CHAPTER XIV
MOTHER AND PETER ARRIVE ON A VISIT
I said that mother and I were going to have a peaceful and happy time together—that we should chat in the mornings, doze in the afternoons, and discuss Amelia in the evenings. We are doing none of these things. We are expending our entire energies, and mine are very feeble, in soothing Peter and trying to keep him in a good temper, for Peter arrived with mother a couple of days ago on a visit to One Tree Cottage.
I will say that it wasn't dear mother's fault. She even stooped to equivocation, or, to put it plainly, lying to keep him away. She told him that she didn't know by which train she was coming, when she knew perfectly well. She told him our spare-room bed would only hold one. Oh, mother! And she told him that there had been burglaries in the neighbourhood of Dorking, and it would be unsafe to leave the house to servants. To all of which he said, "Pooh!"
From what I can gather he lay in waiting at the station like a detective in plain clothes, and pounced upon mother just as she was saying to Mary, the parlourmaid, "Good-bye; you will take great care of the master, and give him kidneys with his bacon twice a week."
"No, she won't," he said sardonically as he limped into the carriage, "for she won't get the chance. I am coming with you, Emma. I refuse to be left to the mercy of servants when my gout is so troublesome. It is most selfish and unreasonable of you to suggest such a thing. I am as much to be considered as Marguerite," at which he planked himself firmly on to the seat opposite to mother and glowered at her.
At the moment he is seated in the sun with his feet on Amelia's fair white step, which is now covered with a sort Of Egyptian hieroglyphic—à la the Tompkinses'. When she wheeled me in the other evening after a long day in the garden, and I caught sight of the step, I was filled with a great amazement, for I was unaware that Amelia understood the ancient Egyptian language. A series of curves and dots, and flourishes and symbolic signs met my gaze. I leaned forward and translated with fluency —a water-line, —the sun, —a reed, —night, —hilly country, —egg. Father was a bit of an Egyptologist, and I had picked up the meaning of a few of the symbols from him: —star, —tooth, —serpent.
Amelia opened her mouth and stared at me, and then shot me into the house. It is on such occasions that she regards me as "dotty," and quickly puts me to bed.
Peter is now scraping his boots on the step after carefully dirtying them in the gooseberry-bed. Amelia is hissing at him through the front door; she objects to her hieroglyphics being defaced. Peter is not accustomed to being hissed at, and he will presently come and tell me what he thinks of Amelia.
I persuaded mother a little time back to wheel me under the apple tree and sit with me. The grass is still dew-laden, and Peter will not dare, on account of his gout, to join us till the lawn is dry, hence his position on the doorstep. Peter's gout has been the one bit of luck in mother's life since she was married. Being the more active of the two, she can, when the pressure becomes very great, walk away from him—in fact, run.
I cannot help rejoicing at Dimbie's being away while Peter is here, for I am convinced that long ere this Dimbie would have thrown my father out of the house; and for mother's sake I should not care for such an ignominious thing to happen to her husband. Besides, he would make such a mess on the step while he danced about, his customary habit being, when extra annoyed, to dance a kind of war dance.
When he and mother arrived Amelia rushed into the drawing-room and in great excitement whispered, "A red-nosed gent has come with your mother!"
In an instant my mind flew to Peter, but I remained sufficiently controlled to correct Amelia for saying '"Your mother."
"Is she your step, mum?" she murmured cautiously.
"Certainly not,"' I said. "But it is not polite. You must speak of her as Mrs. Macintosh. Where have you left them? Why don't they come in?"
"The gentleman is having a row with the cabby. Don't you hear him?" She grinned with enjoyment. "He has just called the cabby a grasping, white-livered Jew. It seems as though he knowed how to take care of himself."
I did not speak.
"Who is he, mum?"
I pretended not to hear.
"Is he your uncle?"
"He's—my father." I closed my eyes, signifying that the conversation was finished.
"Never knew you had a father, mum," came in a succession of gasps and squeaks.
"Of course I have a father," I said excessively crossly. "How do you suppose I came into the world. Kindly show them in here and go and unstrap the luggage."
When they appeared, and I had embraced them both, giving mother an extra squeeze, I said—
"Dear father, whatever has been the matter?"
"That impudent shark has been trying to rob me," he replied, picking up a vase from the mantelshelf and returning it with a bang.
"What did he charge you?"
"Two shillings."
"Well, that is the right fare, and Dimbie gives an extra sixpence if he has a portmanteau. What did you give him for the luggage?"
"A piece of my mind, and threatened him with the police for his impudence."
"Oh, father," I cried, "I am sorry you have made a disturbance. Up to now we—Dimbie and I—have been respected in the village."
"Have you been to church?" He smiled sardonically.
"N—o."
"Who respects you—the vicar?"
"The villagers have a great respect for us. I—I am sure they have."
"That's all right. They'll respect your father now. They'll know I'm a man not to be trifled with. How are you?" He shot this last at me as though he were at Bisley competing for the King's Prize.
"I'm pretty well, thank you."
"Well, you don't look it. You're as thin as a rat. But it's rather improved you than otherwise, made you look less defiant and assertive."
"Oh, Peter," mother broke in, "Marguerite never looked assertive. I remember Dimbie saying to me that he had never seen a sweeter face."
"Of course, that is exactly the sort of thing Dumbarton would say," he jeered; "but then Dumbarton's an ass."
"Look here, father," I said steadily, "once and for all I wish you to remember that I will not allow you to call my husband an ass. Yes, allow, I repeat the word." I shivered all over as I spoke. Never, never had I dared to speak to Peter in such a manner, but my blood was up. "Dimbie was a brave man to have married into such a family. His courage was immense there." I clutched the tortoise as I spoke—clutched it for support, but I kept my head well up, looking at him defiantly and waiting for the storm.
But it never burst. To my everlasting astonishment Peter remained mute and just stared at me, stared at me for a full minute, then putting his hands in his pockets, he said, "Well, well!" and stumped out of the room.
"There!" I said, "that is the way you should have treated Peter—always."
But mother sat with her hands locked and remained speechless for some seconds.
"How dared you do it?" she breathed at length.
"Oh, it was quite easy," I replied airily.
"Was it?"
"Well, perhaps not quite easy," I corrected myself, "but fairly easy when you once get started."
