THE STEPMOTHER.

Otago Witness, Issue 3774, 13 July 1926, Page 80

THE STEPMOTHER.

By Mart Matim. (Copyright.—Fob thk Witness.) “Rye, where ever did you put my collars this week?” “Rye,” from the back room, “Rye, what’s the lawnmower doing out there uncovered? It’s beginning to rain.” “Rye,” a bellow from outside, “Come and help me pull down the net.” And irom the doorway, a creak, “Rye, I’ve cut my finger.” «£he put her hands to her head with a sudden wild gesture. Why had she done it? W T hy? If she read about them in a book she wouldn’t have believed it; she couldn’t have believed it. If it weren’t for little Tom—little Tom had never been like them. He was like her father. Ah well, it was too late now. Sometimes she meditated going. Matthew had meant so well when he condemned her to stay with them. Little Tom was to get his share only if she stayed on with his family by his first wife. “I could earn for him,” she said to the lawyer, “I know I could. And it’s not a good atmosphere for him.'* They either spoil him or tease him. He’s my only child, and I wouldn’t count it any trouble at all to work for him.” Her dark, unhappy eyes searched his face for a hint yielding her child to her—but the lawyer had shaken his head. “It’s only natural that Bird wished to keep uthe two families together. Besides, have you the right to take him away? Have you any expectations of your own that you could replace the legacy you would cause him to loose by taking him away?” It was in his office they had talked it over. He was a busy man, in a hurry to get the talk ended and fulfil another engagement. She did not seem to hear him, so he repeated the question. She shook her head dumbly. “Then would it be wise, Mrs Bird? Besides, you have the company of Mr Bird’s daughter and the three boys. The daughter must be somewhere about your own age, I think.” “A year older!” “I see. Well, she seems a charming girl.” She smiled faintly. The 6mile annoyed him. He found Barbara Bird a fine little sport. This pale-faced girl'with the miserable eyes would not be likely to understand or sympathise with the athletic type. ‘‘How old is your son?” “Two,” very briefly. His sharp face was even less pleasing to her. Matthew had been stricken suddenly, and she had called in the nearest lawyer when he gasped the word. They had blamed her for that, too. Matthew would never have made that will if he had had time to think it out. Why, it made her their servant. She got an income which she lost if she left them. It wasn’t like Matthew, that will. She came back to herself with a start. She must bind Charlie’s knee. She did it swiftly and deftly. “Yah! Yeh made it too tight. Never do anything the right way!” It was an echo of Hugh, who w as his hero. Hugh came in at the moment, grumbling about the collars. “You go to the Chow at this end, just because its nearer. And these are as yellow as butter”—he. held out the slighted collars. She remembered the lawnmower and ran out to cover it. On the way she heard Barbara. “For heaven’s sake, hurry. Whatever have you been doing? I’m not going to pull and drag at this thing by myself.” She helped with the net, wordlessly and deliberately “How about my linen frock? Did you get it ironed?” “No!” • “Well, I don’t know what on earth you do all day. We got Lizzie to help you, but you don’t do much to repay us. We’d be better on our own with a competent housekeeper.” Half an hour later Margaret Hanson called to take her to tennis. “Wait on. Marge, Rye’s just finishing my frock. Marr-ia, Maria ! Hurry up !** It was their sporting fashion to give her before strangers—with feline name she hated. Rye was sweet—but Maria! Lizzie, the tweeny, put a towselled head in at the door. “Please, Mum, he’s strayed somewheres. He was here a minit ago, and I jes' took my eyes off him for a second and he, was gone—in the flick of an eye.” That meant a hunt down the street, and a small whipping for Tommy for wandering afield. She found him two streets away and led him home, accompanied by appropriate music. “Got no one in our place. Got no one in our place, and Hecky Gray's got a big boat with a sail on it.” Toys wouldn’t keep him home. She’d tried that. It was company he craved, poor, fearless little Tom. She felt the small bones of his hand, knuckle by knuckle, with a storm of tenderness. His little brown hands, so like her own father’s! Well, her father would never see him. She was on her own in the world. She came back to get the cold tea of pressed tongue and cool green salad, and ice-cream and fruits. It was a dainty tea. She had barely struggled into her fresh black when Hugh came back with his

