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diff --git a/14597-h/14597-h.htm b/14597-h/14597-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..27b09e1 --- /dev/null +++ b/14597-h/14597-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,23908 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> +<meta name="generator" content= +"HTML Tidy for Windows (vers 1st February 2004), see www.w3.org" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Woman Thou Gavest Me, by Hall +Caine.</title> + +<style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + .bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + .bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + .br {border-right: solid 2px;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span {display: block; margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14597 ***</div> + +<div> +<h1>The Woman<br /> +Thou Gavest Me</h1> +</div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3>Being the Story of Mary O'Neill</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>By HALL CAINE</h2> +<h4>Author of "The Prodigal Son," Etc.</h4> +<div class="figcenter"><br /> +<img src="images/001.png" width="10%" alt="" title="" /></div> +<h5>Published August, 1913</h5> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>THE AUTHOR TO THE READER</h2> +<p><i>How much of the story of Mary O'Neill is a work of my own +imagination, and how much comes from an authentic source I do not +consider it necessary to say. But as I have in this instance drawn +more largely and directly from fact than is usually the practice of +the novelist, I have thought it my duty to defeat all possible +attempts at personal identification by altering and disguising the +more important scenes and characters. Therefore this novel is not +to be understood as referring to any living person or persons, and +the convent school described in it is not to be identified with any +similar educational institution in Rome</i>.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>MARTIN CONRAD TO THE AUTHOR</h2> +<p><i>Here are the Memoranda we have talked about. Do as you like +with them. Alter, amend, add to or take away from them, exactly as +you think best. They were written in the first instance for my own +eye alone, and hence they take much for granted which may need +explanation before they can be put to the more general uses you +have designed for them. Make such explanation in any way you +consider suitable. It is my wish that in this matter your judgment +should be accepted as mine. The deep feeling you could not conceal +when I told you the story of my dear one's life gives me confidence +in your discretion.</i></p> +<p><i>Whatever the immediate effect may be, I feel that in the end +I shall be justified—fully justified—in allowing the +public to look for a little while into the sacred confessional of +my darling's stainless heart.</i></p> +<p><i>I heard her voice again to-day. She was right—love is +immortal. God bless her! My ever lovely and beloved one!</i></p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<div class="center"> +<table summary=""> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td>THE NARRATIVE OF MARY O'NEILL</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td> </td> +<td>PAGE</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#FIRST_PART">FIRST PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#FIRST_PART">MY GIRLHOOD</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#FIRST_PART">1</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#FIRST_CHAPTER">1</a>] [<a href= +"#SECOND_CHAPTER">2</a>] [<a href="#THIRD_CHAPTER">3</a>] [<a href= +"#FOURTH_CHAPTER">4</a>] [<a href="#FIFTH_CHAPTER">5</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTH_CHAPTER">6</a>] [<a href="#SEVENTH_CHAPTER">7</a>] +[<a href="#EIGHTH_CHAPTER">8</a>] [<a href="#NINTH_CHAPTER">9</a>] +[<a href="#TENTH_CHAPTER">10</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#ELEVENTH_CHAPTER">11</a>] [<a href= +"#TWELFTH_CHAPTER">12</a>] [<a href="#THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER">13</a>] +[<a href="#FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER">14</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER">15</a>] [<a href="#SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER">16</a>] +[<a href="#SEVENTEENTH_CHAPTER">17</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTEENTH_CHAPTER">18</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETEENTH_CHAPTER">19</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTIETH_CHAPTER">20</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#TWENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">21</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">22</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">23</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#SECOND_PART">SECOND PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#SECOND_PART">MY MARRIAGE</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#SECOND_PART">97</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#TWENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">24</a>] +[<a href="#TWENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">25</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">26</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">27</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">28</a>] [<a href= +"#TWENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">29</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTIETH_CHAPTER">30</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">31</a>]<br /></td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#THIRD_PART">THIRD PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#THIRD_PART">MY HONEYMOON</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#THIRD_PART">135</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#THIRTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">32</a>] +[<a href="#THIRTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">33</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">34</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">35</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">36</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">37</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">38</a>] [<a href= +"#THIRTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">39</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTIETH_CHAPTER">40</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#FORTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">41</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">42</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">43</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">44</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">45</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">46</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">47</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">48</a>] [<a href= +"#FORTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">49</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTIETH_CHAPTER">50</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#FOURTH_PART">FOURTH PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#FOURTH_PART">I FALL IN LOVE</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#FOURTH_PART">210</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#FIFTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">51</a>] +[<a href="#FIFTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">52</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">53</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">54</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">55</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">56</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">57</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">58</a>] [<a href= +"#FIFTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">59</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTIETH_CHAPTER">60</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#SIXTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">61</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">62</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">63</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">64</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">65</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">66</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">67</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">68</a>] [<a href= +"#SIXTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">69</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#FIFTH_PART">FIFTH PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#FIFTH_PART">I BECOME A MOTHER</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#FIFTH_PART">308</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#SEVENTIETH_CHAPTER">70</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">71</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">72</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">73</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">74</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">75</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">76</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">77</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">78</a>] [<a href= +"#SEVENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">79</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTIETH_CHAPTER">80</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#EIGHTY_FIRST_CHAPTER">81</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_SECOND_CHAPTER">82</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_THIRD_CHAPTER">83</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">84</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">85</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">86</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">87</a>] [<a href= +"#EIGHTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">88</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#SIXTH_PART">SIXTH PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#SIXTH_PART">I AM LOST</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#SIXTH_PART">401</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href="#EIGHTY_NINTH_CHAPTER">89</a>] +[<a href="#NINETIETH_CHAPTER">90</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_FIRST_CHAPTER">91</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_SECOND_CHAPTER">92</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_THIRD_CHAPTER">93</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_FOURTH_CHAPTER">94</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_FIFTH_CHAPTER">95</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_SIXTH_CHAPTER">96</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">97</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">98</a>] [<a href= +"#NINETY_NINTH_CHAPTER">99</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDREDTH_CHAPTER">100</a>]<br /> +[<a href="#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIRST_CHAPTER">101</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SECOND_CHAPTER">102</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRD_CHAPTER">103</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTH_CHAPTER">104</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTH_CHAPTER">105</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td align="right"><a href="#SEVENTH_PART">SEVENTH PART:</a></td> +<td><a href="#SEVENTH_PART">I AM FOUND</a></td> +<td align="right"><a href="#SEVENTH_PART">505</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td> </td> +<td align="center">[<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTH_CHAPTER">106</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SEVENTH_CHAPTER">107</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_EIGHTH_CHAPTER">108</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_NINTH_CHAPTER">109</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TENTH_CHAPTER">110</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_ELEVENTH_CHAPTER">111</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TWELFTH_CHAPTER">112</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER">113</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER">114</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER">115</a>] [<a href= +"#ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER">116</a>]</td> +<td> </td> +</tr> +</table> +</div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div class="center">AUTHOR'S NOTE: <i>The name Raa (of<br /> +Celtic origin with many variations among<br /> +Celtic races) is pronounced Rah in Ellan.</i></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div> +<h1>THE NARRATIVE OF<br /> +MARY O'NEILL</h1> +</div> +<h2><a name="FIRST_PART" id="FIRST_PART"></a>FIRST PART</h2> +<h3>MY GIRLHOOD</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIRST_CHAPTER" id="FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>FIRST +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>"Out of the depths, O Lord, out of the depths," begins the most +beautiful of the services of our church, and it is out of the +depths of my life that I must bring the incidents of this +story.</p> +<p>I was an unwanted child—unwanted as a girl at all events. +Father Dan Donovan, our parish priest, told me all about it. I was +born in October. It had been raining heavily all day long. The rain +was beating hard against the front of our house and running in +rivers down the window-panes. Towards four in the afternoon the +wind rose and then the yellow leaves of the chestnuts in the long +drive rustled noisily, and the sea, which is a mile away, moaned +like a dog in pain.</p> +<p>In my father's room, on the ground floor, Father Dan sat by the +fire, fingering his beads and listening to every sound that came +from my mother's room, which was immediately overhead. My father +himself, with his heavy step that made the house tremble, was +tramping to and fro, from the window to the ingle, from the ingle +to the opposite wall. Sometimes Aunt Bridget came down to say that +everything was going on well, and at intervals of half an hour +Doctor Conrad entered in his noiseless way and sat in silence by +the fire, took a few puffs from a long clay pipe and then returned +to his charge upstairs.</p> +<p>My father's impatience was consuming him.</p> +<p>"It's long," he said, searching the doctor's face.</p> +<p>"Don't worry—above all don't worry," said Father Dan.</p> +<p>"There's no need," said Doctor Conrad.</p> +<p>"Then hustle back and get it over," said my father. "It will be +five hundred dollars to you if this comes off all right."</p> +<p>I think my father was a great man at that time. I think he is +still a great man. Hard and cruel as he may have been to me, I feel +bound to say that for him. If he had been born a king, he would +have made his nation feared and perhaps respected throughout the +world. He was born a peasant, the poorest of peasants, a crofter. +The little homestead of his family, with its whitewashed walls and +straw-thatched roof, still stands on the bleak ayre-lands of Ellan, +like a herd of mottled cattle crouching together in a storm.</p> +<p>His own father had been a wild creature, full of daring dreams, +and the chief of them had centred in himself. Although brought up +in a mud cabin, and known as Daniel Neale, he believed that he +belonged by lineal descent to the highest aristocracy of his +island, the O'Neills of the Mansion House (commonly called the Big +House) and the Barons of Castle Raa. To prove his claim he spent +his days in searching the registers of the parish churches, and his +nights in talking loudly in the village inn. Half in jest and half +in earnest, people called him "Neale the Lord." One day he was +brought home dead, killed in a drunken quarrel with Captain +O'Neill, a dissolute braggart, who had struck him over the temple +with a stick. His wife, my grandmother, hung a herring net across +the only room of her house to hide his body from the children who +slept in the other bed.</p> +<p>There were six of them, and after the death of her husband she +had to fend for all. The little croft was hungry land, and to make +a sufficient living she used to weed for her more prosperous +neighbours. It was ill-paid labour—ninepence a day fine days +and sixpence all weathers, with a can of milk twice a week and a +lump of butter thrown in now and then. The ways were hard and the +children were the first to feel them. Five of them died. "They +weren't willing to stay with me," she used to say. My father alone +was left to her, and he was another Daniel. As he grew up he was a +great help to his mother. I feel sure he loved her. Difficult as it +may be to believe it now, I really and truly think that his natural +disposition was lovable and generous to begin with.</p> +<p>There is a story of his boyhood which it would be wrong of me +not to tell. His mother and he had been up in the mountains cutting +gorse and ling, which with turf from the Curragh used to be the +crofter's only fuel. They were dragging down a prickly pile of it +by a straw rope when, dipping into the high road by a bridge, they +crossed the path of a splendid carriage which swirled suddenly out +of the drive of the Big House behind two high-spirited bays driven +by an English coachman in gorgeous livery. The horses reared and +shied at the bundle of kindling, whereupon a gentleman inside the +carriage leaned out and swore, and then the brutal coachman, +lashing out at the bare-headed woman with his whip, struck the boy +on his naked legs.</p> +<p>At the next moment the carriage had gone. It had belonged to the +head of the O'Neills, Lord Raa of Castle Raa, whose nearest +kinsman, Captain O'Neill, had killed my grandfather, so my poor +grandmother said nothing. But her little son, as soon as his +smarting legs would allow, wiped his eyes with his ragged sleeve +and said:</p> +<p>"Never mind, mammy. You shall have a carriage of your own when I +am a man, and then nobody shall never lash you."</p> +<p>His mother died. He was twenty years of age at that time, a +large-limbed, lusty-lunged fellow, almost destitute of education +but with a big brain and an unconquerable will; so he strapped his +chest and emigrated to America. What work he found at first I never +rightly knew. I can only remember to have heard that it was +something dangerous to human life and that the hands above him +dropped off rapidly. Within two years he was a foreman. Within five +years he was a partner. In ten years he was a rich man. At the end +of five-and-twenty years he was a millionaire, controlling trusts +and corporations and carrying out great combines.</p> +<p>I once heard him say that the money tumbled into his chest like +crushed oats out of a crown shaft, but what happened at last was +never fully explained to me. Something I heard of a collision with +the law and of a forced assignment of his interests. All that is +material to my story is that at forty-five years of age he returned +to Ellan. He was then a changed man, with a hard tongue, a stern +mouth, and a masterful lift of the eyebrows. His passion for wealth +had left its mark upon him, but the whole island went down before +his face like a flood, and the people who had made game of his +father came crawling to his feet like cockroaches.</p> +<p>The first thing he did on coming home was to buy up his mother's +croft, re-thatch the old house, and put in a poor person to take +care of it.</p> +<p>"Guess it may come handy some day," he said.</p> +<p>His next act was worthy of the son of "Neale the Lord." Finding +that Captain O'Neill had fallen deeply into debt, he bought up the +braggart's mortgages, turned him out of the Big House, and took up +his own abode in it.</p> +<p>Twelve months later he made amends, after his own manner, by +marrying one of the Captain's daughters. There were two of them. +Isabel, the elder, was a gentle and beautiful girl, very delicate, +very timid, and most sweet when most submissive, like the woodland +herbs which give out their sweetest fragrance when they are trodden +on and crushed. Bridget, the younger, was rather homely, rather +common, proud of her strength of mind and will.</p> +<p>To the deep chagrin of the younger sister, my father selected +the elder one. I have never heard that my mother's wishes were +consulted. Her father and my father dealt with the marriage as a +question of business, and that was an end of the matter. On the +wedding day my father did two things that were highly significant. +He signed the parish register in the name of Daniel O'Neill by +right of Letters Patent; and on taking his bride back to her early +home, he hoisted over the tower of his chill grey house the stars +and stripes of his once adopted country stitched to the flag of his +native island. He had talked less than "Neale the Lord," but he had +thought and acted more.