Part 9

So Jo began the new role and actually made Donelle unhappy in the effort to achieve the reverse. Alone, in the white house at Point of Pines, Jo found her father's old clothes and contemplated them gravely. She was slipping back, poor soul, to her empty life.

Donelle had not accepted the proposed plans without a struggle. She was wonderfully sensitive and compassionate and her quick imagination made it possible for her to understand what the future would mean to poor Jo. Then, too, she shrank from the uprooting. Her dreams of what lay before were exciting and thrilling, but with sincere kinship she loved the quiet hills, the marvellous river, and the peace, freedom, and simplicity which were her birthright.

"Sometimes I fear," she said to Mrs. Lindsay, "that it will deafen me, hush me, kill me!"

"It will not, dear; and I will always be near."

"Unless you were, I would not dare. You are the only hope, Mrs. Lindsay."

"That's not so, Donelle. The real hope is your gift. You are taking it there to make it perfect."

"I hope so. And when I have learned, I must get Mamsey into my new life, quick."

"Indeed, yes!" Mrs. Lindsay nodded cheerfully.

"Isn't it queer how some people are part of you? Mamsey is part of me, Mrs. Lindsay." Then softly, "I suppose you know how Mamsey got me and from where?"

Alice Lindsay started.

"Yes, Mam'selle told me," she said.

"I never speak of it. Mamsey thought best that I should not; but I do not forget! Often, when we are driving past St. Michael's--I remember."

"Donelle, why do you tell me this now?"

"Just because I want you to understand how I feel about Mamsey. She didn't have to do things for me, she chose to, and I know all about her spinning and weaving and--the rest. I have cost her a good deal, and I mean to make it all up."

Proudly, happily Donelle stood. And looking at her, Mrs. Lindsay fervently wished the real truth might be kept away from the girl. Better the uncertainty of birth to such a spirit than the ugly fact. Safer would her relations with Mam'selle be if she could keep her present belief.

"Come," she said suddenly, "take your violin and stand--so! This is the way my good friend Anderson Law is to paint you."

Donelle took the violin; she tucked it under her chin and drew her bow lovingly across it. The uplifted face smiled serenely. Donelle was no longer afraid; something bigger than herself caught her and carried her to safety.

Alice Lindsay's eyes grew dim.

"Life is not all that is lying in wait for the child," she thought. "What is love going to do with her?"

And then, it was two days before they were to start for the States, Donelle went for a walk along the quiet highway! She had bidden Jo good-bye! Her heart ached with the haunting fear that she had not been quite sure about Mamsey. Was it enough that she was going to prepare for life? Were her purpose and joy quite unselfish? How about those long empty days, when the Walled House would be but a memory?

And Nick! The dog had acted so strangely. His awful eyes, yes, they were quite awful, had been fixed upon her a long, long time, then he had gone--to Jo! After that he could not be lured from her. It was as if he said:

"Very well, think what you choose, _I_ will never desert Mamsey!"

Jo had tried to force the dog from her; had scolded him sharply, but he would not stir.

His silent protest had angered Donelle, and she remembered it now, walking on the road. She felt her tears rising.

It was a day of calm and witchery. Never had the trees been more splendid, never the river more changing and beautiful. And the quiet, was there in all the world so sacred and safe a place as this?

And just then, toward Donelle, came a staggering, wretched figure. The girl stopped short and the man, seeing her, stopped also, not twenty feet away.

"It's Tom Gavot's terrible father," thought Donelle. She had never been so close to anything so loathesome before. She was not really frightened, the day made things safe enough, but she estimated the best chances of getting by the ugly thing and escaping from it.

Gavot knew her. All Point of Pines knew her and snapped their hateful remarks about her at Dan's Place. They were like a pack that had been defeated. Even Father Mantelle had the feeling that he had been incapable of coping with a situation that should not exist. It was putting a premium on immorality.

"Ha!" Pierre Gavot reeled and laughed aloud. When he was in the first stages of drunkenness he was diabolically keen. His senses always put up a revolt before they surrendered.

