now and would soon be at the Prentiss gate. Involuntarily Patricia's steps slowed as she remembered. Would her mother be home yet? She was sometimes late at the club when she was on the committee. She might have to stay and clear up afterward today, as it was a sort of party meeting with guests. Oh, perhaps she wouldn't be home yet! For if she was and saw her walking with John Worth, what would she say? Very vividly Patricia remembered the awful experience several years ago when John Worth came to sell strawberries. What if that were to happen all over again? Of course, they were both older now, but her mother wouldn't stop for that. If she happened to recognize John Worth, she would be very angry. And especially since Thorny Bellingham wasn't anywhere in sight. That would be rather terrible. Oh, if only her mother wasn't home yet!

She grew very silent as they neared her home. She remembered that her father was not to be home until the midnight train from New York. She wouldn't have anybody to take her part.

The boy by her side studied her furtively. At last he said quietly, “It's been very wonderful having you visit us today. I'm not going to forget it. I always thought you would be worth knowing.”

“Oh, thank you!” said Patricia, with her pale cheeks suddenly flaming happily. “I guess I felt that way about you, too. Only, of course, you were older and a lot wiser than I.” She looked up with a sweet glance of humility. “It's rather wonderful to be walking home with a senior!” And then her cheeks grew pink again.

“Oh, but that sort of thing doesn't matter, you know,” said the boy. “I always thought perhaps you were real, and now I know it. It's being real, that counts, you know. And knowing God. That counts most of all, I guess.”

Their eyes met in a quick glad understanding.

But they were quite near to the gate now, and they both realized it. Their steps lagged slower and slower. Patricia was trying to think what to do. In a moment the house would be right in plain sight, and she couldn't bear the thought that her mother might glimpse them and come out and be disagreeable to John, after the lovely way he and his family had treated her. She couldn't stand it. But the boy seemed almost to share her feeling, for his steps lingered, too.

“Listen,” he said in a guarded tone, as if even now someone might be upon them, watching, listening. “I'm not coming in. I think it's best not, don't you? But I'll plant these lilies. Would it do if I put them right here by the fence behind the evergreens? No one will see me here planting them, and it won't take but a minute. I have my knife in my pocket. And then if you want to move them somewhere else afterward, it will be all right, you know.”

He smiled at her engagingly, and his eyes seemed to be pleading with her to agree with him.

“Oh,” she said with a troubled look, “I could stay here till you have finished. Or perhaps
I
could plant them?” She looked with a worried question at her useless little white hands that had never attempted such a task.

He smiled back and the lamps in his eyes flamed out.

“Of course you
could
,” said the boy, “but I like to do it, you know. Please let me finish. I like to think I am giving you these and fixing them just right so they will go on growing for you.”

Her glance beamed in shy response.

“Besides,” he went on, “I don't think it would be wise for me to come in, do you? Your mother might not understand. And there are things that can't really be explained in a case like that.”

“I know,” said Patricia, suddenly sobered, a shadow coming over her bright look.

“Are you sure no one will object to the lilies being put here?”

“Oh, quite sure,” said Patricia. “Nobody ever comes past here to look over the hedge.”

“That's all right, then,” said John Worth, dropping down on his knees between the hedge and the tall evergreen trees with their plumy branches that hid the house completely. He began to dig rapidly with his knife. “I guess it would be better if you went into the house now. Your mother might be worrying about where you are. Perhaps she is telephoning all around the neighborhood by this time trying to find out if the others are home. And if you should go in now, I could go right on working here and nobody would notice me.”

“Yes, of course,” said Patricia a little sadly, “but—it doesn't seem quite polite to leave you this way. After you've been so kind, and I've had such a lovely time—”

“That's all right,” said the boy, dropping his knife and standing up. “You and I understand, and that's all that matters, isn't it?” The look on his face made it seem as though he had said a great deal more than just those few words, and somehow she knew he understood how her mother would feel and wanted to protect her from unpleasantness. She answered him with a sweet wistful look, assenting to his words, and turned reluctantly to go.