"I never dare start," she said plaintively. "As soon as I open my mouth I——"
"Shut it again," I said. "But don't in future, keep it well open. Begin to-night, and I'll help you. Make a firm stand like Horatius."
"What did he do?" she asked with interest.
"He stood alone and—and looked after a gate."
"Oh, I could do that. If your father were a gate——" she began eagerly.
"What would you do?" inquired Peter, walking into the room and surveying her from head to foot.
"I—I——" she stammered.
"Don't forget Horatius," I signalled.
"I—I should sit on you!" With which terrific exhibition of courage she took to her heels and fled.
"I mustn't laugh," I told myself, "or everything will be spoiled."
Peter stood in the middle of the room, staring at the closed door.
"I believe your mother is trying to be funny," he remarked when he had got his breath.
"Mother is often funny," I murmured.
"I have noticed she has been a bit strange lately."
"Oh?"
"Very secretive."
"Indeed?"
"In fact, deceitful."
"Mother deceitful?"
"Yes, said she didn't know what train she was coming by." He was beginning to raise his voice.
"Trains don't always start at the time mentioned in Bradshaw. Look at the South Eastern."
"This was the South Western," he snapped. "I must give her a dose of medicine."
"A dose of medicine!" I repeated in surprise.
"Yes, calomel. It's her liver, I expect. She has been like this before. How soon will dinner be ready?"
"When Amelia feels inclined to give it to us."
"Is Amelia the forward young person with the pearl necklace who came to the door?"
"That is an excellent description of Amelia, but I thought you had seen her before."
"And does she arrange the hour you are to dine?"
"She arranges the hour in which the potatoes are dried, the meat dished, the gravy made, and the cabbage chopped. You see, as she does it all, she naturally knows when it will be ready."
"God bless my soul!" he ejaculated.
"What is the matter?"
"I had no idea you ran your servants in such a shocking manner."
"Servant," I corrected; "and I don't run her, she runs me."
"I wouldn't have believed it."
"You would if you had an Amelia."
"I'd sack her."
"She wouldn't go if I did."
"I'd lock her out."
"She'd break a window and climb through it."
He began to march about the room.
"I'd manage that girl in ten minutes."
"She would hold you in the hollow of her hand in less than five," I said.
He spluttered.
"What do you take me for?"
"I never know. I've often thought about it," I said gently.
He stopped marching and stared at me.
"I wonder what mother is doing," I said, averting my eyes.
"Your mother," he shouted, rushing towards the door, "is the slowest woman on God's earth. She'll be doing her hair. I'll bring her down." And he went to take out of her what, by right, he should have taken out of me.
"Poor mother!" I sighed.
I much fear we are going to have ructions—Peter and I. A strange and tremendous courage has come to me. Is it that I know I shall have a staunch ally in Amelia? One Amelia is surely worth two Peters. And yet I don't know. Peter has been accustomed to fighting and bloodshed, and managing his men and out-manoeuvring the enemy most of his life; and Amelia is only used to managing her mistresses and charwomen. As a tactician Amelia may be weak. One cannot tell. I am hoping for the best.
CHAPTER XV
AMELIA GIVES ME NOTICE
It is said that the young look forward and the old look backward. I am still young enough, I suppose, to live chiefly in the future—a beautiful future, with Dimbie ever as the central figure. But should I live to be an old woman, and send my thoughts backward through the years, a smile will rise to my lips unbidden at the memory of a certain dinner at which Peter and Amelia played prominent parts.
I have to put down my manuscript book for a moment while I laugh. Amelia is, I know, watching me through the pantry window. She will be considering that this is one of my "dotty" moments. For anyone to lie under an apple tree and apparently laugh at nothing at all is to Amelia a strange and sad sight.
Wait a while, Amelia, you may see stranger things yet. Life contains infinite possibilities for those who have even the smallest sense of humour. At present that sense with you is lacking. Let us hope that it is not altogether void, but in an embryo stage waiting for development.
To you the dinner last evening was not in the least amusing. In fact, the tears you shed later on were very bitter. Of course, lookers-on always see most of the game, and had I been in your place I admit I should have been very angry; for Peter is capable of arousing in the human breast passions which are anything but Christian.
Let me relate the story as it sounded to my ears from the drawing-room. It is a source of regret to me that I cannot be present at meals, for the bicycle-room is not large enough to hold both the dining-table and my Ilkley couch. Still, with both doors set wide apart I can hear most of what is going on.
Peter's voice carried better than Amelia's; he is used to drilling. Mother's sounded like punctuation marks—notes of exclamation and interrogation, gentle little apostrophes, and full stops. But Peter was not to be stopped. This is how he began to annoy Amelia:—
"What's this?" A stab of a fork.
"Don't you know, sir?"
"No, I don't."
"Not seen lamb before?"
"Do you call this burnt cinder lamb?"
Mother, gently, "I think it looks beautifully cooked, just nicely browned."
"Of course you do. You can eat anything. Some people have the digestion of an ostrich."
Amelia, breaking in, "Please don't carve it that way, sir. We eats the bottom side first—that was Tompkinses' way—and next day when it's turned over it looks as though it had never been touched, quite respectable like."
Peter: "Am I carving this cinder or are you?"
Amelia (calmly, but as I knew ominously): "Neither of us, sir, at this partickler minute. But p'r'aps you will be startin' before it's cold."
Sounds of splashings of gravy, and hurried exit of Amelia (I guessed to fetch a cloth).
"It's the best table-cloth, sir, double damux, and has to last a fortnight."
"A what?"
"A week for dinner, and followin' week for breakfast."
"A piggish habit!"
"A what, sir?"
"A piggish habit. Are there no laundries or washerwomen about here?"
"Plenty, sir, but we don't want to over-work 'em. Will you give me a bit of the knuckle for the mistress, she likes knuckle. It's not often she gets meat for her dinner, only beef and lamb and mutton, no pork or veal or beefsteak pie. That's the knuckle, sir, the other end."
Splutterings and drill language from Peter.
"And what does she have then?" asked mother.
"A whitin', mum, mostly."
"She looks like it."
"And you'd look like it too, sir, if you was to lie still, flat on your back, day after day."
Arrival of Amelia with my tray. Confidential whispering. The meat will have to be hashed to-morrow, as it's been carved so disgracefully. I cheer her up to the best of my ability.
Return of Amelia to dining-room.