"So!" he called in his thick voice and with that debauched gallantry that marked him, "So! it is Mam'selle's bastard dressed and ready to skip out as her damned father did before her, leaving the Mam'selle to make the most of the broken bits. Curse ye, for what ye are!"

The veins swelled in Gavot's face, a confused, bestial desire for revenge on somebody, somehow, possessed him.

"Ye've taken all she had to give, as your father did before ye, blast him! And now, like him, ye kick her out of your way. Her, who spent herself."

The words were scorching into Donelle's soul, but they numbed sensation as they went. It was later the hurt would come! Now, there was but one thing to do, pass the beast in the road and get behind the walls of safety.

And so Donelle darted forward so suddenly that Gavot staggered aside in surprise. She gave him one horrified look and was gone!

No one saw her enter the house. She was breathing hard, her face was like a dead face, set and waxen. In the great hall was a book stand. On it was a dictionary.

Donelle was repeating over and again in her mind a word. A strange, fearful word, she must know about that--word. It would explain something, perhaps.

The trembling hands found it, the wide eyes read it once--twice--three times.

Slowly, then, the heavy feet mounted the shallow stairs. As old, blind Revelle used to grope in the upper hall, so Donelle groped now. She reached her room, closed the door and locked it. Then she sat down by the window and began to--suffer. The safe ground upon which she had trodden for the last few years crumbled. At last she managed to reach St. Michael's. Yes, she remembered St. Michael's, but how long she had been there before Jo found her she could not remember!

But it was clear: Jo, not her father, had put her there. Jo had made up the sad story to save her, Donelle! She bore Jo's name, and that was to save her, too. And her father had deserted poor Mamsey long ago and she had made the most of the bits that were left!

That is what the horrible man had said. And they had all known, always. That was why people never came to the little white house; that was why Jo had put her in the Walled House, to save her. And Jo had stayed outside as she always had done, outside, making the most of the bits!

At last, a wild, hot fury smote the girl, a kind of fury that resented the love that placed her in a position which unfitted her for the only part she could decently play. Of course they must have realized that she would know some day, and have to give up! She could not go on with the sham and be happy. They had defrauded her of life while thinking they had saved her for life. It was cruel, wicked! The yellow eyes blazed and the slender hands clenched.

"What have they done to me?" she moaned.

And so through the afternoon, alone and driven to bay, Donelle suffered. The sun went down, leaving its benediction on the wonderful river which glistened and throbbed as it swelled with the high, full tide, but there was no peace for Donelle. A shame she could not understand overcame her. Her unawakened sex battled with the grim spectre.

Then memory helped the girl and she became a woman as she sat alone in the still room; a woman so pure and simple that Jo was saved.

How great poor Jo's love must have been, always! How little she had asked, how bravely she had borne her punishment!

The care and devotion of the long nights, when Donelle was so ill, returned like dreams and haunted the girl. That was the beginning of Jo, and this was the end? But was it?

It was all in her, Donelle's, hands, to decide. She could keep still! She could take her life, make it beautiful, and by and by she could come back to Mamsey. Then she would say, "This I have done for you! But I could not do it then! I could not give up then," Donelle murmured.

Then the present held the girl, drove away the temptation. There was the little, lonely white house under the hill at Point of Pines and Mamsey who that morning had said:

"Child, I'm gladder than you know to be able to give you your chance."

Her chance!

Just then a maid tapped at the door and gave her a message.

Mrs. Lindsay would be detained for dinner and would not be home until late.

"We are to start to-morrow," the girl said, "very early."

And again Donelle was alone with her chance!

Later she ate her dinner quietly in the dim oak dining room. Candles burned; there was an open fire on the hearth and pale yellow hothouse roses on the table. Never was the girl to forget that last meal in the Walled House. And then, she was once more alone upstairs with--her chance!

She went to the window and looked out. A rising moon was lighting the road, The Road!

Suddenly Tom Gavot seemed to stand in the emptiness and beckon her from that road with which he had played when he was a sad and neglected child. How clean and fine he had made it seem; he who had come from such a father! In that moment Pierre Gavot shrank from sight, he had polluted the road, but Tom had sanctified it.

