VI. The October Chapter
On the second morning after Old Lady Lloyd's journey to town,
Sylvia Gray was walking blithely down the wood lane.
It was a beautiful autumn morning, clear and crisp and sunny;
the frosted ferns, drenched and battered with the rain of yesterday,
gave out a delicious fragrance; here and there in the woods
a maple waved a gay crimson banner, or a branch of birch
showed pale golden against the dark, unchanging spruces.
The air was very pure and exhilarating. Sylvia walked with a
joyous lightness of step and uplift of brow.
At the beech in the hollow she paused for an expectant moment, but there
was nothing among the gray old roots for her. She was just turning
away when little Teddy Kimball, who lived next door to the manse,
came running down the slope from the direction of the old Lloyd place.
Teddy's freckled face was very pale.
"Oh, Miss Gray!" he gasped. "I guess Old Lady Lloyd has gone
clean crazy at last. The minister's wife asked me to run up to
the Old Lady, with a message about the Sewing Circle--and I knocked--
and knocked--and nobody came--so I thought I'd just step in and
leave the letter on the table. But when I opened the door,
I heard an awful queer laugh in the sitting-room, and next minute,
the Old Lady came to the sitting-room door. Oh, Miss Gray,
she looked awful. Her face was red and her eyes awful wild--
and she was muttering and talking to herself and laughing like mad.
I was so scared I just turned and run."
Sylvia, without stopping for reflection, caught Teddy's hand and ran
up the slope. It did not occur to her to be frightened, although she
thought with Teddy that the poor, lonely, eccentric Old Lady had really
gone out of her mind at last.
The Old Lady was sitting on the kitchen sofa when Sylvia entered.
Teddy, too frightened to go in, lurked on the step outside.
The Old Lady still wore the damp black silk dress in which she had walked
from the station. Her face was flushed, her eyes wild, her voice hoarse.
But she knew Sylvia and cowered down.
"Don't look at me," she moaned. "Please go away--
I can't bear that YOU should know how poor I am.
You're to go to Europe--Andrew Cameron is going to send you--
I asked him--he couldn't refuse ME. But please go away."
Sylvia did not go away. At a glance she had seen that this
was sickness and delirium, not insanity. She sent Teddy off
in hot haste for Mrs. Spencer and when Mrs. Spencer came they
induced the Old Lady to go to bed, and sent for the doctor.
By night everybody in Spencervale knew that Old Lady Lloyd
had pneumonia.
Mrs. Spencer announced that she meant to stay and nurse
the Old Lady. Several other women offered assistance.
Everybody was kind and thoughtful. But the Old Lady did not know it.
She did not even know Sylvia Gray, who came and sat by her
every minute she could spare. Sylvia Gray now knew all that
she had suspected--the Old Lady was her fairy godmother.
The Old Lady babbled of Sylvia incessantly, revealing all her
love for her, betraying all the sacrifices she had made.
Sylvia's heart ached with love and tenderness, and she prayed
earnestly that the Old Lady might recover.
"I want her to know that I give her love for love," she murmured.
Everybody knew now how poor the Old Lady really was.
She let slip all the jealously guarded secrets of her existence,
except her old love for Leslie Gray. Even in delirium something
sealed her lips as to that. But all else came out--her anguish over
her unfashionable attire, her pitiful makeshifts and contrivances,
her humiliation over wearing unfashionable dresses and paying
only five cents where every other Sewing Circle member paid ten.
The kindly women who waited on her listened to her with tearfilled eyes,
and repented of their harsh judgments in the past.
"But who would have thought it?" said Mrs. Spencer to the
minister's wife. "Nobody ever dreamed that her father had lost ALL
his money, though folks supposed he had lost some in that old affair
of the silver mine out west. It's shocking to think of the way she has
lived all these years, often with not enough to eat--and going to bed
in winter days to save fuel. Though I suppose if we had known we couldn't
have done much for her, she's so desperate proud. But if she lives,
and will let us help her, things will be different after this.
Crooked Jack says he'll never forgive himself for taking pay for
the few little jobs he did for her. He says, if she'll only let him,
he'll do everything she wants done for her after this for nothing.