“I'll drop in now and then and give these flowers a bit of attention sometimes, late, or early, while it's still dark and no one can see me. And—” he hesitated shyly, “
sometime
I'm coming to
see you
, when things are so—that—I can come—honorably!”

She turned back, and her eyes met his with a glad light in them.

“I—shall be—
expecting
you—sometime,” she said with a little tremble of happiness in her voice. She turned and slid out of the green shelter by the hedge, and he could hear her quick steps on the walk up to the house. Then suddenly there came a strident voice rasping on the quiet evening air, and he shrank behind the trees in the deepest shadow.

“Well, for pity's sake! Where did you come from?” said Patricia's mother sharply. “Mrs. Bellingham just got done telephoning me that you were all going to stay at a roadhouse, where you had had to take refuge from the storm, and have dinner and a dance. I said you might stay if they would bring you back before ten o'clock. And now you come walking in alone! Where is Thorny?”

“I don't know, Mother. I wasn't with Thorny when the storm came on. I didn't go to any roadhouse.”

“Do you mean to tell me that you have been wandering around all this time since that storm came on without seeing Thorny, when he went as your special attendant?”

Patricia came into the house and tried to walk past her mother, but her mother caught her arm and held her.

“Answer me, Patricia! Don't try to evade me. Where were you during that awful storm?”

“In a pretty cottage, Mother, quite near to the woods. There was a sweet lady there who made me welcome and gave me hot gingerbread to eat, and fresh milk. I've had a nice time.”

“But what became of your escort, Thorny?”

“I don't know, Mother; indeed I don't!” said the girl, her voice beginning to tremble. “He was very unpleasant. I was ashamed of him the way he acted to my classmates. And then afterwards he was awful! He came where I was picking flowers and told the people I was with that somebody wanted them, and then he grabbed me and kissed me and hugged hard. I was so frightened I didn't know what to do. Mother, he was
disgusting
! You wouldn't have liked him if you had been there! I had an awful time getting away from him. He was just awful. I never will go anywhere with him again! I
hate
him! Mother, if you had seen him, you would have hated him, too.”

“Nonsense!” said her mother sharply. “As if a kiss or two from a nice boy would hurt anybody! What a baby you are, Patricia! Don't you realize that you are a fairly pretty girl and you are getting to the age when nice boys will want to kiss you? It is time you grew up and began to act like a lady and not a child anymore. You ought to be proud that such a nice, well-educated, well-mannered boy as Thornton Bellingham wanted to kiss you, instead of making such a fuss!”

“Mother! Please don't talk that way by the door. Everybody will hear you! Please come inside and shut the door.”

“Shut the door? Why, you poor little silly! What is there in that that the neighbors shouldn't hear? I certainly am proud that Thorny honored my child by kissing her—”

But suddenly Patricia pushed by her mother and fled up the stairs, bursting into wild noiseless sobs as she went, and in her own room flung herself facedown upon her bed.

Oh, had John Worth heard her mother? Her mother talking about that shameless conduct of Thorny's as if it were all right! And now the whole horrible experience was down upon her young soul again, as if she could not bear the thought that it had happened in her life.

Suddenly her mother spoke from her open door. “Patricia, get up and wash your face and behave yourself!”

Patricia caught her breath and got up. The lilies of the valley were still in her hand, and she clutched them to her side so that her mother would not notice them as she went toward the bathroom to wash her face. Oh, she didn't want her mother to bring them into the open and examine them and put a line of questions on them. But Mrs. Prentiss had eagle eyes, and she could ferret out anything when she was on the warpath.

“What is that you are trying to hide behind you, child?” she said sharply. “Is it your lunch basket?” Patricia winced. Now she would have to be examined about that lunch basket. She sighed and lifted up the flowers in all their lovely freshness.

“Well, really, where did you get those lilies? It looks like a bride's bouquet.”

