Despite the seeming failure of her last visit, Nancy came again to the house where the brook and river met—and after that she came again—until she had started coming every weekend. Slowly, just like the ice on the river, she began to thaw. As the April rains thrummed against the windows, she came out of her shell, bit by bit. Now she would take a turn reading Frost's poems—now she helped Cecilia bake a cake for Marshall's birthday, icing it beautifully and scattering bits of shredded cocoanut on top—now she sang with Lee, even sitting down on the piano bench with him, and the tune and words were not at all maudlin:
Forget your troubles, come on, get happy!
Chase all your cares away.
She was a very different girl from the Nancy who had come to them at Christmas, and the little house and its inhabitants were always glad to see her. She was bright, and helpful, and underneath whatever sadness she wore like a cloak over her bowed shoulders, she was even fun. She hardly ever left the house—Cecilia thought that she must be afraid of something—but she sat in the garden for hours, or folded herself into some nook so that it was almost a surprise to stumble upon her. There were times when she seemed like any other pretty, happy girl of twenty.
But there were other times when the veil dropped down before her eyes, separating her from the world again. There were times when Cecilia heard the unmistakable sound of sobs coming from the little bedroom, and the first time she did get up and go to her cousin.
"Oh, go away," Nancy said, raising her tearstained face to meet Cecilia's eyes. "You want to help me—how can you? What can you know of what I feel? You—with your husband and your baby and your friends and your happy home. You will never understand—never."
Cecilia thought that Nancy was right: she couldn't understand. And Nancy wouldn't help her, by telling her what was wrong.
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One mild afternoon—the first really warm afternoon of the year—Cecilia sneezed. And then again. At lunchtime her head ached, and her throat was raspy when she called Marshall to the supper table that Nancy had graciously set for her. By nightfall, it was clear that Cecilia Douglas had a cold—a particularly nasty one—and the worst time of a year for it, when the world was scent and gorgeousness again. Oh, a cold in May is like a slap in the face!
Dr. Harper, thinking of the baby that he never mentioned so directly, sent her to bed with strict orders not to get up until she was feeling better than she had been feeling before. He had never known how much he really loved his little partner until he saw her looking white and weak. He took to dropping by the house every day, with a bag of licorice tea, which Nancy brewed up and brought in steaming cupfuls for Cecilia to drink. She hated the horrid stuff—but everybody was being so nice to her—everyone wanted her to get better, and she must not disappoint them.
But oh—she longed to be out of doors! From her window she could see the faint filmy leaves on the trees—the goldenrod springing up along the lane—she could smell the blossoms on the apple seedling she had planted by the door. Lee was kind—he brought her the first little buds of roses on her bush—but it was Marshall who brought her the Mayflowers. He was not a poetic fellow but something in his soul had always loved the story of how Uncle Jem brought them to his mother, and then his wife, every year. He splayed his large, strong, finely-molded hand on her belly.
"When he gets old enough, I'll have him do it, for me."
Nancy was a comfort to her, running up and down the stairs to check on her, and generally keeping the house going smoothly. And the ladies of Hyacinth House came over nearly every day for the express purpose of 'keeping Cecilia company.'
One or the other of them, Miss Lottie or Miss Ada, always began the conversation by saying, "We want to hear all about what's going on with you," and then proceeded to talk so incessantly that even if Cecilia had been dying she would not have been able to say. But she did not really mind. The ladies had a horror of gossiping, and if she had asked them outright, they would have refused to gossip with her. But talking things over amongst themselves didn't count, and Cecilia had a deep love of 'news.' So she let them talk, and sometimes had to cough into her handkerchief lest she laugh out loud and break the spell.
"Wesley Morris has gotten a divorce," pronounced Miss Ada one afternoon. "It is the first we've ever had in Bright River—even a Yankee divorce. Isn't it, Charlotte? And to tell the truth, I never thought it would be Wesley who got one. Sarah has been a good wife to him, even if she is a Sloane—" apparently, Sloanishness crossed the county lines, and was not limited to Avonlea or its inhabitants. "Half of me thinks that Wes only got it to see if he could. And now he has, he'll be sorry about it. The Morrises have always been like that. Why, when Wesley's father was courting his mother, he was wild about her—until he proposed and she accepted. Then he couldn't fathom what he saw in her in the first place."
"If I had ears like George Morris I'd wonder, too, at anybody who'd want me," Miss Lottie said. "Ears like mud-flaps—just like mud-flaps, Adeline! I read an article in a Yankee magazine about a movie star who had an operation to make her nose smaller. Far be it for any of us to meddle with the looks God gave us—but if I were a Morris, I'd think on it—I'd think on it. Those ears! And they all have so many children. Thank heaven people move away from the place they're born, or with all the intermarrying we'd be a race of flap-eared people."
"I don't know about the Morris ears—but the Macneill nose would be a cross to bear," said Miss Ada, whose own nose was perhaps the most beautiful thing about her—long and straight and aristocratic. "I went over to Agnes Macneill's to drop off some of my damson preserves—and I saw her baby—not two days old and he has the Macneillest nose that I've ever seen. And you know baby's noses always get worse—not better. How that little tot will look in twenty years will be just plain abominable, Charlotte."