The road was open now for Donelle to choose. Should she go over the hill to life or---- And so she struggled. She heard Mrs. Lindsay return, but it did not occur to her to confide in any one. The shame was only bearable if she bore it in secret, but where should she bear it? Out, over the hill, where no one knew; where Mrs. Lindsay and Jo would keep people from knowing? Could she be happy and forget?

Donelle took up her violin. She clutched it to her. It could make her forget, it _must_! Even if she wakened the household she felt she must play.

But she could not play! Her hand was heavy, her brain dull.

Then something Revelle had once said to her flashed into her mind.

"Always live right, child. You can never have your gift at its best unless you keep its place holy. No matter what any one may tell you, keep the place clean and right in which your gift lives!"

Then it was that Donelle dressed herself in a plain, warm suit, packed a little bag, took her violin, left a note on her dressing table, and went on--Tom Gavot's Road! Just for a moment she stood outside the tall gates and looked wistfully up the hill, then she turned as if relinquishing all the joy and promise of life, and set her face toward Point of Pines.

*CHAPTER XI*

*THE GREAT DECISION*

Donelle made herself a little fire that night in the shelter of a pine grove. She slept, too, with her back against a sturdy tree and the sound of the river in her ears.

She had walked fast for many miles. She was tired, but she meant to go on and reach Point of Pines before any one saw her; before Mrs. Lindsay could get there and talk to Jo.

At three o'clock she roused herself and went on. There was no one else, in all the world, it seemed, she was alone, alone. But something was strengthening her, she no longer grieved or felt remorse. She was, poor child, learning a tremendous lesson, she had an ideal for which she was ready to suffer and die. She had found her soul and a peace had come to her; a peace that the world can neither give nor take away.

"I'm glad!" murmured Donelle; "I'm not a bit sorry. I'd have hated myself if I had gone away, after I knew."

The gray dawn was creeping with chilly touch over the empty road when Donelle, footsore and aching in every muscle, came in sight of the little house.

"Why, there's a light burning!" she said, "a light in the living room. Maybe Mamsey is ill, ill and all alone."

The fear drove her on more quickly.

Up the steps she went softly and peered into the room. Nothing mattered now to Jo, she had nothing to hide, so she had not even lowered the shade.

And there she sat, nodding before the stove in which the fire had long since died. She wore her father's old discarded clothes--she had resurrected them after returning from bidding Donelle good-bye--she had worked hard until late, had fallen asleep exhausted by the fire, and forgotten to go to bed.

Close to Jo, so close that his faithful head rested against her arm, was Nick!

He was not asleep, he was on guard. He had heard those steps outside; he knew them and his ears were tilted and alert. Still, he would not leave Jo! The time for choice had come and passed with Nick. His heart might break but he had decided.

The door opened softly, Jo never locked it, and Donelle came tiptoeing across the room. Nick tapped the floor, but otherwise did not move.

Beside the sleeping Jo the girl crouched down and waited. She was crying, blessed, happy tears, and one tired hand lay upon Nick's head.

The clock in the kitchen struck in its surprised, alarmed way. How well Donelle remembered! The sun edged in through the east window, and found the little group by the cold stove.

Then Jo awoke. She did not move, she only looked! She could not make it out, and gave an impatient exclamation. She felt that her mind was betraying her.

"Donelle!" she said presently, "what does this mean?"

"Only that I--I have come, Mamsey."

"Tell me everything." The words were stern.

"Why, Mamsey, there isn't much to tell--except--that I'm here."

"How did you get here?"

"I--I walked. I walked all night."

"And Mrs. Lindsay, she knows?"

"Oh! no, Mamsey, she was away, but I left a note. I had to come Mamsey, I had to. You see," brightly, piteously, "I--I couldn't play my fiddle. It would not be played. When I got to thinking of how it would be out where I was going, I just couldn't! The pretty dresses and the--the excitement made me forget for a little time, but all of a sudden I saw how it was going to be. Then I tried to play, and I couldn't! Then I knew that I must stay, because more than anything, Mamsey, I wanted--you!"