“They were growing in the yard where the nice lady lives,” said Patricia in a colorless young voice. Oh, if her mother would only forget about the lunch basket and not talk about the flowers.

“Well, they're very pretty indeed,” said her mother surprisingly. “You may put them down in my Dresden vase in the living room. I'm expecting callers this evening, and it will be nice to have some flowers.”

The doorbell rang while Patricia was washing her hands and face, and her mother went downstairs. She hoped the flowers would be forgotten. She did so want to have them all to herself, at least for tonight. Besides, if the flowers went downstairs, somebody would be sure to ask where they came from and there was no telling but John Worth's name might come out somehow in connection with the afternoon.

So Patricia washed her face and hands, then bent and laid her lips against the sweet waxen lilies in her drinking glass. She hung a clean towel where it would hide them from anyone casually passing her bathroom door. After that she went and stood at her window. She could catch a glimpse of the front gate if she put her face very close to the glass in the upper window sash and twisted her neck slightly. She watched a long time to see if John Worth was still there behind the evergreens, but the rosiness of the sunset was fading now, and there was no sign of him. Perhaps he had slipped out while she was washing her hands. She hoped and prayed that her mother had not seen him. It seemed too sad to think her day that was to have been so wonderful, and had unexpectedly turned out to be marvelous because of John Worth, might even yet be picked to pieces by her mother and its joy utterly demolished by criticism and ugly commands.

But now came a command from downstairs. The maid came up to say that her mother wanted her to put on her pink dress with the white lace on the ruffles, comb her hair nicely, and come right downstairs and play a piece or two for the callers.

How Patricia hated to be exhibited in this way! It happened so often, too. It seemed to take all the joy out of her music, to have to parade it before people who didn't care a bit about music.

“Who is down there?” she asked the maid.

“The Warriners,” said the maid. “I don't think they are staying long. Your mother said to hurry.”

Patricia slid out of her crumpled picnic dress and into her pink one in an instant, reflecting that the Warriners lived in another township and likely wouldn't have heard of the picnic. She resolved to play as well as she could and as often as she was asked. Perhaps in that way she could distract her mother's attention for a time from the happenings of the day.

So she went downstairs looking very sweet and pretty, and she played several times. And when at last they said good night, she slipped away unnoticed while her mother stood talking with them at the door.

She went out the side door and into the shadows of the yard, making her way by a circuitous route to the big evergreen trees by the front walk. She slid between their interlacing branches and arrived within the dim sweet aisle between the hedge on one hand and the trees on the other. Eagerly her feet found the way down the grassy path, and then, going carefully, she stopped and felt through the darkness, until her hand came in contact with the sharp, crisp leaves of the plants. Her fingers brushing lightly the lily bells brought forth that heavenly fragrance of the blossoms. Then her young heart thrilled to think those were hers and she could come down there sometimes and find them growing; that John Worth was going to tend them, at night and early morning when no one was around. It was something all her own that no one else knew anything about. It was pleasant.

“Good night, dear little flowers,” she whispered softly, and then with another touch like a caress she slipped away among the feathery trees, around to the back door, and so upstairs, hoping her mother might forget her various grievances and let her go to her bed in peace.

But she had scarcely reached the haven of her room when her mother arrived at the door.

“Now, Patricia,” she began severely, “I want to understand this matter thoroughly. And first of all I certainly expect a little thanks for the nice basket of luncheon I took the time and trouble to put together for you. Weren't you surprised at the darling little strawberry tarts I put in, in those cute little paper cups with individual covers? And weren't those chicken sandwiches delicious?”

Patricia was very still for a minute looking out the window into the night sky with a twinkling star winking at her as if it understood her dilemma. Then her mother spoke again.

“Well? You don't seem to have even any appreciation.”

“I'm sorry, Mother. I know the lunch you made was very nice. Everything you do like that is always lovely, of course, and I do appreciate what you tried to do for me.”

