Norton, Andre - Novel 23 Read online

  The older girl believed that her own education well exceeded that of those girls her own age whom she had known in Boston and Sussex. She had taken to book knowledge eagerly from the time she had learned to read at four. But at least in this one subject Damaris far outstripped her, and spoke with the authority of a collector of many years standing.

  "Captain Whaley taught you all this?" she asked at last, her amazement leading her once more to questions.

  "He and the Princess—she knows—" Damaris flushed. Her hand flew to cover her own mouth, as if to smother the words. But she had already uttered them. Now she looked frightened, almost as if she were ready to burst into tears. All her authority was stripped from her. Again, she was only a Httle girl, suddenly fearful. "I—you must not ask me! Please, don't ask me!" The face she turned to Saranna was piteous, and Saranna restrained her curiosity.

  "It's all right, Damaris. I won't ask you anything you do not want to tell me," she said quietly, soothingly.

  "I—I remember things very well. Grandfather always said

  I did," Damans obviously was trying to regain her self-confidence. "He said I had a quick mind. And he taught me how to learn with my fingers. He would tie his handkerchief around my eyes and give me something to hold—a piece of jade, or a bowl, or one of the bronze horses. Then he would tell me to feel it all over, so my fingers would learn how it should be. Afterward, he would bring out things—things like Mr. Fowke called trash—those the Chinese make to sell to foreigners who don't know about the real treasures. And he would have me feel those, too. So I would get to know the difference. It was a game we played. I was good at doing it. Grandfather said."

  "Do you still do it?"

  Damaris' eyes slid away hurriedly. "Sometimes. Maybe I can show you—but you have to be real careful."

  Saranna looked around her at the delicate porcelain, the carved jade, the burnished lacquer. She was not quite sure she wanted to take the responsibility of that game. To handle such pieces was a danger.

  "I like Mr. Fowke," Damaris changed the subject, "even if he is probably going to marry Honora. I wish he wouldn't, he's too nice for her—much too nice!"

  She touched a fingertip to the edge of a shallow bowl of a soft green shade, across the surface of which was spread a single flowering branch in white.

  "Honora is a Nu Wu" she added.

  "And what is that?"

  "A witch. She witches people so they do what she tells them. She witched my father so he wouldn't listen to anybody but her. But she couldn't ever witch Grandfather—he knew what she was. He said she was a Nu Hsing Kuei. That's a kind of demon. The Chinese have big screens at the doors of their houses so the demons can't get in. Demons have to fly in straight lines, you see," Damaris continued seriously, as if the lore she now recited was as authentic as that she had known concerning her grandfather's collection, "So if you have a screen, they just strike against that and can't ever enter. It was too bad we did not have one of those here at Tiensin when Honora came."

  "Damaris, there are no such things as demons.”

  The younger girl shook her head. "You don't know, Saranna, really you don't. My grandfather said there were a lot of things in this world that men laugh at until they meet them face to face. I've—" Again she paused, flushing.

  "Anyway, maybe you're right that Honora isn't any ghost-demon. But she can make a lot of trouble."

  They went out of the last of the rooms which held the collection and Damaris closed the door carefully behind them.

  "Damaris," asked Saranna suddenly, "what does the word mei mean? Is it Chinese?"

  She tried to give the word sound the same accent as it had held in her dream. But she was not sure that she had succeeded.

  "Mei?" Damaris repeated.

  Saranna recognized the slightly different inflection.

  "Yes, that is it!"

  "It means Younger Sister! But where did you hear it?"

  A Chinese word, why had it come into her dream? Surely it was not one which Damaris had used in her hearing. Before she thought, Saranna answered with the truth.

  "In a dream—a dream about the hedge wall, and the foxes' eyes shining there. Then a voice called that word."

  Damaris moved away from her with a jerk. The child's face was contorted with the same scowl she had shown when she found Saranna examining the brush rest.