"What's this vegetable supposed to be—seakale or asparagus?"
"Neither, sir" (chuckling). "It's salsify. Thought you wouldn't know it, as you don't seem to be up in the names of things."
I bury my face in my serviette and hold on to the tortoise.
"It's like stewed sawdust."
"Is it, sir? The cookery book says it's like vegetable hoyster."
"Vegetable what?"
"Vegetable hoyster."
"I don't understand you" (thunderingly). "Speak plainly, girl."
"Do you know what gentlefolks buys off stalls at the seaside and eats with lemon and cyenne?" (An apparent effort to keep calm.)
Peter (shouting): "Winkles!"
Amelia (with fine scorn): "My friends don't buy winkles; it's only common folks as does that. My friends buy hoysters."
"Oh, oy—sters!"
"Yes, hoy—sters."
"You can bring in the next course, Angelina."
"Amelia, sir. You're that bad in your memory——" Rest of sentence finished in hall and kitchen.
Gentle murmur from mother.
"I shall!" (loudly). "It's a treat to speak to a girl with a bit of sense, though she is an impudent hussy, after our sleek-tongued fools—yes, fools, every one of them!"
Clattering of saucepans in kitchen and stamping of Amelia across the hall with the pudding. I could not remember what I had ord—suggested in the way of pudding, and I hoped it would meet with Peter's approval.
"Is this a pudding?"
"Yes, sir."
"I thought puddings stood up straight?"
"Not all of 'em, sir. Some is a bit weak-kneed in the joints."
Was she poking fun at Peter's gouty legs?
"What's inside it?"
"Here's a knife and fork, sir. You'll soon find out."
"What's inside it?"
"P'r'aps it's a spoon you are wantin' as well."
"I don't eat red-currant pudding."
"Sorry, sir. Just keep quiet till the next course, sir.
"Keep quiet!" (Yells.) "What do you mean?"
"The mistress's nerves gets upset with a bit of noise."
"Your mistress seems to get upset with the slightest provocation."
"She does, sir. I saw her cryin' not so long ago over a bunch of honeysuckle. She was took reg'lar bad—red eyes and nose."
"Well, of course she'll miss gathering it this year. The deuce knows why women like picking things full of d—ahem! abominable insects. But they're born that way—born stupid."
I surprised a gentle note almost in the first part of his sentence which filled me with wonder. Was Peter really sorry for me?
And as though he were ashamed of his unwonted softness his next remark made Amelia skip. I could distinctly hear her skip, and it made me laugh. Few people can make her run, let alone skip.
"This pudding makes me sick, girl. It smells of suet, reeks of suet. Remove it at once!" he thundered.
She stood her ground for a moment.
"But the mistress hasn't had any."
"Remove that pudding!"
"But supposin' Mrs. Macintosh wants another helpin'" (waveringly).
"Mrs. Macintosh won't require any more pudding. Mrs. Macintosh is going to take a liver pill. Too much pudding would be bad for her."
"But——"
"Take out this pudding!"
The windows rattled, and Amelia bolted—not into the kitchen but into here, and after planking the pudding down on to Dimbie's arm-chair, said—
"If you please, mum, I must leave."
"Leave?" I echoed in astonishment.
"Yes, mum. I could not stop another minute—not for a thousand pounds down—with that gentle—I mean man in the house. Either he must go or me."
Before I could check myself I had smiled, for had not Amelia called Peter a gentle, the offspring of a meat-fly—the horrible creature with which I had fished as a little girl? And—Amelia took instant offence at my smile. Not being able to follow my train of thought, she imagined I was laughing at her.
"To-night," she said.
"To-night!" I cried, not wishing to echo her words, but surprise bereft me of an original mode of speech.
"I must leave you to-night."
I lay back and looked at Amelia—at her leaning, high-heeled shoes, at her pearl necklace, at her befrilled apron, at her perky cap, at her tightly-curled fringe. Could all these things be leaving me to-night, leaving me forever? I should miss them, I knew, so accustomed does one become to familiar objects. I wondered where they would go, how long it would be before Amelia stitched the right-hand string to her apron instead of pinning it there? My eyes rose slowly from the apron, upon which they had been resting, to her necklace. Whose gaze, instead of mine, would rest upon those pearls? Then I reached Amelia's face—her soap-shone, eager face. This brought me to the girl herself. She, Amelia, who had seemed so devoted, she was going to leave me——
"To-night!" broke in Amelia sternly.
"Yes, yes," I said quickly.
She stood and looked at me defiantly. I don't know why, for I wasn't speaking.
"How soon shall you start?" I asked for want or something to say.
She did not reply.
"Perhaps you wouldn't mind giving me a little pudding before you go," I said. "It's getting cold. You put it over there on the chair." And to my immense surprise she burst into tears.
"Whatever's the matter?" I asked in consternation. "Don't cry, Amelia, don't cry." I patted the tortoise as Amelia wasn't near enough to pat.
"I—I don't want to go," she sobbed.
"No? Well, don't go," I said soothingly.
"But you want me to."
"I want you to go?"
"Yes."
"Whatever makes you think that?"
"You didn't say as I wasn't to go when I said I was, and I would too."
This was a little involved, but I disentangled it.
"I never thought of saying you were not to go. You seemed to have so completely made up your mind."
"I wish everybody was all like you," she said, somewhat inconsequently.
"All cripples," I laughed.
She went on sobbing.
"I wonder why you are crying?" I said at length gently.
"Because I don't know where to go at this time of night. It's past eight, and the roads are full of tramps."
"Well, don't go. Your bedroom is surely comfortable. You've always said how much you like the pink roses on the wall-paper."
"I couldn't sleep in the same house as that man who calls himself a gentleman, beggin' your pardon, mum. The same roof shall never cover us again. And to think he's your father—you're flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone."
For a moment I wondered whether she would consent to sleep in the shed with the canoe and Jumbles if we rigged up a hammock. Or could I persuade Peter to return home if I explained how matters stood? But on reflection I knew neither of these things could be. Amelia was still repeating "bone of his bone" in an automatic fashion, when I broke in, "I can't help that, Amelia. I can't help his being my father." Then perhaps I behaved foolishly, unfilially, for I took her into my confidence. But what else was I to do? I am not a diplomatist. I am not a Talleyrand. Amelia must be kept at any price. The thought of mother and Peter struggling to light the kitchen fire on the morrow made me shudder.