</p> +<p>Two years passed without offspring, and my father made no +disguise of his disappointment, which almost amounted to disgust. +Hitherto he had occupied himself with improvements in his house and +estate, but now his restless energies required a wider field, and +he began to look about him. Ellan was then a primitive place, and +its inhabitants, half landsmen, half seamen, were a simple pious +race living in a sweet poverty which rarely descended into want. +But my father had magnificent schemes for it. By push, energy and +enterprise he would galvanise the island into new life, build +hotels, theatres, casinos, drinking halls and dancing palaces, lay +out race-courses, construct electric railways to the tops of the +mountains, and otherwise transform the place into a holiday resort +for the people of the United Kingdom.</p> +<p>"We'll just sail in and make this old island hum," he said, and +a number of his neighbours, nothing loth to be made rich by +magic—advocates, bankers and insular councillors—joined +hands with him in his adventurous schemes.</p> +<p>But hardly had he begun when a startling incident happened. The +old Lord Raa of Castle Raa, head of the O'Neills, the same that had +sworn at my grandmother, after many years in which he had lived a +bad life abroad where he had contracted fatal maladies, returned to +Ellan to die. Being a bachelor, his heir would have been Captain +O'Neill, but my mother's father had died during the previous +winter, and in the absence of direct male issue it seemed likely +that both title and inheritance (which, by the conditions of an old +Patent, might have descended to the nearest living male through the +female line) would go to a distant relative, a boy, fourteen years +of age, a Protestant, who was then at school at Eton.</p> +<p>More than ever now my father chewed the cud of his great +disappointment. But it is the unexpected that oftenest happens, and +one day in the spring, Doctor Conrad, being called to see my +mother, who was indisposed, announced that she was about to bear a +child.</p> +<p>My father's delight was almost delirious, though at first his +happiness was tempered by the fear that the child that was to be +born to him might not prove a boy. Even this danger disappeared +from his mind after a time, and before long his vanity and his +unconquerable will had so triumphed over his common sense that he +began to speak of his unborn child as a son, just as if the birth +of a male child had been prearranged. With my mother, with Doctor +Conrad, and above all with Father Dan, he sometimes went the length +of discussing his son's name. It was to be Hugh, because that had +been the name of the heads of the O'Neills through all the ages, as +far back as the legendary days in which, as it was believed, they +had been the Kings of Ellan.</p> +<p>My mother was no less overjoyed. She had justified herself at +last, and if she was happy enough at the beginning in the tingling +delight of the woman who is about to know the sweetest of human +joys, the joy of bearing a child, she acquiesced at length in the +accepted idea that her child would be a boy. Perhaps she was moved +to this merely by a desire to submit to her husband's will, and to +realise his hopes and expectations. Or perhaps she had another +reason, a secret reason, a reason that came of her own weakness and +timidity as a woman, namely, that the man child to be born of her +would be strong and brave and free.</p> +<p>All went well down to the end of autumn, and then alarming news +came from Castle Raa. The old lord had developed some further +malady and was believed to be sinking rapidly. Doctor Conrad was +consulted and he gave it as his opinion that the patient could not +live beyond the year. This threw my father into a fever of anxiety. +Sending for his advocate, he took counsel both with him and with +Father Dan.</p> +<p>"Come now, let us get the hang of this business," he said; and +when he realised that (according to the terms of the ancient +Patent) if the old lord died before his child was born, his +high-built hopes would be in the dust, his eagerness became a +consuming fire.</p> +<p>For the first time in his life his excitement took forms of +religion and benevolence. He promised that if everything went well +he would give a new altar to Our Lady's Chapel in the parish church +of St. Mary, a ton of coals to every poor person within a radius of +five miles, and a supper to every inhabitant of the neighbouring +village who was more than sixty years of age. It was even rumoured +that he went so far in secret as to provide funds for the fireworks +with which some of his flatterers were to celebrate the forthcoming +event, and that one form of illumination was a gigantic frame +which, set upon the Sky Hill, immediately in front of our house, +was intended to display in brilliant lights the glowing words "God +Bless the Happy Heir." Certainly the birth was to be announced by +the ringing of the big bell of the tower as signal to the country +round about that the appointed festivities might begin.</p> +<p>Day by day through September into October, news came from Castle +Raa by secret channels. Morning by morning, Doctor Conrad was sent +for to see my mother. Never had the sun looked down on a more +gruesome spectacle. It was a race between the angel of death and +the angel of life, with my father's masterful soul between, +struggling to keep back the one and to hasten on the other.</p> +<p>My father's impatience affected everybody about him. Especially +it communicated itself to the person chiefly concerned. The result +was just what might have been expected. My mother was brought to +bed prematurely, a full month before her time.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SECOND_CHAPTER" id="SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>SECOND +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>By six o'clock the wind had risen to the force of a hurricane. +The last of the withered leaves of the trees in the drive had +fallen and the bare branches were beating together like bundles of +rods. The sea was louder than ever, and the bell on St. Mary's +Rock, a mile away from the shore, was tolling like a knell under +the surging of the waves. Sometimes the clashing of the rain +against the window-panes was like the wash of billows over the +port-holes of a ship at sea.</p> +<p>"Pity for the poor folk with their fireworks," said Father +Dan.</p> +<p>"They'll eat their suppers for all that," said my father.</p> +<p>It was now dark, but my father would not allow the lamps to be +lighted. There was therefore no light in his gaunt room except a +sullen glow from the fire of peat and logs. Sometimes, in a +momentary lull of the storm, an intermittent moan would come from +the room above, followed by a dull hum of voices.</p> +<p>"Guess it can't be long now," my father would say.</p> +<p>"Praise the Lord," Father Dan would answer.</p> +<p>By seven the storm was at its height. The roaring of the wind in +the wide chimney was as loud as thunder. Save for this the +thunderous noise of the sea served to drown all sounds on the land. +Nevertheless, in the midst of the clamour a loud rapping was heard +at the front door. One of the maid-servants would have answered it, +but my father called her back and, taking up a lantern, went to the +door himself. As quietly as he could for the rush of wind without, +he opened it, and pulling it after him, he stepped into the +porch.</p> +<p>A man in livery was there on horseback, with another saddled +horse beside him. He was drenched through, but steaming with sweat +as if he had ridden long and hard. Shouting above the roar of the +storm, he said:</p> +<p>"Doctor Conrad is here, is he?"</p> +<p>"He is—what of it?" said my father.</p> +<p>"Tell him he's wanted and must come away with me at once."</p> +<p>"Who says he must?"</p> +<p>"Lord Raa. His lordship is dangerously ill. He wishes to see the +doctor immediately."</p> +<p>I think my father must then have gone through a moment of fierce +conflict between his desire to keep the old lord alive and his hope +of the immediate birth of his offspring. But his choice was quickly +made.</p> +<p>"Tell the lord," he cried, "that a woman is here in child-birth, +and until she's delivered the doctor cannot come to him."</p> +<p>"But I've brought a horse, and the doctor is to go back with +me."</p> +<p>"Give the lord my message and say it is Daniel O'Neill who sends +it."</p> +<p>"But his lordship is dying and unless the doctor is there to tap +him, he may not live till morning."</p> +<p>"Unless the doctor is here to deliver my wife, my child may be +dead before midnight."</p> +<p>"What is the birth of your child to the death of his lordship?" +cried the man; but, before the words were well out of his mouth, my +father, in his great strength, had laid hold of the reins and swung +both horse and rider round about.</p> +<p>"Get yourself to the other side of my gate, or I'll fling you +into the road," he cried; and then, returning to the porch, he +re-entered the house and clashed the door behind him.</p> +<p>Father Dan used to say that for some moments more the groom from +Castle Raa could be heard shouting the name of the doctor to the +lighted windows of my mother's room. But his voice was swirled away +in the whistling of the wind, and after a while the hoofs of his +horses went champing over the gravel in the direction of the +gate.</p> +<p>When my father returned to his room, shaking the rain from his +hair and beard, he was fuming with indignation. Perhaps a memory of +forty years ago was seething in his excited brain.</p> +<p>"The old scoundrel," he said. "He'd like it, wouldn't he? They'd +all like it! Which of them wants a son of mine amongst them?"</p> +<p>The roaring night outside became yet more terrible. So loud was +the noise from the shore that it was almost as if a wild beast were +trying to liberate itself from the womb of the sea. At one moment +Aunt Bridget came downstairs to say that the storm was frightening +my mother. All the servants of the house were gathered in the hall, +full of fear, and telling each other superstitious stories.</p> +<p>Suddenly there came a lull. Rain and wind seemed to cease in an +instant. The clamour of the sea became less and the tolling of the +bell on St. Mary's Rock died away in the distance. It was almost as +if the world, which had been whirling through space, suddenly stood +still.</p> +<p>In that moment of silence a deeper moan than usual came from the +room overhead. My father dropped into a chair, clasped his hands +and closed his eyes. Father Dan rattled his pearl beads and moved +his lips, but uttered no sound.</p> +<p>Then a faint sound came from the room overhead. My father opened +his eyes and listened. Father Dan held his breath. The sound was +repeated, but louder, clearer, shriller than before. There could be +no mistaking it now. It was Nature's eternal signal that out of the +womb of silence a living soul had been born into the world.</p> +<p>"It's over," said my father.</p> +<p>"Glory be to God and all the Saints!" said Father Dan.</p> +<p>"That'll beat 'em," cried my father, and he leapt to his feet +and laughed.</p> +<p>Going to the door of the room, he flung it open. The servants in +the hall were now whispering eagerly, and one of them, the +gardener, Tom Dug, commonly called Tommy the Mate, stepped out and +asked if he ought to ring the big bell.</p> +<p>"Certainly," said my father. "Isn't that what you've been +standing by for?"</p> +<p>A few minutes later the bell of the tower began to ring, and it +was followed almost immediately by the bell of our parish church, +which rang out a merry peal.</p> +<p>"That'll beat 'em, I say," cried my father, and laughing in his +triumph he tramped the flagged floor with a firmer step than +ever.</p> +<p>All at once the crying of the child ceased and there was a +confused rumble of voices overhead. My father stopped, his face +straightened, and his voice, which had rung out like a horn, +wheezed back like a whistle.</p> +<p>"What's going doing? Where's Conrad? Why doesn't Conrad come to +me?"</p> +<p>"Don't worry. He'll be down presently," said Father Dan.</p> +<p>A few minutes passed, in which nothing was said and nothing +heard, and then, unable to bear the suspense any longer, my father +went to the foot of the staircase and shouted the doctor's +name.</p> +<p>A moment later the doctor's footsteps were heard on the stone +stairs. They were hesitating, halting, dragging footsteps. Then the +doctor entered my father's room. Even in the sullen light of the +peat fire his face was white, ashen white. He did not speak at +first, and there was an instant of silence, dead silence. Then my +father said:</p> +<p>"Well, what is it?"</p> +<p>"It is . . ."</p> +<p>"Speak man! . . . Do you mean it is . . . <i>dead?</i>"</p> +<p>"No! Oh no! Not that."</p> +<p>"What then?"</p> +<p>"It is a girl."</p> +<p>"A gir . . . Did you say a girl?"</p> +<p>"Yes.</p> +<p>"My God!" said my father, and he dropped back into the chair. +His lips were parted and his eyes which had been blazing with joy, +became fixed on the dying fire in a stupid stare.</p> +<p>Father Dan tried to console him. There were thistles in +everybody's crop, and after all it was a good thing to have +begotten a girl. Girls were the flowers of life, the joy and +comfort of man in his earthly pilgrimage, and many a father who +bemoaned his fate when a daughter had been born to him, had lived +to thank the Lord for her.</p> +<p>All this time the joy bells had been ringing, and now the room +began to be illuminated by fitful flashes of variegated light from +the firework-frame on the top of Sky Hill, which (as well as it +could for the rain that had soaked it) was sputtering out its +mocking legend, "God Bless the Happy Heir."</p> +<p>In his soft Irish voice, which was like a river running over +smooth stones, Father Dan went on with his comforting.</p> +<p>"Yes, women are the salt of the earth, God bless them, and when +I think of what they suffer that the world may go on, that the +generations may not fail, I feel as if I want to go down on my +knees and kiss the feet of the first woman I meet in the street. +What would the world be without women? Think of St. Theresa! Think +of the Blessed Margaret Mary! Think of the Holy Virgin herself. . . +."</p> +<p>"Oh, stow this stuff," cried my father, and leaping to his feet, +he began to curse and swear.</p> +<p>"Stop that accursed bell! Is the fool going to ring for ever? +Put out those damnable lights, too. Put them out. Are the devils of +hell trying to laugh at me?"</p> +<p>With that, and an oath at himself for his folly, my father +strode out of the room.</p> +<p>My mother had heard him. Through the unceiled timbers of the +floor between them the words of his rage had reached her. She was +ashamed. She felt as if she were a guilty thing, and with a low cry +of pain she turned to the wall and fainted.</p> +<p>The old lord died the same night. Somewhere towards the dead +reaches of the dawn his wicked spirit went to its reckoning, and a +month afterwards the new Lord Raa, a boy in an Eton jacket, came +over to take possession of his inheritance.</p> +<p>But long before that my father, scoring out his disappointment +like an account that was closed, had got to work with his +advocates, bankers and insular councillors on his great schemes for +galvanising the old island into new life.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRD_CHAPTER" id="THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>THIRD +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Out of the mist and veil of my own memory, as distinguished from +Father Dan's, there comes first the recollection of a big room +containing a big bed, a big wardrobe, a big dressing table, a big +praying-stool with an image of Our Lady on the wall above it, and +an open window to which a sparrow used to come in the mornings and +chirp.</p> +<p>When I came to recognise and to classify I realised that this +was my mother's room, and that the sweet somebody who used to catch +me up in her arms when I went tottering on voyages of discovery +round the vast place was my mother herself, and that she would +comfort me when I fell, and stroke my head with her thin white +hand, while she sang softly and rocked me to and fro.</p> +<p>As I have no recollection of ever having seen my mother in any +other part of our house, or indeed in any other place except our +carriage when we drove out in the sunshine, I conclude that from +the time of my birth she had been an invalid.</p> +<p>Certainly the faces which first emerge from the islands of my +memory are the cheerful and sunny ones of Doctor Conrad and Father +Dan. I recall the soft voice of the one as he used to enter our +room after breakfast saying, "How are we this morning ma'am?" And I +remember the still softer voice of the other as he said "And how is +my daughter to-day?"</p> +<p>I loved both of them, but especially Father Dan, who used to +call me his Nanny and say I was the plague and pet of his life, +being as full of mischief as a goat. He must have been an old child +himself, for I have clear recollection of how, immediately after +confessing my mother, he would go down on all fours with me on the +floor and play at hide-and-seek around the legs of the big bed, +amid squeals and squeaks of laughter. I remember, too, that he wore +a long sack coat which buttoned close at the neck and hung loose at +the skirts, where there were two large vertical pockets, and that +these pockets were my cupboards and drawers, for I put my toys and +my doll and even the remnants of my cakes into them to be kept in +safe custody until wanted again.</p> +<p>My mother called me Mally veen (Mary dear) and out of love of +her only child she must have weaned me late, for I have vague +memories of her soft white breasts filled with milk. I slept in a +little wickerwork cot placed near her bed, so that she could reach +me if I uncovered myself in the night. She used to say I was like a +bird, having something birdlike in my small dark head and the way I +held it up. Certainly I remember myself as a swift little thing, +always darting to and fro on tiptoe, and chirping about our chill +and rather cheerless house.</p> +<p>If I was like a bird my mother was like a flower. Her head, +which was small and fair, and her face, which was nearly always +tinged with colour, drooped forward from her delicate body like a +rose from its stalk. She was generally dressed in black, I +remember, but she wore a white lace collar as well as a coif such +as we see in old pictures, and when I call her back to my mind, +with her large liquid eyes and her sweet soft mouth, I think it +cannot be my affection alone, or the magic of my childish memory, +which makes me think, after all these years and all the countries I +have travelled in, and all the women I have seen, that my darling +mother, though so little known and so little loved, was the most +beautiful woman in the world.</p> +<p>Even yet I cannot but wonder that other people, my father +especially, did not see her with my eyes. I think he was fond of +her after his own fashion, but there was a kind of involuntary +contempt in his affection, which could not conceal itself from my +quick little eyes. She was visibly afraid of him, and was always +nervous and timid when he came into our room with his customary +salutation,</p> +<p>"How now, Isabel? And how's this child of yours?"</p> +<p>From my earliest childhood I noticed that he always spoke of me +as if I had been my mother's child, not his, and perhaps this +affected my feeling for him from the first.</p> +<p>I was in terror of his loud voice and rough manner, the big +bearded man with the iron grey head and the smell of the fresh air +about his thick serge clothes. It was almost as if I had conceived +this fear before my birth, and had brought it out of the tremulous +silence of my mother's womb.</p> +<p>My earliest recollections are of his muffled shout from the room +below, "Keep your child quiet, will you?" when I was disturbing him +over his papers by leaping and skipping about the floor. If he came +upstairs when I was in bed I would dive under the bedclothes, as a +duck dives under water, and only come to the surface when he was +gone. I am sure I never kissed my father or climbed on to his knee, +and that during his short visits to our room I used to hold my +breath and hide my head behind my mother's gown.</p> +<p>I think my mother must have suffered both from my fear of my +father and from my father's indifference to me, for she made many +efforts to reconcile him to my existence. Some of her innocent +schemes, as I recall them now, seem very sweet but very pitiful. +She took pride, for instance, in my hair, which was jet black even +when I was a child, and she used to part it in the middle and brush +it smooth over my forehead in the manner of the Madonna, and one +day, when my father was with us, she drew me forward and said:</p> +<p>"Don't you think our Mary is going to be very pretty? A little +like the pictures of Our Lady, perhaps—don't you think so, +Daniel?"</p> +<p>Whereupon my father laughed rather derisively and answered:</p> +<p>"Pretty, is she? Like the Virgin, eh? Well, well!"</p> +<p>I was always fond of music, and my mother used to teach me to +sing to a little upright piano which she was allowed to keep in her +room, and on another day she said:</p> +<p>"Do you know our Mary has such a beautiful voice, dear? So sweet +and pure that when I close my eyes I could almost think it is an +angel singing."