Warning Hill (28 page)

“Then you come back home,” said Mal. “Say—you've gotta come back home. Pa's laid up with rheumatism, but you can stay with us. What'll it get you being yellow and not wanting to come back? I guess you've been in lots worse places than our house, and don't call me a fool when you're a bigger one. Honest, Tom—you come back home. You've been there before.”

And then Tommy knew that it was the only thing to do. No matter what might happen, he could not get away. Sooner or later, he would have to see the Jelletts in the flesh instead of imagining he saw them.

“Will you take me in if I come?” He asked it almost humbly, and it was like the ending of a struggle, and the glow of Mal's friendliness was all about him.

“I said so, didn't I?” said Mal.

“Then thanks,” said Tommy. “I'll be down to-morrow night.”

“I'll be down to meet you, kid,” Mal Street said, “right when the train comes in.”

That was how Tommy Michael went back, and sometimes he said that he never knew when he would have come if it had not been for Mal. But Mal Street, in spite of what he promised, was not there to meet the train.

It was eight o'clock on one of those misty evenings such as come in early June. The air was thick and gray and smelled of the salt water. That was the only difference from a hundred other places in the dark—the damp smell of the sea. It was like memory, but ever so much stronger. It was the town and everything he knew, and days were in it which he had never known.

Tommy brought nothing home with him but his trench coat, which was torn and patched, and one of those musette bags, slung across his shoulder. He did not expect any one to recognize him, but they did. He should have remembered how wistfully he himself once had watched the passengers from the evening train. Old Mr. Quinn, the baggage-master, dropped the handle of his truck, and Jimmy Griffin, who ran a car for the taxi service, for there was a taxi service by that time, jumped down and left his motor running.

“Hey, Tom,” said Jim, and Mr. Quinn, of an older and more courtly school, said, “Welcome back,” and they shook hands. It was curious, Tommy sometimes thought, that they knew him so well, when he had nearly forgotten both of them. They were like fixed objects in some room which he had left years back, and now that he had opened the door of that room again, it was exactly as he had left it. It had been waiting for him all the while. It seemed to him that all of Michael's Harbor had been waiting, and that it was his place, and that there would be something always waiting, whenever he got back home.

There were all sorts of things he wanted to say. All sorts of thoughts were crowding through him, but he did not speak them.

“Where's Mal Street?” he asked instead.

“With his old man, I guess,” said Jim. “Jim Street's got the rheumatism so he can hardly hobble. It's what comes of being out in boats. Are you going any place?”

“Thanks,” said Tommy, “I'll walk. I'm sort of used to walking.”

“Hey!” he heard some one calling, as he stepped into the dark. “Did you see him? Tom Michael's got back home.”

It never occurred to him to think it strange that Mal did not meet him. The wind was coming from the northeast. It was whispering through the trees. Now and then drops of water would fall from the elms splash upon the sidewalk. The lights from the houses along the street turned the mist into millions of little glowing specks. Down toward Welcome River his heels clicked sharply on the bricks, and he remembered how his father's heels had clicked one morning, ever so long before, and how the old drake had whispered by the door. He remembered later that all the while he walked he had not thought of Mal.

It was the stillness of the Streets' dooryard that made him uneasy first, indefinably uneasy. No dog barked, for the last of the water spaniels had been buried years ago. A light was burning very dimly in the kitchen window, but no one opened the door when he walked up those rickety back steps. Tommy never knew why he went in without knocking, except that he had been used to acting on instinct. It must have been some instinct that things were not right which made him snatch at the knob before he thought, and step inside and slam the door behind him.

A lamp was burning on the kitchen table. The sink was full of dishes, and the kettle was steaming on the stove. Jim Street was seated near it in a grimy upholstered chair. He was gripping at the arms with ugly distorted fingers; he was trying to pull himself up, but, as Tommy looked, he sank back with a grimace of pain. Mary Street was by the table. Her hair was loose as it had been when she was a child.

“Well,” said Jim, “git up and take his bag, Mary. Don't you see it's Tom?”

“What's wrong?” said Tommy.

