The Able McLaughlins Margaret Wilson (best ebook reader under 100 TXT) 📖

to see that the women had such things, McNair had assured him solemnly. That was one of the best things he had had to tell his mother for a long time! Alex McNair telling him, Wully McLaughlin, how to treat a wife! McNair strutted about, taking all the credit for that garden, extremely proud of having the best-looking place for miles around. As if he had been able to help himself! Wully had said nothing about the incident to Chirstie. He couldn’t seem always to be laughing at her father. Just then she went on to tell him about the new dress Barbara had made for little Jeannie. Whatever the neighbors might say enviously about Barbara McNair, they must in justice agree that she was an excellent stepmother to her husband’s children. The way she loved Jeannie and Dod, and was loved in return, was a source of deep satisfaction to Chirstie. And so she gossiped contentedly and harmlessly on about the neighbors, and the baby kicked the protesting Wully gleefully in the ribs. They felt cosily shut in to themselves by the sense of the countryside emptied of its patriotic and picnicking dwellers. Wully lounged about till almost eleven. There was a little hay cut which he wanted to turn. He would be back by dinnertime, he said.

He started down the path to the hayfield, taking the scythe with him. It was a hot day, but there was a lively breeze blowing the grass into waves and billows, and momentary disappearing swift maelstroms. Safe white clouds were sailing on high, but along the horizon hints of much rain were gathering slowly. It wouldn’t be safe to cut much hay in face of them. He really need not have brought the scythe. He began turning what was cut, forkful by forkful. Then he cut a few swathes. Working, he lay bare a marsh hawk’s nest. He stopped for breath, and stood watching the catlike birdlings turn on their backs and offer fight with their pawing, scrawny claws, while the mother circled angrily about him. He must tell Chirstie about those warlike babies. He went on, to leave them in peace. He kept getting farther and farther away from the house, towards the far edge of the plot of prairie they had chosen for hay. He worked away, scarcely lifting his head from his task, wondering occasionally if the rain, undoubtedly gathering, would come by night.

Suddenly he heard a cry. He looked up. He threw down his scythe. He started running. Chirstie was running towards him. She was crying out to him, too far away to be heard. He gave a look towards the house. There seemed to be no sign of fire. He tore on towards her. It must be the baby. He saved his breath till he got near her. She stumbled against him, gasping, fainting. What she managed to say brought the contentment of his life crashing down to ruin.

“It’s Peter! Peter Keith! He’s back!”

She would have fallen. He caught her. He held her against him. She couldn’t speak. He couldn’t believe his ears.

“You said he wouldn’t come back!” she began, again. “Wully, he took hold of me! He⁠—” She was weeping with rage and terror. “Look here!” Her sleeve was torn half off. “You said he wouldn’t come back!” she cried, shaking.

“You’re dreaming!” he cried. He couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t possible.

“He came to the door,” she sobbed. “I didn’t see him till then. I’m not dreaming! Look at my dress! Where you going? Don’t leave me alone!”

He had started for his gun. Rage came over him like a fever mounting. The sight of that torn sleeve made him suddenly blind with anger. He couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t possible that man had dared to come back and lay violent hands on his wife. It simply couldn’t be. She was calling to him to wait for her. She wouldn’t be left alone.

He helped her along blindly. He had never known such murderous anger. He wanted her to hurry. He lusted for that gun. He felt her trembling against him. By God, his wife wouldn’t have to tremble much longer!

It seemed to him long before they came to their house⁠—very long. “Don’t you let him hurt you!” she moaned as they came up to it. He strode into the kitchen. There the baby slept in his cradle, and flies walked leisurely over the piecrust scattered over the floor. He seized his gun. He went to the east door, and looked out. He went to the west door. He stood looking. Before his eyes hens scratched for their broods in peace. He searched the house. He turned to go to the barn. She cried after him, “Oh, don’t let him hurt you!” He went without caution, madly. But in the barn there was no enemy. No sign of a man behind the barn, where the grass billows chased one another. No one hiding about the haystack. He strode about seeking. There was no enemy in any place. But beyond the little tree bed, and the garden, beyond the wheat fields⁠—what might be there, to the east to the west, to the north and the south, in those wild man-high grasses! There a thousand men might hide and laugh at pursuers. Looking at those baffling stretches, Wully choked. He was helpless.

He went back to his wife. She was trying vainly to compose herself. “I never thought he would come! I never imagined it! You said he wouldn’t, Wully!” Didn’t she see how that reproach must madden him! “I was just standing there, making the pie. He came to that door. I thought it was you. And when I looked up, he was looking at me, Wully!” She wailed out that last. “He was looking at me. I didn’t know what to do. He just grabbed me!” She buried her face in her arms, and sobbed.

God! If only he could get hold of that snake who hid in the grasses! He