</p> +<p>Whereupon my father laughed as before, and answered:</p> +<p>"A voice, has she? Like an angel's, is it? What next, I +wonder?"</p> +<p>My mother made most of my clothes. There was no need for her to +do so, but in the absence of household duties I suppose it +stimulated the tenderness which all mothers feel in covering the +little limbs they love; and one day, having made a velvet frock for +me, from a design in an old pattern book of coloured prints, which +left the legs and neck and arms very bare, she said:</p> +<p>"Isn't our Mary a little lady? But she will always look like a +lady, whatever she is dressed in."</p> +<p>And then my father laughed still more contemptuously and +replied,</p> +<p>"Her grandmother weeded turnips in the fields +though—ninepence a day dry days, and sixpence all +weathers."</p> +<p>My mother was deeply religious, never allowing a day to pass +without kneeling on her prayer-stool before the image of the +Virgin, and one day I heard her tell my father that when I was a +little mite, scarcely able to speak, she found me kneeling in my +cot with my doll perched up before me, moving my lips as if saying +my prayers and looking up at the ceiling with a rapt +expression.</p> +<p>"But she has always had such big, beautiful, religious eyes, and +I shouldn't wonder if she becomes a Nun some day!"</p> +<p>"A nun, eh? Maybe so. But I take no stock in the nun business +anyway," said my father.</p> +<p>Whereupon my mother's lips moved as if she were saying "No, +dearest," but her dear, sweet pride was crushed and she could go no +farther.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FOURTH_CHAPTER" id="FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>FOURTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>There was a whole colony on the ground floor of our house who, +like my father, could not reconcile themselves to my existence, and +the head of them was Aunt Bridget.</p> +<p>She had been married, soon after the marriage of my mother, to +one Colonel MacLeod, a middle-aged officer on half-pay, a widower, +a Belfast Irishman, and a tavern companion of my maternal +grandfather. But the Colonel had died within a year, leaving Aunt +Bridget with one child of her own, a girl, as well as a daughter of +his wife by the former marriage. As this happened about the time of +my birth, when it became obvious that my mother was to be an +invalid, my father invited Aunt Bridget to come to his house as +housekeeper, and she came, and brought her children with her.</p> +<p>Her rule from the outset had been as hard as might have been +expected from one who prided herself on her self-command—a +quality that covered everybody, including my mother and me, and was +only subject to softening in favour of her own offspring.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget's own daughter, a year older than myself, was a +fair child with light grey eyes, round cheeks of the colour of ripe +apples, and long yellow hair that was carefully combed and curled. +Her name was Betsy, which was extended by her mother to Betsy +Beauty. She was usually dressed in a muslin frock with a sash of +light blue ribbon, and being understood to be delicate was +constantly indulged and nearly always eating, and giving herself +generally the airs of the daughter of the house.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget's step-daughter, ten years older, was a gaunt, +ungainly girl with red hair and irregular features. Her name was +Nessy, and, having an instinctive sense of her dependent position, +she was very humble and subservient and, as Tommy the Mate used to +say, "as smooth as an old threepenny bit" to the ruling powers, +which always meant my Aunt, but spiteful, insolent, and acrid to +anybody who was outside my Aunt's favour, which usually meant +me.</p> +<p>Between my cousin and myself there were constant feuds, in which +Nessy MacLeod never failed to take the side of Betsy Beauty, while +my poor mother became a target for the shafts of Aunt Bridget, who +said I was a wilful, wicked, underhand little vixen, and no wonder, +seeing how disgracefully I was indulged, and how shockingly I was +being brought up.</p> +<p>These skirmishes went on for a considerable time without +consequences, but they came at last to a foolish climax which led +to serious results.</p> +<p>Even my mother's life had its gleams of sunshine, and flowers +were a constant joy to her. Old Tommy, the gardener, was aware of +this, and every morning sent up a bunch of them, freshly cut and +wet with the dew. But one day in the spring he could not do so, +being out in the dubs of the Curragh, cutting peat for the fires. +Therefore I undertook to supply the deficiency, having already, +with the large solemnity of six, begun to consider it my duty to +take charge of my mother.</p> +<p>"Never mind, mammy, I'll setch some slowers sor you," I said +(every <i>f</i> being an <i>s</i> in those days), and armed with a +pair of scissors I skipped down to the garden.</p> +<p>I had chosen a bed of annuals because they were bright and +fragrant, and was beginning to cut some "gilvers" when Nessy +MacLeod, who had been watching from a window, came bouncing down +me.</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, how dare you?" cried Nessy. "You wilful, wicked, +underhand little vixen, what will your Aunt Bridget say? Don't you +know this is Betsy Beauty's bed, and nobody else is to touch +it?"</p> +<p>I began to excuse myself on the ground of my mother and Tommy +the Mate, but Nessy would hear no such explanation.</p> +<p>"Your mamma has nothing to do with it. You know quite well that +your Aunt Bridget manages everything in this house, and nothing can +be done without her."</p> +<p>Small as I was that was too much for me. Somewhere in my little +heart there had long been a secret pang of mortified +pride—how born I do not know—at seeing Aunt Bridget +take the place of my mother, and now, choking with vexation but +without saying a word, I swept off the heads of all the flowers in +the bed, and with my arms full of them—ten times more than I +wanted—I sailed back to my mother's room.</p> +<p>Inside two minutes there was a fearful tumult. I thought I was +doomed to punishment when I heard the big bunch of keys, which Aunt +Bridget kept suspended from her waist, come jingling up the stairs, +but it was my poor mother who paid the penalty.</p> +<p>"Isabel," cried Aunt Bridget, "I hope you are satisfied with +your child at last."</p> +<p>"What has Mary been doing now, dear?" said my mother.</p> +<p>"Don't ask me what she has been doing. You know quite well, or +if you don't you ought to."</p> +<p>My mother glanced at the flowers and she seemed to understand +what had happened, for her face fell and she said submissively,</p> +<p>"Mary has done wrong, but I am sure she is sorry and will never +do it again."</p> +<p>"Sorry, indeed!" cried my Aunt. "Not she sorry. And she'll do it +again at the very next opportunity. The vixen! The little wilful, +underhand vixen! But what wonder if children go wrong when their +own mothers neglect to correct them."</p> +<p>"I daresay you are quite right, dear Bridget—you are +always right," said my mother in a low, grave voice. "But then I'm +not very well, and Mary is all I have, you know."</p> +<p>My mother was in tears by this time, but Aunt Bridget was not +content with her triumph. Sweeping downstairs she carried her +complaint to my father, who ordered that I was to be taken out of +my mother's charge on the ground that she was incapable of +attending to my upbringing—a task which, being assigned to my +Aunt Bridget, provided that I should henceforward live on the +ground floor and eat oaten cake and barley bonnag and sleep alone +in the cold room over the hall while Betsy Beauty ate wheaten bread +and apple tart and slept with her mother in the room over the +kitchen in which they always kept a fire.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTH_CHAPTER" id="FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The altered arrangements were a cause of grief to my mother, but +I am bound to confess that for me they had certain compensations. +One of them was the greater ease with which I could slip out to +Tommy the Mate, who had been a sailor before he was a gardener, and +was still a fine old salt, with grizzled beard and shaggy eyebrows, +and a merry twinkle in what he called his "starboard" eye.</p> +<p>I think Tommy was one of the few about my father's house who +were really fond of me, but perhaps that was mainly because he +loathed aunt Bridget. He used to call her the Big Woman, meaning +that she was the master and mistress of everything and everybody +about the place. When he was told of any special piece of her +tyranny to servant or farmhand he used to say: "Aw, well, she'll +die for all"; and when he heard how she had separated me from my +mother, who had nothing else to love or live for, he spat sideways +out of his mouth and said:</p> +<p>"Our Big Woman is a wicked devil, I'm thinking, and I wouldn't +trust [shouldn't wonder] but she'll burn in hell."</p> +<p>What definite idea I attached to this denunciation I do not now +recall, but I remember that it impressed me deeply, and that many a +night afterwards, during the miserable half-hours before I fell +asleep with my head under the clothes in the cold bedroom over the +hall to which (as Nessy MacLeod had told me) the bad fairies came +for bad children, I repeated the strange words again and again.</p> +<p>Another compensation was the greater opportunity I had for +cultivating an acquaintance which I had recently made with the +doctor's son, when he came with his father on visits to my mother. +As soon as the hoofs of the horse were heard on the gravel, and +before the bell could be rung, I used to dart away on tiptoe, fly +through the porch, climb into the gig and help the boy to hold the +reins while his father was upstairs.</p> +<p>This led to what I thought a great discovery. It was about my +mother. I had always known my mother was sick, but now I got a +"skute" (as old Tommy used to say) into the cause of her illness. +It was a matter of milk. The doctor's boy had heard his father +saying so. If my mother could only have milk morning, noon and +night, every day and all day, "there wouldn't be nothing the matter +with her."</p> +<p>This, too, impressed me deeply, and the form it took in my mind +was that "mammy wasn't sed enough," a conclusion that gained colour +from the fact that I saw Betsy Beauty perched up in a high chair in +the dining-room twice or thrice a day, drinking nice warm milk +fresh from the cow. We had three cows, I remember, and to correct +the mischief of my mother's illness, I determined that henceforth +she should not have merely more of our milk—she should have +all of it.</p> +<p>Losing no time in carrying my intentions into effect, I crept +into the dairy as soon as the dairymaid had brought in the +afternoon's milking. There it was, still frothing and bubbling in +three great bowls, and taking up the first of them in my little +thin arms—goodness knows how—I made straight for my +mother's room.</p> +<p>But hardly had I climbed half-way up the stairs, puffing and +panting under my burden, when I met Nessy MacLeod coming down, and +she fell on me with her usual reproaches.</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, you wilful, underhand little vixen, whatever are +you doing with the milk?"</p> +<p>Being in no mood for explanations I tried to push past, but +Nessy prevented me.</p> +<p>"No, indeed, you shan't go a step further. What will your Aunt +Bridget say? Take the milk back, miss, this very minute."</p> +<p>Nessy's loud protest brought Betsy Beauty out of the +dining-room, and in a moment my cousin, looking more than ever like +a painted doll in her white muslin dress with a large blue bow in +her yellow hair, had run upstairs to assist her step-sister.</p> +<p>I was now between the two, the one above and the other below, +and they laid hold of my bowl to take it from me. They tugged and I +resisted and there was a struggle in which the milk was in danger +of being spilled.</p> +<p>"She's a stubborn little thing and she ought to be whipped," +cried Nessy.</p> +<p>"She's stealing my milk, and I'll tell mamma," said Betsy.</p> +<p>"Tell her then," I cried, and in a burst of anger at finding +myself unable to recover control of my bowl I swept it round and +flung its contents over my cousin's head, thereby drenching her +with the frothing milk and making the staircase to run like a river +of whitewash.</p> +<p>Of course there was a fearful clamour. Betsy Beauty shrieked and +Nessy bellowed, whereupon Aunt Bridget came racing from her +parlour, while my mother, white and trembling, halted to the door +of her room.</p> +<p>"Mally, Mally, what have you done?" cried my mother, but Aunt +Bridget found no need of questions. After running upstairs to her +dripping daughter, wiping her down with a handkerchief, calling her +"my poor darling," and saying, "Didn't I tell you to have nothing +more to do with that little vixen?" she fell on my mother with +bitter upbraidings.</p> +<p>"Isabel, I hope you see now what your minx of a child +is—the little spiteful fury!"</p> +<p>By this time I had dropped my empty bowl on the stairs and taken +refuge behind my mother's gown, but I heard her timid voice trying +to excuse me, and saying something about my cousin and a childish +quarrel.</p> +<p>"Childish quarrel, indeed!" cried my Aunt; "there's nothing +childish about that little imp, nothing. And what's more, I shall +be obliged to you, Isabel, if you will never again have the +assurance to speak of my Betsy Beauty in the same breath with a +child of yours."</p> +<p>That was more than I could hear. My little heart was afire at +the humiliation put upon my mother. So stepping out to the head of +the stairs, I shouted down in my shrillest treble:</p> +<p>"Your Betsy Beauty is a wicked devil, and I wouldn't trust but +she'll burn in hell!"</p> +<p>Never, to the last hour of my life, shall I forget the effect of +that pronouncement. One moment Aunt Bridget stood speechless in the +middle of the stairs, as if all breath had been broken out of her. +Then, ghastly white and without a word, she came flying up at me, +and, before I could recover my usual refuge, she caught me, slapped +me on the cheek and boxed both my ears.</p> +<p>I do not remember if I cried, but I know my mother did, and that +in the midst of the general tumult my father came out of his room +and demanded in a loud voice, which seemed to shake the whole +house, to be told what was going on.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget told him, with various embellishments, which my +mother did not attempt to correct, and then, knowing she was in the +wrong, she began to wipe her eyes with her wet handkerchief, and to +say she could not live any longer where a child was encouraged to +insult her.</p> +<p>"I have to leave this house—I have to leave it to-morrow," +she said.</p> +<p>"You don't have to do no such thing," cried my father. "But I'm +just crazy to see if a man can't be captain in his own claim. These +children must go to school. They must all go—the darned lot +of 'em."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTH_CHAPTER" id="SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Before I speak of what happened at school, I must say how and +when I first became known to the doctor's boy.</p> +<p>It was during the previous Christmastide. On Christmas Eve I +awoke in the dead of night with the sense of awakening in another +world. The church-bells were ringing, and there was singing outside +our house, under the window of my mother's room. After listening +for a little while I made my voice as soft as I could and said:</p> +<p>"Mamma, what is it'?"</p> +<p>"Hush, dear! It is the Waits. Lie still and listen," said my +mother.</p> +<p>I lay as long as my patience would permit, and then creeping +over to the window I saw a circle of men and women, with lanterns, +and the frosty air smoking about their red faces. After a while +they stopped singing, and then the chain of our front door rattled, +and I heard my father's loud voice asking the singers into the +house.</p> +<p>They came in, and when I was back in bed, I heard them talking +and then laughing in the room below, with Aunt Bridget louder than +all the rest, and when I asked what she was doing my mother told me +she was serving out bunloaf and sherry-wine.</p> +<p>I fell asleep before the incident was over, but as soon as I +awoke in the morning I conceived the idea of singing the Waits +myself. Being an artful little thing I knew that my plan would be +opposed, so I said nothing about it, but I got my mother to play +and sing the carol I had heard overnight, until my quick ear had +mastered both tune and words, and when darkness fell on Christmas +night I proceeded to carry out my intention.</p> +<p>In the heat of my impatience I forgot to put on cloak or hat, +and stealing out of the house I found myself in the carriage drive +with nothing on but a pair of thin slippers and the velvet frock +that left my neck and arms so bare. It was snowing, and the +snow-flakes were whirling round me and making me dizzy, for in the +light from my mother's window they seemed to come up from the +ground as well as down from the sky.</p> +<p>When I got out of the light of the window, it was very dark, and +I could only see that the chestnuts in the drive seemed to have +white blankets on them which looked as if they had been hung out to +dry. It was a long time before I got to the gate, and then I had +begun to be nervous and to have half a mind to turn back. But the +thought of the bunloaf and the sherry-wine buoyed me up, and +presently I found myself on the high road, crossing a bridge and +turning down a lane that led to the sea, whose moaning a mile away +was the only sound I could hear.</p> +<p>I knew quite well where I was going to. I was going to the +doctor's house. It was called Sunny Lodge, and it was on the edge +of Yellow Gorse Farm. I had seen it more than once when I had +driven out in the carriage with my mother, and had thought how +sweet it looked with its whitewashed walls and brown thatched roof +and the red and white roses which grew over the porch.</p> +<p>I was fearfully cold before I got there. The snow was in my +slippers and down my neck and among the thickening masses of my +hair. At one moment I came upon some sheep and lambs that were +sheltering under a hedge, and they bleated in the silence of the +night.</p> +<p>But at last I saw the warm red windows of the doctor's cottage, +and coming to the wicket gate, I pushed it open though it was +clogged with snow, and stepped up to the porch. My teeth were now +chattering with cold, but as well as I could I began to sing, and +in my thin and creachy voice I had got as far as—</p> +<p>"<i>Ch'ist was born in Bef-lem,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Ch'ist was born in +Bef-lem,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Ch'ist was born in +Bef-lem,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">An' in a manger laid. . . +."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>when I heard a rumbling noise inside the house.</p> +<p>Immediately afterwards the door was opened upon me, and a woman +whom I knew to be the doctor's wife looked down into my face with +an expression of bewilderment, and then cried:</p> +<p>"Goodness gracious me, doctor—if it isn't little Mary +O'Neill, God bless her!"</p> +<p>"Bring her in at once, then," said the voice of Doctor Conrad +from within, and at the next moment I found myself in a sort of +kitchen-parlour which was warm with a glowing turf fire that had a +kettle singing over it, and cosy and bright with a ragwork +hearth-rug, a dresser full of blue pottery and a sofa settle +covered with red cloth.</p> +<p>I suppose the sudden change to a warm room must have caused me +to faint, for I have no recollection of what happened next, except +that I was sitting on somebody's lap and that she was calling me +<i>boght millish</i> (little sweet) and <i>veg-veen</i> (little +dear) while she rubbed my half-frozen limbs and did other things +that were, I am sure, all womanly and good.</p> +<p>When I came to myself Doctor Conrad was saying I would have to +sleep there that night, and he must go over to the Big House and +tell my mother what had happened. He went, and by the time he came +back, I had been bathed in a dolly-tub placed in front of the fire, +and was being carried upstairs (in a nightdress many sizes too +large for me) to a little dimity-white bedroom, where the sweet +smelling "scraas" under the sloping thatch of the roof came down +almost to my face.</p> +<p>I know nothing of what happened during the night, except that I +was feeling very hot, and that as often as I opened my eyes the +doctor's wife was leaning over me and speaking in a soft voice that +seemed far away. But next day I felt cooler and then Aunt Bridget +came in her satin mantle and big black hat, and said something, +while standing at the end of my bed, about people paying the +penalty when they did things that were sly and underhand.