When the half hour was over, the policemen escorted the three crestfallen women out of the house, with orders to see each to her own place wherever that was, in the taxi that had been ordered, and they departed bag and baggage.
Then the three Kershaws stood in the front hall of their deserted home and looked at each other. They felt closer to each other than they had for the past ten years.
Chapter 4
It was the father who first recovered his equilibrium.
“There remains the butler!” he said with a sad smile, the first breaking of a gloom that had been on his face since his children had come back from school. “We might as well make a clean sweep of it and get rid of him, too, though I’m sure I don’t know what good it will do. Their successors will probably be just as bad, if not worse. I suppose I ought to have had them all arrested.”
“D’ya think Hawkins was mixed up in this mess?” asked Randall, keen for another sensation.
“Perhaps not,” said the father, passing his hand wearily over his eyes. “He wouldn’t likely have cared for fur coats and velvet gowns except as merchandise with a possible profit, but no doubt he has helped himself to some of the stores in the cellar. I guess there was plenty!” He sighed heavily.
“Should I go and put out those lights?” asked Christobel practically, hoping to turn her father’s attention and wishing she knew how to lift some of the burden from his shoulders.
“Oh, I’ll do that,” he said. “I had forgotten.”
“We’ll all go,” said Randall. “Better give a once-over to the rooms again. There might be something hidden away they’ve forgotten.”
So the young people followed their father up the stairs and back to the servants’ rooms.
It was after they had been carefully over the closets and bureau drawers again and had put out the light behind them, that Kershaw paused in a new kind of dismay before the heap of his dead wife’s clothes lying in a quivering mass of velvets and chiffons and fur.
“We oughtn’t to leave these things here I suppose,” he said, looking at them helplessly, with sad distaste. “I don’t know why I made such a fuss about it, after all. I suppose I might as well have let the poor things take them. Nobody would have cared. If it hadn’t been for the principle of the thing. I can’t bear to be robbed, even of something that is of no further use to me!”
“Let’s put them back!” said Randall energetically, stooping over the heap with a wide basketball reach and scooping up a great armful. “You get the rest, Chris, an’ we’ll stow ’em away.”
The father gathered up the little white ermine coat that Clara, the parlormaid, had shed, and touched its whiteness pitifully.
“Wait, Rand,” cried his sister, “you’re dragging that sable coat, and it’s got to go back, hasn’t it, Father?” She looked, half frightened toward her father, wondering if he would consider her words presumptuous.
“Why, yes,” he said, brightening. “I suppose that will be possible, if it is a recent purchase. Both of those furs can be returned. That ought to be looked after tomorrow morning. Could you call them up, Chrissie, and ask them about it? Here. Here’s the sales slip. But—oh, I forgot! Perhaps you ought to be going back to school in the morning,” he said with another of those deep sighs. “I haven’t had time to think about anything yet.” And again that look of depression came over his face and made it look almost ashen.
“No, not tomorrow,” said Christobel, “of course not. Tomorrow is Saturday, anyhow. Come, let’s get these things put away. What are you going to do with them, Father? Pack them away somewhere, or give them to somebody, or sell them? If you’d like me to I’ll attend to that for you, and you needn’t bother any more about it.”
They had reached the door of Charmian’s rooms now, and Randall had flung it wide and dumped his armful down on a chaise longue. His eager, breezy youth seemed somewhat to dispel the gloom from this room where one couldn’t help but be conscious that the inhabitant had gone out, never to return. Randall had little reverence for anything. He dashed in where any angel would have feared to tread, but on this occasion it was a relief to them all.
“Now, where d’ya want this junk put? Gimme the hangers, Chris, an’ I’ll stick ’em in.” Christobel handed him a bunch of hangers from the rod in the wardrobe, and he proved himself not so awkward in putting them into the dresses.
“You musn’t be so rough with those delicate laces and chiffons, Rand,” warned his sister, coming to the rescue.
Mr. Kershaw was forcing himself to go about the room.
“I don’t think you ought to be doing all this, Chrissie, little girl,” he said suddenly with a new tenderness that made the girl’s heart leap. “There are some friends I suppose who would look after it for us, though I’m not sure whom I would want here. I didn’t care much for some of the people who have been coming to this house. There would be Mrs. Romayne. I suppose she would come in, but your stepmother never liked her. It seems rather crude.”
“No, Father, don’t get anybody. This should be my work,” said Christobel, suddenly filled with longing to get all such matters out of the way before that perfumed woman of many words should come around. “I’ll not mind doing it at all. But—don’t you know what you want to do with them? Of course, those coats. Here, I’ll fold them in their boxes and they’ll be ready to go back. But the rest. There are some lovely things here, Father. And they ought to go to someone. Aren’t there people who would like them?”
“Yes, plenty!” said her father sternly. “But they are not the sort of people I care to please. I would rather burn them all. Those people are of another world. A wild sort. No, I don’t know anybody I would want to have them. You couldn’t use any of them yourself, I suppose? No. I wouldn’t want you to. They are not your type of things. I would rather you had things of your own that fitted your character.”
