Chapter XIX The Confession
Jo was not one to take any step hurriedly. Though her heart broke, she was cautious. Upon entering her quiet house she found a note from Alton. It merely said that Donelle would explain. Going to the room above, Jo saw that a hurried but orderly departure had evidently been made.
“He hasn’t messed much,” she muttered vaguely, while a great fear rose in her heart, she knew not why.
“Well, there’s nothing to do but wait for Donelle,” she concluded, and began the waiting.
She went to the stable and sheds. The animals had evidently been fed the night before, so Jo milked the cow, did the chores, and whistled aimlessly for Nick. She was comforted by his absence, he was with Donelle. But where was Donelle? The sun was setting, what should be done?
Jo decided to wait until the sun had gone wholly down before she took any steps. She was not one to set tongues wagging.
It was nearing sundown when Marcel Longville, standing by her kitchen window, saw Donelle coming toward the house. The Captain was at Dan’s Place. Donelle walked slowly, and when she saw Marcel, smiled wanly and opened the door.
“Marcel,” she began, and her voice was tired and thin, “I want you to do something for me. I want you to—to tell a lie for me.”
“Why, child, what’s the matter?”
“Marcel, Mamsey thought I was here last night. Will you please tell her I was?”
Marcel’s hands were in biscuit dough; she leaned forward heavily, and the soft, light mass rose half-way up her arms.
“Lord! child, where were you last night? I thought you were keeping my boarder as well as your own. Mam’selle just stopped here; she looked queer enough when she found you were not here. There’s no use of the lie, child. She knows.”
For a moment Donelle looked as though nothing mattered, as if the earth had slipped from beneath her feet.
From Gavot’s window she had seen the River Queen depart with its two passengers from Point of Pines. Tom had not been visible since daybreak, the world had drifted away. Alone, in space, Donelle waited, looking dumbly at Marcel.
“Where were you, child?”
“I was at Tom’s cabin. I’m married to him. Father Mantelle married us.”
Marcel raised herself, the dough clinging to her hands. She shook it off, tore it off, went to a bucket of water and soaked it off, then sank into a chair.
“I’m fainting,” she announced in a businesslike tone, and seemed, for an instant, to have lost consciousness.
This brought Donelle to her senses, she sprang to Marcel and put her arm around the limp form.
“It’s quite true,” she faltered, “but of course you could not know. All my life has happened to me since yesterday morning. I’ve got used to it, but I forgot you did not know. Nothing is any use now, nothing need be hidden. I am going back to Mamsey and tell her everything—everything.”
Marcel was reviving. She still lay on the young, protecting arm, her eyes fastened on the white, sad face above her.
“You better go slow, Donelle, when you tell Mam’selle. You don’t want to stop her heart,” she cautioned.
“No, I do not want to stop her heart. But I’m going to tell her everything, beginning from the time I came back from the Walled House, after Pierre Gavot told me—who I was! I can tell her now because it does not matter; nothing matters since I’m married to Tom Gavot.”
“It will kill her, Donelle! Mam’selle brought you from the place where she hid you. She’s had high hopes for you. It will kill her to know you’re married to Tom. Whatever made this happen?”
“Why, whatever makes such things happen to any one?” Donelle sighed. Then: “If you are better, I’m going now to Mamsey.”
“And I’m going with you!”
Marcel sprang to her feet.
“Come, I’m ready,” she said, wrapping her rough shawl about her head and shoulders.
And together they went to Jo, followed by poor Nick.
They found Jo sitting in the living room, knitting, knitting. Every nerve was strained, but outwardly she was calm as ever.
“Well, child,” she said as they entered, “you look worn to the death. You need not talk now unless you want to.” She rose and went to Donelle.
“I want to, Mamsey. I want to.”
“And you want Marcel to stay?” Jo spoke only to the girl. No one entered the sacred precincts of her deepest love when Donelle needed her.
“Yes, I want her, too, Mamsey, because she is your friend and mine.”
Marcel blinked her tears back and sat down. Jo went back to her chair and Donelle dropped beside her and quietly told her pitiful story; both women sat like dead figures while they listened.