“What I
tried
to do for you! Is that all you can say? Haven't you anything to say about how pretty the basket looked inside, how tempting it was, and how delicious everything tasted?”

Patricia was silent another moment and then she said, “But, Mother, I didn't see inside the basket at all, and I didn't have a chance to taste anything that was in it! You remember you gave the basket to Thorny, and that was the last of it so far as I was concerned.”

“Do you mean you deliberately walked away from him and wouldn't eat your lunch with him? Did you carry your animosity to that extent? I declare you don't deserve any consideration at all if you acted like that.”

“No, Mother. It was nothing like that. I asked Thorny to give me the basket, and he wouldn't. He downright refused! And when they all put their baskets together in a pile till lunchtime, he wouldn't give it up, even then. He just carried it around with him everywhere, and he kept poking his fingers in it and bringing out a sandwich or a piece of cake or a drumstick, until I'm very sure there wasn't much left in it by lunchtime. And he went off with another girl and gave her pieces, too. You see, I didn't get a single thing from that basket myself, so I can't exactly say I was surprised.”

“You mean, of course, that you acted so disagreeable to Thorny that he was obliged to walk with another girl to make you jealous.
Is
that it?”

“No, Mother, no. Why would I be jealous? I didn't want to go with Thorny. It was you who must have invited him. You see, the class had voted not to have any outsiders, and it put me in a very uncomfortable position, appearing to bring in someone none of them knew.”

“And so you thought you would get it back on me by being disagreeable to Thorny!”

“Mother! No! Oh, you will not understand.”

“No, I'm afraid I never will understand,” sighed the mother in a deeply hurt tone. “That you should pick out the son of my very dearest friend to dislike is more than I can fathom. A nice, handsome, wealthy, dependable boy, and yet you scorn him! Just because your mother favors him and wants you to have an escort who is from a good family and has some social standing. Just to disappoint me!”

The mother's voice trembled, and Patricia's tears flowed copiously. She did love her mother in spite of everything, and she couldn't bear to hear her talk in that hurt tone. It was worse than her scolding.

Mrs. Prentiss went away at last and left her standing by that dark window crying. Slowly, sadly the daughter prepared for bed, thinking sorrowfully about the day, how eager she had been for it, and how almost everything she had planned had gone awry and been deeply disappointing. Yet there had been a bright ending when the storm came. She wouldn't have missed that experience in the Worth home, not for all the picnics in the world! And she had the dear valley-lilies!

Her mother came back just then. “Patricia, where did you say that lovely expensive lunch basket is that I took the trouble to buy for you? Surely you didn't throw it away or leave it behind in the woods.”

“I don't know where it is, Mother. Thorny must have it. I have not had it in my hands since you gave it to him.”

“Now that is absurd, Patricia. Thorny wouldn't carry a basket as large as that around with him all day! You must know what he did with it.”

“No, I don't know, Mother,” she said desperately. “I didn't see what he did with it.”

“Well, you certainly are a careless girl, after I spent all that money to have a pretty basket for you.”

“I'm sorry, Mother. If you had given it to me, I would have looked after it. But I could not get it away from Thorny, though I tried more than once.”

“Well, I suppose there is no use talking to you as long as you go to that terrible school. You care more for that school than you do for your family. However, I shall be obliged to ask you to use your brains a little and remember where that basket is. And in the morning you and I will go and get Thorny back to those woods and find that basket! And you will apologize to Thorny, too, for the way you have treated him, understand that! I'm not going to have you insulting the son of my best friend.”

Patricia stood very still in the darkness by the window in her little white nightdress until her mother's footsteps died away behind the living room door, which closed sharply. Then forlornly she dropped on her knees beside her bed.

Patricia was in the habit of saying her prayers at night as she had been taught, but now it came to her that she had been hearing a different kind of prayer today from any she had ever said. She had heard a man talk intimately with God and bring all his concerns and cares and interests to Him as if He were a real father. And John had said that she might do that herself, too. She caught her breath and brushed away the tears.