He had not intended to speak so sharply, but any one could see that something was very wrong. It was written on Jim Street as plain as print, and Mary gave him an odd look when she pushed back her chair, half questioning, half defiant.

“It's Mary,” Jim Street's eyes were on her, dull and burning. “Oh, what's the use? She—Now who'd have thought it of Mary? Was it my fault? Tell me that.”

And then she spoke, softly, gently, her voice very far away, and it always seemed to him that she was a picture of all the Mary Streets he remembered, when she spoke. There was the sadness in her, and the wildness, and the mystery and something that was new. Her face was like his own face. Her eyes were dark and weary.

“You needn't tell him, Pa,” said Mary Street. “Tommy understands.”

Now why it was he understood he could not tell, but all at once it was as clear as clear. It was something which had been bound to happen, as sure as the course of stars. Something seemed to strike him straight and hard, so that he caught his breath; and nothing was over, nothing.

“Oh,” said Mr. Street. His voice was weak and listless. “So you've got some shame, have you? That's sweet now, coming from the likes of you. You—All right, I won't say it. What's the use of talking? But I'll tell him, never fear. He's got enough against 'em. It's them Jelletts. Damn them Jelletts. She was aiming to go off with that young Jellett—God knows where, and I'll be bound it's not the first time, either. Mal's the one who shook it out of her. Mal's gone up there now.”

“No,” said Mary Street, “it's not the first time, either. Tommy, don't be like the rest of them. You ought to understand.”

For a moment Tommy stared at her, and he could not find his voice. She was beautiful. She had never been so beautiful, and she was broken. Mary Street was broken, finished just as he had been, and that was what she was trying to tell him in that wordless way of hers.

“Where's Mal gone?” he asked. “Up where?” But of course he knew where Mal had gone, even as he asked.

“Where's he likely to have gone?” Jim Street's voice came to him dully, like a voice through a wall. “Up to Warning Hill, he's gone, just like I would, if I could walk that far. And I hope to God he kills him! Damn them Jelletts! There's some things we haven't got to stand.”

But Mary did not seem to notice. As she looked at Tommy, she spoke in that distant voice of hers, as though none of the fury touched her.

“I was planning to be away,” she said, “before you came.”

All the while the kettle was hissing and bubbling on the stove, and the room was very close, and it seemed, as Tommy listened, exactly like a dream. It had the same grotesqueness that robbed everything of logic. He remembered thinking, very clearly, how often Sherwood must have held her in his arms. He could see his lips touch hers, as she was trying, as he had tried, to get to Warning Hill. It was the Jelletts. It was the Jelletts still.

“Tom!” Mary was pulling at his coat. “You've got to go and stop Mal. Tommy, won't you go?”

It was as incongruous as a dream when Mary pulled at his coat. Something inside him was breaking like the ice on Welcome River in the spring, and his mind was whirling like the water with broken thoughts upon it.

“Mary,” said Jim Street, “you be still. We know what to do. We'll show them Jelletts they don't own the town.”

Mary, wide-eyed and white, was pulling at his coat.

“Tommy,” she was saying, “I don't care what anybody thinks—but you know Mal. He—oh, won't you hurry, Tom? Mal took his gun along.”

Tommy should have known. A harebrained quality in Mal would have made him do just that He seemed to be watching himself, half wearily, half critically, but at the same time he was aware of the logic in it. It was rolling toward him like stones and gravel on a slope until it crashed in that fantastic end.

“How long has he been gone?” he asked.

“Not more than twenty minutes,” she said. “He went up by the road.”

Tommy was used to thinking quickly then.

“All right,” he said; “then he won't be there unless he got a ride. Mary, will you bring the lamp?”

“Hey!” shouted Mr. Street, half pulling himself from his chair. “Where are you going?”

“To call a taxi,” Tommy said. “I'm going up with Mal.”

The Streets had a telephone near the stairs. He stumbled over some old boots before he reached it, and half a minute later he was asking for Mr. Grafton Jellett on business he could tell no one else. It surprised him that there was no tremor in his voice. He did not seem to be the person who was speaking.

