University of Virginia Library

43. CHAPTER XLIII.
IN CYNTHIANA.

GEORGE P. STORMS & CO.,
DEALERS IN
DRY GOODS, GROCERIES & PROVISIONS.

THAT was the sign which our travellers saw after landing
at the station in the little town of Cynthiana. Magdalen
was the first to see it, and the first to enter a low
room where a young man of twenty-five or more was weighing
a codfish for a negress with a blue turban bound around her
head.

Magdalen was taking the lead in all things, and Mr. Grey
and Guy let her, and smiled at her enthusiasm and the effect
she produced upon the young man. He was not prepared for
this apparition of beauty in so striking contrast to old Hannah
and her codfish, and he blushed and stammered in his reply to
her question as to whether “Mrs. James Storms was a relative
of his, and lived near them.”

“She is my mother, and lives just down the street. Did you
wish to see her?” he said, and Magdalen replied:

“Yes; that is, if she is the Mrs. Storms I am after. Is she
a church woman, and has she ever been in Cincinnati?”

“She is a church woman, and has been in Cincinnati,” the
young man said, and then he followed Magdalen to the door
and pointed a second time to his mother's house, and stood
watching her as she sped like a deer along the muddy street,
leaving Mr. Grey and Guy very far behind her.

A very respectable-looking woman answered Magdalen's
knock, and inviting her to enter, stood waiting for Mr. Grey
and Guy, who had just reached the gate

It was Magdalen who did most of the talking, — Magdalen
who, without taking the chair offered her, broke out impetuously,
“Are you Mrs. James Storms, and did you years ago, —
say nineteen or twenty — know a Mrs. Clayton, in Cincinnati,
and her daughter, Mrs. Grey, — Laura they called her?”

The woman, who seemed to be naturally a lady, cast a wondering
glance at Magdalen, and replied:

“I am Mrs. Storms, and I knew Laura Clayton, or rather
Mrs. Grey. Are you her daughter? You look like her as I
remember her.”

Magdalen did not answer this question, but went on vehemently:

“Were you much with Mrs. Grey, and can you tell me anything
about her starting for her home in New York, and if she
had a baby then, and how old it was, and what dress did it
wear? Try to remember, please, and tell me if you can.”

Mrs. Storms was wholly bewildered with all these interrogatories

of a past she had not recalled in years, and looked
inquiringly at Mr. Grey, who was standing by Magdalen, and
who said with a smile:

“Not quite so fast. You confuse the woman with your
rapid questions. Ask her one at a time; or perhaps it will be
better for me to explain a little first.”

Then as briefly as possible he repeated what he thought
necessary for Mrs. Storms to know of the business which had
brought them there, and asked if she could help them any.

For a moment Mrs. Storms was too much surprised to speak,
and stood staring, first at Magdalen and then at Mr. Grey, in a
dazed, helpless kind of way.

“Lost her baby, — the little child I stood for! Didn't have
it when she got home, nor her baggage either! it takes my
breath away! Of course she was crazy. I can see it now,
though I did not suspect it then. I only thought her queer at
times.”

“Yes, but tell us; begin at the beginning,” Magdalen exclaimed,
too impatient to wait any longer. And thus entreated,
Mrs. Storms began:

“I knew Mrs. Clayton in New Orleans, before she moved
to Cincinnati, or I was married and came here. I had seen
Laura when a little girl, but did not know much of her until
she came home after her marriage. Then I saw her every time
I was at her mother's, which was quite often, considering the
distance between here and Cincinnati, and the tedious way we
had then of getting there by stage. My husband, who is dead
now, and myself were sponsors for her baby, whom she called
Magdalen.”

“Was there one or two children? Tell me that first, please,”
Magdalen said, and when Mrs. Storms replied, “She had two,
but one died before it was christened,” she gave a sudden
scream, and staggered a step towards Mr. Grey, who, almost as
white and weak as herself, laid his hand with a convulsive
grasp upon her shoulder and said, “Two children! twins! and
I never knew it!”

“Never knew it!” Mrs. Storms repeated. “I wrote it to you
myself the day after they were born. I happened to be there,
and Laura asked me to write and tell you, and I did, and directed
my letter to Rome.”

