Radio and television mirror (July-Dec 1942)

find no comfort in the thought that she was doing her duty to her father. She didn't tee] heroic or noble. She didn't feel anything but hopelessness. All she could see ahead of her was years of captivity and deadness. And she didn't even have one memory to take into those empty years with her. But by the time, hours later, when the train had reached her station, Louise's tears had worn themselves out. Stepping down to the platform, she saw Henry coming toward her. "Your Pa asked me to fetch you home," he said. "I got the wagon over here." "Thank you, Henry," Louise said. She followed his lumbering, loose stride to the end of the platform. He helped her up into the seat and climbed up beside her and, a moment later, they were rattling over the paved highway. "Too bad 'bout your Aunt Matilda," he said. "Yes," Louise said, her throat choking up with tears. "One good thing," Henry said comfortingly, "she didn't suffer none — went sudden like. Too bad, though — she was a good woman." He was silent for a bit. "Well," he sighed, at last, "your Pa'll be glad to have you back. My Anna's been doin' for him the last couple of days, but it ain't been easy — with the plowin' and all." "I know," Louise said. "Thank you, Henry." They turned off the highway and bumped along the dirt road leading to the farm. "Almost home, now," Henry said. HOME, Louise thought. She could barely remember the farm when it had been home. Once it had been a white house with green shutters, set down in the midst of rolling fields of sunlit, yellow grain. There had been a truck garden and a big, red barn and horses and cows and chickens. Louise's eyes took in the fields on either side of the rutted road. The gray of the twilight accentuated the desolation. The fields had been idle and weed-grown and neglected for years. The fences that had once enclosed the pasture were falling into decay. No matter, Louise thought, there were no cows now. Up ahead lay the house. It had been built on the foundation of the burned one. In the deepening twilight, in spite of the light burning from her father's window, it looked deserted and haunted, like a house in which no one had lived for a long time. Henry pulled up the horse. "Well," he said, "here we are. I'll have to be gettin' on home." Louise climbed down from the seat and caught her suitcase as Henry threw it down to her. She murmured her thanks and turned to the house. For a moment, she stood quite still in the gathering darkness. The door creaked as she opened it. Inside, it was murky dark and the air smelled stale, shut in. At the back of the hall a door opened and a streak of light fell across the splintered floor-boards. Then Louise heard her father's wheel-chair. "Anna? It's about time — " his high, querulous voice complained. "No one remembers a crippled man, seems like — " He stopped suddenly, as he 60 Come Away, My Love! Continued from page 9 caught sight of her. "So you've come home, have you?" No welcome, no greeting. "So you've come home," he repeated coldly. "I told you not to go. I told you it was sinful to go against my wishes. But you wouldn't listen. You had to bring the wrath of the Lord down on us. Because of your sinful desires for — for — I don't know what — we've had to pay. Your Aunt Matilda had to die to show you the evil of your ways!" Louise wanted to tell him it had been his own selfish demands that had killed Aunt Matilda, literally worked her to death. But she didn't say it. "I'm back now," she said. "And I don't ever want to talk about my trip to New York again." Her father chuckled maliciously. "That's sensible," he said. Then, "I'm hungry. I haven't had a decent meal [enmjlDise says... "Skimp to Beat a Skunk!" TO bleach yellowed linens, you may ' need nothing more than sunshine — if you leave extra moisture in the material, after final rinsing. The damper the fabric — the better the job Old Sol will do in bleaching! Then buy WAR SAVINGS STAMPS instead of new linens — that the sun will soon again shine on an America at peace! in three days. That Anna can't cook." It was on the tip of Louise's tongue to ask him how he could be so ungrateful. She didn't, though. It seemed too pointless. Instead, she left her luggage at the foot of the stairs and went into the kitchen. She lit the lamp and her throat choked up with tears again. Aunt Matilda's apron hung on a nail by the stove. Her darning basket still sat on a corner of the table, a needle stuck into a sock, as though she were coming back to it any minute. Quickly, Louise thrust it out of sight on a shelf. She went to the pantry and busied herself with her father's supper. In the next few days, Louise drove herself to the limits of her strength, working, working, doing anything to keep herself from thinking. The nights were bad. The darkness seemed to make a trap of the house, imprisoning her with her father. Then one evening as she washed the vegetables for supper, she heard the wind wailing over the fields and beating against the side of the house. Through the window over the sink, she watched the thick, black clouds tossing and whirling in the darkening sky. Her father wheeled himself into the kitchen. "Louise," he ordered. "A storm's blowing. Go and lock the barn." The idea was so ridiculous that Louise laughed. "What are you laughing at?" "The barn — locking it," Louise said. "There's nothing there." "Don't talk back to me!" her father said angrily. "If I could walk, I'd teach you to be respectful. I'd show you. Oh, I wish I could walk!" "I wish you could, too!" Louise cried. "I'd never have come back, if you could get around." She saw her father wince with pain. "It's a wonder you did come back," he murmured, covering his face with his thin hands. "It's a wonder you don't leave me here to die alone." At once, Louise regretted her outburst. "You know I'll never leave you alone," she said. "I could have stayed away. I was free in New York. But I came back." They were still, then. Somewhere in the front of the house a shutter banged against the wall. "You'd better close that shutter, Louise," her father said, more gently than he had spoken to her in years. Louise had barely fastened the shutter before the storm broke. The wind-driven rain beat down on the house, making a deafening clatter against the shingles. Louise checked all the windows and went back toward the kitchen. She had just stepped into the room when someone knocked at the front door. Her father threw up his head. "What's that?" "Someone's at the door," Louise said. "I'll see who — " "No," her father said nervously. "Don't open the door. Don't let anyone in. It might be a thief — " "Father," Louise admonished with a little laugh, "it's just someone lost in the storm." "They can go somewhere else," her father said. "Haven't we had enough bad luck, without inviting it into the house?" But Louise had already reached the door and opened it. Someone, someone tall, murmured an apology and stepped inside. "Phew!" a hearty voice laughed. "I might as well have been standing in a river." LOUISE could see him now. He was a stranger, young, not more than twenty-five, she thought. His hair was black and curly and his eyes were very dark and alert. He was tall, with broad shoulders. He shook himself and grinned. "My name's Denis Wilson," he said. "Mind if I take off my coat?" "What do you want?" Louise's father said. "This isn't a tourist home. You can't stay here." The young man stared at him. "I'm sorry to bust in this way — but — it's pretty bad out there and I saw the light—" "I don't want any strangers here," Louise's father said, "storm or no storm." RADIO AND TELEVISION MIRROR