The Boarded-Up House (13 page)

”My son!”

“Mother!”

The two girls, who had been watching this scene with amazement unutterable, saw the strange pair gaze, for one long moment, into each other's eyes. Then, with a beautiful gesture, the man held out his arms. And the woman, with a little gasp of happiness, walked into them!

J
OYCE, will you just oblige me by pinching me—real hard! I'm perfectly certain I'm not awake!”

Joyce pinched, obligingly, and with vigor, thereby eliciting from her companion a muffled squeak. The two girls were sitting on the lower step of the staircase in the dark hallway. They had been sitting there for a long, long while.

It was Joyce who had pulled Cynthia away from staring, wide-eyed, at the spectacle of that marvelous reunion. And they had slipped out into the hall unobserved, in order that the two in the drawing-room might have this wonderful moment to themselves. Neither of them had yet sufficiently recovered from her amazement to be quite coherent.

“I can't make anything out of it!” began Cynthia, slowly, at last,
“He's dead!”

“Evidently he isn't,” replied Joyce, “or he wouldn't be here I But oh!—it's true, then! I hardly dared to hope it would be so! I'm
so
glad I did it!” Cynthia turned on her.

“Joyce Kenway!
What
are you talking about? It sounds as though you were going crazy!”

“Oh, of course you don't understand!” retorted Joyce. “And it's your own fault too. I'd have been glad enough to explain, and talk it over with you, only you were so hateful that I just went home instead, and thought it out myself.”

“Well, I may be stupid,” remarked Cynthia, “but for the life of me I can't make any sense out of what you're saying!”

“Listen, then,” said Joyce, “and I'll explain it all. You remember last night how I sat reading the newspaper,—first, just to tease you, and afterward I really got interested in it? Well, I happened to be glancing over the news about people who had just landed here from abroad, when a little paragraph caught my eye. I can't remember the exact words, but it was something like this,—that among the passengers just arrived in New York on the
Campania
was Mr.
Fairfax Collingwood,
who was interested in Western and Australian gold mines. He had not been here in the East for nearly forty years, and it said how astounded he was at the remarkable changes that had taken place during his long absence. Then it went on to say that he was staying at the Waldorf-Astoria for only a few days, as he was just here on some important business, and was then going to cross the continent, on his way back to Australia.

“Well, you'd better believe that I nearly jumped out of my skin at the name—Fairfax Collingwood. It's an unusual one, and it did n't seem possible that more than one person could have it, though of course it might be a distant connection of the same family. And then, too,
our
Fairfax Collingwood was dead. I didn't know what to think! I tried to get your attention, but you were still as mad as you could be, so I made up my mind I'd go home and puzzle over it by myself, and I took the paper with me.

“After I got home, I sat and thought and
thought!
And all of a sudden it occurred to me that perhaps he was n't killed in the war after all,—that there'd been some mistake. I've read that such things did happen; but if it were so, I could n't imagine why he did n't go and make it up with his mother afterward. It seemed very strange. And then this explanation dawned on me,—he had left that note for his mother, and perhaps thought that if she really intended to forgive him, she'd have made some effort to get word to him in the year that elapsed before he was reported killed. Then, as she never did, he may have concluded that it was all useless and hopeless, and he'd better let the report stand, and he disappear and never come back. You see that article said he had n't been East here for forty years.

“And when I'd thought this out, an idea popped into my head. If what I'd imagined was true, it did n't seem
right
to let him go on thinking that, when I knew that his mother never saw that letter, and I decided I'd let him know it. So I sat right down and wrote a note that went something like this:

“M
R
. F
AIRFAX
C
OLLINGWOOD
:

“If you are the same Mr. Fairfax Collingwood who, in 1861, parted from your mother after a disagreement, leaving a note for her which you hoped she would read, I want to tell you that she never saw that note.

“J
OYCE
K
ENWAY
.

“I signed my name right out, because Father has always said that to write an anonymous letter was the most despicable thing any one could do. And if he ever discovered who I was, I would n't be ashamed to tell him what we had done, anyway. Of course, I ran the chance of his not being the right person, but I thought if that were so, he simply would n't pay any attention to the note, and the whole thing would end there. I addressed the letter to his hotel, and decided that it must be mailed that very night, for he might suddenly leave there and I'd never know where else to find him. It was then nearly ten o'clock, and I did n't want Father or Mother to know about it, so I teased Anne into running out to the post-office with me. He must have received it this morning.”

Cynthia had listened to this long explanation in astonished silence. “Is n't it the most remarkable thing,” she exclaimed when Joyce had finished, “that each of us should write, I to the mother and you to the son, and neither of us even guess what the other was doing! And that they should meet here, just this afternoon! But there are a whole lot of things I can't understand at all. Why, for instance, did he give the name of Arthur Calthorpe when he came in, and pretend he was some one else?”

“That's been puzzling me too,” replied Joyce, “and I can't think of any reason.”

“But the thing that confuses me most of all,” added Cynthia, “is this. Why, if you had written that note, and had an idea that he was alive, were
you
so tremendously astonished when he and his mother recognized each other? I should have thought you'd guess right away, when you saw him at the door, who he was!”

“That's just the queer part of it!” said Joyce. “In the first place, I never expected him to come out here at all,—at least, not right away. I never put the name of this town in the letter, nor mentioned this house. I supposed, of course, that he'd go piling right down to South Carolina to find his mother, or see whether she was alive. Then, later, when they'd made it all up (provided she was alive, which even I didn't know then), I thought they might come back here and open the house. That was one reason I wanted to have our illumination next week, on the chance of their arriving.

