CHAPTER XII

POOR HETTY

In mid-July, Wint at last found out the truth about Hetty. That is to say, he found out a part of the truth; enough to make him heartsick and sorry.

His eventual enlightenment was inevitable as to-morrow morning’s sunrise. A more sophisticated young man--Jack Routt, for example--would not have remained in the dark so long. But Wint, aside from noticing that Hetty looked badly, and aside from some casual consideration of Routt’s repeated warnings, gave very little thought to his mother’s handmaiden. There were too many other and more important things to occupy him. His work as Mayor, his studies, his Joan. Joan was bulking very large in his life in those days. He found understanding, and sympathy, in her. They were better than sweethearts; they were friends. The other--this thought must have been lying, unspoken, in the mind of each--the other could wait and must wait till Wint had proved himself for good and all. Then.... Once in a while, Wint allowed himself to look forward, and to dream. But not often. The present was too engrossing to give much time for dreaming of the future.

So, though he saw Hetty daily, when she served the meals at home, or when he went into the kitchen, or when he encountered her at her cleaning in the front part of the house, Wint gave her very little consideration. His mother protested, once in a while, that Hetty was growing lazy. “She slacks things,” the voluble little woman said. “She leaves dust about; and she’s not so neat as she used to be. I declare, you just can’t get a girl that will keep up her work. They all get so lazy after a while, but I did think that Hetty was going to be--”

Wint’s father said, tolerantly, that Hetty was all right; that she was a good cook, and did her work well enough, so far as he could see. The elder Chase had always been a good-natured man; but a new generosity in his appraisal of others was developing in the man now. He had been in some trouble of mind since that day in May when Amos Caretall came home. Chase was oppressed by the conviction that he had acted unworthily in that matter; yet he could not admit as much. His hostility toward Amos would not let him. The result was that he felt at odds with his son; that they avoided discussions of the town’s affairs; that they lived together in a polite neutrality. It was working changes in Chase. He was becoming, in some fashion, a sympathetic, rather likable figure. You felt he was unhappy, needed comforting.

So, on this day, he spoke well of Hetty; and because Mrs. Chase was always the loyal mirror of her husband’s opinions, she also ceased to criticize the girl. Wint had heard the conversation, but it made little impression on him. He was thinking of other things; wondering, for example, when Kite would make the first move in the conflict that was sure to come. He had heard, that day--Gergue told him--that Routt was thinking of running for Mayor against him in the fall. Wint was having difficulty in understanding that. He knew Routt was his friend; and, of course, political opponents might still be personal friends. Nevertheless.... The thing puzzled him. It did not jibe with his opinion of Routt.

After supper that night, the elder Chase went downtown. Wint had some writing to do, and went upstairs to his room to do it. Mrs. Chase had a caller, Mrs. Hullis, from next door. They were sewing and talking together in the sitting room. Wint could hear the murmur of his mother’s voice, steady and persistent. Mrs. Hullis was a good listener.

About an hour after supper, Wint realized that he wanted a drink of water. There was water in the bathroom; but there was a filter on the faucet in the kitchen, and Hardiston water needed filtering. It was pure enough, clean enough, but there was a proportion of iron in it that sometimes gave the water a slightly rusty color. So Wint went down by the back stairs, in order not to disturb his mother, into the kitchen.

He found Hetty sitting in a kitchen chair with her arms hanging limply and her feet outstretched before her. The girl’s whole body was slumped down, as though she had fainted; and at first Wint thought this was what had happened, for Hetty’s eyes were closed. He cried out:

“Why, Hetty? What’s the matter? Are you sick?”

And he went quickly toward her across the kitchen.

But when he spoke, Hetty opened her eyes and looked at him, and shook her head. “No,” she said, in the sullen tone that had become habitual to her. “No, I’m all right.”

“You are not,” Wint protested. “You’re as white as a rag.” He saw the dishes piled in the sink. “You’ve not cleaned up after supper. How long have you been this way?”

Hetty closed her eyes wearily, and opened them again, and managed a smile. “Oh, I’m all right, Wint,” she said. “You’re a nice boy. Run along. Don’t bother about me.”

Wint laughed. “I’m not bothering. I want to help. What happened?”

“I--just felt terribly tired--all of a sudden,” she said. There was a suggestion of surrender in her voice; as though the barriers of reserve were breaking down. “That’s all, Wint; I’m just tired.”

“You need a rest,” Wint agreed. “You’ve been plugging away, taking care of us, for a long time, now. Come in and lie down on the couch in the dining room.”

Hetty shook her head in a frightened little way; the bravado was going out of her. She seemed very helpless and feminine. “No, no,” she protested. “I’ll be all right as soon as I rest a little. Do run along, Wint.”

Wint put his hand on her forehead. “There’s more than just being tired the matter with you. You’re sick, Hetty. Your head’s hot. I’ll tell you, you go up and go to bed, and I’ll clean up down here. I’m a champion dish washer.”

