Hetty Dorval by Ethel Wilson Page B

the death of Ernestine that hastened Father’s and Mother’s plans. I don’t know. But I found that Mother and I were really going to England in the late autumn. We began our serious preparations and I my excited goodbyes. Mother alternated between joy at going and a resolve not to leave Father. She would go. My spirits rose. She would not go. My spirits sank. Father said she was going, and no nonsense. Again she would go.
    Three days before we left, Father drove down to the rancheree where Joe Charley lived, to get some Indians to help at the ranch before the good weather broke completely, and Mother and I went with him. We always drove with Father, that last week, wherever he went. Three sit crowded in the front seat, talking and laughing together. Because this is, perhaps, the last drive, each is in his own degree projected into the future, which at that moment joins the flying present and the past. No one says so, but each one is aware within – we shall be gone, he will be here – they will be gone, I shall be here. Those who make a real and long departure of years, see the familiar road, houses, trees, shops, people, the sage-brush and the hills, the cat, the dog – and a difference lies upon these objects. Each common thing bears the strange mark of something which we are imminently leaving behind, whichwe shall not hereafter customarily see as before, but which is intrinsically real and will remain in its own place. And so it was then as we drove about Lytton and the surrounding country with Father.
    After crossing the Bridge and the rivers that day we drove east, and as we neared the fork that led downhill to the rancheree beside the river, Mother said to Father, “Frank, I’ve never seen the place where The Menace used to live. Turn up to the right, it’s only a little way!” And Father turned to the right and stopped at the top of the slope as we saw the bungalow, and Mother and I got out and went round to each window. The wind blew fresh up there. The sage-brush spread for miles before your eyes, and sage had invaded the garden.
    “She left here over a year ago, you know, Frankie. No one seemed to know why,” said Mother. “I don’t know where she is, menacing about, now, but someone from Lytton saw her in Vancouver not long ago. And quite affluent.” And I said that I had seen her too, just that once, looking at the pearls. Ernestine, and leaving school, and coming home, had quite put Hetty out of my mind.
    Mother and I could not get into the bungalow anywhere, but we turned and stood on the broad porch, looking down on the rapids of the river bright and noisy below, and across at the great back-drop of dun-coloured hills desolate under a blue sky. Father honked the horn. “Come here, Frank,” called Mother. “Do come. Just for a minute. I want to show you.”
    Father, doing his pretend grumbling, got out and came over to us. Two things about Father. He was a man of some substance and a good rancher, and he could wear a hat better than anyone I ever saw. It didn’t matter whether it was his old wide-brimmed ranch hat or his town hat. On went the hat – smack – withFather’s genius for angle. He came over to the porch and stood with us there and looked north, east, and west.
    “Good old Menace,” he said, “she certainly picked a view!” (Good old Menace! – but then Father hadn’t seen Hetty.) And we all stood looking.
    When we reached the dilapidated long shack where Joe Charley lived, Mother and I waited outside while Father went to find someone to speak to. The rancheree looked forsaken. Most of the Indians had gone to town. One or two dogs came and barked at us, a few hens scratched in the dust, some children peeped shyly, and then a squaw followed by two young girls came out of a house like Joe Charley’s. Father gave them the message and we drove away.
    When we got near Lytton, Mother said, “Frank, you’ll say I’m crazy. All right, I’m crazy. But I want to get the key for