"This is sheer nonsense!" said Jo, but her voice shook, and the hand lying against Donelle's cheek trembled.

"You mad child! Why, Donelle, don't you see you are running away from your life?"

"It will have to find me here, then, Mamsey. Don't send me away. I would hate it as I would have hated St. Michael's if you had sent me back there. You see, Mamsey, when I run away I always run to what is really mine. Don't you see?"

"Are you sick, child?"

Jo felt, now, the uplifted face.

"No, but I would have been, off there! And I couldn't play. What good would anything have been, if I couldn't play?"

Jo was thoroughly alarmed.

"Can you play here?" she asked, bewildered, not knowing what to think, but seeking to calm the girl on the floor.

"Why, Mamsey, let me try!"

And Donelle tried, rising stiffly, fixing the violin and raising the bow.

A moment of indecision, of fear; then the radiance drove the haggard lines from the tired, white face.

She could play! She walked about the plain home-room. She forgot Jo, forgot her troubles, she knew everything was all right now! The final answer had been given her! When she finished she stood before Jo, and Nick crept toward her. He, too, felt that something, which had been very wrong, was righted.

Mrs. Lindsay came later. She was alarmed and angry. She and Jo attacked poor Donelle's position and were indignant that they were obliged to do so; they, women and wise; she, a stubborn and helpless girl!

"I couldn't leave Mamsey," was her only reply, and she looked faint from struggle.

"But Mam'selle does not want you!" Mrs. Lindsay said almost brutally, seeing that she had succeeded only too well in preserving this girl for Jo. "You have no right to become a burden, Donelle, when you have the opportunity of independence."

"Am I a burden?" Donelle turned weary, patient eyes on Jo. And Jo could not lie. That white, girlish face wrung her heart.

"This is temperament run mad!" exclaimed Alice Lindsay. "I have a great mind to take you by force, Donelle. I will if Mam'selle gives the word."

"You won't though, will you, Mamsey?"

Jo could not speak. Then Donelle turned kind, pleading eyes to Mrs. Lindsay.

"You see, I couldn't play if I were dragged. When I'm dragged I can never do anything. I wish I could tell you how sorry I am and how much I love you; but I am so tired. When I got to thinking of Mamsey here alone, and the Walled House closed, why----"

Alice Lindsay turned from the sad eyes, the quivering mouth.

"Listen, dear!" she said in her old, gentle tones; "I've lived enough with natures like yours to understand them. Stay with Mam'selle this winter, Donelle, and think your way out. You have a clear mind, you will see that what we all want to do for you is right. In the spring I will return, we'll have another summer in the Walled House. A year from now all will be safe and right. The trip abroad can wait, everything shall wait, for you. Now will you be good, Donelle?"

She turned smilingly to the girl, and Donelle gratefully stretched out her hands.

"Oh! how I thank you," she said, "and I do love and trust you. I will try to be good. Oh! if you only really knew!"

"Knew what, Donelle?"

"Why, how I could not live away off there, even with you, if I remembered Mamsey sitting here making the best of the bits that are left." Then Donelle broke down and wept violently.

Still she was not ill. She was worn to the edge of endurance, but after a day and night of rest in the room beside Jo she got up, quite herself again.

"And we'll say no more about it until spring," vowed Jo, but a wonderful light had crept into her eyes.

"I'm a selfish, unworthy lot----" But the light stayed in her eyes.

Then one day Donelle took her fiddle and strolled out alone to test the virtue of her safe, happy feeling. She went down to the river and sat upon the bare, black rocks. The tide was low and the day was more like spring than early autumn.

"And now," whispered Donelle, "I'll play and think. I have to act too much when Mamsey is watching."

Donelle knew she had to untangle many loose ends, now that she had snapped her thread. She did not want, above anything on earth, that Jo should know her deep, real reason for returning. But how could she make sure with that horrible man, Pierre, loose in Point of Pines? It did not matter how lonely she and Jo might be, if only they could have each other without their common secret rising between them.

Donelle had stayed close to Jo since she had come back, she shrank from everyone. She meant, some day, to go to Marcel Longville--when the Captain was at a safe distance. She meant to have Marcel tell her many things, but not now! She was going to face the future quite bravely, without shame or cringing. Jo should have that reward at least.

