The Red Signal (Grace Livingston Hill Book) (3 page)

She looked out in the darkness. The sky overhead was luminously kind, but far away. There was starlight and a young moon, serene but distant, unheeding of her distress. The tears rained down upon her hands, which were clasped desperately on the window sill as she knelt, her breast heaving with silent sobs she dared not make audible lest they should be heard downstairs. She put her head down on the window sill and prayed a pitiful little prayer. Heaven seemed so far away to-night. Did God care about her? She looked out again.

It seemed a long way to the ground in the darkness and very black below. She could not remember how it had appeared when she had looked out in the afternoon. She had been all taken up with watching the engineer's cap then and realizing that he had actually kept his word and whistled to her. How long ago that seemed, and how different he had been from these dreadful men among whom she had come to live. Kind, gentle, strong, courteous, gallant! She could feel his arms lifting her now, and holding her against the bars of the fence as the trains flew by on either side! Oh, that she were hack at that spot in her life and could turn and flee from this new life, anywhere, so it was not here! Better even if her life had ended quickly, sharply under those fierce wheels!

She reached out her hands wistfully to the black line of the railroad grade. If his train would only pass again and she could signal her distress! But it was night! He could not see a signal if he came. Red he had said for danger. Had she anything red? Yes, a little red scarf she had caught up and stuffed in her suitcase just before leaving home, because it reminded her of her school days and all she was leaving behind. She turned and groped in her suitcase in the darkness till she felt the woolly softness of the scarf and hugged it to her breast, kissing and crying over it. How many times her mother had tied it around her throat on a cold day, and how she had hated to wear it sometimes as she grew older and did not want to be bundled up. But now it was precious. It reminded her of her mother, and of the little brother who had often worn it also.

Sobbing softly she stumbled back to her bed again, the old red scarf in her arms, and pulling the stubby quilt up over her, sobbed herself to sleep. Somehow it seemed too awful a place to think of undressing and going to bed regularly, but she was so utterly weary with her hard exciting day that she could stand up no longer.

Some time in the night she awoke from an ugly dream in which she was being pursued over plowed ground by Sylvester Schwarz, who was determined to get her old red scarf away from her, and her own cries for help were stifled in her throat as she struggled on over the furrows. Off in the distance she heard a dim rumble of a freight train, like a kindly voice to still her fright. It soothed and comforted her, so that she fell asleep again.

The raucous voice of Mrs. Schwarz sounded in her ear while it was yet dark, and a vigorous shaking of her locked door brought her to her feet frightened and half stupefied with sleep.

There was no place for her to wash in her room; nothing but the tin basin on the bench by the pump below, and the roller towel on the kitchen door, which she was expected to use in common with the men who were spluttering through their ablutions now. Hilda determined to omit much of her toilet until she could beg for better accommodations for washing. If worse came to worst there was an old towel in her suitcase, and she could certainly find something in which to carry up water—that is, if she stayed here. The horror of the morning made her sure she would find some way of escape before another night if possible.

The men were cross and all swearing at each other in German. Something had happened in the night, or else it had not happened. Hilda could not quite make out from their chance remarks that floated out to the kitchen where she was frying sausage and potatoes. She was not interested and paid little heed.

Sylvester Schwarz did not come down to break-fast with the men. He slept late, and when be came his mother waited upon him and hovered over him till his father came in from the barn, his little pig eyes snapping angrily, and began swearing at Sylvester like a raging bull. It seemed that the young man had been trusted with some weighty errand to a neighboring village the evening before and had neglected or forgotten it until too late. His father raged as if it were a matter of life and death. Sylvester sat stolidly, sullenly, and ate many hot cakes that his indulgent mother baked and brought to him incessantly, with silent tears running down her fat countenance. She spoke no word of protest to her angry spouse, but doggedly fed the pampered culprit till old Schwarz turned on her a storm of words that made the young girl in the kitchen cringe and heartily wish she did not understand German. During the tirade she managed to secure a basin of clean water and escape to her room till the storm was over and Sylvester gone sullenly off with a hoe over his shoulder. It appeared that Sylvester's mission had been one which called for mental attainments, for Hilda heard his father hurl this final sentence after him as he sauntered toward the barn:

“What for did I gif you all this expensive education yet if it was not to look after this end of the pizness? You will bring us all to zhame if you keep on. You might as well know nothing, you pig of a boy!”

