Very tired, at last Lexie responded to an angry call from Elaine and went in to sink in a chair and let Elaine complain.
“Lexie, did you know that maid out in the kitchen isn’t a trained nurse at all? She says she is something special, but I know better. She hasn’t even a uniform. At least she says she left them all packed up at home, but I’m inclined to think she never had any. She hasn’t the least sign of real training, and I told you I wouldn’t have any other.”
“I know, Elaine,” said Lexie wearily, “but there really wasn’t anybody else to be had.”
“Fiddlesticks! I’ll wager I can find somebody when I get well enough to take over the matter. However, she brought me a very creditable supper when you consider what she had to make it with. But Lexie, did you know she was the old woman who used to live down the lane behind the mulberry bushes? She says her name is Lucinda, and I began to remember about her. I should have thought you would have known she never would do. She was half-crazy or something, wasn’t she?”
“No, she wasn’t crazy. She’s a very wise old woman, and very kindly if you don’t antagonize her. But Elaine, she was the only one I knew to go after. You know I’ve been away from this region for almost four years, and it isn’t easy now to pick up anybody to do anything. Besides, she was just about moving, and it meant something to her to have a room at once; that was the only reason she was willing to come. That and because she knew us. And besides, I had to tell her we hadn’t anything to pay her with at present, and most people wouldn’t come to a place like that anyway. And by the way, Elaine, we’ve simply got to talk about money. Have you enough to pay the grocery bill while I’m gone away to see how I can get my affairs straightened out? Because I have hardly anything left, and I’m not sure there is enough food in the house to last more than a couple of days. But if you say your ration books are in your trunk, why, we ought to be able to get things as soon as they come, but they will have to be paid for at once. They have no charge accounts at any of our stores out here anymore, and even the larger stores in the city insist on having charge accounts paid up every month or you have to give up the account.”
“How perfectly horrid!” said Elaine. “I’ll speak to my lawyer and see what can be done about that. I simply won’t buy where I can’t have things charged.”
“But you don’t understand. All the stores are that way now. Everybody is obliged to pay, no matter how wealthy they are.”
“Well, we’ll see. Bettinger will be out in the morning. He telegraphed a little while ago and said he would, and if he can’t make some arrangement with a store near here, I’ll just borrow some money from him, that’s all.”
“Borrow of him! Oh Elaine!” cried Lexie in despair. Please, please, don’t do that! You just don’t understand. It is all wrong.”
“Nonsense! It’s you that does not understand, my prissy little sister. I’ve always known how to get what I wanted from any man, and I shall get it this time, too! I’d thank you not to say any more such things about my lawyer, and not to poison the minds of my innocent little children about him either. I mean that! And what’s more, if you don’t stop this nonsense, I’ll tell him what you are saying about him, and I’ll tell him right before you, too! It’s time you stopped passing on such slanderous gossip. Do you understand?”
Lexie caught her breath and closed her eyes for an instant.
“I understand that I’m very tired, and I’ve simply got to go to bed or I won’t be fit to get up in the morning,” she answered desperately. “Can I help you any before I go, Elaine, or can you manage alone?”
“No, you needn’t help me. I don’t care for such unwilling assistance as I get from you anyway. You can send that so-called nurse in to help me to bed. If she’s a nurse she ought to be able to do that at least.”
Lexie looked at her sister aghast for a minute. Would Cinda be willing to perform menial services for Elaine, or not? Then she turned and went softly out to consult with Lucinda.
But before she could say anything to Lucinda, that dignitary spoke first in an indignant whisper: “Sure I’ll do it. This once, anyhow. Yes, I heard every blessed word she said, and it’s no more’n I expected. If I was you I’d go your journey the first thing in the morning and not let her know you’re going till you’re gone. That way you’ll be out of the house when that dratted lawyer comes, and you won’t have to bother with him. And you leave the rest to me. Them childer’ll be all right. I can get on with ’em, an’ ef I can’t I know how to spank good and proper, and keep their mammy from finding out about it, too. So you don’t need to fret. I’ll carry on till you come back, anyway, and if it gets so bad I have to quit after that, why I’ll just quit. That is, if you say so. You’re my real boss, you know. Not her.”
Lexie smiled a tired little smile.
“All right! Thank you, Cinda. I’ll go as you suggest. Early. You’ll know how to order and save points, won’t you? And if I find I can’t return at once, at least I can send you a check for five dollars right away when I get my checkbook, and perhaps that’ll go till I can send you more. Though perhaps my sister will have some money to pay for things. I don’t know. You might ask her, if you need anything very badly. I do hope she won’t borrow of that terrible man, but I’m afraid I can’t do anything about it, not till I can get some money that some people owe me, anyway.”
“Now, Miss Lexie, you go right along, and I’ll manage somehow. There’s canned goods in this house enough to keep from starving for a long time, and if your sister wants something better, let her get it! Doesn’t she get something off the government of her husband being in the army? Or doesn’t she? She oughtta, I should think.”