“You see, Mamsey, there was no other way, I had to do something quick. But,” and here she smiled dimly, “there must have been some reason for what happened. Maybe the love was so big it caught him and would not let him go. I do not know, but just as you have kept still about my father after he left you, so I am going to keep still about my man. Tom knows, you, and now Marcel Longville, know. No one else matters, shall ever matter!”
But Jo was rousing herself. Her deep eyes flamed, she forgot Marcel, she leaned over the girl at her feet.
“How did you know your father left me?” she whispered.
“Pierre Gavot told me!”
“When?”
Donelle described the scene on the road by the Walled House, but she withheld the ugly word.
“And you came back because of that? You believed I was——”
“I knew you were my mother, and I could not hurt you as my father had. You had never hurt him. I had to do his part. But now, Mamsey, I am glad, oh! so glad, for now I understand everything that life meant for me. I’m safe here with you and Tom and I mean to—pay—pay. You know I always said I would pay, if I were part of life, and I will!”
Jo got up unsteadily. She seemed tall and menacing, her breath came hard and quick.
“Whose step is that outside?” she asked suddenly. The two had not noticed, but to Jo’s “Come” Father Mantelle entered. He meant to make sure that all was well; he had seen Mam’selle return and had come as soon as he could.
“Father,” Jo said solemnly, “take a seat. I am going to confess! Once you would not give me an opportunity, now I am going to take it.”
Her trembling hand lay upon Donelle’s head. The girl did not move.
“This child is not mine. I swear it before my God. Her father left me for another woman. Marcel can testify to that. My heart broke within me, and later, when my poor sister died, I went away. I went to—to Langley’s cabin in the woods. I fought out my trouble there, and then came back to my years of labour, that you all know of. I never knew, until long after, the black thoughts that were held against me. I lived alone—alone.” Here Jo rose majestically, threw back her head, and let her flaming eyes rest upon the two petrified listeners. Her hand was still touching with a marvellously gentle touch the bent head of Donelle, who was crouched on the floor at her feet, and was listening, listening, her breath coming in quick, soft little gasps.
“And then,” the stern voice went on, “Pierre Gavot did me the most hideous wrong a man can do a woman, Gavot, Pierre Gavot, a man unworthy of looking at an honest woman, offered to—to marry me, for my money! He sought to get control of the only thing that I had won from life for my own protection. But out of his foul lips something was sent to guide me. He somehow made me see that I might yet have what my soul had hungered and almost died for—a child! I went to St. Michael’s. I meant to take what some other woman had disinherited. I meant to take a man-child, because I felt I could not see another woman endure what I had endured! But God worked a miracle. He drove me aside, He sent”—and here Jo’s eyes fell upon Donelle with a glance of supreme pity and of worship—“He sent this girl to me, I found her in the woods. During the weeks of her sickness, which followed her coming to my house, she revealed—her identity. It was marvellous. I was frightened, but in my soul I knew God was having His way with me. He had sent me the child of the man I had loved, of the woman who had betrayed me!
“I went, when I could, to St. Michael’s and got the Sisters’ story, and I found——” Jo paused. Even now she hesitated before delivering her best beloved to the danger she long had feared. Then she remembered Tom Gavot and lifted her eyes.
“This girl’s father had been accused of taking the life of his wife. He was bringing his child to me because he knew I would understand. He died before he could reach me. But a man, who, before God, I believe was the guilty one, was after the girl, wanted to get possession of her. For what reason, who can tell? The Sisters saved her. When I took her, I tried to save her by giving her my name. I felt that I was less harmful to her than—than the things the world might say. But I see,” poor Jo’s voice quivered, almost broke, “I see I was wrong. How could I prove my belief in the innocence of Henry Langley, though I could stake my soul’s salvation on my belief that he did not kill his wife?”
Donelle was slowly rising to her feet. A dazed but brilliant light flooded her eyes, she reached out to Jo as she used to do in those first nights of delirium and fever.
