Legend of the Seventh Virgin (29 page)

When she laughed she was like the old Mellyora who had not yet suffered the humiliations which a proud woman like my mother-in-law could not help inflicting on those she considered to be in her power.

“Oh come, Kerensa,” she said, “I am well aware of your faults.”

I laughed with her and I thought: No, Mellyora, you are not. You would be surprised if you could look into this black heart of mine. Black? Perhaps not entirely so. But not shining bright and pure. Tinged with gray.

I was determined that I would make Mellyora’s life easier for her.

What a change Carlyon had wrought at the Abbas. There was not one of us who was unaffected by his presence. Even Johnny had dropped some of his cynicism and had become a proud parent. My child was the whole meaning of life to me, of course. Mellyora was more at peace than she had been for a long time. She was devoted to the baby and there were times when I feared he might grow to love her as much as he loved me. Lady St. Larnston would soften visibly at the sight of her grandson, and the servants adored him; when he was in the garden I knew they all made excuses to go out to him. I guessed he was the only one in the house of whom they were not critical.

There was however one person, perhaps two, who were less happy for his coming. To Judith he was a continual reproach, and I suspected to Justin too. I had seen Justin look with yearning at my son and I could read his thoughts; as for Judith she could not hide hers. There was a wild resentment in her heart as though she were demanding of fate: Why cannot I have a child?

Strangely enough she allowed me to become her confidante. Why she should have chosen me, I could not imagine; perhaps it was because she felt I understood her more than anyone else in the house.

Sometimes I would go and sit with her and I had a way of making her talk which excited me and which she found soothing. I continually remembered Granny’s saying that it was wise to discover all one could because every scrap of knowledge might at some time prove useful.

I would feign sympathy; I would lure her to confidences; and when her mind was dulled by whiskey she talked the more readily. Every day she rode out alone. Her purpose, I knew, was to buy whiskey from the various inns in the neighborhood. She had evidently realized the danger of using the house supplies.

When Justin discovered the empty bottles in the cupboard, he was horrified by her secret drinking.

At first she was elated. “He was so angry, I have rarely seen him so angry. He must care, mustn’t he, Kerensa, to be so angry? He said I would ruin my health. Do you know what he did. He took my whiskey away so that I shouldn’t ruin my health.”

But the elation did not last. I knew then how much she had come to rely on her whiskey. I went into her room once and found her sitting at a table, crying over a letter.

“I’m writing to Justin,” she said. I looked over her shoulder and read ‘My darling, What have I done that you should treat me so? Sometimes I think you hate me. Why do you prefer that girl with her silly meek face and her baby-blue eyes. What can she give you that I can’t …’

I said: “You are not going to send that to Justin?”

“Why not? Why shouldn’t I?”

“You see him every day. Why do you want to write to him?”

“He avoids me. We have separate rooms now. Did you know? It is because I am a nuisance. He prefers to forget me. Things have changed since you were my maid, Kerensa. Clever Kerensa! I wish I knew how to manage my life as you do yours. You don’t care much for Johnny, do you? But he cares for you. How strange! It’s sort of turnabout. The two brothers and their wives …”

She began to laugh wildly and I said warningly: “The servants will hear.”

“They’re far away in the kitchen.”

“They’re everywhere,” I replied.

“Well, what would they discover? That he neglects me? That he wants the parson’s daughter? They know that already.”

“Hush.”

“Why should I?”

“Judith, you are not yourself.”

“I am dying for a drink. He has taken away my one comfort, Kerensa. Why shouldn’t I have my comfort? He has his. Where do you think he and that girl have gone, Kerensa?”

“You are being foolish. You are imagining this. They are both too …” I paused and added, “too conscious of convention to be anything but friends.”

“Friends!” she jeered. “Waiting for the moment when they will be lovers. What do they talk about together, Kerensa? The days when I shall no longer be here?”

“You are overwrought.”

“If I could have a drink I should be better. Kerensa, help me. Buy some whiskey for me … bring it to me. Please, Kerensa, you don’t know how I need a drink.”

“I couldn’t do it, Judith.”

“So you won’t help me. No one will help me … No …” She stopped and smiled slowly.

A thought had evidently occurred to her, but I did not discover what it was until a few days later.

That was when she rode over to her old home and brought Fanny Paunton back with her. Fanny had been a nursery maid at Derrise and had worked there in another capacity when there was no longer a place for her in the nursery.

Fanny was to be Judith’s new lady’s maid.

The affairs of Judith and Justin were suddenly of no more interest to me. My son was ill. One morning I leaned over his cradle and found him in a fever. I was terrified and sent at once for Dr. Hilliard.

Carlyon was suffering from measles, the doctor told me, and there was no cause for alarm. It was a normal childish complaint.

No cause for alarm! I was beside myself with anxiety.

I was with him night and day; I would not allow anyone else to nurse him.

Johnny remonstrated with me. “It’s what happens to all children.”

I gave him a scornful look. This was my son who was different from all other children. I could not bear that he should run the slightest risk.

My mother-in-law was extraordinarily gentle to me.

“You’ll make yourself ill, my dear. Dr. Hilliard assures me it is just an ordinary childish complaint and dear Carlyon’s attack is a mild one. Get some rest, I do assure you that I shall look after him myself while you do.”

But I would not leave him. I was afraid that others would not give him the care that I could. I would sit by his cradle and visualize his death, the little coffin being carried to the St. Larnston vault.

