Nobody's Child

Baird drew rein and looked back at the looming Mine Banks. Autumn had wielded a full brush, splashing the country with October colors, reds, warm-browns, yellows, rioting in gaudy pre-senile triumph over the resigned duns of field and pasture and the stately indifference of the never-changing cedars and pines. The bald iron-reddened forehead of the Banks, forever ferocious over man's vandalism, glared as angrily upon autumn's saturnalia as it had upon spring's tender eagerness. The venturesome tendrils of wild-grape and Virginia creeper, tolerated by the evergreens, had not dared to wind themselves about the Banks' burning forehead, and, now, unlike the more courteous evergreens, it supported none of all this brilliant decay. Not even the sumac, inconsequent reveler, had planted its crimson torch upon the Banks' bald head; only the impalpable blue haze, like the courageous wind and the rain, the sun and the snow, ventured to touch it.

Baird's eyes traveled from the Mine Banks to the pastures, then to the brilliant semicircle of woodland that curtained the Penniman house. "If I go on with it," he repeated. He turned and faced Westmore; spoke to his horse and they moved on.

Nickolas Baird, who loved to fight and to conquer, owned himself beaten. He had kept his promise to Ann: he had gone west to Dempster and had worked indefatigably throughout July, August and September, and, now, in October, they were sending him to France.

Throughout the first two months, he had written frequently to Ann, long letters sometimes, a pretty complete self-expression. She had not answered; it had been a little like writing to the dead. Early in the summer, when terribly anxious over Ann's health, he had written to Coats Penniman, and had received a courteous but reserved reply: "Sue and I wish you well," Coats had written. "We have always thought highly of you. All I can say regarding Ann is that she is steadily improving in health. Yes, she has received your letters, for I have heard her speak of them. Cold comfort this had been to Baird."

Early in August it had occurred to Baird to write Ben. The epistle he had received in return had won Baird's lasting gratitude. There was a big soul in Ben Brokaw, tenderness and loyalty and sincerity. Baird had had some conception of the patient effort Ben had expended upon that letter; he could vision the huge creature compelling himself to chair and table, the dictionary on his knee, his hairy paw cramped by a pen. Ben had told him some of the things he was yearning to know: quite unimportant things Ann said or did, sustenance, nevertheless, to a lover as starved as Baird was. Among other things, Ben wrote:

"She's not herself yet, but she's prettier nor ever, though, more growed up and stately."

Baird had not asked why Ann would not even acknowledge his letters, and Ben had not referred in any way to what lay between Ann and Baird, yet his entire letter had breathed understanding and sympathy. It had emboldened Baird to ask, "Ben, you know Ann better than any one else – tell me, is there no hope at all for me?"

Ben's answer had been cryptic:

"About your hopes – I ain't no wise judge of women, but I've noticed that some of them is just naturally born giving hearted, and some has to grow up to it. The kind that has to grow to it generally loves most to be loved. They seem to grow up to loving by being loved, that is, if they're loved the right way."

Baird had been thrown upon his own resources, as he had been when he had struggled for Ann's life. He had succeeded then in infusing her with his vitality, why could he not infuse love into her now? Those letters of Baird's to Ann were vividly honest self-expressions; the best in him went hand in hand with acute physical craving.

Then, in September, he had received a staggering blow. Ben wrote:

"Something has happened you'll want to know about. Edward Westmore's will has been made known and it's sure that he's left Ann a considerable sum of money. Westmore and one-fourth of his money he left to Judith, and the other three-fourths to be divided equal between Garvin and Sarah and Ann, Sarah's to be held in trust. In case either Garvin or Sarah should die, their portion was to be divided equal between Judith and Ann, so Ann gets half of Garvin's money right now, as well as her own. Edward's will states distinct that he is giving a Penniman this money because of wrongs done the Penniman family by the Westmore family in the past.

"There's great talk on the Ridge about it, and there's those who says that Judith sure will try to break the will on the ground that Edward couldn't have been of sound mind – that the way he did for hisself showed that, and that the will were made just before he died. But I know that Ann will get her money. It's a big thing for Ann, and I thought you'd want to know about it."

Ben had also told Baird that, a few days before, Coats and Sue had been married. "Seems like a little happiness has come to the Penniman family at last," Ben wrote.