“I don’t know, Cinda. She doesn’t tell me things like that. Even if I ask her she doesn’t tell me. She’s got an idea in her head that our father left some money for her and that my mother and I used it up, and she’s trying to get it out of me somehow. I don’t know how she ever got that notion. But she has it, and unless she can find out the truth about it and know there never was any, I’m sure I don’t see how I’m ever going to get along with her.”
“Well, Miss Lexie, you just run along to your college and get your matters straightened out, and then if you want you can telegraph me what you want I should do, and I’ll do it. You trust me. I can hannell things all right. Now go right to bed, an’ I’ll wake you up in plenty o’ time in the mornin’.”
So Lexie finally went to bed, creeping in softly beside the sleeping Bluebell and praying that God would somehow bring her affairs out right, thinking with great gratitude of Judge Foster as she fell asleep.
But Judge Foster was lying at that very moment in a hospital bed, unconscious, as a result of an automobile accident.
Lexie, happily ignorant of this, went on her cautious way the next morning, rejoicing that she had so strong and wise a friend as Judge Foster, who had made her see so plainly that she need not be frightened but might go safely on in the right way.
Chapter 10
Later in the day, after Lexie had had a long talk with the dean of her college, and he had given her two propositions to choose from, she went to her old room and sat down in perplexity. Should she try to stay here in college now for three months more, and get through with her examinations before she went home, trusting that she could get another job at home afterward? Or should she accept the dean’s offer to make arrangements with the university in the city near home to let her finish her course and take examinations with them? Or what would be best? At last she went to the telephone and called up Judge Foster’s office to ask his advice. He had told her to do so if she felt at all worried about anything. But when she finally succeeded in getting the judge’s office, what was her dismay to be told by that cold-voiced secretary of his that Judge Foster was unable to talk with her as he was lying unconscious in the hospital and they were not even sure he would recover.
She hung up the receiver and sat limply down in a chair in the quiet office room where she was phoning. No
t only was she filled with sorrow because this dear old friend of the years was in danger of his life, but she was also overcome with a great dismay. This newly found old friend was gone again, taken away from her need, and she had to go on without his help, at least until he got well. Perhaps he might never get well and she would have to go on through her sea of perplexities alone! Suddenly Lexie put her head down on her folded arms on the desk and wept.
“Oh God! You’ll have to take over for me! I haven’t any other friend to guide me, and I don’t know what to do. Should I stay here and finish and let Elaine see what a mess she’s made of things, or should I go home and try to help and see this thing through? Is this something You are expecting—wanting me to do for You? For righteousness? Won’t You please show me right away?”
It was just then that the telephone girl from the dean’s office opened the door and said: “Oh, you’re still here, aren’t you, Miss Kendall? I was afraid you had gone. There is someone calling you from your hometown. They want to speak with you right away. They say it’s very important. Will you take it on this phone?”
Lexie sat up and looked at the girl in amazement. It seemed so much like an answer to her prayer, that call from home. For of course no one would have called her unless something had happened. Or would they? She tried to summon up reasons, but her tired brain could think of nothing but that this message would decide one way or the other what she must do.
Yes, it was Lucinda’s unmistakable voice.
“Miss Lexie, that you? Now ain’t that somethin’, to think I could get you right away! Miss Lexie, I’m that sorry, but things has been happenin’ thick an’ fast ever since you left this mornin’, an’ I’m sorry, but I guess you gotta come back right away. First, Elaine she took on somethin’ terrible when she found you’d left without tellin’ her, an’ she cried herself sick. An’ then her lawyer, he sent a message he couldn’t come out today, ‘count of a court case he hadta try, an’ that angered her. An’ then Miss Angelica had a fistfight with that boy that’s visitin’ acrost the road, an’ got herself a black eye, an’ Miss Elaine went out an’ give that boy a regular jawin’ an’ finally hit him with a broom when he was sassy. Then his aunt come out an’ give back words an’ threatened to send fer the p’loice. An’ then while that was goin’ on, Gerry, he went out an’ monkeyed with the neighbor’s lawn mower an’ cut his foot bad, an’ I hadta send for the doctor. An’ whiles he was comin’, Bluebell, she went out, an’ got stung by a big bumblebee in the clover, an’ she was crying fit ta raise the dead, an’ her mamma all in hystericks when the doctor come. An’ meself that near crazy I wasn’t knowin’ which ta do first. An’ then ta crown all, that Elaine went up ta the attic and pulled out every blessed thing from the boxes an’ trunks and bureaus an’ left ’em all strewed around the floor. She told me she was looking among your mother’s things for some very important papers she needed for evidence, an’ she claimed to have found what she wanted in your mother’s diary book. So I guess you better come back an’ set things goin’ straight. I’m awful sorry ta havta call you, but it’s me that don’t know what to do first.”
So! Her orders had come. This was her duty, obviously, to go back home and take over. One couldn’t expect Cinda to do everything. She must go at once.
So, God had undertaken, and this was His order! But He would go with her! He would be there to show her step by step what to do. Was that it?
She closed her eyes for one breath of a second, and then drawing a deep breath and glancing up at the clock, she said: “All right, Cinda! I’m taking the first train in the morning. I’ll be there a little after two o’clock. You carry on till I get there, please, Cinda.”