"Amelia"——I began.
She took her apron from her eyes, and I became nervous.
"I—I would like some pudding, please, however cold it may be. And—and what are they doing in the other room?"
"I don't know," she replied, with a gesture indicating, as I took it, that she didn't care if they were descending the bottomless pit.
"Shut the door," I breathed.
She did so.
"Amelia——" I began again.
"Yes, mum."
"I have felt like that."
"Like what?"
"Like—that I couldn't sleep in the same house as Pet—General Macintosh."
Her eyes became round.
"Yes, I have," I repeated.
She nodded her head and came closer.
"You see, he is a little difficult, a little difficult, Amelia. Perhaps his tem—peculiarity has been caused by his gout. He has suffered a great deal. The servants at home and mother—well, they all stay on. They don't leave. Do you understand?"
She nodded with complete comprehension.
I now realised how very clever Amelia was.
"I am not well," I went on plaintively, "and mother isn't very strong and capable, and I don't quite know what I shall do without you. I'm—I'm afraid I shall die if you leave me. In fact, I'm sure I shall die——" and my voice tailed off into a moan as I finished.
Amelia twisted her apron into tight rolls, then untwisted them, and then leaned on her high heels towards the couch.
"Of course, I don't want you to die, mum."
"No?" I said.
"I shouldn't like it to be said as how I finished you off."
"I am sure you wouldn't," I agreed with warmth.
"Well, then, I will stop." There was an uplifted, heroic expression on Amelia's face. "I'll stop. I'll never leave you, mum—not till the breath goes out of my body, not till I'm a corpse in my coffin, not even for the butcher's young man, who was only a-sayin' yesterday as how I had the finest figger he'd ever come across. I'll work for you till I drops. I'll just ignore your father, mum. Oh, mum, if everybody was as gentle and perlite and soft spoken as you I'd die for 'em." And flinging herself upon her knees, she wept against the Liberty sofa blanket, while I surreptitiously stroked her cap, there being no hair visible to stroke.
CHAPTER XVI
FOREBODINGS
I am very weary. In the old days, before my accident, it was my boast that I was never tired. Perhaps the exertion of conciliating Peter, of trying to keep the peace between him and Amelia, has been too much for me these sultry days. I know not. But I do know that I am always tired. The sort of tiredness which makes me say, "Go away, Amelia," when she brings my hot water, and lays my tea-gown and brush and comb on the bed, and the long arduous task of being dressed lies before me. "Leave me for another hour, please." And of course she argues and says the water will go cold; and I tell her I prefer it so, closing my eyes wearily to show that the discussion is finished.
She surveys me, I know, in surprise. How can I be tired when I do absolutely nothing but lie still, when she is quite fresh after doing the whole work of the universe? "Amelia, there is a weariness of the spirit which is greater than that of the flesh. You cannot understand this. A weariness which leads you to no other desire but that of lying quite still with your eyes closed, which makes you regard the simple act of combing out your own hair as tantamount to one of the Herculean labours. You would almost prefer its being tangled to going through the exertion of getting it straight. That you would like to disentangle it for me, I know, but I shudder at the very thought. You are kind, but you don't understand how very tired I am. I want to rest a little longer."
Even the prospect of being under the apple tree, in the proximity of my friends the ants, doesn't tempt me. The dressing has to be got through first. It hurts—the lifting from the bed to the couch—though Amelia is very tender. It jars—that being wheeled from the hall on to the step. I want to be without steps and doors, and corners and turnings and sudden descents. I want to be on a gentle, inclined plane—on a soft, billowy cloud, on wings of thistledown. I am tired of my body. It is troublesome and aching. I would gladly have done with it to-day. Oh, that I could step out of it and into a new, whole, strong body—radiant and beautiful—for Dimbie's sake.
It is hard that these bodies have to get so tired before we have done with them. God sends this weariness, I suppose, to make the passing easier. I am thinking of Aunt Letitia now. She has gone, she has done with the world, she knows what is behind the veil.
Dimbie says she just slept herself away. She was conscious almost to the last, but was too tired even to eat a grape. Then she fell asleep.
Dimbie will be coming home now, but—not for four days. Four days seem a long time in which to bury a very tired, little, old lady. What am I saying? Am I growing selfish? "Forgive me, Aunt Letitia. I will not grudge Dimbie to you at the last, when you have done so much for him." And the time will pass, for mother and Peter are still here, and one cannot be dull when Peter is in the neighbourhood.
I hear Amelia's footsteps. She enters the room and tells me I must get up. It is useless asking her to permit me to have "a little slumber, a little sleep, a little folding of the hands to sleep," for she tells me that it is dining-room day, which means that she must clean it, and cannot waste any more time on an idle, troublesome girl.
I ask her if I may lie in Nature's own garments under the apple tree, with just a soft, silken coverlet thrown over me; and she is scandalised, and says most probably Mr. Brook, the vicar, or Mrs. Cobbold may call.
"Amelia," I say, "I am tired of your threatening me with Mr. Brook. We have lived here for six months, and he does not seem to be dreaming of calling upon us. As for Mrs. Cobbold—well, she will never call again."
"Mr. Brook has been ill," she argues.
"Mrs. Brook might have called."
"She has been too busy nursing him."
"Poor woman! She must be quite glad of an excuse, then, not to call," I said. "I have the truest sympathy for clergymen's wives, always going to see stupid parishioners because it is considered their duty. I only hope she will not call."
"We never use the best china," said Amelia sadly.
"Use it while mother is here," I said cheeringly; "it will be a good opportunity."
She shook her head.
"It's too good for common use. Mrs. Macintosh might stay a fortnight, and he might smash it." ("He" is Peter.)
I ask her what they are doing with themselves, and she says Peter is scrattlin' his feet about on the doorstep like an old hen.
She attacks me with a brush, and I implore her to permit my hair to hang loose to-day. I explain that it is all in a tangle, and perhaps a passing breeze might disentangle it, so saving us much trouble. She regards me severely, and says no breeze will think of knocking about, that it is about 80 degrees in the shade, and that if I wish Mr. Brook to see me, of course—
"Put it up," I cry; "and if you dangle Mr. Brook in front of my eyes once again I will throw something at you."
She tells me to calm myself, and, picking me up, lays me on the couch and trundles me out of the front door.