Nickolas Baird was a thoroughgoing modern with a high appreciation of the value of money. He came of a money-winning and money-worshiping race. However, he was sturdy in his ambitions, for he had never considered marrying money, and had no particular desire to have it given to him. It was making money that fascinated him.

Ben's news had cut the ground from beneath Baird, for Ann Penniman, penniless and tied to the farm, had been a possibility; Ann, independent and with the world of men from which to choose, was another matter. Baird had been unable to write to Ann after that. He was handicapped by as complete a depression as had overtaken him after he had won her back to life. He had been straining to get a hearing; suddenly it seemed futile to attempt anything at all; she was beyond him.

But he wrote to Ben: "Thank you for telling me of Ann's good fortune. I suppose I ought to be glad, but I'm not. I feel more as if I'd had a blow on the head. I can't write to Ann or do anything – she's passed beyond my reach. I've nothing to offer her now – to save my neck, I couldn't clean up more than about twenty thousand – that and my salary. When I make my pile, I suppose I'll have courage to try again – if somebody doesn't get ahead of me, or if in the meantime I don't fall for some woman whose love is big enough for both of us."

Baird was in exactly this frame of mind as he rode up to Westmore under the October sunshine. He had fallen hard, down upon the worldly earth; upon old and familiar thoughts, trite aspirations and desires, cast there by the vision of Ann buttressed by money. The sweet thing that had permeated him had grown sick when frowned upon by cold cash. There was an ugly vacant ache in him.

"Why not?" he asked himself, as he looked at Westmore, its stuccoed length mottled by splashes of red and yellow, clinging vines and low-hung branches. Judith had never failed him. All that long summer her letters had come regularly, warmed by interest, asking nothing of him, simply giving, giving – all she felt she would be allowed to give. He had not told her that he was going to Europe. He had not even told her that he was coming out to the Ridge, for he had decided to keep away from Ann.

Then, suddenly, he had changed his mind. He would go to New York by the southern route; give himself the comfort of seeing Judith. But he would not see Ann.

XXXVIII

THE REVELATION

It seemed very natural to be welcomed by Hetty and shown into the drawing-room. "Miss Judith, she'll be surprised!" Hetty exclaimed. "Lord, Mr. Baird, you done growed thin!"

"I've had too happy a summer to grow fat, Hetty."

"Why, you ain't got married, is you?" Hetty asked seriously.

"Far from it, Hetty – you run along and tell Miss Judith I'm here. I'm in a hurry, for I have to get back to town this evening."

Baird looked about the beautiful old room. How well he knew it! It was Judith's rightful setting; he was glad she possessed the place. The fact that she was a rich woman did not trouble him at all; if he loved her greatly, he supposed it would.

Judith came presently, her light quick step in the hall, then her actual presence, welcome in every movement, her cheeks warm and eyes very bright. She was still in black, but Baird thought he had never seen her look more youthful. Or was it simply because he felt so many years older than when he last saw her?

"You here, Nickolas?" she said.

Baird took the hands she held out to him, clasped them firmly. "Yes – to say good-by for a time – I'm sailing for France day after to-morrow. I've snatched a few minutes this afternoon because I wanted to see you."

There were swift thoughts surging through Judith's brain, but her answer was spontaneous enough: "That was good of you!"

"Yes, kind to myself," Baird said lightly. "I felt urged to come."

Judith's smiling eyes had taken instant note of his appearance, and her keen perception was busied over him. He lacked buoyancy, lacked it utterly; every trace of boyishness was gone. He had aged, hardened. He had the air of a man who looks coolly and joylessly upon his future.

Judith had learned nothing from Baird's letters. He had left the Ridge very suddenly; something had gone wrong. Probably Coats had intervened, or, possibly, when she had discovered herself an heiress, Ann had failed him. Judith had the jealous woman's bitter estimate of the girl who had brought both her brothers under her sway, and had entangled Baird also. The intensity of detestation she felt for Ann sometimes sickened Judith. That Ann had won part of Edward's fortune had ground Judith's detestation to a dagger's point.

