Datasets:
edwindvinas
/
testdataset

Dataset card Data Studio Files
xet
 Community
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72
“No.” Valancy was not asking quarter or giving it. “But I can tell you
where you’ll find a beauty parlor in Port Lawrence where they can
reduce the number of your chins.”
“_Val-an-cy_!” The protest was wrung from Mrs. Frederick. She meant her
tone to be stately and majestic, as usual, but it sounded more like an
imploring whine. And she did not say “Doss.”
“She’s feverish,” said Cousin Stickles to Uncle Benjamin in an agonised
whisper. “We’ve thought she’s seemed feverish for several days.”
“She’s gone dippy, in my opinion,” growled Uncle Benjamin. “If not, she
ought to be spanked. Yes, spanked.”
“You can’t spank her.” Cousin Stickles was much agitated. “She’s
twenty-nine years old.”
“So there is that advantage, at least, in being twenty-nine,” said
Valancy, whose ears had caught this aside.
“Doss,” said Uncle Benjamin, “when I am dead you may say what you
please. As long as I am alive I demand to be treated with respect.”
“Oh, but you know we’re all dead,” said Valancy, “the whole Stirling
clan. Some of us are buried and some aren’t—yet. That is the only
difference.”
“Doss,” said Uncle Benjamin, thinking it might cow Valancy, “do you
remember the time you stole the raspberry jam?”
Valancy flushed scarlet—with suppressed laughter, not shame. She had
been sure Uncle Benjamin would drag that jam in somehow.
“Of course I do,” she said. “It was good jam. I’ve always been sorry I
hadn’t time to eat more of it before you found me. Oh, _look_ at Aunt
Isabel’s profile on the wall. Did you ever see anything so funny?”
Everybody looked, including Aunt Isabel herself, which of course,
destroyed it. But Uncle Herbert said kindly, “I—I wouldn’t eat any more
if I were you, Doss. It isn’t that I grudge it—but don’t you think it
would be better for yourself? Your—your stomach seems a little out of
order.”
“Don’t worry about my stomach, old dear,” said Valancy. “It is all
right. I’m going to keep right on eating. It’s so seldom I get the
chance of a satisfying meal.”
It was the first time any one had been called “old dear” in Deerwood.
The Stirlings thought Valancy had invented the phrase and they were
afraid of her from that moment. There was something so uncanny about
such an expression. But in poor Mrs. Frederick’s opinion the reference
to a satisfying meal was the worst thing Valancy had said yet. Valancy
had always been a disappointment to her. Now she was a disgrace. She
thought she would have to get up and go away from the table. Yet she
dared not leave Valancy there.
Aunt Alberta’s maid came in to remove the salad plates and bring in the
dessert. It was a welcome diversion. Everybody brightened up with a
determination to ignore Valancy and talk as if she wasn’t there. Uncle
Wellington mentioned Barney Snaith. Eventually somebody did mention
Barney Snaith at every Stirling function, Valancy reflected. Whatever
he was, he was an individual that could not be ignored. She resigned
herself to listen. There was a subtle fascination in the subject for
her, though she had not yet faced this fact. She could feel her pulses
beating to her finger-tips.
Of course they abused him. Nobody ever had a good word to say of Barney
Snaith. All the old, wild tales were canvassed—the defaulting
cashier-counterfeiter-infidel-murderer-in-hiding legends were thrashed
out. Uncle Wellington was very indignant that such a creature should be
allowed to exist at all in the neighbourhood of Deerwood. He didn’t
know what the police at Port Lawrence were thinking of. Everybody would
be murdered in their beds some night. It was a shame that he should be
allowed to be at large after all that he had done.
“What _has_ he done?” asked Valancy suddenly.
Uncle Wellington stared at her, forgetting that she was to be ignored.
“Done! Done! He’s done _everything_.”
“_What_ has he done?” repeated Valancy inexorably. “What do you _know_
that he has done? You’re always running him down. And what has ever
been proved against him?”
“I don’t argue with women,” said Uncle Wellington. “And I don’t need
proof. When a man hides himself up there on an island in Muskoka, year
in and year out, and nobody can find out where he came from or how he
lives, or what he does there, _that’s_ proof enough. Find a mystery and
you find a crime.”
“The very idea of a man named Snaith!” said Second Cousin Sarah. “Why,
the name itself is enough to condemn him!”
“I wouldn’t like to meet him in a dark lane,” shivered Cousin
Georgiana.
“What do you suppose he would do to you?” asked Valancy.
“Murder me,” said Cousin Georgiana solemnly.