And here I lie refusing to do anything but gaze at the soft, white, eider-down clouds which seem to be trying to tuck up the blue. Amelia has tried to make me eat. I have refused. Mother has tried to engage me in a conversation about Dimbie—artful mother! I have refused. Peter has tried to draw me into a quarrel. I have still refused. And now they have all gone away and left me. Praised be the gods!
*****
As the shadows began to lengthen upon the lawn I fell asleep, and when I opened my eyes, very slowly, for I did not want to return to a world without Dimbie, I found Dr. Renton sitting at the side of my couch watching me intently. I fancied that he had been there for some time, and I felt vaguely uneasy.
"May I smoke?" was his first question.
"Of course," I said. "Have you been here long?"
"About half an hour." He struck a match.
"Why didn't you wake me?"
"You had a bad night?"
I nodded.
"It was the heat."
"Where's your husband? It's time he was home, isn't it?" He took out his watch.
"He's away."
"Away! Well, he's no right to be away when you are so—feeling the heat. What's he doing?"
"My husband was obliged to go to an aunt of his who was dying," I said with dignity.
"What does she mean by dying now?" he said with asperity.
"She's not, she's dead."
"Ah, that's better!" he observed in a most shameless manner. "He will be returning to-day?"
"Not for four days. He must wait for the funeral. This aunt practically brought him up."
"Well, she's not bringing him up now," he said, marching about the lawn. "His duty lies at home."
"Dimbie knows his duty as well as any man," I said stiffly.
Dr. Renton laughed.
"I beg your pardon, but——"
"You think I am fretting for him?"
"Yes, I do. Your face is like a bit of white notepaper."
"The heat," I said.
"Are you eating properly?"
"Who could eat in this weather?"
"Are you sleeping well?"
"Dr. Renton, I don't want to talk of myself."
"But we must. What's the matter with you?"
"Nothing."
"Are you tired?"
"I have just been to sleep."
"Look here, Marguerite," he said sternly, sitting down and staring into my face, "answer my questions properly—I am your medical adviser—or I will call in Mr. Rovell; in fact, I am going to persuade Rovell to have a look at you in any case."
"Call in Mr. Rovell?" I said blankly.
He nodded.
"Candidly, I am not satisfied with your appearance. You are much thinner."
"Mr. Rovell can't make me fatter."
"I shall bring him this week—say Thursday."
I stared at him, dismayed and frightened.
"I don't see the sense of making Dimbie fork out another big fee," I quavered, "and I'm—I'm quite well."
"Are you? How's the back?"
"It's quite—well, thanks."
"I thought you were truthful."
"Well, it's pretty well."
"Marguerite," he said gently, holding my hand, "I don't want to frighten you. As you say, your white, rose-leaf face and hands may be the result of the great heat, but—I think it well to have another opinion. It cannot do you any harm, it may do you good, and at any rate it will satisfy me."
MARGUERITE, I DON'T WANT TO FRIGHTEN YOU
"Very well," I said, laying my face on his hand for a moment, "but I—am frightened."
"I know," he replied. "I have seen fear, sickening anxiety, written on the faces of many of my patients when the great specialist—the man who will pronounce their doom or otherwise—has entered the room, only to be followed by a great joy. We must hope and pray that this joy will be yours. It must be," he said almost savagely, getting up and kicking over his chair. "You are too young always to lie still." The last words were muttered to himself but I caught them, and a momentary darkness rose before my eyes, but I brushed it away as something tangible.
"You—but you do think it will be well with me, Dr. Renton?" and the bitter entreaty of my cry startled my own ears.
Voices came across the garden, and mother and Peter appeared through the gate.
Dr. Renton hesitated a moment, and then went to meet them.
My question remained unanswered.
CHAPTER XVII
MY WORST FEARS ARE REALISED
The day has come at last on which Dimbie is to return, and—I am not glad. That I, his wife, should ever write such words seems almost unbelievable. But, oh—I am not ready for him! I am not yet brave enough to smile. I shrink from the thought of meeting the look of happiness in his blue eyes, of hearing the joyous ring of his voice, of seeing the whimsical, crooked smile on his lips. For how can I return the look, how smile back at him when my heart is wellnigh breaking, and every fibre of my being will be concentrated in keeping my lips steady, my eyes undimmed?
And yet I must smile—somehow.
It matters not that my happiness is marred so long as Dimbie never knows it—if my tears fall in the darkness when he is asleep; if my spirit cries out in its anguish, and only God hears. God will not mind as Dimbie would mind, for Dimbie loves me. It is hard to believe that God loves me, or why give me such happiness just for a little while only to wrest it from me? It is He who has crippled me for life; He who gave me strong young limbs, only to strike them helpless; He who filled me with a passionate love for Nature, only to shut me away from her forever within four walls.
And yet Christian people tell us that He is a God of love. Love? I smile, it seems so strange that they should believe this. And they will come along and say very kindly, very gently, "You loved Dimbie too much, you made an idol of him. God has sent you this trial to bring you to Him. He must always come first." And you wonder at their lack of understanding. Do they not know that you come closest to God in your moments of supreme happiness? It is then you want to creep away to a quiet spot and thank Him, on your knees, for giving you such happiness. It is then you look upon all the wonders of the world with understanding eyes. It is then you try to help those who suffer and are sick. Oh, dear religious people, it is you who don't understand! It is not sorrow which brings men and women to God, it is joy. It would seem to me a poor sort of thing to go to God when you are down on your luck—to make Him a substitute for husband, home, friends; in fact, to call upon Him when everything else has failed. That sort of religion does not appeal to me!
I was grateful to Him, too, for my happiness, for giving me Dimbie. In my contentment I think I tried to lead a better life, to be more tender-hearted, more charitable, less down upon other people's shortcomings; and now—God has forgotten me.
O God, were you not a little sorry for me when they—the doctors had gone, stepped out into the beautiful wide world, and left me alone a helpless, stricken creature? Did you not feel a little twinge of pity when, not believing them, I struggled to stand, gripped the head of the bed, held out vague, wandering hands to anything that might help me to raise myself, only to fall in a huddled, unconscious heap on the floor? Or perhaps you said, "Poor, foolish little child, she is rebellious now; but a day will come when her spirit will be broken, broken upon the wheel of suffering."