“I never received it, which is not strange, as I journeyed so
much from place to place and had my mail sent after me,” Mr.
Grey rejoined, and Mrs. Storms continued, “I remember now
that after my letter was sent Laura grew worse, — crazy like,
we thought, and seemed sorry I had written, and said the Greys
did not like children and would take her babies from her, and
when the little sickly one died she did not seem to feel so very
badly and said it was safe from the Greys. She was always
queer on that subject, though she never said a word against her
husband. She had plenty of money, and, I supposed, was going
back to Beechwood as soon as you returned. I was not with
her when Mrs. Clayton died; it was sudden, — very, and I only
went to the funeral. Laura told me, then, she was going home,
but said she wished first to visit me. I consented, of course,
though I wondered that she did not go at once. She came to
me after the funeral, and stayed some time with her child, and
appeared very sad and depressed, and cried a great deal at
times, and then, again, was wild, and gay, and queer.”

“But the child, — the little girl — How did she look?” Magdalen
asked.

And Mrs. Storms replied:

“She was very healthy and fat; a pretty creature, with
dark eyes, like her mother's, and dark hair too. A beautiful
baby I called her, who might easily grow to be just like you,
miss.”

She was complimenting Magdalen, whose face flushed a little
as she asked:

“Do you remember what the child wore when she went
away? Would you know the dress if you saw it?”

Mrs. Storms hardly thought she would. Mrs. Grey was in
mourning, but about the baby she did not know.

“Was the dress like this?” Magdalen asked, taking from

her satchel the dress she had worn to Millbank, and the one
found in Laura's bag.

Mrs. Storms looked at them a moment, and then a sudden
gleam of intelligence broke over her face as she exclaimed:

“I do remember them perfectly now. I made them myself
for Mrs. Grey.”

“And you are left-handed?” interrupted Magdalen.

“Yes, I am left-handed. You knew that by the hems?
You would make a capital lawyer,” Mrs. Storms said, laughingly.
Then, excusing herself a moment, she left the room,
but soon returned, bringing a patch-work quilt, made from bits
of delaine.

Conspicuous among these were blocks of the same material
as the two spotted dresses. To these blocks Mrs. Storms
called Magdalen's attention.

“I had a baby then, a boy, Charlie, he is dead now, and
these are pieces of the dress Mrs. Grey gave to him. She
bought enough for him and her baby, too, and I made them
both and then found there was still material for another, provided
the sleeves were short and the neck low. So I made
that at the very last, and as Laura's trunk was full she put it in
her satchel.”

Mr. Grey's hand deepend its grasp on one whom he now
knew to be his child beyond a doubt, and who said to Mrs.
Storms:

“Did she go from here alone to Cincinnati, and about what
time?”

“It was in April, and must have been nineteen years ago.
I know by Charlie's age. I had hurt my ankle and Mr. Storms
was going with her, but at the last something happened, I don't
remember what, and he did not go. She said a great many
harsh things about her mother-in-law and sister, and about their
taking her baby from her, and the night before she went was
more excited than I ever saw her, but I did not think her crazy.
There was no railroad then, and she went by stage, and from
Cincinnati sent me a note that she was safely there and

about to start for the East. I wondered a little she never
wrote to me, but fancied she was with her grand friends and in
her handsome house and had forgotten poor folks like us, and I
would not write first. Then I had a great deal of trouble pretty
soon.

“Charlie died, and Mr. Storms' lungs gave out, and I went to
Florida with him and buried him there, and after six years came
back to Cynthiana. So you see there was a good deal of one
thing and another to put Laura out of my mind.”

Many more questions were asked and explanations and suggestions
made until it was preposterous for Magdalen to require
more testimony. She was Mr. Grey's daughter, — she
believed it now, and her heart throbbed with ecstasy when she
remembered Alice, whom she already loved so much. There
was also a feeling of unutterable tenderness and pity for the
poor crazy woman who had suddenly come up in the capacity
of her mother. She could, aye, she did love her, all wrecked
and shattered and imbecile as she was; but she could not so
soon respond to the affection which showed itself in every lineament
of Mr. Grey's face and thrilled in the tone of his voice as
he wound his arm around her neck, and drawing her closely to
him said, with deep emotion:

“Magdalen, my daughter, my darling child! Heaven has
been better to me than I deserved.”

He stooped and kissed her lips, but she did not give him back
any answering caress, except as she suffered him to hold her in
his embrace. He felt the coldness of her manner, and it affected
him deeply, but there was no opportunity then for any words
upon the subject. The train was coming which would take
them to Cincinnati, and so after a little further conversation
with Mrs. Storms, whom Mr. Grey resolved to remember in
some substantial form, they bade her good-by and were soon
on their way to the city.