Ain't it strange what a fancy she's took to Miss Gray? Think of her
doing all those things for her all summer, and selling the grape jug
and all. Well, the Old Lady certainly isn't mean, but nobody made
a mistake in calling her queer. It all does seem desperate pitiful.
Miss Gray's taking it awful hard. She seems to think about as much
of the Old Lady as the Old Lady thinks of her. She's so worked
up she don't even seem to care about going to Europe next year.
She's really going--she's had word from Andrew Cameron. I'm awful glad,
for there never was a sweeter girl in the world; but she says it
will cost too much if the Old Lady's life is to pay for it."
Andrew Cameron heard of the Old Lady's illness and came out
to Spencervale himself. He was not allowed to see the Old Lady,
of course; but he told all concerned that no expense or trouble
was to be spared, and the Spencervale doctor was instructed
to send his bill to Andrew Cameron and hold his peace about it.
Moreover, when Andrew Cameron went back home, he sent a trained
nurse out to wait on the Old Lady, a capable, kindly woman who
contrived to take charge of the case without offending Mrs. Spencer--
than which no higher tribute could be paid to her tact!
The Old Lady did not die--the Lloyd constitution brought her through.
One day, when Sylvia came in, the Old Lady smiled up at her,
with a weak, faint, sensible smile, and murmured her name,
and the nurse said that the crisis was past.
The Old Lady made a marvellously patient and tractable invalid.
She did just as she was told, and accepted the presence of the nurse
as a matter of course.
But one day, when she was strong enough to talk a little,
she said to Sylvia,
"I suppose Andrew Cameron sent Miss Hayes here, did he?"
"Yes," said Sylvia, rather timidly.
The Old Lady noticed the timidity and smiled, with something
of her old humour and spirit in her black eyes.
"Time has been when I'd have packed off unceremoniously any person
Andrew Cameron sent here," she said. "But, Sylvia, I have gone
through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and I have left pride
and resentment behind me for ever, I hope. I no longer feel as I felt
towards Andrew. I can even accept a personal favour from him now.
At last I can forgive him for the wrong he did me and mine.
Sylvia, I find that I have been letting no ends of cats out
of bags in my illness. Everybody knows now how poor I am--
but I don't seem to mind it a bit. I'm only sorry that I ever
shut my neighbours out of my life because of my foolish pride.
Everyone has been so kind to me, Sylvia. In the future, if my
life is spared, it is going to be a very different sort of life.
I'm going to open it to all the kindness and companionship I can find
in young and old. I'm going to help them all I can and let them help me.
I CAN help people--I've learned that money isn't the only power
for helping people. Anyone who has sympathy and understanding
to give has a treasure that is without money and without price.
And oh, Sylvia, you've found out what I never meant you to know.
But I don't mind that now, either."
Sylvia took the Old Lady's thin white hand and kissed it.
"I can never thank you enough for what you have done for me,
dearest Miss Lloyd," she said earnestly. "And I am so glad
that all mystery is done away with between us, and I can
love you as much and as openly as I have longed to do.
I am so glad and so thankful that you love me, dear fairy godmother."
"Do you know WHY I love you so?" said the Old Lady wistfully.
"Did I let THAT out in my raving, too?"
"No. but I think I know. It is because I am Leslie Gray's daughter,
isn't it? I know that father loved you--his brother, Uncle Willis,
told me all about it."
"I spoiled my own life because of my wicked pride,"
said the Old Lady sadly. "But you will love me in spite of it all,
won't you, Sylvia? And you will come to see me sometimes?
And write me after you go away?"
"I am coming to see you every day," said Sylvia. "I am going
to stay in Spencervale for a whole year yet, just to be near you.
And next year when I go to Europe--thanks to you, fairy godmother--
I'll write you every day. We are going to be the best of chums,
and we are going to have a most beautiful year of comradeship!"
The Old Lady smiled contentedly. Out in the kitchen,
the minister's wife, who had brought up a dish of jelly, was talking
to Mrs. Spencer about the Sewing Circle. Through the open window,
where the red vines hung, came the pungent, sun-warm October air.
The sunshine fell over Sylvia's chestnut hair like a crown
of glory and youth.
"I do feel so perfectly happy," said the Old Lady,
with a long, rapturous breath.
