Transcript

Chapter IV · Sinister House

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Chapter four of Sinister House by Leland Hall. The LibriVox recording is in the
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public domain. Read by Ben Tucker, Chapter four. All this happened early
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in September. The weather had been uncertain from the middle of August, and
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the day after Eric came home was furious with rain and wind. We hadn't
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a very cheerful breakfast, Annette and I and the children. Felicia had had
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nightmares too, and had let the eggs burn. But I remember saying to
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my wife when I got home that night, very wet and tired, that
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it was sure to blow and rain itself out at last, in time for
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my vacation, which I always took in the fall, and which was due
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to begin the next week. That's just what happened. After the fourteenth or
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fifteenth of September, we had a three weeks spell of the loveliest weather you
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can imagine. I always have been lucky on my vacation. But it wasn't
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the spell of weather, but the visit of Giles to our house and what
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he brought with him or stirred up that have made that epoch of vivid memory
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to me, one which has stayed just behind my every day since for nearly
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four years. At the time, none of that was so real to me
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as my enjoyment of the mild fall days, sowing the lawn, setting out
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bulbs. Anette and I crocuses, daffodils, squoils. She can tell you
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what they were, though I think it was Giles that set us to doing
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it, tinkering with the ford and polishing it, days of golf and picnics
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with the children up the river. It may be temperamental with me, and
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the word makes me laugh, but I've always found joy just as real as
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sorrow, more real. Indeed, everything bad that comes to me seems like
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an unpleasant dream from which I'm always looking to wake up, whereas when I'm
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having a good time, I don't want to go to bed at all.
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Half our sorrows come from an overbalanced mind, and the other half are aggravated
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by too much thinking on one's self. I went on having a sensible,
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happy time while two persons whom I knew intimately were being stretched tighter and tighter
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on a rack. And not until I was caught in the infernal thing myself
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had I the slightest suspicion of what was going on. Of course I heard
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the gossip, but I didn't heed it, And in our nightly counsels I
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scolded a net for listening to it and favoring it. As a matter of
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fact, she countenanced no more of it than appeased her pique at Julia.
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That was very slight, after all, and pardonable. If you confess with
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proper humility that you don't see something, and the one to whom you confess
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it replies with no, I suppose not in a tone you take to mean
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poor thing. You ought to see it, but you haven't since enough,
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or you aren't refined enough, or you aren't made of the right stuff.
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Well, it puts you on the look out for the beam in the other
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fellow's eye, no matter how much you may admire him. The trouble was,
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we both see now that Annette misunderstood Julia's meaning entirely. The little remark,
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if it was anything but a blind rang with envy rather than with contempt.
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I used to laugh to see Annette trying to pump her cousin for the
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latest dope on the arts. Olivinnette's family, except Giles, were good sensible
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people like herself, and Giles always remained a freak to them, some one
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for whom an apology or at least an explanation was necessary. I dare say
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no one of them, save my wife, ever thought to profit by his
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abilities and take a little schooling at his hands. But she used in those
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days to ask him questions as if she were humoring him, and entirely nonchalantly,
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And she quite fooled me. Not until I began to hear queer words
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of his lingo, such as composition values chiaroscura fall from her own serene lips
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did I realize what she was up to. And he he must have known
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it too, and if he gave out anything at all to her, it
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must have been with utmost carelessness. He didn't care a snap of his finger
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about our sense of beauty. He knew us for just what we were,
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pitied us for that, liked us for that, and once confessed to me
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envied us for that, which last I take to mean that no one would
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be an artist if he could help it. But i'm us say, Giles
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is a fine fellow and a gentleman. He has since died fighting for France,
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which he was the first to make me understand would be fighting for the
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soul of the world. As for the gossip, I had rather pass over
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it. But since I am going to plunge into the heart of the affair
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and must perforce confine myself to what either Annette or I actually saw or experienced,
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I'd better tell you some of the many yarns so that you will have
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an idea of how the strange drama impressed the circle of Foresby's best. So
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far as I can remember, up to the time of Giles long stay with
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us, the only thing Foresby had against Eric and Julia, and gossip,
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you know, is always what you have against the other fellow, was the
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fact that they live in that gloomy old house. Julia was exceedingly charming.