Under her brilliant exterior Judith was quivering. She had longed for the sight and touch of this man and, but for Ann, she might have recaptured him. Yet she had refrained from dealing the girl a blow. For months Judith's soul had been crisscrossed by passions and burdened by secrets. And Judith was in revolt. In revolt against conventions, against her rearing, against herself; against everything. She was typical of many women of her period; the restless craving woman of 1905 was at heart a revolutionary, and ten years of revolt have molded her into the feminist of to-day.

Judith had been resolutely considering her future. What did life, lived as she was living it, offer her? Unproductive, undeveloping middle-years and a solitary old age. She felt that she had paid her last debt to Westmore, and that the future lay before her, to be lived in different fashion – if she had the courage to make the break. She had decided to make it.

And in her visioning of the future Nickolas Baird was a prominent figure. He was an ambitious man, vastly capable, and destined for big things, and she could help him. He would not marry Ann; she felt certain that she could prevent it; it was her duty to prevent it. He would recover from his infatuation, for he was not the sort of man who would be held very long by an infatuation.

Judith had been on the point of writing to Baird her momentous decisions, and in coming to her he had given her an unexpected opportunity. The smile did not leave her lips. "I have made all the arrangements, Nickolas – I intended to write to you about it before I left – that I am going to Paris, too – in a few days."

"You leave Westmore!" Baird was too much surprised to express pleasure.

"Yes, I am leaving Westmore – and I doubt whether I shall ever return to it." Her color had risen; though she smiled, a little of the bitterness she felt edged her words.

"I imagine it must be desolate for you here – but you, out of this setting – I can't conceive of it exactly." Then it occurred to Baird what this move of hers would mean to them both; a continued intimacy, certainly. The vague motives that had brought him to her prompted the quick addition: "We'll meet in Paris then, Judith – we'll see it together."

Though undefined, there was a suggestion both in his words and his manner that affected Judith curiously, urging her to a sudden defiant candor. What had her restrained, conventional life won for her? Nothing more than expressions of gallant admiration; never the vital gripping thing. "My setting!" she said scornfully. "A woman reared as I have been has no more freedom of will than a walled-in prisoner! She's a perfect slave, bound to the past and handed over hand-tied into the future. From now on, I'm going to live. I am going to know countries, and nations, and women and men – more as a man knows them. I'm going to think as I please and live as I please. Not even the past is going to dictate my future!" She had flung out her resolve, body tense and head high.

Baird studied her; she had both surprised and amused him. Though not widely experienced, he had met this sort of revolt degenerated into mere free-living. Baird considered himself broad-minded, but he had not passed beyond the conception that a woman's assertion of free thought and action invariably meant that she was considering – as he would have expressed it to himself – "going on the loose."

But Judith Westmore, with her monumental pride and her immense self-respect and her narrowly conventional rearing, talking of becoming a free-lance! She didn't know what she was talking about; she could no more do it than she could fly. She would see Paris – the world and its peoples, for that matter – and "men," as conventionally as her class and kind always saw them. She was simply worn into exasperation by Westmore troubles – and her love for him. The thing was laughable – and a little sad.

It was Baird's very genuine admiration and liking for Judith that was responsible for this conclusion. To almost any other attractive woman who had tempted his present uncertain mood, he would have answered, and meaningly, "Well, why not?" But to Judith he said kindly and amusedly, "I don't wonder you want to throw all this off and get out into breathing space. It'll do you good to get a change. I don't believe you'll paint Paris a vivid red, though, Judith, even if I tried to help you do it."

It was evident that he had not taken her seriously, and Judith decided that it was as well that he had not done so; she had said much more than she had intended to say. The future was before them, and he would discover soon enough that she was in deadly earnest. He would find a changed woman when they met in Paris.

She regained her usual bright manner. "I'm glad you're not too shocked to continue our acquaintance. I hope you'll come to see me in Paris, and then you can tell me what you think of my new way of life."

Baird smiled. "Of course I'll come."

She was very beautiful as she stood there, head high and with the color of defiance still warming her cheeks. The ugly ache in Baird reminded him that, at a few words from him, her structure of independence would crumble. She would marry him to-morrow if he asked her, and give him an immense devotion. His flush deepened into a dull red.