Hilda worked silently, almost frenziedly, as the sun rose higher and the morning went on. Mrs. Schwarz moved stolidly through her domain, giving sharp commands, finding incessant fault, and growing more and more unreasonable. Just as the dinner was ready to dish up, and the men were answering the call, Hilda wiped her hands, drew down her sleeves, and turned on her fat persecutor:

“I better tell you, Mrs. Schwarz, I don't think I will stay. I'm not the hind of a girl you need here. I've never had experience in heavy work, and I can see I don't suit you. J know that I can do better work in some other line, and it's best for me to stop right now before you've taken a lot of trouble to teach me your ways.”

Mrs. Schwarz went stolidly on dishing up the potatoes as though she hid not heard. When the last potato was steaming on the piled-up dish she remarked monotonously:

“H’m! What can you do? Otto Lessing send you here. You got to stay! What else can you do?”

“Why, I thought if you could lend me the money to go back to Chicago my teacher would find me a place where I could earn enough to pay you back. I could learn stenography nights while I am working and very soon get a good position.”

“Ach! I have no money! And if I had, Otte Lessing send you here, and here you stay! Unless Otto Lessing say you can go, you stay! I know you are no good to me, but what can I do? You and I are women. We must do what we are told.”

Hilda stood struggling between anger and amazement, trying to think what to say. At last she answered haughtily:

“Very well, then, I will write to my Uncle Otto and tell him. If you will excuse me now, I will go up and write the letter at once. Or perhaps it would be best to send a telegram and my uncle can send me some money.”

 “You have no time to write letters and there is no way to send telegrams here. You get down off your high horse and carry in the potatoes! Your Uncle Otto send you here, and your time pelongs to me now. You are mighty poor help, but such as it is it pelongs to me. Take that platter in and shut up!”

 This was the only result of her well-planned decision. Hilda saw she had little chance unless she made a determined stand and ran away. She looked out the back door and saw the line of rough, burly men, headed by Schwarz, coming up the path to dinner, and knew this was no time to run, so, with whitening lips and trembling hands, she accepted the platter of hot stew and carried it meekly to the table, in a panic lest she would not get back to the protection of the kitchen before Sylvester arrived. She saw that for the present, at least, she must be obedient and unobtrusive, for how indeed could she run away and get anywhere without money? And it was plain there was no further use in asking Mrs. Schwarz.

All that afternoon she worked silently, doggedly, her heart raging, her mind in a turmoil. When the two o'clock freight passed and the whistle screamed its signal, her heart leaped gratefully and tears sprang to her smarting eyes, but fortunately she was scrubbing the floor with her back to Mrs. Schwarz and bore her scrutiny without a tremor. She was glad when she went up to her room to wash that she had left her towel in the window to dry. It was not large nor noticeable, but it was there; a white, silent recognition of the young man's kindness. He had said she was to let him know by this signal that she was all right! Oh, if he knew how far from right she was! If only she had thought to put the old red scarf beside the towel in the window! But, then, what could he do? He had his train to run, and when he was through with his day's work he would be far enough from her! And she was only a little stranger girl to whom he had been kind.