  "It's a trick!" she cried. "You couldn't have heard that! You wouldn't be allowed— Only me— Only me—" She whirled around and before Saranna could say a word, she ran down the hall, banging through the door at the far end.

  "Missie up to her tricks, eh? She's touched in the head, she is."

  Saranna looked over her shoulder. Rufe lounged in the doorway of the breakfast room, one shoulder supported by the door frame. He grinned at her lazily.

  "Miss Honora, she said you might fancy a turn on the river, or maybe a walk m the garden. Says I'm to make myself agreeable. That's no hard thing. Miss Saranna. I just have a likin' to be agreeable to a pretty girl like you now—"

  With some of the same speed Damaris had shown, Saranna reached the stairway and started up, making no answer. Surely Honora could not intend for her to show this loutish boy any encouragement. There was something about the way he watched her which made her shrink—but not visibly, she hoped. She wanted never to let him think that he had the power to frighten her.

  But that he did, Saranna could not deny as she found herself in her room, shutting not only the door, but turning the key in the lock before she was thinking clearly again. She must make Honora understand that she would have nothing to do with Rufe Parton. In the meantime, Saranna put her hands to her flushed face—what was she going to do? She could not remain locked in her room, letting Rufus Parton believe that he had penned her there. What was the matter? She could not even understand her own aversion to him. That emotion was so much deeper, and therefore more frightening, than any dislike she had known before in her serenely ordered life.

  6

  CHIEN-DIFFICULTY

  Saranna settled in a chair near one window. She forced herself to think calmly; that her situation was going to be uncomfortable, she knew. Honora's horrifying suggestion that Rufus play her escort was even a threat. She could not stay forever in her own chamber, though when Honora's company arrived that apparently was what would be asked of her. And why did Honora want to keep her out of sight?

  Saranna glanced around at the mirror of the wardrobe door. By that painfully accurate witness, she was indeed a shabby, poor relation, yes. But she had a suspicion that Honora, if she pleased, might easily remedy that. And certainly Saranna's looks, or lack of looks, were such that Honora could have no fear that this stranger in her rusty black could outshine the beautiful and accomplished daughter of Jethro Stowell.

  She sat up straight now, her shoulders squared back. No, she would keep out of the way of Honora's guests, that was a small matter. But that she should be kept captive in her room because of Rufus Parton—that she must not allow!

  What she should be considering with her full attention was means of escape from a situation which at best was disagreeable and at worst— Saranna shivered. She could not put into words what she felt beyond the fact that fear lay at its core. And she was so alone. There was no one here at Tiensin to whom she could appeal for aid. Millie was friendly, but in a timid, helpless fashion. And certainly Damans might be as much a victim as herself—

  Victim? Why did that word come into her mind? Why was this shadowy feelmg of danger so much a part of her now, as if it enwrapped her with a visible cloud of darkness?

  She arose abruptly. Whether she liked it or not, she was aware that her mother's daughter could not dismiss the problem of Damaris as none of her concern. Was Jethro Damaris' only guardian? Did Honora have full control over the child's future durmg her father's absence? With the way Damaris talked so wildly of Honora being a witch, or a demon—let anyone hear that and they might readily believe Honora's own estimation of her stepdaughter
's condition.

  When she thought of Damaris, Saranna could forget Rufus Parton's sly, leering grin, and push off her uneasiness. She unlocked the door with defiant purpose, went down the hall to stand before Damaris' chamber where she tapped gently on the closed panel. Even though there was no answer, Saranna felt her mission important enough to try the knob. It turned easily under her hand.

  "Damaris," the older girl called softly from the threshold.

  By the clear light of day she could see the contents of the chamber much better than she had on her earlier visit. The fingers of sunbeams touched upon wall panels of the same aged and exotic embroidery as lightened the walls of the hallway without. What Saranna had taken to be a four-poster bed on her first visit, she now perceived to be something else. The piece had four posts to be sure, but carved work built around three sides in screen fashion made it appear more a small inner room than a bed, now that the curtains which had veiled it were looped up for the day.