friend. John Pigeon, a youth as sleek at himself. “Call us when it’s ready, Rye; and I say, get those snaps, will you ? I want to show them to John.” That meant going up the stairs again. Charlie came in* behind her. “That bandage fell off,” he said loudly and reproachfully, just as Barbara and Jim Sesson came through the door. The lawyer laughed. “Was it your fault, Mrs Bird? He sounds pipped.” “We’ll say so!” Her voice was even. “Be a sport, Charlie,” Barbara said quickly. “I’m sure Maria did her best.” Her tone disparaged Maria’s best. Charlie said darkly, “I like that,” but, though he was the youngest, he was faith, ful to the Bird motto, “Hang together before strangers.” And Barbara had warned him before she went out about disgracing her before this particular stranger. Ralph came in with a contemporary of 16, a thin, slouching boy. John Pigeon, who was well known to be Barbara’s for the nod, glowered at Sesson. Barbara, more pronouncedly, did not glower at Sesson. She talked of golf, of tennis, of fishing even, though she had done little of that. Little Tom ate earnestly, expansively, and gloomily. He hated these teas where no one noticed him. He was too young to know that already ne was company to a mother who was equally unnoticed. To-night she was unusually grave. Charlie’s'- insolence before Sesson burned her. She was 22. She would have to live on there as long as one of them wanted a home. The will stated that. Tom got his share when he was 21. That seemed a lifetime away. | She helped the tweeny to clear away. The others went to the courts. £he was straightening the room when John Pigeon walked in. “Barbara says you can’t be persuaded to play tennis, but you can play a bit. Hugh and Ralph both have to go out and Charlie says his knees are too sore. Will you make up the set?” She smiled. “Yes, I will come!” They played Barbara and Sesson. She began quietly, but by the end she had them dazzled. i “I thought it was only a bit you played, Mrs Bird?” “I play with Charlie I used to play a lot before I married.” Figeon’s eyes were on Barbara. “You look as young as she does,” he said. Sesson also remarked on her youth. “Oh, she’s fairly young,” eaid Barbara. “She was infatuated with dad, and he was flattered into it.” “As things stand, your step-mother cannot re-marry.” Sesson felt her stiffen. “No, I suppose the money for Tom would hold her here,” said Barbara. “We’d be much more comfortable with a competent housekeeper, but I -wouldn’t say that to anyone but you.” Going home that night, Sesson thought, “It’s strange that none of them like her. Must be something wrong somewhere.” He did not know of the Bird motto: “Love and hate together.” A certain clannishness had been nurtured in them by an ailing mother, who knew her reign would be short, and feared that her place would be soon filled. “Wait till you get a stepmother, you’ll soon forget me,” the poor, tortured soul would say. The stepmother reaped the fruits of those querulous prophecies. He went there often after that. Barbara’s little deferential ways with him were flattering after seeing her curtness with others. She wore her brown hair in a thick, smooth shingle. One night Mrs Bird appeared with her, shining black curls clipped. She was not tall, and she looked like a boy. “She must be thinking of a second match,” said Barbara to Sesson. “You would think she might consider us a little, with Charlie so young. The rest of us can take care of ourselves, but Ralph is delicate, and she should consider dad’s wishes a little.” Sesson had a few minutes with her as they fixed a net. “Any more content here?” Her black eyes shone, her black curls shone. “I have a feeling, an absurd sort of feeling, that Im going to be released.” “Just a presentiment?” His eyes were hard. “No! I thought of a way. It was a hard way, but I have hopes,” she went to greet Jack Pigeon, and hail him for a game. “Is Pigeon rich?” said Sesson to Barbara. “Fairly! Expectations!” There was a certain self-consciousness in the words. “Johnny’s nose is out of joint these days,” said Charlie, with raucous meaning. Barbara swung round: “Go away, you little rip!” But she wasn’t very angry; and her eyes invited comment. Two months later she spoke in a different strain. “John's devoted to Maria now. She isn’t proud. Everybody knows she’s a second fiddle.” And from the courts floated Maria’s grave, sweet voice. “Jack, you old dreamer!” Sesson strolled up when the game was dona. “How’s ths j>vesen4ln«BM* ,