</p> +<p>Towards evening I was much easier, and when the doctor came in +to see me at night he said:</p> +<p>"How are we this evening? Ah, better, I see. Distinctly +better!"</p> +<p>And then turning to his wife he said:</p> +<p>"No need to stay up with her to-night, Christian Ann."</p> +<p>"But won't the <i>boght millish</i> be afraid to be left alone?" +she asked.</p> +<p>I said I shouldn't, and she kissed me and told me to knock at +the wall if I wanted anything. And then, with her husband's arm +about her waist, the good soul left me to myself.</p> +<p>I don't know how I knew, but I did know that that house was a +home of love. I don't know how I knew, but I did know, that that +sweet woman, who had been the daughter of a well-to-do man, had +chosen the doctor out of all the men in the world when he was only +a medical student fresh from Germany or Switzerland. I don't know +how I knew, but I did know, that leaving father and mother and a +sheltered home she had followed her young husband when he first +came to Ellan without friends or connections, and though poor then +and poor still, she had never regretted it. I don't know how I +knew, but I did know, that all this was the opposite of what had +happened to my own dear mother, who having everything yet had +nothing, while this good creature having nothing yet had all.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id="SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When I awoke next morning the sun was shining, and, after my +hair had been brushed smooth over my forehead, I was sitting up in +bed, eating for breakfast the smallest of bantam eggs with the +smallest of silver spoons, when the door opened with a bang and a +small figure tumbled into my room.</p> +<p>It was a boy, two years older than myself. He wore a grey +Norfolk jacket and knickerbockers, but the peculiarity of his dress +was a white felt hat of enormous size, which, being soiled and +turned down in the brim, and having a hole in the crown with a crop +of his brown hair sticking through it, gave him the appearance of a +damaged mushroom.</p> +<p>Except that on entering he tipped up his head so that I saw his +face, which was far from beautiful and yet had two big blue +eyes—as blue as the bluest sea—he took no notice of my +presence, but tossed a somersault in the middle of the floor, +screwed his legs over the back of a chair, vaulted over a table and +finally stood on his hands with his legs against the wall opposite +to my bed, and his inverted countenance close to the carpet.</p> +<p>In this position, in which he was clearly making a point of +remaining as long as possible, while his face grew very red, we +held our first conversation. I had hitherto sat propped up as quiet +as a mouse, but now I said:</p> +<p>"Little boy, what's your name?"</p> +<p>"Mart," was the answer.</p> +<p>"Where do you come from?"</p> +<p>"Spitzbergen."</p> +<p>I cannot remember that this intelligence astonished me, for when +the inverted face had become scarlet, and the legs went down and +the head came up, and my visitor tossed several somersaults over +the end of my bed, to the danger of my breakfast tray, and then, +without a word more, tumbled out of the room, I was still watching +in astonishment.</p> +<p>I did not know at that time that these were the ways which since +the beginning of the world have always been employed by savages and +boys when they desire to commend themselves to the female of their +kind, so that when the doctor's wife came smiling upstairs I asked +her if the little boy who had been to see me was not quite +well.</p> +<p>"Bless you, yes, dear, but that's his way," she said, and then +she told me all about him.</p> +<p>His name was Martin Conrad and he was her only child. His hat, +which had awakened my interest, was an old one of his father's, and +it was the last thing he took off when he undressed for bed at +night and the first thing he put on in the morning. When the hole +came into its crown his mother had tried to hide it away but he had +always found it, and when she threw it into the river he had fished +it out again.</p> +<p>He was the strangest boy, full of the funniest fancies. He used +to say that before he was born he lived in a tree and was the +fellow who turned on the rain. It was with difficulty that he could +be educated, and every morning on being awakened, he said he was +"sorry he ever started this going to school." As a consequence he +could not read or write as well as other boys of his age, and his +grammar was still that of the peasant people with whom he loved to +associate.</p> +<p>Chief among these was our gardener, old Tommy the Mate, who +lived in a mud cabin on the shore and passed the doctor's house on +his way to work. Long ago Tommy had told the boy a tremendous +story. It was about Arctic exploration and an expedition he had +joined in search of Franklin. This had made an overpowering +impression on Martin, who for mouths afterwards would stand waiting +at the gate until Tommy was going by, and then say:</p> +<p>"Been to the North Pole to-day, Tommy?"</p> +<p>Whereupon Tommy's "starboard eye" would blink and he would +answer:</p> +<p>"Not to-day boy. I don't go to the North Pole more nor twice a +day now."</p> +<p>"Don't you, though?" the boy would say, and this would happen +every morning.</p> +<p>But later on Martin conceived the idea that the North Pole was +the locality immediately surrounding his father's house, and every +day he would set out on voyages of exploration over the garden, the +road and the shore, finding, by his own account, a vast world of +mysterious things and undiscovered places. By some +means—nobody knew how—the boy who could not learn his +lessons studied his father's German atlas, and there was not a name +in it north of Spitzbergen which he had not got by heart. He +transferred them all to Ellan, so that the Sky Hill became +Greenland, and the Black Head became Franz Josef Land, and the +Nun's Well became Behring Strait, and Martha's Gullet became New +Siberia, and St. Mary's Rock, with the bell anchored on it, became +the pivot of the earth itself.</p> +<p>He could swim like a fish and climb a rock like a lizard, and he +kept a log-book, on the back pages of the Doctor's book of visits, +which he called his "diarrhea." And now if you lost him you had +only to look up to the ridge of the roof, or perhaps on to the +chimney stack, which he called his crow's nest, and there you found +him, spying through his father's telescope and crying out:</p> +<p>"Look-out ahead! Ice floes from eighty-six latitude fourteen +point north, five knots to the starboard bow."</p> +<p>His mother laughed until she cried when she told me all this, +but there is no solemnity like that of a child, and to me it was a +marvellous story. I conceived a deep admiration for the doctor's +boy, and saw myself with eyes of worship walking reverently by his +side. I suppose my poor lonely heart was hungering after +comradeship, for being a sentimental little ninny I decided to +offer myself to the doctor's boy as his sister.</p> +<p>The opportunity was dreadfully long in coming. It did not come +until the next morning, when the door of my room flew open with a +yet louder bang than before, and the boy entered in a soap-box on +wheels, supposed to be a sledge, and drawn by a dog, an Irish +terrier, which being red had been called William Rufus. His hat was +tied over his ears with a tape from his mother's apron, and he wore +a long pair of his father's knitted stockings which covered his +boots and came up to his thighs.</p> +<p>He did not at first take any more notice of me than on the +previous day, but steering his sledge round the room he shouted to +his dog that the chair by the side of my bed was a glacier and the +sheep-skin rug was floating ice.</p> +<p>After a while we began to talk, and then, thinking my time had +come, I tried to approach my subject. Being such a clever little +woman I went artfully to work, speaking first about my father, my +mother, my cousin, Nessy MacLeod, and even Aunt Bridget, with the +intention of showing how rich I was in relations, so that he might +see how poor he was himself.</p> +<p>I felt myself a bit of a hypocrite in all this, but the doctor's +boy did not know that, and I noticed that as I passed my people in +review he only said "Is she any good?" or "Is he a stunner?"</p> +<p>At length my great moment came and with a fluttering heart I +took it.</p> +<p>"Haven't you got a sister?" I said.</p> +<p>"Not <i>me</i>!" said the doctor's boy, with a dig of emphasis +on the last word which cut me to the quick.</p> +<p>"Wouldn't you like to have one?"</p> +<p>"Sisters isn't no good," said the doctor's boy, and he instanced +"chaps" at school—Jimmy Christopher and others—whose +sisters were afraid of everything—lobsters and crabs and even +the sea.</p> +<p>I knew I was as timid as a hare myself, but my lonely little +heart was beginning to bleed, and as well as I could for my throat +which was choking me, I said:</p> +<p>"I'm not afraid of the sea—not crabs neither."</p> +<p>In a moment the big mushroom hat was tipped aside and the +sea-blue eyes looked aslant at me.</p> +<p>"Isn't you, though?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>That did it. I could see it did. And when a minute afterwards, I +invited the doctor's boy into bed, he came in, stockings and all, +and sat by my right side, while William Rufus, who had formed an +instant attachment for me, lay on my left with his muzzle on my +lap.</p> +<p>Later the same day, my bedroom door being open, so that I might +call downstairs to the kitchen, I heard the doctor's boy telling +his mother what I was. I was a "stunner."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id="EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>From that day forward the doctor's boy considered that I +belonged to him, but not until I was sent to school, with my cousin +and her stepsister, did he feel called upon to claim his +property.</p> +<p>It was a mixed day-school in the village, and it was controlled +by a Board which had the village butcher as its chairman. The only +teacher was a tall woman of thirty, who plaited her hair, which was +of the colour of flax, into a ridiculous-looking crown on the top +of her head. But her expression, I remember, was one of perpetual +severity, and when she spoke through her thin lips she clipped her +words with great rapidity, as if they had been rolls of bread which +were being chopped in a charity school.</p> +<p>Afterwards I heard that she owed her position to Aunt Bridget, +who had exercised her influence through the chairman, by means of +his account with the Big House. Perhaps she thought it her duty to +display her gratitude. Certainly she lost no time in showing me +that my character had gone to school before me, for in order that I +might be directly under her eye, she placed me in the last seat in +the lowest class, although my mother's daily teaching would have +entitled me to go higher.</p> +<p>I dare say I was, as Father Dan used to say, as full of mischief +as a goat, and I know I was a chatterbox, but I do not think I +deserved the fate that followed.</p> +<p>One day, not more than a week after we had been sent to school. +I held my slate in front of my face while I whispered something to +the girl beside and the girl behind me. Both began to titter.</p> +<p>"Silence!" cried the schoolmistress, who was sitting at her +desk, but I went on whispering and the girls began to choke with +laughter.</p> +<p>I think the schoolmistress must have thought I was saying +something about herself—making game, perhaps, of her personal +appearance—for after a moment she said, in her rapid +accents:</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, please repeat what you have just been +saying."</p> +<p>I held my slate yet closer to my face and made no answer.</p> +<p>"Don't you hear, miss? Speak! You've a tongue in your head, +haven't you?"</p> +<p>But still I did not answer, and then the schoolmistress +said:</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, come forward."</p> +<p>She had commanded me like a dog, and like a dog I was about to +obey when I caught sight of Betsy Beauty's face, which, beaming +with satisfaction, seemed to be saying: "Now, we shall see."</p> +<p>I would not stir after that, and the schoolmistress, leaving her +desk, came towards me, and looking darkly into my face, said:</p> +<p>"You wilful little vixen, do you think you can trifle with me? +Come out, miss, this very moment."</p> +<p>I knew where that language came from, so I made no movement.</p> +<p>"Don't you hear? Or do you suppose that because you are pampered +and spoiled by a foolish person at home, you can defy +<i>me</i>?"</p> +<p>That reflection on my mother settled everything. I sat as rigid +as a rock.</p> +<p>Then pale as a whitewashed wall, and with her thin lips tightly +compressed, the schoolmistress took hold of me to drag me out of my +seat, but with my little nervous fingers I clung to the desk in +front of me, and as often as she tore one of my hands open the +other fixed itself afresh.</p> +<p>"You minx! We'll see who's mistress here. . . . Will none of you +big girls come and help me?"</p> +<p>With the utmost alacrity one big girl from a back bench came +rushing to the schoolmistress' assistance. It was Nessy MacLeod, +and together, after a fierce struggle, they tore me from my desk, +like an ivy branch from a tree, and dragged me into the open space +in front of the classes. By this time the schoolmistress' hands, +and I think her neck were scratched, and from that cause also she +was quivering with passion.</p> +<p>"Stand there, miss," she said, "and move from that spot at your +peril."</p> +<p>My own fury was now spent, and in the dead silence which had +fallen on the entire school, I was beginning to feel the shame of +my ignominious position.</p> +<p>"Children," cried the schoolmistress, addressing the whole of +the scholars, "put down your slates and listen."</p> +<p>Then, as soon as she had recovered her breath she said, standing +by my side and pointing down to me:</p> +<p>"This child came to school with the character of a wilful, +wicked little vixen, and she has not belied her character. By gross +disobedience she has brought herself to where you see her. 'Spare +the rod, spoil the child,' is a scriptural maxim, and the foolish +parents who ruin their children by overindulgence deserve all that +comes to them. But there is no reason why other people should +suffer, and, small as this child is she has made the life of her +excellent aunt intolerable by her unlovable, unsociable, and +unchildlike disposition. Children, she was sent to school to be +corrected of her faults, and I order you to stop your lessons while +she is publicly punished. . . ."</p> +<p>With this parade of the spirit of justice, the schoolmistress +stepped back and left me. I knew what she was doing—she was +taking her cane out of her desk which stood by the wall. I heard +the desk opened with an impatient clash and then closed with an +angry bang. I was as sure as if I had had eyes in the back of my +head, that the schoolmistress was holding the cane in both hands +and bending it to see if it was lithe and limber.</p> +<p>I felt utterly humiliated. Standing there with all eyes upon me +I was conscious of the worst pain that enters into a child's +experience—the pain of knowing that other children are +looking upon her degradation. I thought of Aunt Bridget and my +little heart choked with anger. Then I thought of my mother and my +throat throbbed with shame. I remembered what my mother had said, +of her little Mary being always a little lady, and I felt crushed +at the thought that I was about to be whipped before all the +village children.</p> +<p>At home I had been protected if only by my mother's tears, but +here I was alone, and felt myself to be so little and helpless. But +just as my lip was beginning to drop, at the thought of what my +mother would suffer if she saw me in this position of infamy, and I +was about to cry out to the schoolmistress: "Don't beat me! Oh! +please don't beat me!" a strange thing happened, which turned my +shame into surprise and triumph.</p> +<p>Through the mist which had gathered before my eyes I saw a boy +coming out of the boys' class at the end of the long room. It was +Martin Conrad, and I remember that he rolled as he walked like old +Tommy the gardener. Everybody saw him, and the schoolmistress said +in her sharp voice:</p> +<p>"Martin Conrad, what right have you to leave your place without +permission? Go back, sir, this very moment."</p> +<p>Instead of going back Martin came on, and as he did so he +dragged his big soft hat out of the belt of his Norfolk jacket and +with both hands pulled it down hard on his head.</p> +<p>"Go back, sir!" cried the schoolmistress, and I saw her step +towards him with the cane poised and switching in the air, as if +about to strike.</p> +<p>The boy said nothing, but just shaking himself like a big dog he +dropped his head and butted at the schoolmistress as she approached +him, struck her somewhere in the waist and sent her staggering and +gasping against the wall.</p> +<p>Then, without a word, he took my hand, as something that +belonged to him, and before the schoolmistress could recover her +breath, or the scholars awake from their astonishment, he marched +me, as if his little stocky figure had been sixteen feet tall, in +stately silence out of the school.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINTH_CHAPTER" id="NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I was never sent back to school, and I heard that Martin, by +order of the butcher, was publicly expelled. This was a cause of +distress to our mothers, who thought the future of our lives had +been permanently darkened, but I cannot say that it ever stood +between us and our sunshine. On the contrary it occurred +that—Aunt Bridget having washed her hands of me, and Martin's +father being unable to make up his mind what to do with +him—we found ourselves for some time at large and were +nothing loth to take advantage of our liberty, until a day came +which brought a great disaster.</p> +<p>One morning I found Martin with old Tommy the Mate in his +potting-shed, deep in the discussion of their usual +subject—the perils and pains of Arctic exploration, when you +have little food in your wallet and not too much in your +stomach.</p> +<p>"But you has lots of things when you gets there—hams and +flitches and oranges and things—hasn't you?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"Never a ha'p'orth," said Tommy. "Nothing but glory. You just +takes your Alping stock and your sleeping sack and your bit o' +biscuit and away you go over crevaxes deeper nor Martha's gullet +and mountains higher nor Mount Blank and never think o' nothing but +doing something that nobody's never done before. My goodness, yes, +boy, that's the way of it when you're out asploring. 'Glory's +waiting for me' says you, and on you go."</p> +<p>At that great word I saw Martin's blue eyes glisten like the sea +when the sun is shining on it; and then, seeing me for the first +time, he turned back to old Tommy and said:</p> +<p>"I s'pose you lets women go with you when you're out +asploring—women and girls?"</p> +<p>"Never a woman," said Tommy.</p> +<p>"Not never—not if they're stunners?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"Well," says Tommy, glancing down at me, while his starboard eye +twinkled, "I won't say never—not if they're stunners."</p> +<p>Next day Martin, attended by William Rufus, arrived at our house +with a big corn sack on his shoulder, a long broom-handle in his +hand, a lemonade bottle half filled with milk, a large sea biscuit +and a small Union Jack which came from the confectioner's on the +occasion of his last birthday.</p> +<p>"Glory's waiting for me—come along, shipmate," he said in +a mysterious whisper, and without a word of inquiry, I obeyed.</p> +<p>He gave me the biscuit and I put it in the pocket of my frock, +and the bottle of milk, and I tied it to my belt, and then off we +went, with the dog bounding before us.</p> +<p>I knew he was going to the sea, and my heart was in my mouth, +for of all the things I was afraid of I feared the sea most—a +terror born with me, perhaps, on the fearful night of my birth. But +I had to live up to the character I had given myself when Martin +became my brother, and the one dread of my life was that, finding +me as timid as other girls, he might want me no more.</p> +<p>We reached the sea by a little bay, called Murphy's Mouth, which +had a mud cabin that stood back to the cliff and a small boat that +was moored to a post on the shore. Both belonged to Tommy the Mate, +who was a "widow man" living alone, and therefore there were none +to see us when we launched the boat and set out on our voyage. It +was then two o'clock in the afternoon, the sun was shining, and the +tide, which was at the turn, was beginning to flow.