Judith wondered of what he was thinking so absorbedly. Of Ann? Mentally, she had passed on to the other decision she had reached. "Nickolas, you knew, of course, that Edward remembered Ann Penniman very generously in his will?" she asked.

Baird started and stiffened. "Yes, so I understand."

"Do you still care about her?.. I wouldn't ask unless I had a good reason."

Baird had not realized that anything could hurt so keenly as this questioning. His thoughts of a moment ago had vanished at the first mention of Ann's name. "Yes, I love her just the same."

"But things haven't gone very smoothly, I am afraid, Nickolas?"

"No – they haven't… I love Ann – she doesn't love me."

"I doubt whether she is capable of loving anybody, very much," Judith said quietly. "I hear that she is going to take her little fortune and leave the Ridge – educate herself; first of all, for she is ambitious… You mean to see her before you go, I suppose?"

"Yes."

Baird did not know why he said it; he had meant to go without seeing Ann. But, from the depths of him, the "Yes" came, resonant with determination.

Judith grew dead white, for what she meant to say next was of tragically serious import. And it was not jealousy alone that actuated her. She spoke very slowly and clearly. "I'm sorry to hurt you, Nickolas – I'm certain you don't know – but if you really mean to persist, if you intend to try to persuade Ann to marry you, you ought to know. She may risk not telling you, she may not tell any man whom she wants to marry, and let him in for disgrace in the future, for any amount of undreamed-of trouble… Ann is not Coats Penniman's daughter, Nickolas… Edward, my brother, was Ann's father."

Judith was looking directly into Baird's eyes, and she saw how curiously they widened and grayed. She watched the blood drain from his face. In spite of the passions warring in her, Judith's love for Baird was a very complete thing. She suffered as she watched him. She felt that she had hurt him terribly.

Baird moved at last, looked down at the floor. "I can't realize it – at once – all it means – " he muttered.

Judith continued. "You see, Nickolas, Edward was only a boy, he was only twenty-one, and he was madly in love with Marian Penniman – and she with him. She was a very pretty girl, with Ann's same dangerous allure about her. You know the family quarrel? They met secretly – my father knew nothing about it, neither did Mr. Penniman – until it was too late. Edward was a nice boy, he loved Marian and he wanted to marry her. There was fearful trouble. Mr. Penniman and my father quarreled violently. My father swore that no Westmore should marry a Penniman, and Mr. Penniman was as determined that no daughter of his should owe anything to a Westmore. Edward would have run away with her if he could, but Mr. Penniman guarded his house with a shotgun, and between them all they married Marian to her cousin, Coats Penniman, just to save her good name. Coats loved her – he honestly wanted to help her, so it was a marriage only in name. It was a wretched business. It killed Marian, I believe, and it almost killed Edward." Judith's voice quivered with deep feeling. "Poor Edward!.. And, in the end, he's sacrificed for his family's sins – "

Baird had heard Judith's explanation, his senses mechanically grasped what she said, while he pondered the thing which was of such tremendous import to him. When Judith had finished, he was still pale, but collected enough.

He looked very steadily at Judith when he asked his questions. "Did Garvin know Ann's relationship to him?"

"No. Mr. Penniman, Coats and Sue, and Edward and myself – we were the only ones who knew… And Ben Brokaw knew. I think Ben guessed rather than knew – way back in the beginning. And from the beginning he's been like a father to Ann, I mean in feeling – much more so than Coats."

"And Ann didn't know?"

"Not till Edward told her. Ben says Edward told her, for the first time, on the afternoon of his death… I don't know just what Edward had in mind for her – certainly to take her away from the farm, and perhaps to adopt her. I know he would never have made the truth known – he would guard the Westmore name too carefully for that."

There was coldness in Judith's assertion, a discounting of Ann. Judith Westmore had the southern aristocrat's pitiless contempt for the illegitimate. It was the heritage of the negro, the curse of the South, but why think about it? Nothing would have compelled her to countenance Ann.

Baird understood, but he made no comment. He prepared to go, and smiled when he took Judith's hand. "Thank you for telling me – you have done me a kindness. It's settled that we next meet in Paris, and happily, I hope… By the way, I must have your address."