  All the furniture was set out in odd formality, mainly paired pieces back against the walls. Twin wardrobes of a dark, heavy wood, showing golden threaded fibers when the sun touched the second on one comer, the well-polished surface reflecting the light, stood parted by a small square table on which were carved boxes. The next wall was broken by a dull red chest, its outer surface painted with a time-dulled and fanciful scene. By the bed was a table on which rested a number of smaller boxes, a slab of worked stone, and a small vase in which was a single sprig of green at an angle, the arrangement very simple but somehow attractive, far more so than the crowded vases of flowers Saranna had always been used to. There was a stool on the opposite side of the table from the bed

  But of Damaris herself there appeared no sign. Saranna would have withdrawn, uneasy at her own intrusion. Then the child she sought moved out from behind the shadowed corner of the bed.

  She held a bunch of what appeared small, thin wands in one hand, as if she had been interrupted at some task, but her expression was no longer hostile. Instead, there was a measuring of watchfulness in her eyes.

  "Kuei-Fu-Lu-Li—" The strange words might have been a greeting. "I knew you would come—you had to," Damaris stated almost impatiently. She might have been awaiting some tardy guest, ready to begin a ceremony—

  Ceremony? That word flitted through Saranna's mind. She was now aware of the scent, elusive, but still to be noticed in the room—spicy—different— Not a flower— What?

  "Why did I have to?" That simple question came to her lips first.

  "Because—because—it is willed. I know that now. You— somehow you are a part of it. I—I'm going to throw the wands. Of course—I'm not a real hsueh che, a scholar who knows all the readings. But—well, I'm going to try.*'

  She turned to the table by the bed, and quickly shoved all the objects on it to the far side, leaving bare that portion of it which was in the clearest light. With both hands then she caressed the small wands she held, closing her eyes, muttering words so faintly that they reached Saranna only as unintelligible sounds.

  Suddenly, she tossed the wands from her so that they fell on the table. She hastened to move them so that they made a pattern in six horizontal bars, one above the other. Completely mystified, Saranna moved closer. Now she saw that while some of the wands were of a uniformly dark color, others were broken in two by light bands.

  ''Chien —" Damaris leaned over the wands, her attitude one of reading. "Struggling with great difficulties—yes, but friends come to help— Oh," the child's expression changed as if she were not angered, nor intent on what she was doing, but rather as if she were distressed at some inability of her own. "I cannot read—not like—" She shook her head. "There is so much to learn, and I don't know enough." She swept the wands back together in her grasp. "I must ask—“ Once more her gaze swept toward Saranna and she stopped short.

  "What—what are you trying to do?" Saranna thought she dared ask that question, even though, with Damaris, she must be very careful indeed.

  "I was trying I Ching —to find out— To find out what is going to happen. Only," her answer now held a note of despair, "I don't know enough. Not how to read the Yarrow sticks, maybe not even how to toss them properly. I've only watched it before. I've never really tried to do it myself."

  "I Ching—“

  Damaris nodded vigorously. "It's an old, old way of telling one's future. Grandfather—he knew how—a little. The Princess, she—"

  Her eyes went wide with what Saranna could only read as pure fear. Once more, as she had done before, Damaris clapped one hand over her mouth. "I said it! I told!" her voice was near a wail.

  As much as Saranna wanted to pierce the mystery which Damaris cherished, she could not press the child further, her distress was far too evident.

  "I won't ask you any more questions," she said. "But, Damaris, surely you know that no one is really able to read the future—"

  Now that look of distress changed to one which mingled scorn and pity.

  "There's a lot of things you don't know either!" Damaris returned with her usual self-confidence. "You'll learn—if you stay here. Know what I heard her say?”

  She rolled the wands into a tight bundle and slid them back into a bag of scarlet silk embroidered with gold thread. That the "her" she spoke of meant Honora, Saranna had no doubt.