</p> +<p>I had never been in a boat before, but I dared not say anything +about that, and after Martin had fixed the bow oar for me and taken +the stroke himself, I spluttered and plunged and made many +blunders. I had never been on the sea either, and almost as soon as +we shot clear of the shore and were lifted on to the big waves, I +began to feel dizzy, and dropped my oar, with the result that it +slipped through the rollocks and was washed away. Martin saw what +had happened as we swung round to his rowing, but when I expected +him to scold me, he only said:</p> +<p>"Never mind, shipmate! I was just thinking we would do better +with one," and, shipping his own oar in the stern of the boat, he +began to scull.</p> +<p>My throat was hurting me, and partly from shame and partly from +fear, I now sat forward, with William Rufus on my lap, and said as +little as possible. But Martin was in high spirits, and while his +stout little body rolled to the rocking of the boat he whistled and +sang and shouted messages to me over his shoulder.</p> +<p>"My gracious! Isn't this what you call ripping?" he cried, and +though my teeth were chattering, I answered that it was.</p> +<p>"Some girls—Jimmy Christopher's sister and Nessy MacLeod +and Betsy Beauty—would be frightened to come asploring, +wouldn't they?"</p> +<p>"Wouldn't they?" I said, and I laughed, though I was trembling +down to the soles of my shoes.</p> +<p>We must have been half an hour out, and the shore seemed so far +away that Murphy's Mouth and Tommy's cabin and even the trees of +the Big House looked like something I had seen through the wrong +end of a telescope, when he turned his head, with a wild light in +his eyes, and said:</p> +<p>"See the North Pole out yonder?"</p> +<p>"Don't I?" I answered, though I was such a practical little +person, and had not an ounce of "dream" in me.</p> +<p>I knew quite well where he was going to. He was going to St. +Mary's Rock, and of all the places on land or sea, it was the place +I was most afraid of, being so big and frowning, an ugly black +mass, standing twenty to thirty feet out of the water, draped like +a coffin in a pall, with long fronds of sea-weed, and covered, save +at high water, by a multitude of hungry sea-fowl.</p> +<p>A white cloud of the birds rose from their sleep as we +approached, and wheeled and whistled and screamed and beat their +wings over our heads. I wanted to scream too, but Martin said:</p> +<p>"My gracious, isn't this splendiferous?"</p> +<p>"Isn't it?" I answered, and, little hypocrite that I was, I +began to sing.</p> +<p>I remember that I sang one of Tommy's sailor-songs, "Sally," +because its jolly doggerel was set to such a jaunty tune—</p> +<p>"<i>Oh Sally's the gel for me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Our Sally's the gel for +me,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">I'll marry the gel that I love +best</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">When I come back from +sea."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>My pretence of happiness was shortlived, for at the next moment +I made another mistake. Drawing up his boat to a ledge of the rock, +and laying hold of our painter, Martin leapt ashore, and then held +out his hand to me to follow him, but in fear of a big wave I held +back when I ought to have jumped, and he was drenched from head to +foot. I was ashamed, and thought he would have scolded me, but he +only shook himself and said:</p> +<p>"That's nothing! We don't mind a bit of wet when we're out +asploring."</p> +<p>My throat was hurting me again and I could not speak, but +without waiting for me to answer he coiled the rope about my right +arm, and told me to stay where I was, and hold fast to the boat, +while he climbed the rock and took possession of it in the name of +the king.</p> +<p>"Do or die we allus does that when we're out asploring," he +said, and with his sack over his shoulder, his broom-handle in his +hand and his little Union Jack sticking out of the hole in the +crown of his hat, he clambered up the crag and disappeared over the +top of it.</p> +<p>Being left alone, for the dog had followed him, my nervousness +increased tenfold, and thinking at last that the rising tide was +about to submerge the ledge on which I stood, I tried in my fright +to climb the cliff. But hardly had I taken three steps when my foot +slipped and I clutched the seaweed to save myself from falling, +with the result that the boat's rope slid from my arm, and went +rip-rip-ripping down the rock until it fell with a splash into the +sea.</p> +<p>I saw what I had done, and I screamed, and then Martin's head +appeared after a moment on the ledge above me. But it was too late +for him to do anything, for the boat had already drifted six yards +away, and just when I thought he would have shrieked at me for +cutting off our only connection with the shore, he said:</p> +<p>"Never mind, shipmate! We allus expecs to lose a boat or two +when we're out asploring."</p> +<p>I was silent from shame, but Martin, having hauled me up the +rock by help of the broom handle, rattled away as if nothing had +happened—pointing proudly to a rust-eaten triangle with a +bell suspended inside of it and his little flag floating on +top.</p> +<p>"But, oh dear, what are we to do now?" I whimpered.</p> +<p>"Don't you worrit about that," he said. "We'll just signal back +to the next base—we call them bases when we're out +asploring."</p> +<p>I understood from this that he was going to ring the bell which, +being heard on the land, would bring somebody to our relief. But +the bell was big, only meant to be put in motion on stormy nights +by the shock and surging of an angry sea, and when Martin had tied +a string to its tongue it was a feeble sound he struck from it.</p> +<p>Half an hour passed, an hour, two hours, and still I saw nothing +on the water but our own empty boat rocking its way back to the +shore.</p> +<p>"Will they ever come?" I faltered.</p> +<p>"Ra—ther! Just you wait and you'll see them coming. And +when they take us ashore there'll be crowds and crowds with bugles +and bands and things to take us home. My goodness, yes," he said, +with the same wild look, "hundreds and tons of them!"</p> +<p>But the sun set over the sea behind us, the land in front grew +dim, the moaning tide rose around the quaking rock and even the +screaming sea-fowl deserted us, and still there was no sign of +relief. My heart was quivering through my clothes by this time, but +Martin, who had whistled and sung, began to talk about being +hungry.</p> +<p>"My goodness yes, I'm that hungry I could eat. . . . I could eat +a dog—we allus eats our dogs when we're out asploring."</p> +<p>This reminded me of the biscuit, but putting my hand to the +pocket of my frock I found to my dismay that it was gone, having +fallen out, perhaps, when I slipped in my climbing. My lip fell and +I looked up at him with eyes of fear, but he only said:</p> +<p>"No matter! We never minds a bit of hungry when we're out +asploring."</p> +<p>I did not know then, what now I know, that my little boy who +could not learn his lessons and had always been in disgrace, was a +born gentleman, but my throat was thick and my eyes were swimming +and to hide my emotion I pretended to be ill.</p> +<p>"I know," said Martin. "Dizzingtory! [dysentery]. We allus has +dizzingtory when we're out asploring."</p> +<p>There was one infallible cure for that, though—milk!</p> +<p>"I allus drinks a drink of milk, and away goes the dizzingtory +in a jiffy."</p> +<p>This recalled the bottle, but when I twisted it round on my +belt, hoping to make amends for the lost biscuit, I found to my +confusion that it had suffered from the same misadventure, being +cracked in the bottom, and every drop of the contents gone.</p> +<p>That was the last straw, and the tears leapt to my eyes, but +Martin went on whistling and singing and ringing the big bell as if +nothing had happened.</p> +<p>The darkness deepened, the breath of night came sweeping over +the sea, the boom of the billows on the rock became still more +terrible, and I began to shiver.</p> +<p>"The sack!" cried Martin. "We allus sleeps in sacks when we're +out asploring."</p> +<p>I let him do what he liked with me now, but when he had packed +me up in the sack, and put me to lie at the foot of the triangle, +telling me I was as right as ninepence, I began to think of +something I had read in a storybook, and half choking with sobs I +said:</p> +<p>"Martin!"</p> +<p>"What now, shipmate?"</p> +<p>"It's all my fault . . . and I'm just as frightened as Jimmy +Christopher's sister and Nessy MacLeod and Betsy Beauty . . . and +I'm not a stunner . . . and you'll have to give me up . . . and +leave me here and save yourself and . . ."</p> +<p>But Martin stopped me with a shout and a crack of laughter.</p> +<p>"Not <i>me</i>! Not much! We never leaves a pal when we're out +asploring. Long as we lives we never does it. Not never!"</p> +<p>That finished me. I blubbered like a baby, and William Rufus, +who was sitting by my side, lifted his nose and joined in my +howling.</p> +<p>What happened next I never rightly knew. I was only aware, +though my back was to him, that Martin, impatient of his string, +had leapt up to the bell and was swinging his little body from the +tongue to make a louder clamour. One loud clang I heard, and then +came a crash and a crack, and then silence.</p> +<p>"What is it?" I cried, but at first there was no answer.</p> +<p>"Have you hurt yourself?"</p> +<p>And then through the thunderous boom of the rising sea on the +rock, came the breaking voice of my boy (he had broken his right +arm) mingled with the sobs which his unconquered and unconquerable +little soul was struggling to suppress—</p> +<p>"We never minds a bit of hurt . . . we never minds +<i>nothing</i> when we're out asploring!"</p> +<p>Meantime on shore there was a great commotion. My father was +railing at Aunt Bridget, who was upbraiding my mother, who was +crying for Father Dan, who was flying off for Doctor Conrad, who +was putting his horse into his gig and scouring the parish in +search of the two lost children.</p> +<p>But Tommy the Mate, who remembered the conversation in the +potting-shed and thought he heard the tinkle of a bell at sea, +hurried off to the shore, where he found his boat bobbing on the +beach, and thereby came to his own conclusions.</p> +<p>By the light of a lantern he pulled out to St. Mary's Rock, and +there, guided by the howling of the dog, he came upon the great +little explorers, hardly more than three feet above high water, +lying together in the corn sack, locked in each other's arms and +fast asleep.</p> +<p>There were no crowds and bands of music waiting for us when +Tommy brought us ashore, and after leaving Martin with his broken +limb in his mother's arms at the gate of Sunny Lodge, he took me +over to the Presbytery in order that Father Dan might carry me home +and so stand between me and my father's wrath and Aunt Bridget's +birch.</p> +<p>Unhappily there was no need for this precaution. The Big House, +when we reached it, was in great confusion. My mother had broken a +blood vessel.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TENTH_CHAPTER" id="TENTH_CHAPTER"></a>TENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>During the fortnight in which my mother was confined to bed I +was her constant companion and attendant. With the mighty eagerness +of a child who knew nothing of what the solemn time foreboded I +flew about the house on tiptoe, fetching my mother's medicine and +her milk and the ice to cool it, and always praising myself for my +industry and thinking I was quite indispensable.</p> +<p>"You couldn't do without your little Mally, could you, mammy?" I +would say, and my mother would smooth my hair lovingly with her +thin white hand and answer:</p> +<p>"No, indeed, I couldn't do without my little Mally." And then my +little bird-like beak would rise proudly in the air.</p> +<p>All this time I saw nothing of Martin, and only heard through +Doctor Conrad in his conversations with my mother, that the boy's +broken arm had been set, and that as soon as it was better, he was +to be sent to King George's College, which was at the other end of +Ellan. What was to be done with myself I never inquired, being so +satisfied that my mother could not get on without me.</p> +<p>I was partly aware that big letters, bearing foreign +postage-stamps and seals and coats of arms, with pictures of +crosses and hearts, were coming to our house. I was also aware that +at intervals, while my mother was in bed, there was the sound of +voices, as if in eager and sometimes heated conference, in the room +below, and that my mother would raise her pale face from her pillow +and stop my chattering with "Hush!" when my father's voice was +louder and sterner than usual. But it never occurred to me to +connect these incidents with myself, until the afternoon of the day +on which my mother got up for the first time.</p> +<p>She was sitting before the fire, for autumn was stealing on, and +I was bustling about her, fixing the rug about her knees and +telling her if she wanted anything she was to be sure and call her +little Mally, when a timid knock came to the door and Father Dan +entered the room. I can see his fair head and short figure still, +and hear his soft Irish voice, as he stepped forward and said:</p> +<p>"Now don't worry, my daughter. Above all, don't worry."</p> +<p>By long experience my mother knew this for a sign of the dear +Father's own perturbation, and I saw her lower lip tremble as she +asked:</p> +<p>"Hadn't Mary better run down to the garden?"</p> +<p>"No! Oh no!" said Father Dan. "It is about Mary I come to speak, +so our little pet may as well remain."</p> +<p>Then at a signal from my mother I went over to her and stood by +her side, and she embraced my waist with a trembling arm, while the +Father took a seat by her side, and, fumbling the little silver +cross on his chain, delivered his message.</p> +<p>After long and anxious thought—and he might say +prayer—it had been decided that I should be sent away to a +Convent. It was to be a Convent of the Sacred Heart in Rome. He was +to take me to Rome himself and see me safely settled there. And +they (meaning my father and Aunt Bridget) had promised +him—faithfully promised him—that when the holidays came +round he should be sent to bring me home again. So there was +nothing to fear, nothing to worry about, nothing to . . . to . . +.</p> +<p>My mother listened as long as she could, and then—her +beautiful white face distorted by pain—she broke in on the +Father's message with a cry of protest.</p> +<p>"But she is so young! Such a child! Only seven years old! How +can any one think of sending such a little one away from home?"</p> +<p>Father Dan tried to pacify her. It was true I was very young, +but then the Reverend Mother was such a good woman. She would love +me and care for me as if I were her own child. And then the good +nuns, God bless their holy souls. . . .</p> +<p>"But Mary is all I have," cried my mother, "and if they take her +away from me I shall be broken-hearted. At such a time too! How +cruel they are! They know quite well what the doctor says. Can't +they wait a little longer?"</p> +<p>I could see that Father Dan was arguing against himself, for his +eyes filled as he said:</p> +<p>"It's hard, I know it's hard for you, my daughter. But perhaps +it's best for the child that she should go away from +home—perhaps it's all God's blessed and holy will. Remember +there's a certain person here who isn't kind to our little +innocent, and is making her a cause of trouble. Not that I think +she is actuated by evil intentions. . . ."</p> +<p>"But she is, she is," cried my mother, who was growing more and +more excited.</p> +<p>"Then all the more reason why Mary should go to the +convent—for a time at all events."</p> +<p>My mother began to waver, and she said:</p> +<p>"Let her be sent to a Convent in the island then."</p> +<p>"I thought of that, but there isn't one," said Father Dan.</p> +<p>"Then . . . then . . . then take her to the Presbytery," said my +mother. "Dear, dear Father," she pleaded, "let her live with you, +and have somebody to teach her, and then she can come to see me +every day, or twice a week, or even once a week—I am not +unreasonable."</p> +<p>"It would be beautiful," said Father Dan, reaching over to touch +my arm. "To have our little Mary in my dull old house would be like +having the sun there always. But there are reasons why a young girl +should not be brought up in the home of a priest, so it is better +that our little precious should go to Rome."</p> +<p>My mother was breaking down and Father Dan followed up his +advantage.</p> +<p>"Then wisha, my daughter, think what a good thing it will be for +the child. She will be one of the children of the Infant Jesus +first, then a child of Mary, and then of the Sacred heart itself. +And then remember, Rome! The holy city! The city of the Holy +Father! Why, who knows, she may even see himself some day!"</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, I know," said my mother, and then turning with her +melting eyes to me she said:</p> +<p>"Would my Mary like to go—leaving her mamma but coming +home in the holidays—would she?"</p> +<p>I was going to say I would not, because mamma could not possibly +get on without me, but before I could reply Aunt Bridget, with her +bunch of keys at her waist, came jingling into the room, and +catching my mother's last words, said, in her harsh, high-pitched +voice.</p> +<p>"Isabel! You astonish me! To defer to the will of a child! Such +a child too! So stubborn and spoiled and self-willed! If <i>we</i> +say it is good for her to go she <i>must</i> go!"</p> +<p>I could feel through my mother's arm, which was still about my +waist, that she was trembling from head to foot, but at first she +did not speak and Aunt Bridget, in her peremptory way, went on:</p> +<p>"We say it is good for you, too, Isabel, if she is not to hasten +your death by preying on your nerves and causing you to break more +blood vessels. So we are consulting your welfare as well as the +girl's in sending her away."</p> +<p>My mother's timid soul could bear no more. I think it must have +been the only moment of anger her gentle spirit ever knew, but, +gathering all her strength, she turned upon Aunt Bridget in +ungovernable excitement.</p> +<p>"Bridget," she said, "you are doing nothing of the kind. You +know you are not. You are only trying to separate me from my child +and my child from me. When you came to my house I thought you would +be kinder to my child than a anybody else, but you have not been, +you have been cruel to her, and shut your heart against her, and +while I have been helpless here, and in bed, you have never shown +her one moment of love and kindness. No, you have no feeling except +for your own, and it never occurs to you that having brought your +own child into my house you are trying to turn my child out of +it."</p> +<p>"So that's how you look at it, is it?" said Aunt Bridget, with a +flash of her cold grey eyes. "I thought I came to this +house—your house as you call it—only out of the best +intentions, just to spare you trouble when you were ill and unable, +to attend to your duties as a wife. But because I correct your +child when she is wilful and sly and wicked. . . ."</p> +<p>"Correct your own child, Bridget O'Neill!" cried my mother, "and +leave mine to me. She's all I have and it isn't long I shall have +her. You know quite well how much she has cost me, and that I +haven't had a very happy married life, but instead of helping me +with her father. . . ."</p> +<p>"Say no more," said Aunt Bridget, "we don't want you to hurt +yourself again, and to allow this ill-conditioned child to be the +cause of another hemorrhage."</p> +<p>"Bridget O'Neill," cried my mother, rising up from her chair, +"you are a hard-hearted woman with a bad disposition. You know as +well as I do that it wasn't Mary who made me ill, but +you—you, who reproached me and taunted me about my child +until my heart itself had to bleed. For seven years you have been +doing that, and now you are disposing of my darling over my head +without consulting me. Has a mother no rights in her own +child—the child she has suffered for, and loved and lived +for—that other people who care nothing for it should take it +away from her and send it into a foreign country where she may +never see it again? But you shall not do that! No, you shall not'! +As long as there's breath in my body you shall not do it, and if +you attempt. . . ."</p> +<p>In her wild excitement my mother had lifted one of her trembling +hands into Aunt Bridget's face while the other was still clasped +about me, when suddenly, with a look of fear on her face, she +stopped speaking. She had heard a heavy step on the stairs. It was +my father. He entered the room with his knotty forehead more +compressed than usual and said:</p> +<p>"What's this she shall not do?"</p> +<p>My mother dropped back into her seat in silence, and Aunt +Bridget, wiping' her eyes on her black apron—she only wept +when my father was present—proceeded to explain.</p> +<p>It seems I am a hard-hearted woman with a bad disposition and +though, I've been up early and late and made myself a servant for +seven years I'm only in this house to turn my sister's child out of +it. It seems too, that we have no business—none of us +have—to say what ought to be done for this girl—her +mother being the only person who has any rights in the child, and +if we attempt . . ."