“I sure will, Miss Lexie. An’ don’t you worry none. I’ll do just as I would be, an’ no mistake. Me heart is all right, even if me brain don’t always work the way Miss Elaine thinks it should. Goo’-bye. I’ll look out for everything.” And she hung up.
Lexie turned from the telephone and went swiftly back to the dean’s office.
“I’ve got to go back,” she said breathlessly. I’ve just had a phone call. I must leave on the morning train. Will I have to come back here again to get my credentials for that examination, in case I find opportunity to take the examinations in my own city?”
The dean shook his head and smiled with his characteristic kindness.
“No,” he said kindly, “I’ll fill out the paper for you right away, and I’ll write my friend in the university in your city tonight. I’m sure it can be arranged. I’m sorry you can’t finish with us, however, for I had counted on using you later in our college. I felt you would fit right in here. Nevertheless, if the way opens later for that, you will let us know, please.”
Much relieved, Lexie came away with her papers, and hurried to her room to pack, trying not to think about what she might be returning to, doing her best to keep her anger from rising when she thought of Elaine mauling over her mother’s precious papers, and reading her own intimate words not written for others’ eyes.
It was a sad, confused time, hustling the simple belongings into her trunk, stopping to say good-bye to the friends she had made in the college, trying to explain breathlessly about a sick sister with her children. And then behind it all, in her heart there was an ache of worry about the kind old friend of her father’s who was lying unconscious and in danger in a hospital. Oh, if she could only ask his advice about this. But that was out—nobody to go to now but God. Would God care, and go with her and guide her? she wondered fearsomely. She hurried with her packing, praying that all would be well. This was something she had to go through. It was going to be hard, and maybe long and disappointing, but it was right she should do it, and she must do it even if everything else she had wanted had to be given up. It was sort of like the boys who went to war. They had to go, even though it wasn’t a pleasant prospect. They had to stay and fight it out, even though it might end in death for themselves. And in a way, this was like that. This was death to herself, of her own life and plans. Giving up for righteousness’ sake. She must go, but perhaps God would go with her. Surely it was He who had answered her prayer by letting her know that she was needed at home at once. Only, what was she going to be able to do when she got there? Oh, if Judge Foster would only get well so she could talk to him for a little while. But perhaps if she talked to God in the same way she would have talked to Judge Foster, He would somehow make her know what she ought to do.
So all the way of the journey she sat with closed eyes, her head back on the seat, trying to talk the situation over with God, and to realize that His Presence must be there with her, ready to help, if she would only put herself into His hands and be willing to hand over her own wishes.
When Lexie reached the street in which the little white house was located, she sighted the shining limousine again parked before the white gate, pompous, liveried chauffeur and all, and with quick resolve she turned and skirted that end of the street and slipped into the field behind the house. She did not intend to encounter that lawyer again, not if she could help herself.
But now she had the advantage of coming in quietly by the back door when they thought she was far away and had no idea she was returning. Yet she wished she knew what was going on, and just what line Elaine was taking. There was no telling how she might have twisted words of her mother’s diary to serve her own purposes.
Very quietly she entered the kitchen and put her suitcase down in the laundry entirely out of sight from even a casual observer passing through either the dining room or kitchen. Then cautiously she went over to the side wall close to the dining room door.
The door into the living room was wide open. She could even see the large flat foot of the lawyer as he lounged in the big chair by the table, but she kept well back so she could not be seen herself. It was obvious that she could not go upstairs without being seen by him. She would have to stay here until he was gone. Softly she swayed back again, entirely out of sight, and suddenly she became aware of an
other figure across in the dining room, unobtrusively planted just inside the partly open china closet door. This china closet was next to the living room door, but its doorway opened in such a way that one could stand inside and reach dishes without being seen from the living room. And that was where Cinda was standing. She was absolutely motionless, and in such an attitude that upon the appearance of anyone from the living room she could in an instant appear to be exceedingly busy picking out the right dishes and selecting the linen from the linen drawer for the meal she was preparing. But in the meantime, she was motionless, listening with all her might! It was all too apparent that Cinda had no scruples against listening in on any conversation that went on in that household, of which she was for the time the custodian.
And while Lexie would not have justified a listener under ordinary circumstances, nor have felt justified in arranging to listen herself, somehow she couldn’t help being glad that Cinda was there, ready to be a witness, should there be need of a witness to anything that went on. Anyhow, there was nothing she could do about it, unless she should walk right in and reveal to her sister and Mr. Thomas that she had arrived home and was in a position to hear what they were saying. And after all, hadn’t she a right to hear if there was a conspiracy going on against her, and that involved using evidence Elaine imagined she had found among her mother’s papers? Certainly she must understand this thing fully.
So Lexie kept very still and listened through the long silences while papers rattled and the lawyer cleared his throat and coughed a little now and then. At last she heard a final page turned in whatever papers he was reading, and the whole bunch was laid down on the table. Lexie wished she dared step over nearer the door to see if that was really her mother’s diary he had been perusing, but she knew if she should be discovered now it would only precipitate trouble, so she remained as still as stone and listened.