Hetty laughed wearily. “You’re a champion decent boy, Wint,” she said. “But you’ll just have to let me alone. There’s nothing you can do for me.”

“I can see that you go up to bed.”

“No, no; I’m all right. Nearly.”

Wint started for the door. “I’m going to telephone for a doctor,” he declared. “You’re sick, Hetty. That’s the plain English of it. I’m going to telephone.”

She had moved so swiftly that she startled him; moved after him, caught his arm, shook it fiercely. “You’ll not telephone for any one, do you hear?” she told him hotly. “You let me alone, Wint. What do I want with a doctor!”

Wint was honestly uneasy about her. He said: “Then let me call mother. She’s a good hand to make sick people well. She--”

“No, no, not your mother,” Hetty protested. And half to herself she added: “Not your mother. She would know.”

The little phrase was profoundly revealing. “She would know.” It struck Wint like a splash of cold water in the face. “She would know.” It told so old a story. Wint understood, at last; and Hetty saw understanding in his eyes, and braced herself to defy him. But Wint only said softly:

“Hetty? That.... You poor kid! I’m so sorry.”

Hetty laughed harshly; and her face began to twist and work and assume strange contortions, and abruptly she began to cry. She turned and groped her way to the chair again, and sat down with her head pillowed on her arms on the table, and sobbed as though her heart was broken. Wint stood very still, stunned and miserable, watching her. There was no sound at all in the kitchen except the sound of Hetty’s racking, choking sobs. In the stillness, Wint could hear the even murmur of his mother’s voice, three rooms away, as she talked to Mrs. Hullis. He could almost hear the words she said. And Hetty sobbed, with her head on her arms.

Wint went across to her and touched her head with his hand; and she brushed it away with an angry gesture, as a hurt dog snarls at the hand that comes to heal its hurt. She was like a hurt animal, he thought; she was quite alone in the world. Worse than alone, for she was here in Hardiston, where every one would make her business their business. For that is the way of small towns. Wint was terribly sorry for her, terribly anxious to help her. He had no thought, in this moment, of Jack Routt’s warnings; and if he had remembered them, they would only have hardened his determination to help her. Which may have been what Jack intended.

He said: “Cry it out, Hetty. Then I want to talk to you.”

She said thickly: “Go away. Let me alone.” But Wint did not move, while she cried and cried.

He stood just beside her. Hetty at last shifted her position, so that she could look down between her arms and see his feet where he waited. She said again:

“Go away.”

Wint chuckled comfortingly. “I’m not going away,” he said. “This is the time your friends will stick by you. I’m going to stick by you.”

“I don’t want you to,” she said. “I don’t want any one to. Go away. Let me alone. Let me do what I want to.”

Wint said: “You mustn’t think this is too desperately hopeless, Hetty. I’m going to do anything I can; and mother will take care of you.”

She lifted her head at that and looked at him and laughed in a hard, disillusioned way. “A lot you know about women, Wint,” she said.

“I know that you think things are darker than they are,” he assured her. “You’ll see. We’ll manage. Mother and I.”

“Your mother’ll order me out of the house, minute she knows,” said Hetty unemotionally.

Wint protested. “No; you don’t know her. Mother couldn’t hurt any one. You’ll see. She’ll do everything.”

Hetty got up and went to work on the dishes like an automaton. She had to busy herself with something, or she would have screamed. She was trembling, hysterically astir. Wint watched her for a little; then he said:

“You’re going to let us help you.”

“All the help I’ll get will be a kick,” she said. “Your mother won’t want the like of me in her house.”

“You don’t know her,” he insisted. “Mother’s fine, underneath. She’s always doing things for people. You’ll see.”

Hetty looked at him sideways, smiling a little. “You never would believe anything was so till you’d tried it, Wint,” she told him. “But you’re pretty decent, just the same.”

He said, studying her: “You’re looking better already. Feeling better?”

She nodded. “It helps some--just to tell some one,” she admitted. “And the spell is over, anyway.”

“Having friends always helps,” he told her. “You’ll find it so.” She smiled wistfully; and he went on: “I’m going to speak to mother to-night.”

Hetty said: “Well, she’s got a right to know. I’ll pack up my things.”

“After Mrs. Hullis goes.”

“Why not tell her, too? Your mother will, first thing in the morning.”

Wint laughed. “You like to look at the black side, don’t you? I tell you, it’s going to be all right.”

She whirled to face him, and said, under her breath, with a terrible earnestness: “All right? All right? If you say that again, I’ll yell at you. You poor, nice, straight fool of a kid. You talk like I was a baby that had stubbed its toe. And all the time, I’d better be dead, dead. This is no stubbed toe, Wint. Wake up. Don’t be a--”

And abruptly she collapsed again, weeping, into the chair.

Wint said insistently: “Just the same, Hetty, you’ll see I know what I’m talking about. Things will come out better than you think.”

She cried: “Oh, get out of here. Get out of here. You poor little fool.”

Wint went up to his room. Mrs. Hullis was still with his mother. He would wait till Mrs. Hullis was gone.