</p> +<p>"What's that?"</p> +<p>In his anger and impatience my father could listen no longer and +in his loud voice he said:</p> +<p>"Since when has a father lost control of his own daughter? He +has to provide for her, hasn't he? If she wants anything it's to +him she has to look for it, isn't it? That's the law I guess, eh? +Always has been, all the world over. Then what's all this hustling +about?"</p> +<p>My mother made a feeble effort to answer him.</p> +<p>"I was only saying, Daniel . . ."</p> +<p>"You were saying something foolish and stupid. I reckon a man +can do what he likes with his own, can't he? If this girl is my +child and I say she is to go somewhere, she is to go." And saying +this my father brought down his thick hand with a thump on to a +table.</p> +<p>It was the first time he had laid claim to me, and perhaps that +acted on my mother, as she said, submissively:</p> +<p>"Very well, dear. <i>You</i> know best what is best for Mary, +and if you say—you and Bridget and . . . and Father Dan. . . +."</p> +<p>"I do say, and that's enough. So just go to work and fix up this +Convent scheme without future notice. And hark here, let me see for +the future if a man can't have peace from these two-cent trifles +for his important business."</p> +<p>My mother was crushed. Her lips moved again, but she said +nothing aloud, and my father turned on his heel, and left the room, +shaking the floor at every step under the weight of his sixteen +stone. At the next moment, Aunt Bridget, jingling her keys, went +tripping after him.</p> +<p>Hardly had they gone when my mother broke into a long fit of +coughing, and when it was over she lay back exhausted, with her +white face and her tired eyes turned upwards. Then I clasped her +about the neck, and Father Dan, whose cheeks were wet with tears +patted her drooping hand.</p> +<p>My darling mother! Never once have I thought of her without the +greatest affection, but now that I know for myself what she must +have suffered I love best to think of her as she was that +day—my sweet, beautiful, timid angel—standing up for +one brief moment, not only against Aunt Bridget, but against the +cruelty of all the ages, in the divine right of her outraged +motherhood.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ELEVENTH_CHAPTER" id="ELEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ELEVENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My mother's submission was complete. Within twenty-four hours +she was busy preparing clothes for my journey to Rome. The old +coloured pattern book was brought out again, material was sent for, +a sewing-maid was engaged from the village, and above all, in my +view, an order was dispatched to Blackwater for a small +squirrel-skin scarf, a large squirrel-skin muff, and a +close-fitting squirrel-skin hat with a feather on the side of +it.</p> +<p>A child's heart is a running brook, and it would wrong the truth +to say that I grieved much in the midst of these busy preparations. +On the contrary I felt a sort of pride in them, poor innocent that +I was, as in something that gave me a certain high superiority over +Betsy Beauty and Nessy MacLeod, and entitled me to treat them with +condescension.</p> +<p>Father Dan, who came more frequently than ever, fostered this +feeling without intending to do so, by telling me, whenever we were +alone, that I must be a good girl to everybody now, and especially +to my mother.</p> +<p>"My little woman would be sorry to worry mamma, wouldn't she?" +he would whisper, and when I answered that I would be sorrier than +sorry, he would say:</p> +<p>"Wisha then, she must be brave. She must keep up. She must not +grieve about going away or cry when the time comes for +parting."</p> +<p>I said "yes" and "yes" to all this, feeling very confidential +and courageous, but I dare say the good Father gave the same +counsel to my mother also, for she and I had many games of +make-believe, I remember, in which we laughed and chattered and +sang, though I do not think I ever suspected that the part we +played was easier to me than to her.</p> +<p>It dawned on me at last, though, when in the middle of the +night, near to the time of my going away, I was awakened by a bad +fit of my mother's coughing, and heard her say to herself in the +deep breathing that followed:</p> +<p>"My poor child! What is to become of her?"</p> +<p>Nevertheless all went well down to the day of my departure. It +had been arranged that I was to sail to Liverpool by the first of +the two daily steamers, and without any awakening I leapt out of +bed at the first sign of daylight. So great was my delight that I +began to dance in my nightdress to an invisible skipping rope, +forgetting my father, who always rose at dawn and was at breakfast +in the room below.</p> +<p>My mother and I breakfasted in bed, and then there was great +commotion. It chiefly consisted for me in putting on my new +clothes, including my furs, and then turning round and round on +tiptoe and smiling at myself in a mirror. I was doing this while my +mother was telling me to write to her as often as I was allowed, +and while she knelt at her prayer stool, which she used as a desk, +to make a copy of the address for my letters.</p> +<p>Then I noticed that the first line of her superscription "Mrs. +Daniel O'Neill" was blurred by the tears that were dropping from +her eyes, and my throat began to hurt me dreadfully. But I +remembered what Father Dan had told me to do, so I said:</p> +<p>"Never mind, mammy. Don't worry—I'll be home for the +holidays."</p> +<p>Soon afterwards we heard the carriage wheels passing under the +window, and then Father Dan came up in a white knitted muffler, and +with a funny bag which he used for his surplice at funerals, and +said, through a little cloud of white breath, that everything was +ready.</p> +<p>I saw that my mother was turning round and taking out her +pocket-handkerchief, and I was snuffling a little myself, but at a +sign from Father Dan, who was standing at the threshold. I squeezed +back the water in my eyes and cried:</p> +<p>"Good-bye mammy. I'll be back for Christmas," and then darted +across to the door.</p> +<p>I was just passing through it when I heard my mother say "Mary" +in a strange low voice, and I turned and saw her—I can see +her still—with her beautiful pale face all broken up, and her +arms held out to me.</p> +<p>Then I rushed back to her, and she clasped me to her breast +crying, "Mally veen! My Mally veen!" and I could feel her heart +beating through her dress and hear the husky rattle in her throat, +and then all our poor little game of make-believe broke down +utterly.</p> +<p>At the next moment my father was calling upstairs that I should +be late for the steamer, so my mother dried her own eyes and then +mine, and let me go.</p> +<p>Father Dan was gone when I reached the head of the stairs but +seeing Nessy MacLeod and Betsy Beauty at the bottom of them I soon +recovered my composure, and sailing down in my finery I passed them +in stately silence with my little bird-like head in the air.</p> +<p>I intended to do the same with Aunt Bridget, who was standing +with a shawl over her shoulders by the open door, but she touched +me and said:</p> +<p>"Aren't you going to kiss me good-bye, then?"</p> +<p>"No," I answered, drawing my little body to its utmost +height.</p> +<p>"And why not?"</p> +<p>"Because you've been unkind to mamma and cruel to me, and +because you think there's nobody but Betsy Beauty. And I'll tell +them at the Convent that you are making mamma ill, and you're as +bad as . . . as bad as the bad women in the Bible!"</p> +<p>"My gracious!" said Aunt Bridget, and she tried to laugh, but I +could see that her face became as white as a whitewashed wall. This +did not trouble me in the least until I reached the carriage, when +Father Dan, who was sitting inside, said:</p> +<p>"My little Mary won't leave home like that—without kissing +her aunt and saying good-bye to her cousins."</p> +<p>So I returned and shook hands with Nessy MacLeod and Betsy +Beauty, and lifted my little face to my Aunt Bridget.</p> +<p>"That's better," she said, after she had kissed me, but when I +had passed her my quick little ear caught the words:</p> +<p>"Good thing she's going, though."</p> +<p>During this time my father, with the morning mist playing like +hoar-frost about his iron-grey hair, had been tramping the gravel +and saying the horses were getting cold, so without more ado he +bundled me into the carriage and banged the door on me.</p> +<p>But hardly had we started when Father Dan, who was blinking his +little eyes and pretending to blow his nose on his coloured print +handkerchief, said, "Look!" and pointed up to my mother's room.</p> +<p>There she was again, waving and kissing her hand to me through +her open window, and she continued to do so until we swirled round +some trees and I lost the sight of her.</p> +<p>What happened in my mother's room when her window was closed I +do not know, but I well remember that, creeping into a corner of +the carriage. I forgot all about the glory and grandeur of going +away, and that it did not help me to remember when half way down +the drive a boy with a dog darted from under the chestnuts and +raced alongside of us.</p> +<p>It was Martin, and though his right arm was in a sling, he leapt +up to the step and held on to the open window by his left hand +while he pushed his head into the carriage and made signs to me to +take out of his mouth a big red apple which he held in his teeth by +the stalk. I took it, and then he dropped to the ground, without +uttering a word, and I could laugh now to think of the gruesome +expression of his face with its lagging lower lip and bloodshot +eyes. I had no temptation to do so then, however, and least of all +when I looked back and saw his little one-armed figure in the big +mushroom hat, standing on the top of the high wall of the bridge, +with William Rufus beside him.</p> +<p>We reached Blackwater in good tithe for the boat, and when the +funnels had ceased trumpeting and we were well away, I saw that we +were sitting in one of two private cabins on the upper deck; and +then Father Dan told me that the other was occupied by the young +Lord Raa, and his guardian, and that they were going up together +for the first time to Oxford.</p> +<p>I am sure this did not interest me in the least at that moment, +so false is it that fate forewarns us when momentous events are +about to occur. And now that I had time to think, a dreadful truth +was beginning to dawn on me, so that when Father Dan, who was much +excited, went off to pay his respects to the great people, I +crudled up in the corner of the cabin that was nearest to the door +and told myself that after all I had been turned out of my father's +house, and would never see my mother and Martin any more.</p> +<p>I was sitting so, with my hands in my big muff and my face to +the stern, making the tiniest occasional sniff as the mountains of +my home faded away in the sunlight, which was now tipping the +hilltops with a feathery crest, when my cabin was darkened by +somebody who stood in the doorway.</p> +<p>It was a tail boy, almost a man, and I knew in a moment who he +was. He was the young Lord Raa. And at first I thought how handsome +and well dressed he was as he looked down at me and smiled. After a +moment he stepped into the cabin and sat in front of me and +said:</p> +<p>"So you are little Mary O'Neill, are you?"</p> +<p>I did not speak. I was thinking he was not so very handsome +after all, having two big front teeth like Betsy Beauty.</p> +<p>"The girl who ought to have been a boy and put my nose out, +eh?"</p> +<p>Still I did not speak. I was thinking his voice was like Nessy +MacLeod's—shrill and harsh and grating.</p> +<p>"Poor little mite! Going all the way to Rome to a Convent, isn't +she?"</p> +<p>Even yet I did not speak. I was thinking his eyes were like Aunt +Bridget's—cold and grey and piercing.</p> +<p>"So silent and demure, though! Quite a little nun already. A +deuced pretty one, too, if anybody asks me."</p> +<p>I was beginning to have a great contempt for him.</p> +<p>"Where did you get those big angel eyes from? Stole them from +some picture of the Madonna, I'll swear."</p> +<p>By this time I had concluded that he was not worth speaking to, +so I turned my head and I was looking back at the sea, when I heard +him say:</p> +<p>"I suppose you are going to give me a kiss, you nice little +woman, aren't you?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"Oh, but you must—we are relations, you know."</p> +<p>"I won't."</p> +<p>He laughed at that, and rising from his seat, he reached over to +kiss me, whereupon I drew one of my hands out of my muff and +doubling my little mittened fist, I struck him in the face.</p> +<p>Being, as I afterwards learned, a young autocrat, much indulged +by servants and generally tyrannising over them, he was surprised +and angry.</p> +<p>"The spitfire!" he said. "Who would have believed it? The face +of a nun and the temper of a devil! But you'll have to make amends +for this, my lady."</p> +<p>With that he went away and I saw no more of him until the +steamer was drawing up at the landing stage at Liverpool, and then, +while the passengers were gathering up their luggage, he came back +with Father Dan, and the tall sallow man who was his guardian, and +said:</p> +<p>"Going to give me that kiss to make amends, or are you to owe me +a grudge for the rest of your life, my lady?"</p> +<p>"My little Mary couldn't owe a grudge to anybody," said Father +Dan. "She'll kiss his lordship and make amends; I'm certain."</p> +<p>And then I did to the young Lord Raa what I had done to Aunt +Bridget—I held up my face and he kissed me.</p> +<p>It was a little, simple, trivial incident, but it led with other +things to the most lamentable fact of my life, and when I think of +it I sometimes wonder how it comes to pass that He who numbers the +flowers of the field and counts the sparrows as they fall has no +handwriting with which to warn His children that their footsteps +may not fail.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWELFTH_CHAPTER" id="TWELFTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWELFTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Of our journey to Rome nothing remains to me but the memory of +sleeping in different beds in different towns, of trains screaming +through tunnels and slowing down in glass-roofed railway stations, +of endless crowds of people moving here and there in a sort of +maze, nothing but this, and the sense of being very little and very +helpless and of having to be careful not to lose sight of Father +Dan, for fear of being lost—until the afternoon of the fourth +day after we left home.</p> +<p>We were then crossing a wide rolling plain that was almost +destitute of trees, and looked, from the moving train, like green +billows of the sea with grass growing over them. Father Dan was +reading his breviary for the following day, not knowing what he +would have to do in it, when the sun set in a great blaze of red +beyond the horizon, and then suddenly a big round black ball, like +a captive balloon, seemed to rise in the midst of the glory.</p> +<p>I called Father Dan's attention to this, and in a moment he was +fearfully excited.</p> +<p>"Don't worry, my child," he cried, while tears of joy sprang to +his eyes. "Do you know what that is? That's the dome of St. +Peter's! Rome, my child, Rome!"</p> +<p>It was nine o'clock when we arrived at our destination, and in +the midst of a great confusion I walked by Father Dan's side and +held on to his vertical pocket, while he carried his own bag, and a +basket of mine, down the crowded platform to an open cab outside +the station.</p> +<p>Then Father Dan wiped his forehead with his print handkerchief +and I sat close up to him, and the driver cracked his long whip and +shouted at the pedestrians while we rattled on and on over stony +streets, which seemed to be full of statues and fountains that were +lit up by a great white light that was not moonlight and yet looked +like it.</p> +<p>But at last we stopped at a little door of a big house which +seemed to stand, with a church beside it, on a high shelf +overlooking the city, for I could see many domes like that of St. +Peter lying below us.</p> +<p>A grill in the little door was first opened and then a lady in a +black habit, with a black band round her forehead and white bands +down each side of her face, opened the door itself, and asked us to +step in, and when we had done so, she took us down a long passage +into a warm room, where another lady, dressed in the same way, only +a little grander, sat in a big red arm-chair.</p> +<p>Father Dan, who was still wearing his knitted muffler, bowed +very low to this lady, calling her the Reverend Mother Magdalene, +and she answered him in English but with a funny sound which I +afterwards knew to be a foreign accent.</p> +<p>I remember that I thought she was very beautiful, nearly as +beautiful as my mother, and when Father Dan told me to kiss her +hand I did so, and then she put me to sit in a chair and looked at +me.</p> +<p>"What is her age?" she asked, whereupon Father Dan said he +thought I would be eight that month, which was right, being +October.</p> +<p>"Small, isn't she?" said the lady, and then Father Dan said +something about poor mamma which I cannot remember.</p> +<p>After that they talked about other things, and I looked at the +pictures on the walls—pictures of Saints and Popes and, above +all, a picture of Jesus with His heart open in His bosom.</p> +<p>"The child will be hungry," said the lady. "She must have +something to eat before she goes to bed—the other children +have gone already."</p> +<p>Then she rang a hand-bell, and when the first lady came back she +said:</p> +<p>"Ask Sister Angela to come to me immediately."</p> +<p>A few minutes later Sister Angela came into the room, and she +was quite young, almost a girl, with such a sweet sad face that I +loved her instantly.</p> +<p>"This is little Mary O'Neill. Take her to the Refectory and give +her whatever she wants, and don't leave her until she is quiet and +comfortable."</p> +<p>"Very well, Mother," said Sister Angela, and taking my hand she +whispered: "Come, Mary, you look tired."</p> +<p>I rose to go with her, but at the same moment Father Dan rose +too, and I heard him say he must lose no time in finding an hotel, +for his Bishop had given him only one day to remain in Rome, and he +had to catch an early train home the following morning.</p> +<p>This fell on me like a thunderbolt. I hardly know what I had led +myself to expect, but certainly the idea of being left alone in +Rome had never once occurred to me.</p> +<p>My little heart was fluttering, and dropping the Sister's hand I +stepped back and took Father Dan's and said:</p> +<p>"You are not going to leave your little Mary are you, +Father?"</p> +<p>It was harder for the dear Father than for me, for I remember +that, fearfully flurried, he stammered in a thick voice something +about the Reverend Mother taking good care of me, and how he was +sure to come back at Christmas, according to my father's faithful +promise, to take me home for the holidays.</p> +<p>After that Sister Angela led me, sniffing a little still, to the +Refectory, which was a large, echoing room, with rows of plain deal +tables and forms, ranged in front of a reading desk that had +another and much larger picture of the Sacred Heart on the wall +above it. Only one gasjet was burning, and I sat under it to eat my +supper, and after I had taken a basin of soup I felt more +comforted.</p> +<p>Then Sister Angela lit a lamp and taking my hand she led me up a +stone staircase to the Dormitory, which was a similar room, but not +so silent, because it was full of beds, and the breathing of the +girls, who were all asleep, made it sound like the watchmaker's +shop in our village, only more church-like and solemn.</p> +<p>My bed was near to the door, and after Sister Angela had helped +me to undress, and tucked me in, she made her voice very low, and +said I would be quite comfortable now, and she was sure I was going +to be a good little girl and a dear child of the Infant Jesus; and +then I could not help taking my arms out again and clasping her +round the neck and drawing her head down and kissing her.</p> +<p>After that she took the lamp and went away to a cubicle which +was partitioned off the end of the Dormitory and there I could see +her prepare to go to bed herself—taking the white bands off +her cheeks and the black band off her forehead, and letting her +long light hair fall in beautiful wavy masses about her face, which +made her look so sweet and home like.</p> +<p>But oh, I was so lonely! Never in my life since—no, not +even when I was in my lowest depths—have I felt so little and +helpless and alone. After the Sister had gone to bed and everything +was quiet in the Dormitory save for the breathing of the +girls—all strangers to me and I to them—from mere +loneliness I covered up my head in the clothes just as I used to do +when I was a little thing and my father came into my mother's +room.