“So you see I was quite unprepared to see him rushing out here at once; and when he gave another name, that completely deceived me. And then, there's one thing more. Somehow, I had in my mind a picture of Fairfax Collingwood that was as different as could be from—well, from what he is
I
You see, I'd always thought of him as the
boy
whom Great-aunt Lucia described having seen. I pictured him
as
slim and young looking, smooth-faced, with golden curly hair, and big brown eyes. His eyes are the same but,—well, I somehow never counted on the change that all those forty years would make I You can't think how different my idea of him was, and naturally that helped all the more to throw me off the track.”

“But why—” began Cynthia afresh.

“Oh, don't let's try to puzzle over it any more just now!” interrupted Joyce. “My head is simply in a whirl. I can't even
think
straight! I never had so many surprises all at once in my life. I think he will explain everything we don't understand. Let's just wait!”

There were faint sounds from the drawing room, but they were indistinguishable,—low murmurings and half-hushed sobs. The two reunited ones within were bridging the gulf of forty years. And so the girls continued to wait outside, in the silence and in the dark.

A
T last the two on the staircase heard footsteps approaching the door, and a pleasant voice called out:

“Where are you both, little ladies? Will you not come and join us? I think we must have some things to be explained!” They came forward, a little timidly, and their latest visitor held out a hand to each.

“You wonderful two!” he exclaimed. “Do you realize that, had it not been for you, this would never have happened? My mother and I owe you a debt of gratitude beyond all expressing! Come and join us now, and we will solve the riddles which I'm sure are puzzling us all.” He led them over to the sofa, and placed them beside his mother.

Never was a change more remarkable than that which had come upon Mrs. Collingwood. Her face, from being one of the saddest they had ever seen, had grown fairly radiant. She looked younger, too. Ten years seemed suddenly to have dropped from her shoulders. Her brown eyes flashed with something of their former fire, and she smiled down at them as only the Lovely Lady of the portrait had ever smiled. There was no difficulty now in identifying her with that picture.

“Oh, please—” began Joyce, breathlessly, “won't you tell us, Mr. Collingwood, how you come to be—
not dead!
—and why you gave another name at the door—and—and—” He laughed.

“I'll tell you all that,” he interrupted, “if you'll tell
me
who ‘Joyce Kenway' is!”

“Why,
I
am!” said Joyce in surprise. “Didn't you guess it?”

“How could I?” he answered. “I never supposed it was a
girl
who sent me that note. I did not even feel sure that the name was not assumed to hide an identity. In fact, I did not know what to think. But I'll come to all that in its proper place. I'm sure you are all anxious to hear the strange story I have to tell.

“In the first place, as it's easy to guess, I was n't killed at the battle of Shiloh at all,—but so very seriously wounded—that I came to be so reported. As I lay on the field with scores of others, after the battle, a poor fellow near me, who had been terribly hurt, was moaning and tossing. My own wound did not hamper me so much at the time, so I crawled over to him and tried to make him as comfortable as possible till a surgeon should arrive. Presently he began to shiver so, with some sort of a chill, that I took off my coat and wrapped it round him. The coat had some of my personal papers in it, but I did not think of that at the time.

“When the surgeons did arrive, we were removed to different army hospitals, and I never saw the man again. But he probably died very soon after, and evidently, finding my name on him, in the confusion it was reported that
I
was dead. Well, when I saw the notice of my own death in the paper, my first impulse was to deny it at once. But my second thought was to let it pass, after all. I believed that I had broken forever with my home. In the year that had elapsed, I had never ceased to hope that the note I left would soften my mother's feelings toward me, and that at least she would send me word that I was forgiven. But the word had never come, and hope was now quite dead. Perhaps it would be kinder to her to allow her to think I was no more, having died in the cause I thought right. The more I thought it over, the more I became convinced that this was the wisest course. Therefore I let the report stand. I was quite unknown where I was, and I decided, as soon as I was able, to make my way out West, and live out my life far from the scenes of so much unhappiness. My wound disqualified me from further army service and gave me a great deal of trouble, even after I was dismissed from the hospital.

“Nevertheless, I worked my way to the far West, partly on foot and partly in the slow stage-coaches of that period. Once in California, I became deeply interested in the gold mines, where I was certain, like many another deluded one, that I was shortly going to amass an enormous fortune I But, after several years of fruitless search and fruitless toil, I stood as poor as the day I had first come into the region. In the meantime, the fascination of the life had taken hold of me, and I could relinquish it for no other. I had always, from a small child, been passionately fond of adventure and yearned to see other regions and test my fortune in new and untried ways. I could have done so no more acceptably than in the very course I was now pursuing.

“At the end of those hard but interesting years in California, rumors drifted to me of golden possibilities in upper Canada, and I decided to try my luck in the new field. The region was, at that time, practically a trackless wilderness, and to brave it at all was considered the limit of folly. That, however, far from deterring me, attracted me only the more. I got together an outfit, and bade a long farewell to even the rough civilization of California.

“Those were strange years, marvelous years, that I
spent in the mountain fastnesses of upper Canada. For month on month I would see no human being save the half-breed Indian guide who accompanied me, and most of the time
he
seemed to me scarcely human. And all
the while the search for gold went on, endlessly—endlessly. And the way led me farther and farther from the haunts of men. Then,—one day,—I found it! Found it in a mass, near the surface, and in such quantities that I actually had little else to do but shovel it out
,
wash it, and lay the precious nuggets aside, till at length the vein was exhausted., On weighing it up, I found such a quantity that there was really no object in pursuing the search any farther. I had enough. I was wealthy and to spare, and the longing came upon me to return to my own kind again. By this time, fifteen years had passed.