“Mamsey, Mamsey, he did not! It was this way. My father came into the cabin, he had been hunting. My mother was there. I was there, and—and the man! I cannot, oh! Mamsey, I cannot remember his name, but I hated him. I was afraid. He used to say he would carry me off if—if I told! When my father came into the cabin—I cannot remember it all, for I ran and hid behind a door. But yes, I can remember this: the man said I was—his! Then my father ran toward him and he screamed something, and my mother,” Donelle was crouching, looking beyond Mantelle and Marcel, at what no eyes but hers could see, “and my mother cried out that what the man said was a lie! And then my father and the man struggled. They fought and the gun went off—and—and—my mother fell!
“Mamsey, I—I cannot remember the rest. I was always tired, always going somewhere, but my father did not do that awful thing!”
A sudden stillness filled the dim room, a silence that hurt. Then Jo’s tones rang out like a clanging bell:
“Father, this girl is Tom Gavot’s wife?”
“She is.” The priest was as white as death. Marcel was silent.
“Then no harm can reach her from that man, wherever, whoever, he is?”
“None.”
“And that boy took my girl believing what the world thinks is the worst?” Jo’s voice suddenly softened, her eyes dimmed. There was no reply to this. Marcel was crying softly, persistently, her face covered by her poor, wrinkled hands. The priest’s white face shone in the shadowy room.
Then Jo laughed and lifted Donelle up.
“Child, you have seen the worst and the best in man. We still have Tom Gavot and he will keep all harm from you.” Then she turned to Marcel. “Margot would have been proud of Tom, could she have known,” she said. Marcel groped her way across the room. Her eyes were hidden, her sobs choked her.
“Mam’selle,” she faltered, “Mam’selle Jo!”
Then the two women clung together. Father Mantelle watched them. What he thought no one could know, but a radiance overspread his face.
“Mam’selle Morey,” he said quietly at last, “you have opened my eyes. God’s peace be with you.”
Then, as if leaving a sacred place, he turned and went out into the early evening.
Marcel soon followed, but she was not crying when she went. Donelle had kissed her, Jo had held her hands and smiled into her eyes. Marcel had received her blessing from them.
Then, when they were alone, Jo lighted the lamp and piled wood in the stove.
“And now we will eat, child,” she said. Donelle was still dazed, trembling.
“I remember!” was what she kept repeating. “How strange, Mamsey, but I see it clear and true after all these years.”
“And now, forget it, Donelle. The vision was given to you from God. It has done its work. We must forget the past.” And for years it was never talked of between them.
“But, Mamsey——”
“Not another word, Donelle. We must eat and then talk of Tom.”
It was after eight when, the work indoors and out finished, Jo and Donelle talked of Tom Gavot. By that time Donelle was quiet and strangely at peace.
“All night, Mamsey, while Nick and I were in his cabin,” she said, “he was out in the rain! I crept to the window many times and always he was there walking about or sitting by a little fire that he made in a dry spot to warm his poor, wet body. Mamsey, he told me to put the bar across the door, and I wanted to, but I did not.” Donelle’s eyes shone. “Somehow I felt safer with the bar off. And then, when it was morning, Tom was gone.”
“He will come again!” breathed Jo, her breast heaving. “And what then will you do with him, child?”
“I do not know, Mamsey.”
“He has done the greatest thing for you that it is possible for man to do.”
“Yes, I know, I know. But, Mamsey,” the agony of deadly hurt shook Donelle’s voice, “Mamsey, for a little time I want, I must stay with you. And we must never speak of the other! You kept still when, when my father——”
“Yes, yes, Donelle, I understand,” Jo clutched the girl to her. “You shall stay with me for a little time, but I think the day will come when you will go to Tom Gavot on bended knees.”
“Perhaps, Mamsey, perhaps. I love Tom for his great goodness. I see him always, so safe, so kind, so splendid, but just now—— Oh! Mamsey,” the girl shuddered, “the love has me! I know I am wrong and wicked to let it hold me. I know I was selfish and bad to let Tom save me. You see I had to do something quick; I was so alone. But by and by, Mamsey, the way will be easier and then I will think only of Tom Gavot. I promised.”
In the upper chamber were a few articles belonging to Norval. Jo put them under lock and key the following day, and set the room in its sweet, waiting orderliness once more. The cabin in the wood too, was securely closed against prying eyes and hands. A few sketches and pictures were still there—“The Road” among them. The others had been hastily gathered together. Books rested on a shelf and table, the oil-stained coat hung on a peg. Jo longed, with human revolt, to set fire to the place where she and Langley’s child had known Gethsemane, but her hand was held.