Ah! what am I saying? Forgive me, O Lord. I am weak and sorrowful and lonely. I cannot understand it yet; I cannot see the reason why. I am as a little child groping in the darkness. The darkness stretches away to an eternity, and I can see no daylight. But help me to smile, help me to smile when Dimbie comes home.
The afternoon is hot and long and very silent.
Mother and Peter are gone. Instinctively mother knew I wanted to be alone to meet Dimbie. How wise mothers are! She strained me to her breast, and the hot tears fell upon my face as she said "Good-bye."
"A word from you," she whispered, "will always bring me, even from the very end of the earth."
"And what about Peter, little mother?" I asked tremulously.
"Peter must remain at home."
"But I think even he is a little sorry for me," I said gently.
She turned away, trying to get her face and lips still.
"In the night I heard him say, 'My little Marguerite, my poor little girl!'" she whispered.
"Don't, mother!" A great sob burst from me. "Don't tell me things like that. Don't sympathise with me, for I cannot bear it—yet. Just take your broken girl as a matter of course. Try to pretend that I have always been helpless, crippled. Imagine me as a little baby once more, needing all your love and tenderness, but not your sympathy. It is sympathy that will make me break down, it is sympathy that will make me weep. And I am trying to keep all my strength for Dimbie. If I cry I shall become weak, and then I shan't be able to smile when he comes through the garden-gate. Don't give me sympathy, mother."
*****
It is five o'clock. In an hour's time Dimbie will be here.
The day has passed desperately slowly, and yet all too quickly, for I am not ready for him yet. My smile is still trembly. I feel my lips quiver as I practise it. Amelia looks at me out of the corner of her eye. How can she know what I am doing—that I am engaged in smiling exercises? A new feature of my curious mental condition, she thinks. But Amelia is very gentle and patient with me now. She does not want me to know that there is any difference in her method of treating me. She is still firm and managing, but an unwonted softness creeps into her voice and manner when she addresses me. She has not referred to my trouble, and I understand why. She is cheating herself into believing that the doctors have made a mistake, and she thinks she is cheating me into the same belief. In an off-hand way she will refer to Mr. Tompkins having been told by a famous specialist that he was suffering from "hangina pectorate," and how it was nothing of the kind, but simply indigestion through eating Welsh rabbit six nights out of seven; and how the second Miss Tompkins was told unless she had an operation she would be dead in a week, and how she ran away from the nursing home to which she had been taken and so saved her life, as she never had it done.
Amelia's recitations help to pass the time. Just now I pretended I wanted tea, hoping to decoy her into staying with me a while when she came to remove the tray, but she said she was busy.
"Busy!" I ejaculated, "on a sultry afternoon like this. What can you be doing?"
And she asked me if I imagined the work got done itself. And if I thought an oven never wanted washing out with quicklime.
"What do you do that for?" I said eagerly.
From certain well-known signs I thought Amelia was preparing for a gossip, but I was disappointed, for she picked up the tray and moved towards the house.
"Why do you quicklime the oven?" I called after her desperately. I could not face another long half-hour alone.
She put the tray down on to the step and walked slowly back.
"Do you really want to know, mum?"
"Of course," I said.
"Well, to sweeten it."
"Oh! Doesn't the lime burn you?"
"It would if I got it on to my hands, but I don't."
"Where do you get it from?"
"I got a big lump out of a field."
"Do you—do you find lime in fields?"
She eyed me with pity.
"A house was being built there," she said laconically, as she began to walk away.
"Wait a minute," I called. "There's no hurry. Where was the field?"
She stood and stared at me.
"You see, I—I am very interested in quicklime and ovens." I spoke rapidly. "Did the Tompkinses quicklime their oven?"
Amelia fell into the trap like a mouse.
"They didn't till I taught 'em. They didn't do anythink like that till I showed 'em how. When I went there first, the oven was like that tex in the Bible."
"Which text?" I asked with relief, for she had seated herself upon the grass.
"'It stank in your nostrils.'"
"Dear me," I said, "how unpleasant."
"Heverythink tasted of ovens. You know the taste, mum?"
"I'm not sure that I do."
"It's like bad hot fat."
"Oh, then, I'm sure I don't. And so you cleaned it."
"It came off in cakes. I had to take a knife to it."
"The lime?"
She eyed me sadly.
"I'm afraid you're not listenin', mum?"
"Why?"
"I'm just tellin' you as how I put the lime on, and you asks me if I took it off. It's the dirt—the fat I'm speaking of now."
"Oh, of course. It's the dirt you are speaking of—the fat that stank in your nostrils." I added this last to show how very sure I was of my ground. But this didn't appease her. She was in a contrary mood, and rose.
"Don't go," I cried. "Wait, I have something important to ask you. I—" feverishly I cudgelled my brains—"I want to know the name of the poet who used to go to the Tompkinses', and looked like a garden leek. Was it by any chance"—I picked up a book—"William Watson?"
"No, mum, William Potts."
"A poet named Potts? You must be mistaken. A poet could not be named Potts."
Amelia set her lips doggedly.
"This one was."
"Perhaps he was a tinker really, or you are mistaken in the name, as I said before. Poets have musical-sounding names, such as Wordsworth, Tennyson, Byron."
Amelia was evidently trying to keep her temper.
"This man was named Potts, I know it for a fact, for I always remembered it by thinking of kettles."
"Oh!" I said.
"Yes, whenever I wants to remember a name I think of somethink else like it, that helps me. When that stout lady called on you I thought of a cobbler."
"Oh, Mrs. Cobbold," I said brightly, pleased at being able to follow her meaning.
She cheered up a little.
"Now, when your father, General Macintosh, came, I just thinks quickly of your waterproof hangin' in the hall."
"I see."
"Don't you think it's a good plan, mum?"
"Most brilliant," I replied. "When you want to remember to feed the canary you say to yourself the word 'sparrows.'"
There was a pause. I was not looking at Amelia. I was, therefore, unprepared for the blinding sarcasm which followed.
"That's it, mum. When I wants to remember to boil some pertaters I straightway puts on a cabbage. When I'm trying to recollect to clean the master's patent boots I washes his golf stockin's. You've got it quite right, mum. You've understood my meanin'. I'm not blamin' you. Folks can't help the hinterlecks as God gives 'em, and I'm not blamin' you," and picking herself up she marched into the house.