Judith gave it to him. She wished that she could keep him long enough to smooth away the last few painful moments. It had certainly been a shock to him, but it would be salutary. He was very cool-headed; he would think it over, and from all angles; and he would not go to Ann.

When Baird had circled the lawn and had reached the road below, he looked back. Judith still stood where he had left her, on the steps of the portico. She waved to him, and he lifted his hat. Then his eyes traveled over Westmore. It was a beautiful old place… And the proudly arched brows of Edward Stratton Westmore, first Westmore of Westmore, had been transmitted unto Ann!

When he turned to open country, Baird's face was set and resolute.

XXXIX

"WILL YOU GO WITH ME?"

Baird walked slowly down the cedar avenue, for he was waiting. Then he chose a spot beneath the trees, where the branches hung so low that they shut out the country, and sat down. By leaning forward he could look up and down the avenue, otherwise he was shut away from the world, canopied by a leafy tent. And the evening was closing in early.

Sue had told Baird that Ann would return from the village by way of the avenue. As he waited, Baird remembered the first time he had ridden up between the cedars, light-heartedly determined to discover Ann. That had been a boy's quest. He was still seeking to discover Ann, a man now, anxious and tensely determined.

It seemed a very long time before he saw her at the end of the avenue, driving slowly, her cape about her shoulders, but with hood thrown back. He saw the black and white contrasts of face and hair first, before her features grew distinct. She was leaning back, with reins lax and eyes lowered. Even when he came out into the road, she did not look up; he had time in which to see what the last three months had done to her, that they had brought back much of the old roundness and softness to chin and lips, and fulness and warmth to her throat. The beautiful arch and sweep of her brows, her Westmore inheritance, was even more pronounced. Ben was right, she had grown more arrestingly beautiful.

Baird let the horse pass him, he was abreast of the buggy when she looked up and saw him. Her convulsive jerk of the reins stopped the horse, and Baird came to her, looking directly into her eyes.

"Ann Westmore," he said.

She sat motionless for a full moment, then she answered, very low, "You know, then."

"And you thought that would matter to me?"

"Yes."

The color swept into his face. "So that's why you sent me away, and would have none of me all summer!" He drew back. "Will you come with me now, where I can talk to you, or will you drive on with your Westmore and Penniman pride and leave me to travel alone?"

Ann looked down at the reins, then up, straight up the avenue, a long enough moment to vision the future. Her thoughts, whatever they were, drew the color of surprise from her face. Then she looked at Baird, lips parted a little and eyes blank, like one frightened by what she had seen.

"Will you come?" Baird repeated.

"Yes." She dropped the reins and moved vaguely, as if to get out on the other side, but Baird reached in and lifted her, held her up, as he had once before, long enough to look steadily into her troubled eyes.

Then he set her down. "Come this way – I'll take my answer, whatever it's to be, here – not in the middle of the road."

He guided her to the spot he had chosen. "We'll fight it out here," he said in the same controlled way, though his eyes were alight.

Ann complied in silence, not confusedly, absently rather, as if too completely engrossed by her thoughts either to speak or to object. She sat with hands lax and eyes vague.

Baird studied her, trying to determine just how to begin: by telling her the truth about himself first of all, he decided, though he longed to set that aside until he had captured the one all-important thing.

He began abruptly. "Judith told me about your father and mother, the whole history, and I hoped that was the reason you had sent me away – that you thought it would matter to me… I can match you history for history: my father and mother found each other much as yours did, in spite of their different religions, which was quite as insurmountable a difficulty as Edward and your mother faced. My mother was a Jewess and my father an Irish Catholic. They lived together two years, and then, because I had come, they went before a justice of the peace and gave me my father's name. To their way of thinking they weren't a bit more married than they had ever been. Love had married them and they had clung to each other in spite of everything. I've often thought, when I've seen the children a loveless marriage has brought into the world, that I've had the best of it – that those children must be wanting in some way. I never fully realized how much the mere legality of a marriage means to people like your people until I listened to Judith this afternoon… So, you see, Ann, it doesn't matter to me. It matters a good deal more to me that you've suffered because of the narrow prejudices of your people. You told the collie, when you hugged and kissed him, in the barn, that first day I talked to you, that he and Ben were the only ones that loved you. You have gone hungry and thirsty – that's been the trouble with you."