She threw her bonnet to the floor. “You criticize — you ridicule my deepest feelings. Why did you marry an Irish-woman? A phlegmatic Scotchwoman would be the right mate for you. Someone who would stare at you out of peeled-onion eyes, and say, ‘Ay, lad, but you’re a bonny fighter.’”
Her tear-stained face was flushed with anger.
Philip picked up the bonnet from the floor and set it on his own head. He tied the ribbon strings beneath his chin and gave her a flirtatious look. Adeline did not want to laugh. She was far too angry but she could not prevent herself. Laughter bubbled from her lips and rang out gaily. Philip looked so ridiculous in the bonnet that she simply had to laugh.
The sound of her laughter made the polite knock on the door inaudible. It was cautiously opened and there stood the three children. They had been sent to church and now, in their Sunday best, came to hear news of the Negro meeting, to which they would much sooner have gone. Church was to them an old story. Not that they were irreligious. Augusta and Ernest in particular held strong views on the subject. They were opposed to modern frivolity.
When the children saw their father wearing their mother’s bonnet, saw Adeline’s tear-dimmed eyes — apparently she had laughed till she cried — the boys were enraptured but Augusta was embarrassed.
“You should not rush in on your father and me,” said Adeline. “Why didn’t you knock?”
“We did knock, Mamma,” they said in unison.
Philip turned to them with a stern expression but looked so ridiculous in the bonnet, with the satin bow under his chin, that the boys burst out laughing and Augusta looked more embarrassed.
“What are you laughing at?” Philip demanded of his sons. He had quite forgotten the bonnet.
“You, Papa,” said Ernest.
Philip took him by the shoulder. “You’d make game of me, would you?”
Without flinching little Ernest answered, “You look so sweet in that bonnet, Papa.”
Philip now saw his reflection in the looking glass. He too broke into laughter. He took off the bonnet and set it on Augusta’s head. “Let’s see,” he said, “what sort of young lady Gussie will make.”
“Quite impressive,” Nicholas said.
Augusta saw nothing but amusement in the eyes of her parents. She hung her head and, as soon as she dared, took off the bonnet and laid it on the bed. The parrot flew down from his perch and began to peck at the bonnet as though in calculated destruction.
When the children were gone, Adeline said, in wonder, “How did I ever come by so plain a daughter?”
“Honestly, I hope.”
“What do you mean?” Her eyes flashed.
“Well, there was that Rajah fellow, in India.”
She was not ill-pleased. “Which Rajah?” she asked with an innocent air.
“The one who gave you the ruby ring.”
“Ah, those were the days,” she cried. “What colour — what romance!” She mused, studying her reflection in the mirror, while Philip took off his collar that was limp from the heat in the loft, and put on a clean one.
She remarked, “Nicholas is the only child who resembles me. Thank God he did not inherit my hair. I detest red-haired men.”
“Your own father has red hair.”
“A great part of the time I detest him.”
The children had strolled through the open door on to the lawn. Their Sunday clothes lent them an air of sedateness, but beneath that air there flickered resentment.
“I can’t see why,” Nicholas complained, in his alto voice, “we were not allowed to go to the meeting in the loft. It would have been much better fun.”
“Fun my eye,” said Ernest.
Augusta spoke with some severity. “Boys, think what you are saying. We do not go to church for fun.”
“Mr. Madigan does,” said Nicholas.
“The more shame to him,” said Augusta. “But I can’t think quite so badly of him as that. He goes to church because it is his duty to go with us.”
“Then why did he smile when we all called ourselves miserable sinners?” asked Nicholas.
“He may have been remembering his sins in Ireland and thinking how much better off he is in Canada.”
Nicholas thrust his hands into his pockets and frowned. “I’ll go to the next Negro meeting,” he said, “or know the reason why.”
“Me too,” said Ernest. “I will go or know the reason why.”
“The reason why,” Augusta declared, “may be Papa’s razor strop.”
Her brothers were a little subdued by this remark. They brightened, however, when they saw Cindy, their favourite of the blacks, approaching. She was carrying the baby Philip, to whom she was devoted. To him Cindy was a source of delight. He would clasp her fat neck, press his flowerlike face to hers and rapturously lisp, “Nith Thindy.”
“Nice Cindy, he calls me,” she cried, “the little angel!”
The elder children regarded their little brother without enthusiasm. He was made too much of, they thought.
Augusta said sedately, “I suppose your meeting was a great success, Cindy.”
“Success! Why, praise de Lawd, miss, that preacher had us all cryin’ our eyes out.”
“Did my mamma cry?” asked Ernest.
“She surely did, bless her heart.”
The children were embarrassed.
“I guess she laughed till she cried,” said Nicholas. “Sometimes she does that.”
“If she laughed,” said Cindy, “it was at Oleander, who came to de meetin’ decked out in her old missus’ fine clothes. She oughta be whipped, dat nigger. She surely is a scandal.”
“Scandal, my eye,” said Ernest.
VII
VII
The Night Prowlers
Dusk had fallen. It had passed into darkness, for the moon had not yet risen. It was a wonder that the three men could find their way to the house. Yet they had been well directed and one of them carried a lantern. Just inside the gate they had left the horse and buggy by which they had come. They walked quietly, speaking only in low tones. Their speech had the accents of the South.
Nero, the Newfoundland dog, had a keen ear. As the men approached he gave a deep growl and raised his majesty on the porch where he liked to sit on a warm evening. The light from the narrow stained-glass windows on either side of the front door fell on him.
The door opened and his mistress appeared. Swiftly she took him by the collar and dragged him into the hall, he lumbering along without protest but with a bark and growl at the approaching men.
When they saw that the door was shut they came into the porch, not stealthily but with the air of friends making an evening call. Though they did not knock, the door was opened to them by Adeline, who said, “Good evening to you,” and gave them a smile that showed her white teeth, with a tiny corner broken off one of them.
The men bowed gravely, taking in her beauty with their travel-weary eyes, giving a glance to the lamp lit hall, with its graceful stairway. Nero had been shut in a small room at the back of the hall from where his low bubbling growl could be heard.
“Come