Ceremony of the Innocent (49 page)

To Mrs. Eccles a governess was only a mere servant. She said coldly, “Yes, I am Mrs. Eccles. Didn’t Ellen have a friend to accompany her?”

Maude said, “I am her friend.”

“Indeed,” said Hortense, thinking that this young woman, a servant, was behaving in a very saucy and insolent way. She added, “Maybe you’d like a cup of tea, or something, while I talk to El—I mean, your mistress. The kitchen is back there, at the end of the hall, and my cook will give you your supper there.” She said this with deliberate contempt—servants must be put in their place at once—and besides, Maude’s manner and her English accent vexed Hortense. Superior-like, and impudent.

Maude held back a smile at this woman’s vulgarity, and said, “I should like that very much, indeed. Thank you. I see our luggage is being brought in. No doubt you have assigned us rooms.”

“You can share my housekeeper’s bedroom,” said Hortense, despising and resenting Maude even more. “Mrs. Porter will have the bedroom next to mine, on the second floor. I assume—what is your name again—”

“Maude Cummings.”

“I see. All right, Maude, I must leave you now. You know the way to the kitchen. My housekeeper will appreciate your help in serving dinner and washing up afterwards. My nephew, the Congressman Francis Porter, is my guest here also. In this emergency my maid will appreciate your help, too, so please take care of the Congressman’s bedroom beginning tonight.”

Maude Cummings, whose father had been the younger son of an Earl, and who himself had been the Honorable Gerald Cummings, and an alumnus of Magdalen College at Oxford, and a very rich man, went with composure to the kitchen, highly amused by Hortense Eccles. She found the housekeeper to be much more of a lady, and much politer. Really, thought Maude, the American working class is very commendable, and very kind. The housekeeper recognized Maude’s distinction at once, and made the girl as comfortable as possible in the hot kitchen.

In the meantime Ellen had plunged upstairs to the third floor, where May and her nurse had small sweltering rooms under the roof, but rooms comfortably furnished via Ellen’s purse some years before. Ellen only too well had remembered the mean furniture and the bleakness of those rooms, unbearable in summer, dankly cold in winter. The newest nurse, a tiny and smiling and amiable girl in white starch, greeted Ellen warmly, for Ellen was a lavish tipper in behalf of her aunt. But Ellen ran past her, in the little sitting room, which had once been her bedroom, and into May’s room. May had been “laid out” carefully by her nurse, and she lay on her white pillows with hands folded on her breast, her face gray and still, her hair neatly combed, her best brown silk dress on her motionless body, her features small and withered yet strangely lofty. The lines of pain had softened, and she wore the majestic peace of death. A low lamp had been lit, and its yellowish light flickered over the bedroom. Someone was sitting in a chair nearby, but Ellen did not see anything but the body of her aunt.

She fell on her knees beside the bed and put her hand over the cold stiff fingers and burst into wild sobs. “Oh, Auntie, Auntie!” she groaned, and her hat fell from her head. “Oh, why did I leave you, or you leave me? Oh, Auntie, Auntie, I am so sorry!” She kissed May’s cheek, and wailed desperately. “I am so sorry for being so inconsiderate. You were right. I never thought of anybody but myself. What shall I do? What shall I do?” Her hastily pinned mass of red hair tumbled down her back. Her body shook with her sobs. Her face ran with tears, and sweat. The black shirtwaist was damp and twisted.

Someone touched her shoulder, and she glanced up despairingly to see Francis Porter beside her, his face stern, his spectacles glittering in the lamplight. “Control yourself, Ellen,” he said. His voice was muted but condemning. “It is too late for self-reproach now. Too late, too late.”

She had not seen him for years. Now he seemed to her to be her conscience, her nemesis. He was so tall, so thin, in his dark clothing, so pale, so rigorous, that she wanted to grovel before him and beg him for forgiveness, too, though for what she did not know. “Too late,” she muttered. “Yes, too late.”

As if imploring his compassion, his absolution, she pressed her wet cheek to the fingers on her shoulder. She did not feel their sudden trembling, the sudden heat of lust that ran through them. She did not even feel the sly movement of his other hand over her racked body, nor its pressing and searching. When the hand moved to her white neck, and then down under the unbuttoned collar, even touching her bare breast, she did not feel that either.

“Forgive me,” she whispered. “Oh, forgive me.”

“Not yet,” he answered, and his voice was hoarse. “Not quite yet. Oh, Ellen,” and his voice dropped to a lower intonation. “Oh, Ellen.” Her breast was soft and white. She had fallen into a dim faintness.