I laughed weakly for some minutes after she had gone. She might have been watching me through the pantry window—I care not.
"Bless you, Amelia, for living with me and looking after me and amusing me. I know the kindness of your heart as well as the sharpness of your tongue. I know with what infinite tact you keep away from the subject of my infirmity, and I am grateful to you."
Presently she was out again. I was lying with my eyes closed.
"You're tired, mum?"
"A little," I said.
"Shall I get a flower to put in your gown before the master comes? It will freshen you up a bit."
"How do I look?"
She carefully selected a beautiful red rose.
"There are two spots the colour of this rose in the middle of your cheeks."
"I look well, then?" I asked eagerly.
She sniffed a little.
"I've seen folks as looked better."
"Bring me a hand-glass."
She went slowly to the house.
"I didn't know as you was vain, mum," she observed, as she put it into my hand.
"You can go back to your oven now, Amelia," I said a little frigidly.
I waited till she had gone, and then raised the glass. Two great, dark, burning eyes looked into mine. My cheeks were wasted, and my hair lay in a damp cloud on my forehead. All the gold which Dimbie loved so much seemed to have gone out of it. In the relentless light of day, fascinated, I gazed at my strangely-altered countenance.
"And once Dimbie thought that face beautiful!" The words burst from me in a sob, but no tears came. My aching eyes turned to the roses and lupins which were drooping in the hot afternoon sunshine, to the hedge of wondrous-tinted sweet-peas, to the cool, green limes and beech tree leaning over the fence.
"How lovely to be inanimate!" I cried passionately. "To be without a soul, without a memory, without a future. To be a soft, fragrant rose wrapped round by the sun and the wind and summer rain, sending forth a sweetness to gladden the heart of man, and then falling petal by petal to the cool, kind embrace of mother earth."
Why should humans suffer so? Why should all this pain be? Animals and birds and fish and insects prey upon one another. They drink to the dregs the cup of physical suffering, but they are spared the anguish of mental pain.
Will Dimbie's love stand?
Ah, that is what is torturing me day and night!
Will Dimbie remain faithful?
He is but young. Life is before him. He still lives in the present and future, only the old live in the past. To be tied forever to a helpless wife, to a creature wedded to a couch, to a stricken, maimed woman. Oh, how I hate myself! I despise my own weakness and impotence. Once I was a strong girl, who could run and dance and scale high mountains. Dimbie said my eyes were as bright as stars in the frosty heavens, my hair as gold as the setting sun, my cheeks—ah, he flattered me! And now, God help—but no, there is no one to help me. God has forgotten me!
Bring a brush, Amelia, and try to weave into my dull hair a little of the bright sunshine. Pin the red rose you gathered into my gown. Twine around your finger the damp tendrils which lie on my forehead, and make them curl as of old. Tell me a funny story of the Tompkinses to straighten up the droop of my mouth. For Dimbie is coming down the lane—I hear his footstep eager and fast—and I want to look like the Marguerite he married.
A bird has broken into song in the apple tree—a golden melody. Is he singing for the coming of Dimbie? Or is he a harbinger of hope? Does he mean that Dimbie's love will stand—last throughout the ages? Oh, that it might be so! I would rather be a cripple with Dimbie's love than whole and strong without it.
CHAPTER XVIII
DIMBIE ROLLS A GREAT LOAD FROM MY HEART
In the crises of life—the tremendous moments of fear, hope, and expectation—what a curious calmness overtakes us. Maud's poor lover, after killing her brother in the duel, says—
"Why am I sitting here so stunn'd and still,
Plucking the harmless wild-flower on the hill?"
And later on, when he sits on the Breton strand, he says—
"Strange that the mind when fraught
With a passion so intense
One would think that it well
Might drown all life in the eye,—
That it should, by being so over-wrought,
Suddenly strike on a sharper sense
For a shell, or a flower, little things
Which else would have been passed by."
And so it was with me, I "suddenly struck on a sharper sense" as Dimbie came through the gate, and I had nothing to say in the first moment of greeting but to tell him that a button was missing from one of his boots and his coat was very dusty.
His look of utter astonishment expelled my apathy, and when his arms were round me and he was showering kisses upon my face and hair, and whispering, "Marguerite, Marguerite, have you nothing else to say?" in an overwhelming torrent it came to me what I had to say, what I had to tell him. The reality of it suffocated me, I felt as though I were drowning. I could only cling to him murmuring his name.
"Dear love," he whispered at length, "say that you love me!"
"Love you!" I cried, finding speech. "Love you! Ah, Dimbie, it is not for you to ask such a question. It is I who must put it to you. Do you love me? Can you always love me—forever and ever, whatever happens to me? Whatever I am——"
I broke off. "Whatever I am," I repeated mechanically.
Again he looked at me, held my face away from his, and surprise and bewilderment chased across his countenance.
I could not meet the look in his eyes, and my own fell.
He took my hands in his and held them to his lips very tenderly.
"Love you as you are, whatever you are! Why of course, that is why I shall love you always, because you are Marguerite. You may grow blind and deaf, and old and feeble, but you will always be my Marguerite. That is the beautiful part, we shall always have each other—to the end. Aunt Letitia's was a lonely life and a lonely death. Only old Ann and I with her. No husband nor children, nor brothers nor sisters, no one very closely related; only I, a nephew, and an old servant." He settled himself on the grass at the side of the couch and leant his head against my knee. "But you and I will have each other for ever. But I am not going to talk of sad things—not that Aunt Letitia's death in itself was sad, for it was very peaceful and beautiful—but I want to talk of the delights of being home again, of sitting in our jolly little garden with my own dear wife, and of the said wife's stroking her husband's head." He raised his blue eyes to mine and pulled my hand down to his hair, and perforce I had to stroke it.
"I cannot tell him yet," I cried to myself. "We must have this beautiful hour together. Later on—perhaps when the dusk has fallen."
He sighed contentedly as my hand passed over his crisp, kinky hair, and took Jumbles, who was purring and arching his back, on to his knee.
"Now tell me the news, wife," he commanded. "First of all, how are you? Has Renton been to see you?"
"Yes," I replied after a pause, "he came the other day."
"And what does he think?"
"He thinks"—I caught at my breath—"that I am thinner and—not quite so well."
Dimbie turned round quickly and gave me a prolonged scrutiny. Then he threw Jumbles off his knee and got up.