In the meantime, Donelle wished fervently, and with primitive directness, that Pierre Gavot would die a quick and satisfactory death and be well out of the way before he again got drunk enough to open his vile lips.

"If he were here now," mused Donelle, the while playing a charming sonata, "I'd push him off the rocks and have done with it! What good is he? All his life he's been messing things, and I'm horribly afraid of him. I wish he was dead."

A crackling of the dry bushes startled her and she turned to see, coming down the Right of Way leading from the road to the river, Tom Gavot!

Donelle knew him at once though his good clothes, his happy, handsome face did their best to disguise him.

"Why!" she cried, getting up with a smile, "when did you get back?"

"A week ago," said Tom, "and it's about time. It has been three years since I went away." He beamed upon the girl. "I've learned how to see a road where there isn't even a trail," he went on. "I'm a surveyor. And you?" He glanced at her violin.

"I've learned to fiddle." Donelle's eyes could not leave the dark, handsome face. It was such a good, brave face, and the mere fact of Tom Gavot having returned seemed to make things safer. Tom was like that, quiet, strong, and safe! In a flash Donelle realized that the sense of shame and degradation which had driven her from the Walled House was driving her now to Tom Gavot. She felt sure that he, that all the others, had known what she herself knew now, and yet it had not made Tom despise her.

Her lips quivered and her eyes filled.

"It is so good to see you!" she said softly.

Tom's face was suddenly very serious.

"I came back to see how things were going," he said quietly, "and now that I am here, I'm going to stay."

"How long?" the question was weighted with longing.

"Until there is no more need," said Tom. Then he threw caution to the winds. "My father has told me!" he breathed hard, "he told me! Are you, a girl like--like you, going to let the mad words of a drunken man turn you back?"

For an instant Donelle faltered. Could there be a mistake? She had not thought of that.

"If what he said, Tom Gavot, was true, I had to turn back. The words _were_ true, were they not?"

Tom longed to lie, longed to set her free from the horror that he saw filled her, but he was too wise and just.

"Suppose they were, suppose they were! Suppose Mam'selle did have the blackest wrong done her that a man can do a woman; hasn't she paid for it by her life and goodness?"

"Yes, Tom, she has!"

Hope had gone from the girlish face, but purpose and strength were there.

"And that is why I came back to her. For a moment, Tom Gavot, I stood on your road, the road you played with and mended. I wanted to run up and over the hill. I wanted to turn my back on the awful thing I had heard, but I couldn't, Tom, I couldn't. I would have seemed too mean to be on your road. I believe something died in me as I stood, but when I could think once more, I didn't suffer except for Mamsey. I'm so thankful I feel this way. I want to make up to her--for--for my father. He left her, but I never will. Why once, Tom, I asked her about my father, it was long ago, and she said he was a _good father_. And then I asked her about--about my mother, and she kept still. She let me think my mother was--not good; she would not hurt my father! But oh! if I can only keep her from knowing that I know. If I could only make her think I came back to her simply because I wanted her! I do not want her to think the truth! That would kill her, I know. She is so proud. So fine. I want to make her happy in my own way."

"She shall think that, if I can help!" said Tom.

"But you mustn't stay here for me, Tom. I couldn't bear that."

"See here, Donelle. If you have turned back, so will I. I had my choice of going to the States or overseeing some work back in the hills here. I have chosen."

"But, Tom, you mustn't turn back."

"Perhaps neither of us has turned back," Tom's dark face relaxed. "When things make you dizzy you cannot always tell which is back or forward. I wish you would play your fiddle."

Donelle looked up at him with a kind of glory in her eyes.

"I will," she said; "and after, you must tell me about your roads, the roads that you can see when there are no roads!"

"It's a bargain."

So Tom sat down upon a rock and Donelle paced to and fro on the leafy path and, as she played and played, she smiled contentedly at Tom over her bow. When she was tired she dropped beside him and leaned against a tree.

"Now," she whispered; "I want to hear about your roads."