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Eric was, by contrast, reserved. I've already told you that the house
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was uncanny to most of us. Added to their choice of such a dwelling,
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their dress, their independent manners, and their way of speech were enough
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to brand them. Is different To be different is I have observed invariably blameworthy,
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And in this case Eric naturally was held to blame. There was something
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queer about him. I mean, that was the gossip. It never got
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going very strong to tell the truth, I think most of us stood a
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little in awe of him. But during the six weeks that followed his dramatic
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home coming, it so happened that he was now at home, now off
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on another trip, and Forsby noticed not only that in the periods of his
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being at home, Julia was pale and depressed and didn't appear often on the
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links of the Caraway Club in Stanton, but that when he was away she
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brightened up in appearance and manners, and played golf almost every day. Well,
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Giles was with her a very great deal during the days and sometimes weeks
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that Eric was away. They used to play golf together and to take long
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walks together, and he was almost every afternoon at her house for tea,
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whether Eric was at home or not. It wasn't surprising that the ladies began
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to whisper among themselves, nor was it surprising that they came to the decision
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that Giles was in love with Julia, that Julia glad of Giles's company,
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that everything wasn't peaches and cream in the Greer household, but let it go.
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The saddest part of it was that Eric at one time probably heard some
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of it. He was so sensitive that it didn't take much of a hint
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to make him worry. Yet, as I have already told you, he
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could never have doubted Julia's love for him. Now, to go back to
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my story, it must have been a Friday night that Eric came home so
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unexpectedly from his first trip away. Though he told me that he had only
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thirty six hours to pass at home with his wife, he did not leave
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until Monday morning. This I remember because early Monday morning I telephoned Julia.
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I was going down to the train station from New York to meet Giles,
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from whom we had received a telegram the night before. I wanted to see
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Julia, and I thought that perhaps I might give her a lift along the
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road somewhere, or take some letter down to the station for her. Besides,
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the Ford was working wonderfully well that morning. You understand, we had
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seen nothing of Eric or Julia since that Friday night. They were at that
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time so wrapped up in each other that we should not have thought of breaking
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in on them. To my surprise, Eric answered the telephone, and it
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was he who was glad of a chance to be taken to the station.
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There was a train down to New York just before Giles's train up from there
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was due. Eric was leaving on that so I hustled over for him in
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the ford. It was a wonderful morning. The shadows under the hemlocks by
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Eric's house were the only dark things I saw, and I always felt,
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rather than saw them. Eric was waiting for me on the steps to the
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front door, with his bags at his feet. Julia was standing beside him,
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heavily veiled. Will you be good enough to take me along too?
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She asked, in an unusually low voice. I want to go with Eric
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as far as I can, and Eric added, with great tenderness, I
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want her to have a lot of this sweet fresh air. Then, for
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Heaven's sake, take off that thick veil. Julia I cried, it's a
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gorgeous day. Don't shut it out. There's no dust, the roads are
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still wet. Do my dear Eric urged, No one will see that mark.
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All the black and blue spots in the world wouldn't make any difference to
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me or to any one. She stood beside him. I was going to
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say, trembling. I never saw Julia tremble while she had strength enough to
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stand on her feet. But there was something about her that morning suggestive of
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extreme weakness, and I had a feeling of uncertainty about her health. Have
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you had a fall, Julia, I asked anxiously. The silly girl walked
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in her sleep last night, Eric explained, and bumped her cheek in the
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way of a joke. I shouted, oh you, lady macbeth. I
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had a moment's pride of my knowledge of Shakespeare. But Julia put her hand
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up in protest. Don't say that, She cried, I've done nothing,
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nothing I can think of. I could see that I had upset her,
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all right, Julia, I said, I'll take your word for it,
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only please take off that funeral crape and enjoy the morning sunshine. There's nothing
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better than cool for fresh air for the black and blue spots. That was
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a fatuous remark, but it pleased Eric. We could not persuade Julia to
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lift her veil. However, in her simple gray frock, she looked like
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a girl, but for the wretched black drapery about her head, a device
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which in my eyes always gives women the appearance of victims going to the block
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to have their heads cut off. Not one word did either of them say
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too or for me? As I drove them through flat foresby to the station
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that morning, but I heard their low, affectionate voices all the way.