“Jeremy,” she whispered, not even aware now of where she was. She leaned against Francis’ hip, in that chamber of death, and he shook with desire. He kissed the rumbled red hair, and still she did not know. He thought she did, and was elated.

C H A P T E R   25

MAUDE CAME INTO ELLEN’S bedroom at eight the next morning, carrying a breakfast tray. A doctor had been called last night to give Ellen a sleeping draught, for she had been obviously dazed and distraught. Now she lay on her pillows, white and mute and listless. Maude drew aside the heavy maroon draperies to let in the brilliant morning sunlight.

“Now, Mrs. Porter,” Maude said in her tranquil voice, “I have made this nice breakfast for you, and you really must eat it, or you will be very ill. You had no dinner last night. What would Mr. Porter say to that? By the way, we have received a telegram that he will be here tonight. Unfortunately, he will not arrive before the funeral this afternoon.”

Ellen sat up quickly. “Jeremy!” she cried. “Oh, thank God.” She began to cry, but not with the wild agony of the day before. “I do need him.” Her cheeks flushed faintly. “But what about Chicago?”

“I am sure,” said Maude, “that he delivered his speech, and then planned to arrive here as soon as possible. Now, you must really eat this breakfast. Mr. Porter must not find you in this state. It will only distress him, and we do not want that, do we?”

“I dreamt,” said Ellen, “that he was right there with me when I knelt beside my aunt’s bed.” The flush deepened on her cheeks. “I must have fallen asleep there. I was so tired.” Her tears ran faster, but they were calmer. She looked at the tray. “Thank you, Miss Cummings. It is very kind of you. The funeral? Yes. My aunt loved Wheatfield so much; she was at home here. She was never at home in New York. I can’t forgive myself for taking her away.”

“You have nothing to ask forgiveness for,” said Maude very gently.

But Ellen immediately stiffened, and she looked at Maude with remembered dislike. “You don’t know, Miss Cummings.” Her beautiful voice was actually sullen. “Thank you, again. Yes, I will try to eat my breakfast”

It is very hard to forgive ourselves, thought Maude, especially if we have nothing with which to reproach us. Ellen tried to eat the stewed figs and prunes “Did I dream it, or is Mr. Francis actually here?”

“He is here,” said Maude in a peculiar tone. She had left the kitchen last night to look for Ellen and to console her, and had found her clothing in what is discreetly called “disarray,” with Francis leaning over her avidly. Maude’s hard aloof look at him, her open scorn, when she had appeared at his bent shoulder, had not only vigorously startled him, but had angrily shamed him. They had stared at each other in a terrible silence, and then Francis had turned away, his face slightly contorted. It was Maude who had led Ellen to her bedroom and who had called the physician.

Ellen said, “Jeremy doesn’t like Mr. Francis, though Mr. Francis was really the only friend I had had for years. I am glad he is here.” She sipped the tea on the tray. Her tears slid down her face.

“Yes,” said Maude. “Now do try these scones. I made them myself. This strawberry jam is excellent.” She sat down near Ellen and regarded the older girl seriously. “Mrs. Porter. I lost my dearest father when I was nineteen years old. He was all I had in the world. I do not count uncles and cousins and aunts. I had to reconcile myself. I had to accept things as they are. I came to America, alone, to see myself clearly and what I must do with my life. Death is as common and as natural as birth, and is part of our lives. Once we understand that, we are invulnerable, in spite of grief.”

Again Ellen’s dislike for the younger woman quickened. “You don’t understand,” she said. “My aunt, Aunt May, worked and sacrificed for me for many years. She went hungry so I could have food. I was an orphan, and she became my mother. But I was ungrateful; I did not consider her. I—deserted her.” She turned her cheek to the pillow and began to sob. “I thought of nothing but my husband, and myself, though my first duty was to my aunt.”

Maude frowned with impatience and a faint disgust. “Mrs. Porter, a woman’s first duty is to her husband, and her love. I have heard you did everything possible for Mrs. Watson; you should not reproach yourself—”

But Ellen cried, “You don’t know! Oh, please, do go away and let me alone, this day of her funeral!” She pushed aside the tray and cried convulsively. In silence, Maude picked up the almost untouched tray and left the room, shaking her head. Ellen sobbed, over and over, “Jeremy, Jeremy. Come quickly, or I’ll die.”

