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A Touch Of Sun
by
Miss Benedet looked at the clock, lifting her eyebrows wearily. “I have lost my train,” she remarked, but added no reproaches. “Is there an evening train to the city?”
“Not from here,” Mrs. Thorne replied; “but we could send you over to Colfax to catch the night train from there. I hoped we could have you another day.”
“That would be impossible,” said Miss Benedet; “but I shall be giving you a great deal of trouble.”
“Oh, no; it is only ten miles. Mr. Thorne will take you; we will both take you. It is a beautiful drive by moonlight through the woods. Was I wrong not to call you?”
“If you were, you will be punished by having me on your hands this long, hot afternoon. I ought to have gone last night. When one has parted with the very last bit of one’s self, one should make haste to remove the shell.”
“Then you would have left me with something remaining on my mind, something I must get rid of at once. Come, let us go where we cannot see each other’s faces. I am deeply in the wrong concerning you.”
Mrs. Thorne went on incriminating herself so darkly in her preface that when she came to the actual offense her confessor smiled. “I am so relieved!” she exclaimed. “This is much more like real life. I felt you must be keeping something back, or, if not, I could never live up to such a pitch of generosity. I am glad you did not reach it all at once.”
“But what becomes of the truth–the story as it should have been told to Willy? Oh, I have sinned, for want of patience, of faith–not against you, dear, but my son!”
After a silence Miss Benedet said, “Now for the heart of my own weakness. Suppose that I did have a hope. Suppose that I had laid the responsibility upon you, the parents, hoping that you would decide for happiness, mere happiness, without question of desert or blame. And suppose you had defended me to him. Would that have been best? Where then would be his cure? Now let us put away all cowardice, for him as well as for ourselves. Happiness for him could have but one foundation. You have told him the facts; if he cannot bear them as all the world knows them, that is his cure. I thank you. You knew where to put the knife.”
“Oh, but this is cruel!” said the mother. “I don’t want to be your judge. You have had your punishment, and you took it like a queen. Now let us think of Willy!”
“Please!” said the girl. “I cannot talk of this any more. We must stop sometime.”
The time of twilight came; the gasping house flung open doors and windows to the night. Mr. Thorne pursued his evening walk alone among the fruits and vegetables, counting his egg-plants, and marking the track of gophers in his rows of artichokes. The women were strolling toward the hill. Miss Benedet had put on a cloth skirt and stiff shirt-waist for her journey, and suffered from the change, but did not show it. Her beauty was not of the florid or melting order. Mrs. Thorne regarded her inconsolably, noting with distinct and separate pangs each item of her loveliness, as she moved serene and pale against the dark, resonant green of the pines. They followed a foot-path back among the trees to a small gate or door in the high boundary fence. Mrs. Thorne tried it to see if it were locked.
“Willy used to live, almost, on this hill when he came out for his vacations.” She spoke dreamily, as if thinking aloud. “He slept in that tent. It looks like a little ghost to me these nights in the moonlight, the curtains flap in such a lonely way. That gate was his back door through the woods to town. His wheel used to lean against this tree. I miss his fair head in the sun, and his white trousers springing up the hill. But one cannot keep one’s boy forever. You have made him a man, my dear.”