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That was a pleasant sound, and together with the golden September weather dearly morning
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sun in the clean washed air, drove from my mind the thought it had
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harbored for a moment that this Julia was not the merry Julia of our little
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Friday night dinner. I remember a shock at the station, however, they
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were greatly upset at parting, much as they controlled themselves, and I left
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them standing on the platform and stepped to my car just alongside. As the
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train came in, she threw up her veil to take his kiss, and
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then I caught a glimpse of her face. Anguish at parting might have taken
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the blood from her cheeks. But when after the train had pulled out of
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the station, she came towards me, her veil still lifted, I saw
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she was haggard as well as pale. Tears were in her eyes. Just
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a step or two she appeared uncertain in her movement, and then she set
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her lips and came forward staunchly. She ignored the hand I offered to help
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her into the car, and without even looking at me, stepped in and
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took her seat. Calmly. I saw the mark high on the right cheek
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bone, the discoloration spreading up under the outer corner of the eye. She
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had forgotten about her veils being lifted. Indeed, I now know that she
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wore it to hide her face from Eric. Only up to the final scene,
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it remained her greatest care to conceal from Eric as far as she could
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the signs of her suffering, the nature of which she had determined he must
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not know. After a while, she blew her nose a little, coughed,
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and then turned her moist gray eyes to meet my too anxious Look.
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How foolish I am to love him, so she said, smiling a little.
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In the few minutes we had to wait for Giles's train, we said
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nothing. She was completing the mastery over herself. From time to time I
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stole a glance at her sweet, determined little face. After her tears had
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ceased to flow, she sat quietly with her hands folded in her lap,
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and devoted herself more and more to her own thoughts, no detail of which
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was recorded on the sensitive white mask of her face. Under her breast and
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throat. I saw waves of emotion rise and fall, but her firm lips
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were locked against the force of them. It was a relief to hear Giles's
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train come rumbling into the station we were waiting on the inbound side. After
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the train had pulled out, I saw Giles on the other platform across the
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tracks. He had a couple of heavy bags at his feet, and he
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was looking irascibly up and down and all around, shouting porter at men on
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our side of the rails, pointing his cane at them, behaving as he
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usually behaves, as if the whole world were reprehensibly indifferent to him, and
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he wouldn't put up with it much longer. But I really envied in Giles
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was not his ability as an artist, or his money, or his swagger
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English clothes, but his contemptuous indifference to making a scene. The two or
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three huskies on our side of the station merely gave him the once over and
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went on about their business. Oh, my beloved America, have we not
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much to learn about the treatment of artists? But believe me, I was
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tickled just the same. Of course, it was up to me to go
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get his bags. He could not be expected to carry them himself, So
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I ran down through the tunnel under the tracks up to cousin. Giles took
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his bags heavy brutes, one in each hand, and started back again.
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And he followed me, roaring all the way about this damn deserted place.
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I knew I could have asked him what the blank he came for, but
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it was never any satisfaction to come back at Giles might as well ask Old
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Faithful what he spouts for, or Vesuvius why she smokes. He was a
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sort of short, thick set volcano himself. He had a full face,
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not exactly sallow, but brownish, with rather protruding yellow brown eyes, tremendously
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animated, a ludicrously small nose, and nervous full lips, not a bit
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concealed by his scant mustache, which was yellowish. Also, the line of
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his jaw and chin was overlaid with flesh and muscle, and he had the
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neck of a bull. Though he wasn't what you'd call a beefy man,
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he was, I know, tremendously intelligent, intolerant, impatient, and more
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nervous than any lean man I've ever known. He was so full of energy
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that I often wondered if he ever slept at all. Funny what things come
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back to me. I do remember one night I heard him snoring when there
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was a horror stalking through the house. To many of us, he seemed
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all fired important, and that's what he was, I now believe, to
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his country and to the world. As we approached the ford that morning and
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he saw that there was a woman in it, he all but balked.