</p> +<p>I try not to think bitterly of my father, but even yet I am at a +loss to know how he could have cast me away so lightly. Was it +merely that he wanted peace for his business and saw no chance of +securing it in his own home except by removing the chief cause of +Aunt Bridget's jealousy? Or was it that his old grudge against Fate +for making me a girl made him wish to rid himself of the sight of +me?</p> +<p>I do not know. I cannot say. But in either case I try in vain to +see how he could have thought he had a right, caring nothing for +me, to tear me from the mother who loved me and had paid for me so +dear; or how he could have believed that because he was my father, +charged with the care of my poor little body, he had control over +the little bleeding heart which was not his to make to suffer.</p> +<p>He is my father—God help me to think the best of him.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At half past six in the morning I was awakened by the loud +ringing of the getting-up bell, and as soon as I could rouse myself +from the deep sleep of childhood I saw that a middle-aged nun with +a severe face was saying a prayer, and that all the girls in the +dormitory were kneeling in their beds while they made the +responses.</p> +<p>A few minutes later, when the girls were chattering and laughing +as they dressed, making the room tingle with twittering sounds like +a tree full of linnets in the spring, a big girl came up to me and +said:</p> +<p>"I am Mildred Bankes and Sister Angela says I am to look after +you to-day."</p> +<p>She was about fifteen years of age, and had a long +plain-featured face which reminded me of one of my father's horses +that was badly used by the farm boys; but there was something sweet +in her smile that made me like her instantly.</p> +<p>She helped me to dress in my brown velvet frock, but said that +one of her first duties would be to take me to the lay sisters who +made the black habits which all the girls in the convent wore.</p> +<p>It was still so early that the darkness of the room was just +broken by pale shafts of light from the windows, but I could see +that the children of my own age were only seven or eight +altogether, while the majority of the girls were several years +older, and Mildred explained this by telling me that the children +of the Infant Jesus, like myself, were so few that they had been +put into the dormitory of the children of the Sacred Heart.</p> +<p>In a quarter of an hour everybody was washed and dressed, and +then, at a word from Sister Angela, the girls went leaping and +laughing downstairs to the Meeting Room, which was a large hail, +with a platform at the farther end of it and another picture of the +Sacred Heart, pierced with sharp thorns, on the wall.</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother was there with the other nuns of the +Convent, all pale-faced and slow eyed women wearing rosaries, and +she said a long prayer, to which the scholars (there were seventy +or eighty altogether) made responses, and then there was silence +for five minutes, which were supposed to be devoted to meditation, +although I could not help seeing that some of the big girls were +whispering to each other while their heads were down.</p> +<p>After that, and Mass in the Church, we went scurrying away to +the Refectory, which was now warm with the steam from our breakfast +and bubbling with cheerful voices, making a noise that was like +water boiling in a saucepan.</p> +<p>I was so absorbed by all I saw that I forgot to eat until +Mildred nudged me to do so, and even when my spoon was half way to +my mouth something happened which brought it down again.</p> +<p>At the tinkle of a hand-bell one of the big girls had stepped up +to the reading-desk and begun to read from a book which I +afterwards knew to be "The Imitation of Christ." She was about +sixteen years of age, and her face was so vivid that I could not +take my eyes off it.</p> +<p>Her complexion was fair and her hair was auburn, but her eyes +were so dark and searching that when she raised her head, as she +often did, they seemed to look through and through you.</p> +<p>"Who is she?" I whispered.</p> +<p>"Alma Lier," Mildred whispered back, and when breakfast was +over, and we were trooping off to lessons, she told me something +about her.</p> +<p>Alma was an American. Her father was very rich and his home was +in New York. But her mother lived in Paris, though she was staying +at an hotel in Rome at present, and sometimes she came in a +carriage to take her daughter for a drive.</p> +<p>Alma was the cleverest girl in the school too, and sometimes at +the end of terms, when parents and friends came to the Convent and +one of the Cardinals distributed the prizes, she had so many books +to take away that she could hardly carry them down from the +platform.</p> +<p>I listened to this with admiring awe, thinking Alma the most +wonderful and worshipful of all creatures, and when I remember it +now, after all these years, and the bitter experiences which have +come with them, I hardly know whether to laugh or cry at the +thought that such was the impression she first made on me.</p> +<p>My class was with the youngest of the children, and Sister +Angela was my teacher. She was so sweet to me that her +encouragement was like a kiss and her reproof like a caress; but I +could think of nothing but Alma, and at noon, when the bell rang +for lunch and Mildred took me back to the Refectory, I wondered if +the same girl would read again.</p> +<p>She did, but this time in a foreign language, French as Mildred +whispered—from the letters of the Blessed Margaret Mary +Alacoque—and my admiration for Alma went up tenfold. I +wondered if it could possibly occur that I should ever come to know +her.</p> +<p>There is no worship like that of a child, and life for me, which +had seemed so cold and dark the day before, became warm and bright +with a new splendour.</p> +<p>I was impatient of everything that took me away from the +opportunity of meeting with Alma—the visit to the lay-sisters +to be measured for my new black clothes, the three o'clock +"rosary," when the nuns walked with their classes in the sunshine +and, above all, the voluntary visit to the Blessed Sacrament in the +Church of the Convent, which seemed to me large and gorgeous, +though divided across the middle by an open bronze screen, called a +Cancello—the inner half, as Mildred whispered, being for the +inmates of the school, while the outer half was for the +congregation which came on Sunday to Benediction.</p> +<p>But at four o'clock we had dinner, when Alma read +again—this time in Italian—from the writings of Saint +Francis of Sales—and then, to my infinite delight, came a +long recreation, when all the girls scampered out into the Convent +garden, which was still bright with afternoon sunshine and as merry +with laughter and shouts as the seashore on a windy summer +morning.</p> +<p>The garden was a large bare enclosure, bounded on two sides by +the convent buildings and on the other two by a yellow wall and an +avenue made by a line of stone pines with heads like open +umbrellas, but it had no other foliage except an old tree which +reminded me of Tommy the Mate, having gnarled and sprawling limbs, +and standing like a weather-beaten old sailor, four-square in the +middle.</p> +<p>A number of the girls were singing and dancing around this tree, +and I felt so happy just then that I should have loved to join +them, but I was consumed by a desire to come to close quarters with +the object of my devotion, so I looked eagerly about me and asked +Mildred if Alma was likely to be there.</p> +<p>"Sure to be," said Mildred, and hardly were the words out of her +mouth when Alma herself came straight down in our direction, +surrounded by a group of admiring girls, who were hanging on to her +and laughing at everything she said.</p> +<p>My heart began to thump, and without knowing what I was doing I +stopped dead short, while Mildred went on a pace or two ahead of +me.</p> +<p>Then I noticed that Alma had stopped too, and that her great +searching eyes were looking down at me. In my nervousness, I tried +to smile, but Alma continued to stare, and at length, in the tone +of one who had accidentally turned up something with her toe that +was little and ridiculous, she said:</p> +<p>"Goodness, girls, what's this?"</p> +<p>Then she burst into a fit of laughter, in which the other girls +joined, and looking me up and down they all laughed together.</p> +<p>I knew what they were laughing at—the clothes my mother +had made for me and I had felt so proud of. That burnt me like +iron, and I think my lip must have dropped, but Alma showed no +mercy.</p> +<p>"Dare say the little doll thinks herself pretty, though," she +said. And then she passed on, and the girls with her, and as they +went off they looked back over their shoulders and laughed +again.</p> +<p>Never since has any human creature—not even Alma +herself—made me suffer more than I suffered at that moment. +My throat felt tight, tears leapt to my eyes, disappointment, +humiliation, and shame swept over me like a flood, and I stood +squeezing my little handkerchief in my hand and feeling as if I +could have died.</p> +<p>At the next moment Mildred stepped back to me, and putting her +arm about my waist she said:</p> +<p>"Never mind, Mary. She's a heartless thing. Don't have anything +to do with her."</p> +<p>But all the sunshine had gone out of the day for me now and I +cried for hours. I was still crying, silently but bitterly, when, +at eight o'clock, we were saying the night prayers, and I saw Alma, +who was in the opposite benches, whispering to one of the girls who +sat next to her and then looking straight across at me.</p> +<p>And at nine o'clock when we went to bed I was crying more than +ever, so that after the good-night-bell had been rung and the +lights had been put down, Sister Angela, not knowing the cause of +my sorrow, stepped up to my bed before going down stairs for her +own studies, and whispered:</p> +<p>"You mustn't fret for home, Mary. You will soon get used to +it."</p> +<p>But hardly had I been left alone, with the dull pain I could +find no ease for, when somebody touched me on the shoulder, and, +looking up, I saw a girl in her nightdress standing beside me. It +was Alma and she said:</p> +<p>"Say, little girl, is your name O'Neill?"</p> +<p>Trembling with nervousness I answered that it was.</p> +<p>"Do you belong to the O'Neills of Ellan?"</p> +<p>Still trembling I told her that I did.</p> +<p>"My!" she said in quite another tone, and then I saw that by +some means I had begun to look different in her eyes.</p> +<p>After a moment she sat on the side of my bed and asked questions +about my home—if it was not large and very old, with big +stone staircases, and great open fireplaces, and broad terraces, +and beautiful walks going down to the sea.</p> +<p>I was so filled with the joy of finding myself looking grand in +Alma's eyes that I answered "yes" and "yes" without thinking too +closely about her questions, and my tears were all brushed away +when she said:</p> +<p>"I knew somebody who lived in your house once, and I'll tell her +all about you."</p> +<p>She stayed a few moments longer, and when going off she +whispered:</p> +<p>"Hope you don't feel badly about my laughing in the garden +to-day. I didn't mean a thing. But if any of the girls laugh again +just say you're Alma Lier's friend and she's going to take care of +you."</p> +<p>I could hardly believe my ears. Some great new splendour had +suddenly dawned upon me and I was very happy.</p> +<p>I did not know then that the house which Alma had been talking +of was not my father's house, but Castle Raa. I did not know then +that the person who had lived there was her mother, and that in her +comely and reckless youth she had been something to the bad Lord +Raa who had lashed my father and sworn at my grandmother.</p> +<p>I did not know anything that was dead and buried in the past, or +shrouded and veiled in the future. I only knew that Alma had called +herself my friend and promised to take care of me. So with a glad +heart I went to sleep.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>FOURTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Alma kept her word, though perhaps her method of protection was +such as would have commended itself only to the heart of a +child.</p> +<p>It consisted in calling me Margaret Mary after our patron saint +of the Sacred Heart, in taking me round the garden during +recreation as if I had been a pet poodle, and, above all, in making +my bed the scene of the conversaziones which some of the girls held +at night when they were supposed to be asleep.</p> +<p>The secrecy of these gatherings flattered me, and when the +unclouded moon, in the depths of the deep blue Italian sky, looked +in on my group of girls in their nightdresses, bunched together on +my bed, with my own little body between, I had a feeling of dignity +as well as solemnity and awe.</p> +<p>Of course Alma was the chief spokeswoman at these whispered +conferences. Sometimes she told us of her drives into the Borghese +Gardens, where she saw the King and Queen, or to the Hunt on the +Campagna, where she met the flower of the aristocracy, or to the +Pincio, where the Municipal band played in the pavilion, while +ladies sat in their carriages in the sunshine, and officers in blue +cloaks saluted them and smiled.</p> +<p>Sometimes she indicated her intentions for the future, which was +certainly not to be devoted to retreats and novenas, or to witness +another black dress as long as she lived, and if she married (which +was uncertain) it was not to be to an American, but to a Frenchman, +because Frenchmen had "family" and "blood," or perhaps to an +Englishman, if he was a member of the House of Lords, in which case +she would attend all the race-meetings and Coronations, and take +tea at the Carlton, where she would eat <i>méringues +glacés</i> every day and have as many <i>éclairs</i> +as she liked.</p> +<p>And sometimes she would tell us the stories of the novels which +she bribed one of the washing-women to smuggle into the +convent—stories of ladies and their lovers, and of +intoxicating dreams of kissing and fondling, at which the bigger +girls, with far-off suggestions of sexual mysteries still +unexplored, would laugh and shudder, and then Alma would say:</p> +<p>"But hush, girls! Margaret Mary will be shocked."</p> +<p>Occasionally these conferences would be interrupted by Mildred's +voice from the other end of the dormitory, where she would raise +her head from her pillow and say:</p> +<p>"Alma Lier, you ought to be ashamed of yourself—keeping +that child up when she ought to be asleep, instead of listening to +your wicked stories."</p> +<p>"Helloa, Mother Mildred, is that you?" Alma would answer, and +then the girls would laugh, and Mildred was supposed to be covered +with confusion.</p> +<p>One night Sister Angela's footsteps were heard on the stairs, +and then the girls flew back to their beds, where, with the furtive +instinct of their age and sex, they pretended to be sleeping +soundly when the Sister entered the room. But the Sister was not +deceived, and walking up the aisle between the beds she said in an +angry tone:</p> +<p>"Alma Lier, if this ever occurs again I'll step down to the +Reverend Mother and tell her all about you."</p> +<p>Little as I was, I saw that between Alma and Sister Angela there +was a secret feud, which must soon break into open rupture, but for +my own part I was entirely happy, being still proud of Alma's +protection and only feeling any misgivings when Mildred's +melancholy eyes were looking at me.</p> +<p>Thus week followed week until we were close upon Christmas, and +the girls, who were to be permitted to go home before the Feast, +began to count the days to the holidays. I counted them too, and +when anybody talked of her brother I thought of Martin Conrad, +though his faithful little figure was fading away from me, and when +anybody spoke of her parents I remembered my mother, for whom my +affection never failed.</p> +<p>But, within a week from the time for breaking up, the Reverend +Mother sent for me, and with a sinking heart I went to her room, +knowing well what she was going to say.</p> +<p>"You are not to go home for the holidays this time, my child. +You are to remain here, and Sister Angela is to stay to take care +of you."</p> +<p>She had a letter from Father Dan, telling her that my mother was +still unwell, and for this and other reasons it was considered best +that I should not return at Christmas.</p> +<p>Father Dan had written a letter to me also, beginning, "My dear +daughter in Jesus" and ending "Yours in Xt," saying it was not his +fault that he could not fulfil his promise, but my father was much +from home now-a-days and Aunt Bridget was more difficult than ever, +so perhaps I should be happier at the Convent.</p> +<p>It was a bitter blow, though the bitterest part of it lay in the +fear that the girls would think I was of so little importance to my +people that they did not care to see me.</p> +<p>But the girls were too eager about their own concerns to care +much about me, and even on the very last day and at the very last +moment, when everything was bustle and joy, and boxes were being +carried downstairs, and everybody was kissing everybody else and +wishing each other a Happy Christmas, and then flying away like mad +things, and I alone was being left, Alma herself, before she +stepped into a carriage in which a stout lady wearing furs was +waiting to receive her, only said:</p> +<p>"By-by, Margaret Mary! Take care of Sister Angela."</p> +<p>Next day the Reverend Mother went off to her cottage at Nemi, +and the other nuns and novices to their friends in the country, and +then Sister Angela and I were alone in the big empty, echoing +convent—save for two elderly lay Sisters, who cooked and +cleaned for us, and the Chaplain, who lived by himself in a little +white hut like a cell which stood at the farthest corner of the +garden.</p> +<p>We moved our quarters to a room in the front of the house, so as +to look out over the city, and down into the piazza which was full +of traffic, and after a while we had many cheerful hours +together.</p> +<p>During the days before Christmas we spent our mornings in +visiting the churches and basilicas where there were little +illuminated models of the Nativity, with the Virgin and the Infant +Jesus in the stable among the straw. The afternoons we spent at +home in the garden, where the Chaplain, in his black soutane and +biretta, was always sitting under the old tree, reading his +breviary.</p> +<p>His name was Father Giovanni and he was a tall young man with a +long, thin, pale face, and when Sister Angela first took me up to +him she said:</p> +<p>"This is our Margaret Mary."</p> +<p>Then his sad face broke into warm sunshine, and he stroked my +head, and sent me away to skip with my skipping-rope, while he and +Sister Angela sat together under the tree, and afterwards walked to +and fro in the avenue between the stone pines and the wall, until +they came to his cell in the corner, where she craned her neck at +the open door as if she would have liked to go in and make things +more tidy and comfortable.</p> +<p>On Christmas Day we had currant cake in honour of the feast, and +Sister Angela asked Father Giovanni to come to tea, and he came, +and was quite cheerful, so that when the Sister, who was also very +happy, signalled to me to take some mistletoe from the bottom of a +picture I held it over his head and kissed him from behind. Then he +snatched me up in his arms and kissed me back, and we had a great +romp round the chairs and tables.</p> +<p>But the Ave Maria began to ring from the churches, and Father +Giovanni (according to the rule of our Convent) having to go, he +kissed me again, and then I said:</p> +<p>"Why don't you kiss Sister Angela too?"</p> +<p>At that they only looked at each other and laughed, but after a +moment he kissed her hand, and then she went downstairs to see him +out into the garden.</p> +<p>When she came back her eyes were sparkling and her cheeks were +flushed, and, that night, when she took away her black and white +whimple and gorget on going to bed, she stood before a +looking-glass and wound her beautiful light hair round her finger +and curled it over her forehead in the way it was worn by the +ladies we saw in the streets.</p> +<p>I think it was two nights later that she told me I was to go to +bed early because Father Giovanni was not well and she would have +to go over to see him.</p> +<p>She went, and I got into bed, but I could not sleep, and while I +lay waiting for Sister Angela I listened to some men who as they +crossed the piazza were singing, in tremulous voices, to their +mandolines and guitars, what I believed to be love songs, for I had +begun to learn Italian.</p> +<p>"<i>Oh bella Napoli. Oh suol beato<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Onde soiridere volta il +creato."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>It was late when Sister Angela came back and then she was +breathing hard as if she had been running. I asked if Father +Giovanni's sickness was worse, and she said no, it was better, and +I was to say nothing about it. But she could not rest and at last +she said:</p> +<p>"Didn't we forget to say our prayers, Mary?"