  "She wants Rufe to beau you around; she told Mrs. Parton that!" Saranna betrayed, she hoped, no reaction on that statement.

  "I am sure Honora made no such remark before you."

  "I told you," Damaris continued. "I listen—I have to. With her around one must. She always gets her way, or thinks she is going to. Do you want Rufe to beau you?”

  "Listening is wrong, Damaris," Saranna gave lip service to her own traming. But she was in no doubt at all about the truth of what Damaris had blurted out. Honora must have made just some such statement to the housekeeper. Her own suspicions, thus reinforced, brought about real inner dismay. Only this was the enlightened nineteenth century. Girls, in spite of the disadvantages of being much under the control of relatives and guardians, could not be thrust into some situations against their wills. And if a strong will were needed to protect herself against such an encroachment upon her own privacy, Saranna could certainly summon such.

  Damaris laughed. "That made you think, didn't it? I could see you didn't like to hear that. It was good of me, really, to tell you, you know. Now you can be ready when she tries some of her tricks. And she will, she always does—“

  "Damaris," Saranna spoke with what she hoped was emphasis enough to make the younger girl listen and heed. "You must remember your grandfather's advice and not provoke Honora. I do not know how much power she has over your future, but—"

  "Jethro Stowell is my guardian. He says what is done here, until I am grown up."

  "But Jethro is in Brazil. He will be there a long time," Saranna reminded her. "Is—is there someone else—besides Honora—who can decide your way of living here?"

  Damaris regarded her with a long, searching look before she answered. Her tongue tip swept over her lower lip as if her mouth had gone suddenly dry. Then she nodded.

  "There's someone—someone who can take care of the Nu Wu—''

  "Who?" Saranna demanded.

  Now Damaris shook her head with the same vigor as she had nodded.

  "That's a secret Grandfather's own secret. Only I know now—"

  "It may be important for me to know too, in the future." Saranna was exasperated.

  "I know. That's all that's important. You'd better think of Rufe and what you are going to do about him." She laughed a little maliciously. "Me—I'm going to dust the porcelain. Mrs. Parton and the maids—Grandfather said never leave it to them. Butterfingers—that's what most of them are!" She skipped past Saranna to open the door and slip out. The older girl had no recourse but to follow her. Before she could even call to Damaris, the child was already halfway down the stairs and Saranna felt it wiser not to try to follow her at that moment.
>
  Saranna had no idea how she would handle the problem of Rufus Parton, but she was not going to let him intimidate her, she made up her mind to that. She was going to walk in the garden. If he appeared there, to again make himself objectionable, she would snub him in a manner which would pierce even his thick skin.

  But it was the sharp cry of pain which led her to Rufus. That the cry came from an animal, Saranna never doubted and she hurried toward it, certain that some poor creature was in great trouble. So she ran, from one of the alleys of clipped box which walled the garden path, into the open.

  There were two figures before her, intent upon a fox which was struggling wildly to escape from a net, the ends of which were held by a black youth. While Rufus Parton, his face flushed, his small eyes shining with a kind of greedy delight, rained blows with a riding crop on the animal! Its yelps of pain were echoed by laughter on Rufe's part, and, as the crop rose and fell with a horrible regularity, Saranna could only believe that he was engaged in a slow and horrible process of beating the animal to death.

  She did not hesitate to rush forward, and Rufus did not see her, so intent was he in making sure that the animal could not evade the crop. Thus her grasp upon his arm was so forceful and determined that he actually swung part way around, unable for an instant or two of surprise to break free.

  Saranna shouted at the black boy. "Let it go! Let it go— at once!"

  The fox, seeming to realize her support instantly, lunged, though still within the net, snarling at the black. With a cry of fear, he dropped his hold, and jumped back. Out of the meshes which had held it for that outrageous punishment, the creature won—and was gone, slipping under the box hedge where no man could possibly crawl to track it.