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Probably he had had no sleep the night before, for he had come from
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somewhere down in Maine, and the thought of having to ride so early in
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the morning with a commonplace woman gave his nerves another twist of the screw.
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But I said, come on now, Giles, you've got to be civil
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on such a fine morning. Besides, it's missus Greer. Greer, Greer,
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he roared, making me hot all over. I don't know any Greers.
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Why the devil should I be civil to missus Greer? Because I answered,
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in a low but angry voice. She's a damn fine woman, whether
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you know her or not, and she isn't very well. Huh, So
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you're going to give me a sick one on this fine morning. Are you
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damned if I won't walk? We didn't often damn ourselves and each other so
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freely, and I was mortified at the thought that Julia might have heard.
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By the way, I have never heard Eric use an oath of any kind,
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But Julia was probably too much absorbed in her own thoughts to hear us.
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She started when I spoke to her, Julia, I said, as
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cheerfully as I could, this is my cousin, mister Giles, Pharaoh.
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He has just told me that he is going to walk to the house.
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We shan't have the pleasure of his company. He braked off his hat in
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a boorish sort of way, his lank hair never seemed to and stooped to
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lift his dress suit case. But at the sound of her voice, like
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a sweet silver bell, always with something courteous in the inflection, he stood
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up quickly, gave her a keen, critical, almost arrogant look, and
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then plumped himself down beside her in the back seat. I don't know what
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it was. Always made Giles seem bigger than the place he was in,
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Mopping his forehead and blowing a bit, he was like a steam engine in
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the back seat of my Ford. While I was laboring to lift his heavy
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bags to the front seat, and while I made sure that the doors were
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all fast and did the many little things one does so proudly about a ford,
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I saw him dart swift glances at Julia's face. She rather turned away
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from him, which I should judge was not what he was used to having
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women do. And we rode on in silence for a good while. All
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of a sudden he asked her if she lived in one of the new concrete
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stables they were putting up out here. She laughed and told him that she
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lived in the one old house that had been left standing. I knew it,
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he roared, You've got some sense. I've seen you before too.
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I stumbled on that old place when I was here in June, saw you
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and your husband setting out flowers, foxgloves, nispah. How did you happen
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to hit on that place? Look at all these other insufferable boxes of houses.
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Look at that one over there like a county jail. No shade anywhere
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either. But I say, you don't look so well as when I saw
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you before. What's the matter been? Ill? You don't think that old
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houses are healthy, do you, Giles, I threw back at him over
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my shoulder, to blazes with health, he cried, incontinently, always thinking
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of your body as you Americans. If Giles was out of sorts, he
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always sailed into the Americans, just as if he weren't one himself. There's
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a spirit in a soul to consider these things you call homes. Look at
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them, garages, jails, memorial bakes. Give me a house that has
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a spirit in it, like missus. Julia's laugh was a little strained,
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I thought, But the two of them fell into conversation. They both lived
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in Europe and all that sort of thing. So I, who had never
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been farther across the water than to Staten Island, gave my thoughts to the
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smoothness of the ford and the good September sunshine and air. It was Giles
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who did most of the talking. But now and then Julia asked a question,
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and once or twice she laughed. At last we reached our home.
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I got Giles's heavy luggage out on to the granolithic walk. Annette came flying
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through the front door and down to the car to greet him. My sensible
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wife was not insensible of the fact that her relationship to Giles gave her something
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of a standing in the community. This morning, largely for the sake of
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Julia, I imagine, she greeted him with more enthusiasm than the tie of
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second cousin usually prompts. Lord, how human that is. But Giles stuck
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fast in the car. He hardly acknowledged Annett's greeting at all, but tried
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to continue his conversation with Julia, just as if Annette had not been there
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beside the car, looking right pretty too in the bright sunlight. You see,
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she has a good skin and pretty hair. Well. It was a
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little humiliating for Annette. Still, that was no excuse for her taking it
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out on Julia. Julia was really very sweet to Annette that morning, and
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thanked her specially for having been good to Eric Friday night. And what did
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Annette do but say something about having brought a couple of nightmares to the house
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with him. I only said it half jokingly, she explained to me later,
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when I took her task for it. You heard me, Pierre,
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I only said he had brought a couple of nightmares to Bobby and Felicia.