"Agnes Macneill was a Macneill who married a Macneill," sniffed Miss Lottie. "They are all so clannish, them folks. I said to her, ten years ago, before her wedding, 'Aggie, are you very sure you know what you're doing?' 'No, Aunt Charlotte,' she told me. 'But then, I'm never very sure.' Her ma was that way. Never knew her own mind from one minute to the next. You remember, once, when she had the minister to tea, and she was going about getting the pot brewed up, and accidentally emptied her dripping can into the pot instead of the water from the kettle. And didn't even notice until she'd drunk half of it down. You know, Adeline, they say that Lee Goddard has been seen going around with Trina Macneill."
"There is no truth to that report," said Miss Ada, with dignity. "He is far too good-looking a man to risk introducing that nose into his gene pool. He has some sense, Charlotte."
"Well, if you're so smart—I met Lee himself coming out of the florist the other day with a bunch of yellow roses. And then they say that Trina wore a yellow rose in her hair at the dance at the pavilion."
"Likely she got it from that big bush that grows in yard," dismissed Miss Ada. "Her mother planted it years ago. She took a cutting from a rosebush that grew in the graveyard. I find that scandalous. Well, Angus Macneill's going around with a bee in his bonnet because his daughter married Ed Moyer, who owns that old house in the middle of town—the pretty red-brick one—and they say they're going to tear it down and build a Douglas supermarket in its place."
"Oh, that is not true," said Cecilia, spurred to speaking. "Douglas Co. never tears homes or other businesses to build. Marshall is adamant about that. He doesn't want our stores to be big, horrible, impersonal places like they are in the states. He takes over abandoned storefronts—or builds from the ground up on an empty lot—and he works with the neighborhood to ensure that the look won't spoil the atmosphere of the town. You'll never see a neon sign in a Douglas's window."
"That reminds me of the lightbox sign that the old Baptist church got a few years ago," said Miss Lottie. "They wanted it to say First Church of Christ—but wrote it down wrong or something, so that the one that was delivered said Worst Church of Christ. It was supposed to be a mistake but Andrew Donnelly owned the store that made it up, and everybody knows that he is an affirmed atheist—whatever that is. But it can't be good, because Herb Davies is one, too, and Herb never was anything worth being. If ever a man was born under a dark cloud, that one was."
"I seem to remember that you let Herb Davies take you to a dance, once," said Miss Ada, with a note of triumph in her voice. She was as sweet as a china shepherdess—but even china shepherdesses must give forth their own share of slings and arrows.
"Yes, I let him take me to a dance—not save my everlasting soul," Miss Lottie retorted. "I'd let the devil himself squire me around the floor as long as he didn't try to make no bargains with me, Adeline Owen. I'm that fond of dancing."
"I used to wear something pink to every dance I ever went to," said Miss Ada, dreamily. "It was my color—my signature. Pink roses in my hair, or a pink ribbon at my waist. The fellows called me the Pink Lady. I had the complexion for it, and you never had, Charlotte. Blue was your color. For all that we were identical, you spent too much time in the sun—like little Cecilia here. She's pretty as a picture but she'll never wear pink—but that Nancy-girl can wear it, even with her ruddy hair."
"She's a sweet girl, Nancy Blythe is," said Miss Lottie. "Said my hyacinth was like a dream when she was up last week. I wish she'd run over more often, but she can't be induced to. I'd give my left leg to know what happened to make that girl look so hunted betimes. I tried to pull it out of her, last night, when we were here, and the rest of you playing that infernal Scrabble game and making up words right and left." Miss Lottie had been beaten, badly, and her soul still smarted over it. "Who ever heard of 'perspicacious?'"
"I never did," said Miss Ada, gravely.
"Oh, you!" Miss Lottie eschewed the notion of solidarity in order to sling a few arrows of her own. "You would have failed out of Bright River school, Adeline, if the teacher hadn't been sweet on you. Nobody ever chose you for your brains."
"Yes—but I got chosen all the same," said Miss Ada with an air of great satisfaction.
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When the ladies had gone, Nancy stole up the stairs to sit with Cecilia in the twilight. She brought two plates on a tray, and the girls ate their supper together in a companionable silence. Nancy had been merry that morning—Cecilia had heard her singing in the kitchen—but her old melancholy had crept back as the sun leaned down the horizon. She was very quiet and faraway, and Cecilia could not eat a bit for watching her—and wondering. There had been a sheaf of music at the door that morning—handwritten, called 'Nancy's Tune.' Cecilia had thrilled to the pit of her romantic heart to see it, but Nancy had held it up with the tips of her fingers, and cast it into the fire.
"Nancy," she said, suddenly. "Won't you ever—tell me—what it is that happened to you?"
Nancy seemed to consider this. She dropped her lashes down to her cheeks and sat very still. When she raised them again she looked as though she would like to speak—but couldn't—not just yet.
"I will tell you," she said slowly. "But not today—and maybe not even tomorrow."
Cecilia's eyes went soft. "I only want to know, dearest, so I can help you." She was surprised to find that Nancy had become very dear to her—not just a cousin, but a friend. "I hate to see you upset," she said, and meant it.
"I know," Nancy nodded. "I'll tell you," she said. "When—if—I am ever ready to speak of it."