“Is that you, Mr. Jellett?” he was saying. “This is Tom Michael speaking. It's important so please don't interrupt.… In about five minutes Mal Street will be there looking for Sherwood.… Yes, Sherwood. When he comes, have all the men on the place ready to grab him—and keep him till I get there. I'll be up right away. Be sure you get him—that's all.… I'd rather not tell you over the telephone.… Oh, you want to have it, do you? Very well. It's Sherwood and Mary Street.… Yes, that's exactly what I mean. And you better do what I told you. I'll be up right away.”

Then he was calling the taxi service, and then he was mopping his forehead with his handkerchief.

“Mary,” he was saying, “it's all right now. It doesn't do any good to beat the Jelletts. There'll only be some more.”

It still was like a dream. Mary was clinging to him, sobbing, her face buried in the wet of his coat, and there seemed nothing more to say. There seemed nothing more, and yet he was speaking.

“Mary,” he was saying, “do you love him?”

Her head moved, and she looked up at him wide-eyed, with that half-frightened look of hers that he remembered best.

“No,” she said. “Love him? No, I don't. I—I guess I've always hated everything—but you.”

“Mary,” he said, and he knew that he was right, “neither of us was made for it. We ought to have kept away from Warning Hill—both you and I.”

Yet it all was so futile when he said it, and he knew she thought it so, for all at once her glance had gone beyond him, as though she were looking at something very far away.

“I don't know,” she said. “Oh, I don't know. It would have been—so awful—if we hadn't. It's just as well we tried.”

And then his arm tightened about her, and he was filled with a strange vague wish for something that was gone.

“Mary,” he said, “there's you and me. It's what you said. We've always been alone.”

But she shook her head, for she was the one who saw, and surely she must have always been stronger than he and wiser. There was something in her clear and fine, mysterious and bright.

“No,” she answered. “No. You've gone too far. You can't go back. Neither of us can. And besides—I wouldn't let you, Tommy—dear. There was once … Do you remember in the kitchen and the rain? Oh, Tom, I'm glad you've gone. I'm very glad—for you.”

And then his voice was choked, and he could not tell—was it pity for himself, or what? He was tired, very tired.

“Mary,” he said, “it's awful—always to be alone.”

“Yes,” she said, “it's awful. I'll be all right, Tommy dear. Tommy, please don't cry.”

Even when he reached the Jellett house it was all unreal. He could almost believe that he was imagining as he had imagined before so often, that he was standing before the plate glass and iron grill of the Jelletts' door.

He noticed absently that Hubbard's face was white.

“Mr. Street has arrived, sir,” said Hubbard. “He—is in the library with Mr. Jellett. Will you please come, sir?”

Only a few of the lights were burning in the hall. The stairs went upward, seemingly for an immense distance, into shadows. The two suits of armor by the fireplace were like figures guarding a gaping gate.

“Mr. Michael, sir,” said Hubbard. After passing through the hall, the library seemed startlingly alight. Everything was stark in a glare of brightness which made Tommy blink. Mr. Jellett was standing, staring blankly at the room. He turned slowly as Hubbard spoke, and Tommy had a sensation of surprise when Mr. Jellett faced him. Mr. Jellett looked ever so much older. There seemed to be little weights at the bottom of his chin and cheeks, pulling at the flesh above and drawing it to wrinkles.

“Ah,” said Mr. Jellett, “there you are, eh?”

Tommy did not bother to answer, for the sight of Mal Street held all his attention at that moment. Mal was sprawling on one of the leather armchairs, livid, with blazing eyes, and a trickle of blood was running down his cheek. A man was standing on either side of him and one behind his chair, and all their clothes were very much deranged. Henri, the chauffeur, was one of them; the second was that groom who had handed Tommy a letter once, and the third was Campbell, the foreman of the place. On another chair, Sherwood was sitting. There were beads of perspiration on Sherwood's forehead.

Sherwood was in evening clothes and his hair was rumpled. Upon perceiving Tommy, he got up and scowled. “So you're the boy who spilled the beans, are you?” he remarked. “What the hell's all this to you?”