Christobel was silent a moment, thinking this over.
“No, I would rather not have them!” she said gravely, trying to keep her utter distaste for them out of her voice. “Why don’t you send them—or some of them at least—to her mother? Wouldn’t she like to have them?”
The father looked at her thoughtfully.
“I hadn’t thought of her. What could she do with them? Take that for instance.” He touched with his toe the lovely red velvet that poured itself in a brilliant pool on the floor. “How would Mrs. Harrower look in that?”
Christobel’s lips almost quivered into a smile to think of the meek, petted little old woman, with her faded eyes and hair and her indifference to the world in general, arrayed in that sophisticated frock.
“She could sell it,” said Christobel practically. “It is a lovely frock and imported, I guess. There are places where they pay good prices for such things. I know, because the girls at school get most of their evening dresses at such places. They’ll get a dress that originally sold for a hundred or two hundred sometimes for forty or fifty dollars.”
“Well, Mrs. Harrower wouldn’t know how to make any such deal, and I’m not sure under the circumstances that I care to assist her financially any more than I have been compelled to already. If you can discover anybody who will buy any of these things, you have my permission to sell them. Just pick out a few plain things that the old lady might like and put them in a box, and we’ll ship it to her. For the rest, I don’t care what you do with it. Come. Let’s get out of here. Suppose we go over to my room and talk things over.”
Mr. Kershaw snapped out the lights and locked the door, and they went into his big room.
The children stood, almost embarrassed for a moment. They felt so little acquainted with this new father who was so much more friendly than he had ever been before. Then, as he turned on a low reading lamp that made a pleasant dimness in the room, he came toward them and flung an arm about each of them and drew them toward the wide leather couch.
“Come, let’s sit down and get acquainted,” he said with sudden effort, as if he were longing to get someh
ow nearer to them.
Christobel nestled down with her head on her father’s shoulder, and even Randall seemed not averse to being drawn close also. They sat there in utter silence for a few minutes, a kind of peace coming over them after the troubles of the day. Then the father spoke.
“I hate to have you go back,” he said. “We ought to stay nearer together, see more of each other.” His tone was almost shy.
After a minute, Christobel spoke.
“Father, why do I have to go back? Why can’t I stay here with you? This is my last year. The rest of the semester isn’t going to be much but getting ready for commencement, rehearsing plays, and writing essays and all that. What good is it, anyway?”
“Oh, but—” objected the father, “why, of course you need to graduate. It’s the thing to do.”
“But why, Father dear?” she urged.
“Well,” said the father, trying to think of some suitable reason, “everybody has to graduate. They graduate and then they come out. One of your stepmother’s reasons for buying this great house was that it was almost time for you to come out, and we would need a place like this to do it properly. And of course, it might look rather strange to come out without first graduating. People might think you couldn’t pass your examinations or something.”
“What people? Why do we care what people think? I have passed my examinations. I got good marks, too. Why should I have to go through all the rest? I’d much, much rather stay with you.” She snuggled down closer and nestled her hand in his.
He gave her hand a warm pressure and felt a strange sweetness to have her so close after all these years of estrangement. It almost unnerved him to think she cared to be with him. He had thought of her as having grown away from him.
“And, Daddy,” she went on earnestly, “why do I have to come out? I’d much rather stay in. What do people come out for?”
“Well,” began the father, “the world seems to think it is a necessary act.”
“Did my mother come out?” she asked suddenly, with a sweet shyness in her voice.
The father was still a long time, and then he answered in a moved voice, “No.”
“I’d like to be like her, Father, if you don’t mind,” she said in a low voice.
He drew her closer and said with a fervent gentleness, “There’s nothing in the world greater that I could desire for you, Chrissie dear.”
“Then may I?” she asked eagerly.
“May you what?” said the startled father.
“May I stay at home with you, and not go back to this last semester of school, and not do any coming out ever at all?”
He was still a long time, and then he said, “Well, daughter, this is a new thought to me. I’ll have to think it over.”
“I’m sure my mother would want me to stay here with you,” she breathed earnestly.
He turned his lips to her and kissed her forehead very gently.
“I’ll think about it, little girl.”
“I wouldn’t mind staying, too,” said Randall gallantly, “only I guess I’d havta go back fer the rest of the term. I’m cheerleader, ya know, and it’s rather late ta get a new one. We’ve been practicing a lot fer the spring games.”
“Well, yes, Son, it wouldn’t be quite right to desert them just now, would it? And anyhow, you have those examinations to take over again, that we were talking about tonight.
“It wouldn’t do to leave school with a blot on your scholarship. We’ll ship you back sometime tomorrow, I guess, but we’ll try to make some plans to be nearer each other after this term is over. I’ve been thinking a lot about it. We’ll see when we get things here straightened out.”