"You are decidedly thinner, Marg. Let me feel your arms."
"My arms," I said, trying to smile, "were always so abominably fat that it is an improvement their being thinner."
Dimbie felt me carefully, then his mouth set in a hard, straight line.
"We must get you away from here," he said, "to the sea, or somewhere bracing. By the time you are ready to walk about there will be nothing left of you to walk."
"By the time you are ready to walk about," I started. Amelia was coming across the lawn, and heard Dimbie's words. Her lips parted. She was going to tell him.
"Amelia," I cried, "come here quickly. The—the tortoise is slipping down the couch."
"And that won't be the first time, mum," she returned, diving after it. "And you won't have a pocket, mum."
"Shake up my cushions, please, and—" I whispered in her ear as she leaned over me, "don't tell the master yet."
"What are you two up to?" asked Dimbie.
"Amelia is bringing you some tea, and we are going to have supper in the garden. I always have supper under the apple tree when it's fine," I said quickly.
"Isn't it a bit earwiggy?"
"It is; but to make up for that there is the night-scented stock, and a corncrake in the field. Peter got very angry with the corncrake and the frogs."
"By the way, where are Peter and your mother? It is very decent of them to have gone out and left us alone for a bit."
"They are gone home," I replied. "A seismic movement of the earth's crust is now taking place at Dorking."
Dimbie laughed.
"Not very polite to me to clear off just as I was returning."
"I think Peter feared you might quarrel with him."
"A nice way of putting it. How did he and Amelia get on?"
"They didn't get on at all. Amelia gave me notice to leave, and Peter flung dinner plates on to the floor. I think he had been reading about Savage Landor's pitching crockery about when he was a little annoyed."
"I'd have pitched him out of the house."
"Yes," I said, "that was why I felt glad you were not at home."
Amelia appeared with the tray.
"How did you like General Macintosh, Amelia?" asked Dimbie.
She sniffed and tilted her head.
"I gave him his half-sovereign back when he went this morning; that will show you how much I liked him, sir. He nearly wore the mistress and me out. I managed him though in the end."
"What did you do?"
"Well, sir, I peppered him and Keatinged him just as though he was a house-moth."
We both stared at her.
"Readin' a book made me think of it; it was about a duchess and a baby, and the baby kept sneezin'. 'This will do for him,' says I to myself. So I buys a quarter of a pound of pepper and a tin of Keating's moth powder, and I sprinkles his pillow and hairbrushes, and handkerchiefs and pyjamas, and shaving-brush and his clothes, and the sneezin' which took place after that was somethin' dreadful. His eyes and nose was runnin', and he says he had a dreadful attack of influenza. Don't you remember, mum?"
She looked at me, but I made no answer. He was, after all, my father, and I must not sympathise with Amelia in her depravity.
"Go on," said Dimbie encouragingly, helping himself to a large supply of strawberry jam.
"Well, he came and danced about my kitchen like a hathlete at the circus. Couldn't have believed pepper could have made anythink so active, and with his gout, sir. I couldn't get him out of the kitchen for hever so long."
"And what did you do?"
"Oh, I just fetched the pepper-pot and shook it at him, one shake and he fairly raced. And Jumbles began a-sneezin' too, and rushed off to the roof of the shed; there was legs flying in all directions."
Dimbie tilted back his chair and roared with laughter.
"And was he polite to you after that?"
"Pretty well, sir. He had to be. Every time he was going to break out I just casual-like referred to the pepper. I would ask Mrs. Macintosh if there was enough of it in her soup, or if the curry was too hot."
"You are a strategist, Amelia," said Dimbie.
"Yes, sir," she replied, without comprehension.
"Do you know what I mean?"
"No, sir."
"You can outwit the enemy."
"Yes, sir."
She moved towards the house. She was wearing the tea-rose slippers again. Dimbie caught sight of them.
"Why are you wearing my slippers? How dare you, Amelia!"
She stood nonplussed for a moment, then, "The mistress won't allow you to wear them, sir, and I thought it was a pity for them to be wasted," and she disappeared into the house.
We looked at each other and laughed.
"She is a good girl, and looks after you well, doesn't she?"
"Excellently."
"But I think we will get another maid—one who is more used to invalids."
"No one but Amelia shall look after me; besides, we can't afford," I said decidedly.
"Oh, we can afford right enough, Marg. Wouldn't you like one, dear?"
"No, I wouldn't."
He smiled.
"Well, don't get so heated about it, you shan't if you don't like. You shan't do anything or have anything contrary to your wishes."
"You are very good to me, Dimbie, dear;" and tears trembled in my eyes.
"Whatever's the matter?" he said in alarm.
"I'm only tired. I have been so excited about your coming."
"Poor darling!" he murmured softly. "It's this hot weather that is making you so weary. I'm going to read you to sleep, and you must sleep till supper. What shall it be?" He picked up one or two of the books from the table. "Omar?"
"No, I'm tired of Omar."
"The Garden of Allah?"
"No, beautiful but sad."
"What, then?"
I lay and thought. Dimbie had a musical voice; he read well. I wanted something to suit his voice.
"Pilgrim's Progress," I said. "It's on the drawing-room table."
He fetched it, and turned the pages.
"What part do you fancy?"
"Anywhere, so long as I can see you while you read."
He stooped and kissed me, and holding one of my hands in his he began.
Very little of the beautiful language did I hear, for I was thinking and pondering upon what I should say to him later. How should I tell him? How break my news? The shock would be so great; I must choose my words carefully. "Help me to say the right thing," I prayed I know not to whom. "Help me to choose the right words, and let him go on loving me."
*****
And Dimbie himself made it all quite easy for me, for before I spoke or told him his own words rolled a great load from my heart.
We had finished supper, the darkness had fallen, and a moon swam in a sky of the deepest blue. Heavy on the warm night air lay the perfume of the roses, the night-scented stock, and the flowering lime, in which a thousand and one bees had been humming throughout the day. Now they were asleep, and the lime was at rest.
Dimbie, with his arm around me, was telling me of Aunt Letitia's death, and how glad she was to go; how quietly and simply she had talked of her business affairs, of the disposal of her money, of her legacies. She had left her house in order, and with the faith of a little child had set out on the long, unknown journey fearless and with a great trust in the mercy of God.