Johnny came to sit beside me.

“Do you know what’s the matter with you?” he said. “You want more children. Then you won’t have all these alarms over one. What would you say to half a dozen little sons and daughters? You were meant to be a mother. It’s done something to you, Kerensa.”

“Don’t be flippant,” I commanded.

But when Carlyon was better and I could think more reasonably, I thought of a large family and the years ahead when I should be the grand old lady of the Abbas with not only Sir Carlyon and his children, but others … my children, my grandchildren. I would be to them what Granny Bee had been to me.

It was an expansion of my dream.

Johnny had given me a glimpse into a future which seemed good to me.

Carlyon suffered no ill effects and was soon himself again. He was walking and talking now. It gave me the utmost joy to watch him.

Johnny and I had slipped into a new relationship. We were as we had been during those early days of our marriage. There was passion between us as fierce as there had been then. On my side it grew out of a desire to fulfill a dream; on his, for a woman whom he was half convinced was a witch.

In the rose garden, Carlyon was playing with a wooden hoop, guiding it with a wooden stick, as he bowled it along. Mellyora was sitting on a seat near the Virgin’s wall, sewing, when I came into the garden.

Carlyon was now nearly two years old and big for his age; he was rarely out of temper, and always happy to play by himself, although he would share the game with any who wished to join him. I often marveled that a man like Johnny and a woman like myself could have produced such a child.

I was at this time twenty-one and I often felt as I went about the Abbas that I had lived there all my life.

Lady St. Larnston was visibly aging; she suffered from rheumatism which kept her in her room a great deal, and had not employed another companion to take Mellyora’s place because she no longer had much correspondence, nor did she wish to be read to as she had in the past. She wanted to rest more and occasionally Mellyora or I would sit with her. Mellyora sometimes read to her; when I did, she would always interrupt and we would find ourselves talking, mostly about Carlyon.

This meant that I was gradually becoming mistress of the house, a fact which the servants realized and only occasionally did I see an expression flicker over one of their faces which told me they were remembering that time when I had been one of them.

Judith did not stand in my way at all. She would sometimes spend days in her room with no one but her maid — “that Fanny from over Derrise,” as the servants called her.

Granny was not as well as I should have liked but I was not worried about her as I had once been. It was my plan to set her up in a little house of her own near the Abbas, with a servant to look after her. It was a subject I had not yet broached with her for I knew that, at the moment, it would not be well received.

Joe was engaged to Essie Pollent and Mr. Pollent was to make him a partner on the day of the marriage. I felt piqued by Granny’s glee in this state of affairs. She said: “Both of my little ’uns have done well for themselves.” I did not see how Joe’s rise could be compared with mine; and I still felt a nagging irritation that he was not studying to be a doctor.

My desire for other children had not yet been satisfied, but Granny had assured me that it was normal enough to have a gap of two or three years, and better for my health too. I had all my life before me. So I was content enough. I had the perfect son; and with each passing month, I became more and more sure that Judith would never bear a child. Thus Carlyon would inherit the title and the Abbas, and I would one day be the grand old lady of the Abbas.

That was the state of affairs that morning when I joined Mellyora and Carlyon in the rose garden.

I sat down by Mellyora and for a few seconds gave myself up to contemplating my son. He had been immediately aware of my coming into the rose garden and stood still to wave to me; then he trotted after his hoop, picked it up, sent it bowling, and glanced at me to see if I was watching. This was another of those moments which I should have liked to capture and preserve forever; moments of pure happiness, and when one grows older one learns that happiness — complete and unadulterated happiness — comes only in moments, and must be recognized and savored to the full, for even in the happiest life, the complete joy is not always present.

I saw then that Mellyora was uneasy and immediately the moment was passed, for joy had become tinged with apprehension.

“Something is on your mind?” I asked.

She was thoughtful; then she said: “It’s Judith, Kerensa.”

Judith! Of course it was Judith. Judith was the cloud which hid the sun. Judith stood across her path like a colossus preventing her passage along the river to love and contentment.

I nodded.

“You know she is drinking far too much.”

“I know she has a fondness for the bottle, but I believe Justin is aware of this and won’t let her drink to excess.”

“She
is
drinking too much in spite of … Justin.”

Even the way in which she said his name was a revelation. The little pause; the hushed reverence. Oh, Mellyora, I thought, you betray yourself in a hundred ways.

“Yes?” I said.

“I was passing her room yesterday; the door was open and I heard her … groaning, so I thought. I went in. She was lying across the bed in a drunken stupor. It was awful, Kerensa. She didn’t recognize me. She was lying there with a dazed look in her eyes, groaning and mumbling. I couldn’t hear what she said. I was so worried I went along to find Fanny. Fanny was in her room … the room you used to have. She was lying on the bed and she didn’t get up when I went in. I said to her: ‘I think Lady St. Larnston needs you. She seems ill.’ And she lay there looking at me in a horrid, sneering sort of way. ‘Is that so, Miss Martin?’ she said. I went on: ‘I heard her moaning and I went in to see. Pray go and do something for her.’ She laughed. ‘Her ladyship’s all right, Miss Martin,’ she said. Then: ‘I didn’t know it was her ladyship you were interested in.’ It was horrible. It’s a great pity that woman ever came here. I was so angry, Kerensa …”