“Father,” said Christobel after a moment of silence, “do you think a lot of this house? Did you buy it to stay in always, like a sort of ancestral home?”
“I did not,” said her father decidedly, and a smile melted over his tired face. “Why, little girl, don’t you like it?”
“Well,” said Christobel slowly, “I suppose it’s all right, only somehow it’s so big and strange. I don’t know whether I could ever get used to it. There doesn’t seem to be any really useful homey rooms in it. Maybe that’s only because I’m not used to it. But it doesn’t seem like the home we used to have when I was a little girl before we went to school.”
“Gee! Where’d we live then?” asked Randall, suddenly raising his head from the soft cushion and entering the conversation. “I just don’t remember that time. Wasn’t there a big tree and a swing in the yard?”
“Yes,” said Christobel eagerly, “and a flower garden. I had a garden and you had a garden, and you used to pull the plants up every day to see if the roots were growing any more.”
“Gee! I remember! And I useta skin the cat on the top of the swing. Where was that, Dad? Somewhere in the city, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. It was over on the other side of the city, quite a long distance from here. It used to be a suburb then, but it is within the city limits now.”
“Is the house still there or has it been torn down?” the boy asked.
“Oh, it’s still there. I still own it,” answered the father sadly.
“Is it rented?” asked Christobel.
“No, it’s never been rented. Somehow I never quite wanted to rent it. I always thought perhaps I’d go back there someday. But of course I don’t suppose I ever will,” he ended with a sigh.
“I wish we could,” said Christobel.
“Say! Gee! So do I!” said Randall, rumpling his father’s hair that was beginning to show threads of silver in its blackness.
“You do?” said the father, a pleased surprise in his voice, and then more quietly, “Oh, but you wouldn’t if you saw it. It’s built up all around. There are a lot of plain little houses in rows down in the next block where there used to be a meadow and a sunset.” His eyes took on a retrospective look, as if he were again watching one of those sunsets.
“Oh, I remember,” said Christobel. “Mother and you and I used to go down in the meadow and watch the sun go down, and once, I remember you wheeling Rannie in his baby carriage.”
“Aw, get out,” said Randall, half pleased. “You remember a lot! You’re not so much older than I. Only a little over two years. I guess I remember that, too. I remember throwing sticks down in a little creek that went through the lower part of the meadow, and there was an old cow, and a dog that came to drive her home.”
“Yes, and you were afraid of the cow,” laughed Christobel. “And Mother called you a little soldier!”
“Say! Weren’t you afraid of cows?”
“Yes, she was afraid of cows, too, when she was a tiny girl,” said the father with a look of reminiscence in his eyes. “There was a day when the cow stood in front of Christobel and mooed at her, and she puckered up her face and roared so loud she frightened the cow. Your sister turned and tried to run but stubbed her toe on a stone and was so scared she held her breath for fear the cow would walk over her. Mother had to pick her up and hold her close and kiss her a long time before she would stop sobbing.”
“Why, I remember that,” said Christobel softly, nestling close to her father’s shoulder and speaking with a deep joy in her voice. “I remember the feel of her arms around me!” There was such a yearning in her voice that her father was greatly stirred.
He laid his hand tenderly on the soft hair beside her face.
“Poor little girl!” he said gently. “Without a mother all these years!” And then he gave another of those deep, dreadful sighs that hurt Christobel to hear.
“Never mind, Daddy,” she said and put her small hand up and stroked his face softly. “We’ve got you now.”
Then there came back to her memory those terrible words of the cook about that awful Mrs. Romayne, and she put her hand down quickly in her lap and wondered if they really did have him permanently, or was Mrs. Romayne going to get him away from them?
And then the phone rang sharply, like an intruder into their intimate talk
.
Mr. Kershaw gathered himself reluctantly from the couch and answered it. A woman’s high-pitched voice and sweetly modulated tone responded.
“Yes? Hello? Oh, Mrs. Romayne? Yes. It was very kind of you to call. I am sure my daughter appreciated it. Yes, she said you had been here.”
He drew his brows in an effort to remember what Christobel had said about the visit, and the sweet full tones flowed on.
“Oh…. Why, no,” he responded. “Why, I’m not sure…. She probably did mention it, but I’ve had a number of things to attend to. We have only just begun to talk…. I have been otherwise occupied all the evening…. Dinner tomorrow did you say? Well, I would hardly be able to come myself…. It’s most kind of you…. But perhaps Christobel—you see, Mrs. Romayne, I have some things to look after for my son before his return to school…. What? … Oh, you said dinner Sunday—” He frowned. “Well, Christobel might. It’s most thoughtful of you—yes, I suppose you’re right. It is a little dismal for a young person, of course. Just a moment, Mrs. Romayne, I’ll speak to my daughter.”
The father looked up to see a look of dismay on his daughter’s face.
“Oh, no, no, Daddy, please,” she said in a low tone. “I’d rather be with you alone, you and Rannie.”