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How could she have taken it. So she knows that Bobby adorees Eric.
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She knows old Felicia would lie down on the ground for Eric to walk over
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her. She shouldn't be so sensitive. At the time, I felt that
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her wrong had been done, and I tried to relieve the situation by reminding
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Annette that Eric had been good enough to take the nightmares away with him.
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That didn't improve the situation, but it covered up the silence which had fallen
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upon Julia's strange, inarticulate distress. Her eyes looked quite horror struck. I
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remember thinking, well, women beat the Dutch, and being glad that Annette
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couldn't see the mark on Julia's other cheek. When women get going, no
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mere man can tell where they'll end. Giles was determined not to get out
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of the car, but to go on with Julia and me to the old
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house. I don't think he cared a hang about seeing it, but he
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wanted to stay with Julia. How he puffed and roared along the way in
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spite of him. However, there were silent spaces. Julia said absolutely nothing
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and laughed no more. The consciousness that Annette's brusqueness had pained her never left
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my mind, but I had little idea how nearly Julia was done for,
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to my utter dismay, she fainted as she stepped out of the car.
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Luckily, Giles, who could be as courteous as a bear, had got
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round to the door on her side to help her out, and he caught
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her in his powerful arms as she sank forward. My he was strong.
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I think he could have carried a net, and he carried Julia into the
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house as if she were a feather. I ran ahead to open the door,
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fortunately on the latch, and knowing the house, I piloted him down
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the narrow hallway, hung with that rosy stuff, into the sitting room,
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across the floor of which the sunlight, streaming between the rich curtains, lay
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in bright bars. It touched the pillow on the sofa, just the place
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for her head to wrin Her hat fell off as Giles laid her down,
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and the sunbeams glistened in her dark chestnut hair. No need to loosen anything
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round the slender white throat which rose spotless from the loose blouse she wore.
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Giles, the thick set, knelt down beside her and chafed her hands for
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him. At that moment, there was but one person in the world besides
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himself. He was wholly absorbed in watching her face, but only for a
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moment or two. He began shouting for some one, any one, and
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ordering me not to stand like a blockhead, but to fetch water, find
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the servant, do something. He himself rushed to part the curtains wider,
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and he nearly tore them down from their rods doing so, and to open
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the windows and let in more air. Before I left the room, I
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heard Julius say in a low voice, keep that thing away from me.
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Don't let it touch me. Oh Eric, how her whispers shook with horror.
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By the time I returned to the room with a kharaf of water and
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word that the servant would follow me with cologne, Giles had dragged the count
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with Julia on it, to the west windows, giving upon the verandah and
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overlooking the river. A cool breeze came up from the water and blew the
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curls round her pale face, and Giles was standing looking at her, his
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chin in his hand, his legs far apart, his whole body tense and
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motionless. Is she better? I whispered, eh, yes, he growled,
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what a handkerchief, and put it on her forehead. You you,
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I did so, and Julia opened her eyes. Dazed. At first,
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she asked for Eric, and when I told her that he was gone,
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she said cryptically, he must not come back yet, not yet. I
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was at a loss to understand this, until as she regained more of her
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strength, she repeated several times, he must not see me like this,
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he must not know he would indeed have been tortured. At last, the
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old servant came in with the cologne, and Julia held out a hand to
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me. She spoke a word of thanks to Giles too, and said to
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both of us, it's a feminine absurdity. It means nothing except that,
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well nothing. I trust you not to say a word to Eric about it.
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She closed her eyes, the tears came pushing out slowly from beneath her
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pallid lids. We knew it was time for us to go. I'd left
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the motor running. There's extravagance for you with gasolene mounting towards the sky,
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but I didn't care. Giles got up in the front seat beside me,
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and we started off without a word. At last, I said that for
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your old houses, I don't believe that one's healthy. I'll bet it's haunted
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too. But Giles never opened his lips, except to put a cigarette between
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them, which he did not try to light. We must have gone a
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mile before he shot out at me her husband. What about him, I
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gasped, startled her husband. He roared again. Look here, Giles,
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I said, feeling pretty serious. He's a fine fellow, and she adores
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him. End of chapter four