Valancy was in the midst of realities after a lifetime of unrealities. And busy—very busy. The house had to be cleaned. Not for nothing had Valancy been brought up in the Stirling habits of neatness and cleanliness. If she found satisfaction in cleaning dirty rooms she got her fill of it there. Roaring Abel thought she was foolish to bother doing so much more than she was asked to do, but he did not interfere with her. He was very well satisfied with his bargain. Valancy was a good cook. Abel said she got a flavour into things. The only fault he found with her was that she did not sing at her work.
“Folks should always sing at their work,” he insisted. “Sounds cheerful-like.”
“Not always,” retorted Valancy. “Fancy a butcher singing at his work. Or an undertaker.”
Abel burst into his great broad laugh.
“There’s no getting the better of you. You’ve got an answer every time. I should think the Stirlings would be glad to be rid of you. They don’t like being sassed back.”
During the day Abel was generally away from home—if not working, then shooting or fishing with Barney Snaith. He generally came home at nights—always very late and often very drunk. The first night they heard him come howling into the yard, Cissy had told Valancy not to be afraid.
“Father never does anything—he just makes a noise.”
Valancy, lying on the sofa in Cissy’s room, where she had elected to sleep, lest Cissy should need attention in the night—Cissy would never have called her—was not at all afraid, and said so. By the time Abel had got his horses put away, the roaring stage had passed and he was in his room at the end of the hall crying and praying. Valancy could still hear his dismal moans when she went calmly to sleep. For the most part, Abel was a good-natured creature, but occasionally he had a temper. Once Valancy asked him coolly:
“What is the use of getting in a rage?”
“It’s such a d⸺d relief,” said Abel.
They both burst out laughing together.
“You’re a great little sport,” said Abel admiringly. “Don’t mind my bad French. I don’t mean a thing by it. Jest habit. Say, I like a woman that ain’t afraid to speak up to me. Sis there was always too meek—too meek. That’s why she got adrift. I like you.”
“All the same,” said Valancy determinedly, “there is no use in sending things to hell as you’re always doing. And I’m not going to have you tracking mud all over a floor I’ve just scrubbed. You must use the scraper whether you consign it to perdition or not.”
Cissy loved the cleanness and neatness. She had kept it so, too, until her strength failed. She was very pitifully happy because she had Valancy with her. It had been so terrible—the long, lonely days and nights with no companionship save those dreadful old women who came to work. Cissy had hated and feared them. She clung to Valancy like a child.
There was no doubt that Cissy was dying. Yet at no time did she seem alarmingly ill. She did not even cough a great deal. Most days she was able to get up and dress—sometimes even to work about in the garden or the barrens for an hour or two. For a few weeks after Valancy’s coming she seemed so much better that Valancy began to hope she might get well. But Cissy shook her head.
“No, I can’t get well. My lungs are almost gone. And I—don’t want to. I’m so tired, Valancy. Only dying can rest me. But it’s lovely to have you here—you’ll never know how much it means to me. But Valancy—you work too hard. You don’t need to—Father only wants his meals cooked. I don’t think you are strong yourself. You turn so pale sometimes. And those drops you take. Are you well, dear?”
“I’m all right,” said Valancy lightly. She would not have Cissy worried. “And I’m not working hard. I’m glad to have some work to do—something that really wants to be done.”
“Then”—Cissy slipped her hand wistfully into Valancy’s—“don’t let’s talk any more about my being sick. Let’s just forget it. Let’s pretend I’m a little girl again—and you have come here to play with me. I used to wish that long ago—wish that you could come. I knew you couldn’t, of course. But how I did wish it! You always seemed so different from the other girls—so kind and sweet—and as if you had something in yourself nobody knew about—some dear, pretty secret. Had you, Valancy?”
“I had my Blue Castle,” said Valancy, laughing a little. She was pleased that Cissy had thought of her like this. She had never suspected that anybody liked or admired or wondered about her. She told Cissy all about her Blue Castle. She had never told anyone about it before.
“Everyone has a Blue Castle, I think,” said Cissy softly. “Only everyone has a different name for it. I had mine—once.”
She put her two thin little hands over her face. She did not tell Valancy—then—who had destroyed her Blue Castle. But Valancy knew that, whoever it was, it was not Barney Snaith.
XVIII
Valancy was acquainted with Barney by now—well acquainted, it seemed, though she had spoken to him only a few times. But then she had felt just as well acquainted with him the first time they had met. She had been in the garden at twilight, hunting for a few stalks of white narcissus for Cissy’s room when she heard that terrible old Grey Slosson coming down through the woods from Mistawis—one could hear it miles away. Valancy did not look up as it drew near, thumping over the rocks in that crazy lane. She had never looked up, though Barney had gone racketting past every evening since she had been at Roaring Abel’s. This time he did not racket past. The old Grey Slosson stopped with even