It was Maude who dressed Ellen for the funeral, in the bedraggled black she had worn. It was Maude who had firmly led Ellen away from May’s bedroom, so that the undertakers could do their last duties and place the body in a bronze casket. It was Maude who had firmly informed Hortense Eccles that a shabby parson would not “do,” and who had called an Episcopalian priest. It was Maude who had called for flowers, though Hortense had an outraged comment. “She was only a servant, like Ellen. The flowers are not necessary. No one will be at the funeral, except my nephew and myself, out of mercy and consideration.”

“The flowers,” said Maude, “are for the living. They will comfort Mrs. Porter.”

“Much she needs comforting for,” Hortense had said. “She left her poor old aunt to my Christian compassion.”

“Which I am sure you gave her,” said Maude. Hortense did not miss the irony and was freshly outraged. “How dare you speak to me like that! You, only a servant, and presumptuous!”

The granddaughter of an Earl looked at Mrs. Eccles, and in that exchange Hortense felt “lowered.” “Only a servant,” she muttered. “You take too much on yourself. I never did like the English. They get above themselves. I will have a talk with my darling Jeremy. He doesn’t like insolence, either, in servants, though how he overlooked Ellen’s station and married her I just don’t know.”

“I do,” said Maude. “Mrs. Porter was never a servant. She is a gentlewoman.”

Hortense turned on her incredulously. “How could you possibly know anything, you only a servant yourself! I will talk to Mr. Porter. He will give you your notice at once. I will make sure of that myself. Then you will be on the streets, where you belong.” She smiled in satisfaction as she bustled away.

What an odious woman, Maude commented to herself, not in the least perturbed by the encounter. She went into the parlor, where the casket had been placed on the undertaker’s trestle. It stood open, and May’s hands held a bouquet of white lilies and white roses covered her feet and twisted legs. Draperies had been drawn; candlelight flickered about the coffin. Ellen was seated by her aunt; her hand lay on the dim, neatly combed hair; the girl was in a state of semi-stupefaction again, but tearless. Her red hair flamed in the candlelight; it had been Maude who had arranged it, and every bright wave and curl glistened. Ellen’s fixed eyes shimmered in the gloom; her pale lips were parted as if for air. Her black garments seemed more funereal than the dead woman herself. At her right shoulder stood Francis Porter, and he looked only at Ellen, and for a single moment Maude felt pity for him, thinking that a man does not fondle a woman sensually in the presence of death—and certainly not a man like Francis—except for some extraordinary and uncontrollable emotion in himself.

Mrs. Eccles stood decorously at the foot of the casket, her hands clasped together as if praying, her expression solemn. There were strangers present, friends of Mrs. Eccles, and they too stood decorously and glanced with affection at their friend. Their glances at the silent Ellen were not so kind. Here was a young woman who had deserted, unfeelingly, her lone relative, and had neglected her shamefully, and had it not been for Hortense, who, out of her large heart, had taken this unfortunate creature into her house and had attended her like a sister, only Heaven knew what would have become of her, May Watson. The poor farm, without doubt, or some back-street boardinghouse full of vermin and the stench of cabbage and coal gas, there possibly to starve to death, alone. In the doorway of the parlor the house servants were gathered, avid for drama.

To think, Mrs. Eccles’ friends whispered to each other, that a Congressman from Washington, a real Congressman, Mrs. Eccles’ nephew, had condescended to attend the funeral of a servant. What a gentleman he was, what kindness, what humanity. Maude, who had much perception, and very keen hearing, was amused. She knew now what had brought Francis Porter here, and again she pitied him.

The priest arrived, with his secretary, and he was in his clerical garments, a rosy little man with twinkling eyes. He did not consider death a calamity; he had seen too much of life to deplore dissolution. Ellen did not hear the brief service. She had sunk into a numb apathy, in which she relived the years of her childhood, seeing not the dead woman but the aunt who had loved her and had stolen food for her and had admonished her and guarded her. She did not feel herself raised to her feet; she blinked in the raw hot sunlight outside while Francis and Maude led her to the waiting limousine. She looked about her blankly, her black-gloved hands folded weakly over each other. She was conscious of none of the living about her. She gazed through the windows of the limousine at remembered streets in which she had walked and in which she had cried. A loosened curl, vivid and lustrous, had escaped a pin and lay on her shoulder. Francis could not look away from it; he remembered how soft such a curl had been against his lips the night before, and how fragrant and warm and living, and he was full of pain. He avoided glancing at Miss Cummings, whom he considered a drab servant, lifeless and meek, for all the cold disbelief and condemnation that had shone in her fine eves the night before.