 Nevertheless, the sound of the kindly whistle had heartened her, and she took new courage from the passing presence of her friend. After all, who was she that her way should be made smooth through life? Should she not encounter some hard places and overcome them? For the time being her lot seemed to be cast inevitably in this most unkindly spot. It was intolerable. It was inconceivable that it should be right for her to remain in such a situation long. There would be some way out of it surely. But for the moment, the day at least, until a way opened, she must be brave. She must be worthy of having had her life saved in such a remarkable way. Surely the good God had saved her for some little purpose. It might be only that it was going to be good for her to pass through this unpleasant experience. Whatever it was, she would hold herself to win out if courage and faithfulness could do it. Perhaps the way to get away was to work hard and win the favor of these strange, disagreeable people. If they were human they must have a kinder side to them somewhere if she could only find it. Except, perhaps, that loutish son! Oh, how could she abide another day under the same roof with him? But even he might perhaps be avoided. She would do her best.

 So she tried to cheer herself and scrubbed with a right good will till her young back ached and her arms, all unaccustomed to such violent exercise, began to tremble. Still, white with weariness and faint for lack of food, because she had been too excited to eat, she slaved on through the afternoon work; over the hot stove, cooking the supper which she was too fatigued again to eat; thankful only that she was allowed to remain in the kitchen and cook rather than to serve at the table with those awful men. She came at last to the time when, the dishes done, she might hang up her dish towels and creep up the stairs to her room. One horror she had been spared to-night. Sylvester had taken himself off after supper, and she had not been bothered by his attentions. Heinrich, of the gray stubbly hair, had established himself ominously in the kitchen doorway and barred all approaches of any of the men. She disliked him with all her heart, but she could not but be grateful to him whatever his motive might be.

She had asked for a. candle and was given a small bit grudgingly. With this flickering uncertain light, she tried to write to her mother and uncle, but before she had half finished her mother's letter the candle flickered down to the socket and went out, and her aching back and arms cried out for rest. Sleep was heavy on her eyelids, too, and she knew she had not written what she meant. Besides, it was hard, now she was at it, to tell her mother what kind of a place she was in. Supposing there was no way out. Supposing she must stay here awhile. There was no need to make her mother anxious. She had enough trouble already. No, she must write to her uncle.

 She groped to her window sill and with only the starlight to guide her, she scrawled a few lines to her uncle, slipped them in an envelope, sealed, addressed and stamped it, and laid it ready for mailing in the morning. Then she went to her bed.

 Sleep was her master now, and she had no chance for the heavy problems she had meant to think out on her pillow. She sank at once into a deep, exhausted slumber that seemed to end almost at once with the sharp voice of her mistress in her ear and the merciless grip of duty on her tired young shoulder. She woke with the consciousness of the inevitable that had her in its power. She had heard of Prussianism, but she did not know that she was beginning to experience it.

When she went down in the morning she took her letters and asked Mrs. Schwarz how she should mail them. She was told to lay them on the table and “he” would see to them. Hilda had a. feeling that they had fallen into an abyss, as from the distance of the kitchen she saw her letters swept up in the elder Schwarz's big gnarled fist. Instinctively, she felt they might never reach their destination. Surely not until they had passed the censorship of this household tyrant. She spent the day trying to devise a means by which she might mail her own letters, or at least send a telegram. She was beginning to feel virtually a prisoner on this farm.

 Yet there was little time to think. She was driven from one duty to another, and the sudden violent plunge into unwonted labor had made her so stiff and sore in every joint that she could scarcely move without pain.

Three age-long days and three more nights, all too short for resting, passed, with only the sound of the friendly freight whistle to mark the daylight, and the rumble of the midnight freight through her dreams for comfort. The fourth night she cried herself to sleep once more, because the expected letter from Uncle Otto had failed to appear. The day had been so tortuous with its drudgery, so bleak in its monotony, the future seemed so impossible, so interminable, like eternity in hell. Then, suddenly, some time after midnight, she awoke with a strange insistent whirring approaching in the air through the night. It seemed to be coming on straight through the house, like some terrible destroying animal that nothing could stay, and the sound of it was like no sound that she had ever heard before. Nearer and nearer it drew, and she sprang from her bed softly and crept to her window. She could hear stealthy, sudden noises in the house, as if some other sleeper had also been aroused by the sound.