“A presentiment's a bad thing,” she told him, “this is good, and now I have poniething even better.” “What is that?” “Well, you see, Fve thought it all out, and even if release never comes, even if they never grow kinder, I must on. Some people get what they want m this world, others don’t. I’m one of the ‘don’tß.’ And there’s a curious kind of happiness in doing the hard thing. It’s—well—serenity—l’ve found it in giving up my own way.” The email, tilted face challenged his mockery. He had never known her epeak so much before. “What are you gassing about, Maria ?” It was that lovely child, Charlie. She bit her lip. Humiliation is the test of exaltation. Sesson looked at him, looked at him once, looked at him twice* and in a manner that earned him a lifelong enmity, for this sweet youth was more faithful in' his hates than in his loves. Barbara came up. “What’s the matter, Chari?” “She knows. And you look out, Barb, she’s got the second one from you.” The exquisite, delicate candour of this warning stunned his listeners. Hugh came up. “What’s the damage?” Barbara said sharply: “Oh, Maria and Charlie again. She’s always nagging him.” Charlie, still doubtful after his last daring effort, welcomed reinforcements wildly. “Yes! And my word, what dad was thinking of, I don’t know. Tying us to her and her nuisance of a Tommy for life.” Sesson took him by the ear: “March!” he said, and in such a tone that the martial spirit died in his captive. “You don’t understand, Mr Sesson. Charlie is a bit fierce certainly, but we all feel that Maria only lives with us for the money, and dad was so good leaving her an income. She would be penniless but for dad.” From over the low hedge came a grim voice: “Would she, indeed? Would she?” They had all clustered near the main drive, and from that drive a tall greyhaired man gazed angrily upon them. Rye gave a flying leap over the low hedge. “You came, daddy, you came at ldst. I’d given up all hope, when you didn’t answer.” “I was in Europe, my child, just wandering round to fill in time. Perhaps now you believe what I told you. The will proves me right. The selfish, jealous, old rascal. Binding you to his memory, making you the servant of children older than yourself. Oh, I warned you. I knew. I knew. You thought me hard, but I’d sooner give you up as I did than have the pain of seeing you together.” He paused for breath, and the Bird family gathered their forces: “Father was most generous to Maria. She had more from him than 6he was ever used to.” “Did you ever see Rye’s home? Did your father ever see it? No! For she married him on a holiday against my consent, and I quarrelled with her. If you care to come to Tahutu, you can see Maria’s home.” “Then you are Mr Reedan ? said Sesson. Reedan bowed stiffly. He thought him a Bird. . “I have seen Tahutu. That ends a dream of mijje,” said Sesson frankly. His eyes were on Rye within that fierce old arm. “What’s the boy like? Like him?” The old man forgot Sesson. - “No! He’s you over again. His hands are yours, bone for bone! Oh, daddy!” her voice broke. “Go and get your clothes! To think I’m two months late in coming through that European trip. And bring the boy. I want the boy. I can make up to him for 50 Bird legacies.” “Looks like you’re left, Mr Sesson,” said Charlie’s dear, forgiving voice in his ear. The taunt reached Rye’s ears as she turned to go. “There are roads to Tahutu,” she said softly, and her eyes said more. “Who are you?” said the old man suddenly. “Only a lawyer,” said Sesson grimly. “Not much loss if you do go,” said Charlie graciously. “A condemnation from that sprig is a recommendation, sir. Come to Tahutu!” said Reedan.