And still Tom Gavot did not return. No word came from him for a week, and a great fear rose in Jo’s heart. Then came a brief note to Donelle.
You know you can trust me. Father Mantelle has written to me about you and Mam’selle; it’s a big thing. And, Donelle, I’m never going to take anything you don’t want to give! I didn’t marry you to hurt you. I did it to help you. It seemed the only way, in the hurry.
I’m staying here in Quebec for a few months. Nothing can harm you now and I am thinking of longer and bigger roads, farther away, where I can make more money and get ahead. It can’t harm you, Donelle, to tell you that, always from the first time I saw you, I loved you better than anything else. I love you now better than myself, my roads, anything! And because I love you this way, I’m leaving you with Mam’selle.
How they all evaded Norval. It was as if he had never been. Point of Pines was like that.
Since Tom had not killed him, he was able to blot him out.
“Tom is a man, a big one!” murmured Jo. “Donelle, you will be able to see him by and by.”
“Yes, Mamsey, by and by.”
Then summer came warmly, brightly, over the hills, but with it stalked a grim, black shadow. A shadow that no one dared speak about aloud, though they whispered about it at Dan’s Place, on the roads, and in the quiet houses. Father Mantelle felt his old blood rising hot and fierce. He remembered his France; but he remembered that his France had driven his Order from its fasthold. He remembered England, with traditional prejudice. Then he gazed into the depth of the black shadow that would not depart, and preached “peace, peace,” even before his people had thought of anything else but peace. It was full summer. The States’ people filled Marcel’s house, the Point of Pines hamlet throbbed and waited. Then the shadow stood revealed—War! And from over the sea England called to her sons. And they no longer paused. They lifted up their stern young faces and turned from field, river, and woods, turned back again Home!
And the women! At first they were stunned; horrified. It could not be! It could not be!
Soon, soon, they were to learn the lesson of patience, bravery, and heroism, but at first they saw only their boys going away. They saw the deserted houses, farms, and river, their own great helplessness, their agony of fear.
They saw their children grow old in a night with the acceptance of this call they could not quite comprehend, but which could not be disregarded. It was such a strange call, it sounded depths they, themselves, had never known. It found an answer in their untried youth. They simply had to go.
The old men were sobered, exalted. Even Pierre Gavot forgot the tavern, put on his best clothes, and waited for Tom. Were all the others going, and not his son? Gavot was full of anxiety. He did not want to drink and forget. He was obliged to stay clearheaded and watch for Tom’s return. He even forgot himself and his demands on Tom. He’d manage somehow, but he could not endure the shame of Tom’s not going overseas.
It was an hour when souls were marching up to the Judgment Seat, each according to its kind.
And one day Jo Morey met Pierre on the high-road, her burning woman-heart not yet adjusted to the shock that was reverberating through Canada.
“And so, Gavot,” she said, “’tis taking this cause to bring you to your senses? I hear of your talking of Tom as if he was a big thing. Why, he’s been big ever since he was born, and you took no heed.”
Pierre drew back. Tom was not yet revealed as a hero, but Gavot could not conceive of the boy being anything else.
“I’m ready to lay my only son on the altar,” mumbled Pierre grandiloquently. “I can sacrifice my all for my country.”
Jo laughed, a hard, bitter laugh.
“You men!” she sneered, “ever since Abraham carried his poor boy up the mountain to lay him on the altar, you’ve all been alike, you fathers! You don’t lay yourselves on the fire, not you! You don’t even live your decent best when you might, but you’re ready enough with the sacrifice of your young. Gavot, have you ever noticed that the Sarahs of the world don’t carry their sons to the altar?” Jo’s feelings choked her.
Gavot looked at the woman before him with bleared and strangely serious eyes. “That’s wild talk,” he mumbled, “bad talk. The right has to be done. Could such as I fight?”
Jo looked at the wretched creature by the roadside and she did not laugh now. That intangible something that was settling on the faces of her people hushed her.