</p> +<p>So I got up again and Sister Angela said one of the beautiful +prayers out of our prayer-book. But her voice was very low and when +she came to the words:</p> +<p>"O Father of all mankind, forgive all sinners who repent of +their sins," she broke down altogether.</p> +<p>I thought she was ill, but she said it was only a cold she had +caught in crossing the garden and I was to go to sleep like a good +girl and think no more about her.</p> +<p>But in the middle of the night I awoke, and Sister Angela was +crying.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Most of the girls were depressed when they returned to school, +but Alma was in high spirits, and on the first night of the term +she crept over to my bed and asked what we had been doing during +the holidays.</p> +<p>"Not a thing, eh?"</p> +<p>I answered that we had done lots of things and been very +happy.</p> +<p>"Happy? In this gloomy old convent? You and Sister Angela +alone?"</p> +<p>I told her we had two lay sisters-and then there was Father +Giovanni.</p> +<p>"Father Giovanni? That serious old cross-bones?"</p> +<p>I said he was not always serious, and that on Christmas Day he +had come to tea and kissed me under the mistletoe.</p> +<p>"Kissed you under the mistletoe!" said Alma, and then she +whispered eagerly,</p> +<p>"He didn't kiss Sister Angela, did he?"</p> +<p>I suppose I was flattered by her interest, and this loosened my +tongue, for I answered:</p> +<p>"He kissed her hand, though."</p> +<p>"Kissed her hand? My! . . . Of course she was very angry . . . +wasn't she angry?"</p> +<p>I answered no, and in my simplicity I proceeded to prove this by +explaining that Sister Angela had taken Father Giovanni down to the +door, and when he was ill she had nursed him.</p> +<p>"Nursed him? In his own house, you mean?"</p> +<p>"Yes, at night, too, and she stayed until he was better, and +caught a cold coming back."</p> +<p>"Well, I never!" said Alma, and I remember that I was very +pleased with myself during this interview, for by the moonlight +which was then shining into the room, I could see that Alma's eyes +were sparkling.</p> +<p>The next night we recommenced our conferences in bed, when Alma +told us all about her holiday, which she had spent "way up in St. +Moritz," among deep snow and thick ice, skating, bobbing, lugging, +and above all riding astride, and dragging a man on skis behind +her.</p> +<p>"Such lots of fun," she said. And the best of it was at night +when there were dances and fancy-dress balls with company which +included all the smart people in Europe, and men who gave a girl +such a good time if she happened to be pretty and was likely to +have a dot.</p> +<p>Alma had talked so eagerly and the girls had listened so +intently, that nobody was aware that Sister Angela had returned to +the room until she stepped forward and said:</p> +<p>"Alma Lier, I'm ashamed of you. Go back to your bed, miss, this +very minute."</p> +<p>The other girls crept away and I half covered my face with my +bed-clothes, but Alma stood up to Sister Angela and answered her +back.</p> +<p>"Go to bed yourself, and don't speak to me like that, or you'll +pay for your presumption."</p> +<p>"Pay? Presumption? You insolent thing, you are corrupting the +whole school and are an utter disgrace to it. I warned you that I +would tell the Reverend Mother what you are and now I've a great +mind to do it."</p> +<p>"Do it. I dare you to do it. Do it to-night, and to-morrow +morning <i>I</i> will do something."</p> +<p>"What will you do, you brazen hussy?" said Sister Angela, but I +could see that her lip was trembling.</p> +<p>"Never mind what. If I'm a hussy I'm not a hypocrite, and as for +corrupting the school, and being a disgrace to it, I'll leave the +Reverend Mother to say who is doing that."</p> +<p>Low as the light was I could see that Sister Angela was deadly +pale. There was a moment of silence in which I thought she glanced +in my direction, and then stammering something which I did not +hear, she left the dormitory.</p> +<p>It was long before she returned and when she did so I saw her +creep into her cubicle and sit there for quite a great time before +going to bed. My heart was thumping hard, for I had a vague feeling +that I had been partly to blame for what had occurred, but after a +while I fell asleep and remembered no more until I was awakened in +the middle of the night by somebody kissing me in my sleep.</p> +<p>It was Sister Angela, and she was turning away, but I called her +back, and she knelt by my bed and whispered:</p> +<p>"Hush! I know what has happened, but I don't blame you for +it."</p> +<p>I noticed that she was wearing her out-door cloak, and that she +was breathing rapidly, just as she did on the night she came from +the chaplain's quarters, and when I asked if she was going anywhere +she said yes, and if I ever heard anything against Sister Angela I +was to think the best of her.</p> +<p>"But you are so good. . . ."</p> +<p>"No, I am not good. I am very wicked. I should never have +thought of being a nun, but I'm glad now that I'm only a novice and +have never taken the vows."</p> +<p>After that she told me to go to sleep, and then she kissed me +again, and I thought she was going to cry, but she rose hurriedly +and left the room.</p> +<p>Next morning after the getting-up bell had been rung, and I had +roused myself to full consciousness, I found that four or five nuns +were standing together near the door of the dormitory talking about +something that had happened during the night—Sister Angela +had gone!</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards when full of this exciting event, the +girls went bursting down to the Meeting Room they found the nuns in +great agitation over an incident of still deeper +gravity—Father Giovanni also had disappeared!</p> +<p>A convent school is like a shell on the shore of a creek, always +rumbling with the rumour of the little sea it lives under; and by +noon the girls, who had been palpitating with curiosity, thought +they knew everything that had happened—how at four in the +morning Father Giovanni and Sister Angela had been seen to come out +of the little door which connected the garden with the street; how +at seven they had entered a clothing emporium in the Corso, where +going in at one door as priest and nun they had come out at another +as ordinary civilians; how at eight they had taken the first train +to Civita Vecchia, arriving in time to catch a steamer sailing at +ten, and how they were now on their way to England.</p> +<p>By some mysterious instinct of their sex the girls had gathered +with glistening eyes in front of the chaplain's deserted quarters, +where Alma leaned against the wall with her insteps crossed and +while the others talked she smiled, as much as to say, "I told you +so."</p> +<p>As for me I was utterly wretched, and being now quite certain +that I was the sole cause of Sister Angela's misfortune, I was +sitting under the tree in the middle of the garden, when Alma, +surrounded by her usual group of girls, came down on me.</p> +<p>"What's this?" she said. "Margaret Mary crying? Feeling badly +for Sister Angela, is she? Why, you little silly, you needn't cry +for her. She's having the time of her life, she is!"</p> +<p>At this the girls laughed and shuddered, as they used to do when +Alma told them stories, but just at that moment the nun with the +stern face (she was the Mother of the Novices) came up and said, +solemnly:</p> +<p>"Alma Lier, the Reverend Mother wishes to speak to you."</p> +<p>"To me?" said Alma, in a tone of surprise, but at the next +moment she went off jauntily.</p> +<p>Hours passed and Alma did not return, and nothing occurred until +afternoon "rosary," when the Mother of the Novices came again and +taking me by the hand said:</p> +<p>"Come with me, my child."</p> +<p>I knew quite well where we were going to, and my lip was +trembling when we entered the Reverend Mother's room, for Alma was +there, sitting by the stove, and close beside her, with an angry +look, was the stout lady in furs whom I had seen in the carriage at +the beginning of the holidays.</p> +<p>"Don't be afraid," said the Reverend Mother, and drawing me to +her side she asked me to tell her what I had told Alma about Sister +Angela.</p> +<p>I repeated our conversation as nearly as I could remember it, +and more than once Alma nodded her head as if in assent, but the +Reverend Mother's face grew darker at every word and, seeing this, +I said:</p> +<p>"But if Sister Angela did anything wrong I'm sure she was very +sorry, for when she came back she said her prayers, and when she +got to 'Father of all mankind, forgive all sinners . . .'"</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, that will do," said the Reverend Mother, and then she +handed me back to the Mother of the Novices, telling her to warn me +to say nothing to the other children.</p> +<p>Alma did not return to us at dinner, or at recreation, or at +chapel (when another chaplain said vespers), or even at nine +o'clock, when we went to bed. But next morning, almost as soon as +the Mother of the Novices had left the dormitory, she burst into +the room saying:</p> +<p>"I'm leaving this silly old convent, girls. Mother has brought +the carriage, and I've only come to gather up my belongings."</p> +<p>Nobody spoke, and while she wrapped up her brushes and combs in +her nightdress, she joked about Sister Angela and Father Giovanni +and then about Mildred Bankes, whom she called "Reverend Mother +Mildred," saying it would be her turn next.</p> +<p>Then she tipped up her mattress, and taking a novel from under +it she threw the book on to my bed, saying:</p> +<p>"Margaret Mary will have to be your story-teller now. By-by, +girls!"</p> +<p>Nobody laughed. For the first time Alma's humour had failed her, +and when we went downstairs to the Meeting Room it was with sedate +and quiet steps.</p> +<p>The nuns were all there, with their rosaries and crosses, +looking as calm as if nothing had occurred, but the girls were +thinking of Alma, and when, after prayers, during the five minutes +of silence for meditation, we heard the wheels of a carriage going +off outside, we knew what had happened—Alma had gone.</p> +<p>We were rising to go to Mass when the Reverend Mother said,</p> +<p>"Children, I have a word to say to you. You all know that one of +our novices has left us. You also know that one of our scholars has +just gone. It is my wish that you should forget both of them, and I +shall look upon it as an act of disobedience if any girl in the +Convent ever mentions their names again."</p> +<p>All that day I was in deep distress, and when, night coming, I +took my troubles to bed, telling myself I had now lost Alma also, +and it was all my fault, somebody put her arms about me in the +darkness and whispered:</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, are you awake?"</p> +<p>It was Mildred, and I suppose my snuffling answered her, for she +said:</p> +<p>"You mustn't cry for Alma Lier. She was no friend of yours, and +it was the best thing that ever happened to you when she was turned +out of the convent."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>A child lives from hour to hour, and almost at the same moment +that my heart was made desolate by the loss of my two friends it +was quickened to a new interest.</p> +<p>Immediately after the departure of Sister Angela and Alma we +were all gathered in the Meeting Room for our weekly rehearsal of +the music of the Benediction—the girls, the novices, the +nuns, the Reverend Mother, and a Maestro from the Pope's choir, a +short fat man, who wore a black soutane and a short lace +tippet.</p> +<p>Benediction was the only service of our church which I knew, +being the one my mother loved best and could do most of for herself +in the solitude of her invalid room, but the form used in the +Convent differed from that to which I had been accustomed, and even +the <i>Tantum ergo</i> and the <i>O Salutaris Hostia</i> I could +not sing.</p> +<p>On this occasion a litany was added which I had heard before, +and then came a hymn of the Blessed Virgin which I remembered well. +My mother sang it herself and taught me to sing it, so that when +the Maestro, swinging his little ivory baton, began in his alto +voice—</p> +<p>"<i>Ave maris stella,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Dei Mater +alma—"</span><br /></i></p> +<p>I joined in with the rest, but sang in English instead of Latin +Of all appeals to the memory that of music is the strongest, and +after a moment I forgot that I was at school in Rome, being back in +my mother's room in Ellan, standing by her piano and singing while +she played. I think I must have let my little voice go, just as I +used to do at home, when it rang up to the wooden rafters, for +utterly lost to my surroundings I had got as far as—</p> +<p>"<i>Virgin of all virgins,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">To thy shelter take +us—"</span><br /></i></p> +<p>when suddenly I became aware that I alone was singing, the +children about me being silent, and even the Maestro's baton +slowing down. Then I saw that all eyes were turned in my direction, +and overwhelmed with confusion I stopped, for my voice broke and +slittered into silence.</p> +<p>"Go on, little angel," said the Maestro, but I was trembling all +over by this time and could not utter a sound.</p> +<p>Nevertheless the Reverend Mother said: "Let Mary O'Neill sing +the hymn in church in future."</p> +<p>As soon as I had conquered my nervousness at singing in the +presence of the girls, I did so, singing the first line of each +verse alone, and I remember to have heard that the congregations on +Sunday afternoons grew larger and larger, until, within a few +weeks, the church was densely crowded.</p> +<p>Perhaps my childish heart was stirred by vanity in all this, for +I remember that ladies in beautiful dresses would crowd to the +bronze screen that separated us from the public and whisper among +themselves, "Which is she?" "The little one in the green scarf with +the big eyes!" "God bless her!"</p> +<p>But surely it was a good thing that at length life had began to +have a certain joy for me, for as time went on I became absorbed in +the life of the Convent, and particularly in the services of the +church, so that home itself began to fade away, and when the +holidays came round and excuses were received for not sending for +me, the pain of my disappointment became less and less until at +last it disappeared altogether.</p> +<p>If ever a child loved her mother I did, and there were moments +when I reproached myself with not thinking of her for a whole day. +These were the moments when a letter came from Father Dan, telling +me she was less well than before and her spark of life had to be +coaxed and trimmed or it would splutter out altogether.</p> +<p>But the effect of such warnings was wiped away when my mother +wrote herself, saying I was to be happy as she was happy, because +she knew that though so long separated we should soon be together, +and the time would not seem long.</p> +<p>Not understanding the deeper meaning that lay behind words like +these, I was nothing loath to put aside the thought of home until +little by little it faded away from me in the distance, just as the +island itself had done on the day when I sailed out with Martin +Conrad on our great voyage of exploration to St. Mary's Rock.</p> +<p>Thus two years and a half passed since I arrived in Rome before +the great fact befell me which was to wipe all other facts out of +my remembrance.</p> +<p>It was Holy Week, the season of all seasons for devotion to the +Sacred Heart, and our Convent was palpitating with the joy of its +spiritual duties, the many offices, the masses for the repose of +the souls in Purgatory, the preparations for Tenebrae, with the +chanting of the Miserere, and for Holy Saturday and Easter Day, +with the singing of the Gloria and the return of the Alleluia.</p> +<p>But beyond all this for me were the arrangements for my first +confession, which, coming a little late, I made with ten or twelve +other girls of my sodality, feeling so faint when I took my turn +and knelt by the grating, and heard the whispering voice within, +like something from the unseen, something supernatural, something +divine, that I forgot all I had come to say and the priest had to +prompt me.</p> +<p>And beyond that again were the arrangements for my first +communion, which was to take place on Easter morning, when I was to +walk in procession with the other girls, dressed all in white, +behind a gilded figure of the Virgin, singing "Ave maris stella," +through the piazza into the church, where one of the Cardinals, in +the presence of the fathers and mothers of the other children, was +to put the Holy Wafer on our tongues and we were to know for the +first time the joy of communion with our Lord.</p> +<p>But that was not to be for me.</p> +<p>On the morning of Holy Wednesday the blow fell. The luminous +grey of the Italian dawn was filtering through the windows of the +dormitory, like the light in a tomb, and a multitude of little +birds on the old tree in the garden were making a noise like water +falling on small stones in a fountain, when the Mother of the +Novices came to my bedside and said:</p> +<p>"You are to go to the Reverend Mother as soon as possible, my +child."</p> +<p>Her voice, usually severe, was so soft that I knew something had +happened, and when I went downstairs I also knew, before the +Reverend Mother had spoken, what she was going to say.</p> +<p>"Mary," she said, "I am Sorry to tell you that your mother is +ill."</p> +<p>I listened intently, fearing that worse would follow.</p> +<p>"She is very ill—very seriously ill, and she wishes to see +you. Therefore you are to go home immediately."</p> +<p>The tears sprang to my eyes, and the Reverend Mother drew me to +her side and laid my head on her breast and comforted me, saying my +dear mother had lived the life of a good Christian and could safely +trust in the redeeming blood of our Blessed Saviour. But I thought +she must have some knowledge of the conditions of my life at home, +for she told me that whatever happened I was to come back to +her.</p> +<p>"Tell your father you <i>wish</i> to come back to me," she said, +and then she explained the arrangements that were being made for my +journey.</p> +<p>I was to travel alone by the Paris express which left Rome at +six o'clock that evening. The Mother of the Novices was to put me +in a sleeping car and see that the greatest care would be taken of +me until I arrived at Calais, where Father Donovan was to meet the +train and take me home.</p> +<p>I cried a great deal, I remember, but everybody in the Convent +was kind, and when, of my own choice, I returned to the girls at +recreation, the sinister sense of dignity which by some strange +irony of fate comes to all children when the Angel of Death is +hovering over them, came to me also—poor, helpless +innocent—and I felt a certain distinction in my sorrow.</p> +<p>At five o'clock the omnibus of the Convent had been brought +round to the door, and I was seated in one corner of it, with the +Mother of the Novices in front of me, when Mildred Bankes came +running breathlessly downstairs to say that the Reverend Mother had +given her permission to see me off.</p> +<p>Half an hour later Mildred and I were sitting in a compartment +of the Wagon-Lit, while the Mother was talking to the conductor on +the platform.</p> +<p>Mildred, whose eyes were wet, was saying something about herself +which seems pitiful enough now in the light of what has happened +since.</p> +<p>She was to leave the Convent soon, and before I returned to it +she would be gone. She was poor and an orphan, both her parents +being dead, and if she had her own way she would become a nun. In +any case our circumstances would be so different, our ways of life +so far apart, that we might never meet again; but if . . .</p> +<p>Before she had finished a bell rang on the platform, and a +moment or two afterwards the train slid out of the station.</p> +<p>Then for the first time I began to realise the weight of the +blow that had fallen on me. I was sitting alone in my big +compartment, we were running into the Campagna, the heavens were +ablaze with the glory of the sunset, which was like fields of +glistening fire, but darkness seemed to have fallen on all the +world.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Early on Good Friday I arrived at Calais. It was a misty, rimy, +clammy morning, and a thick fog was lying over the Channel.</p> +<p>Almost before the train stopped I saw Father Dan, with his coat +collar turned up, waiting for me on the platform. I could see that +he was greatly moved at the sight of me, but was trying hard to +maintain his composure.</p> +<p>"Now don't worry, my child, don't worry," he said. "It will be +all ri. . . . But how well you are looking! And how you have grown! +And how glad your poor mother will be to see you!"</p> +<p>I tried to ask how she was. "Is she . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes, thank God, she's alive, and while there's life there's +hope."</p> +<p>We travelled straight through without stopping and arrived at +Blackwater at seven the same evening. There we took train, for +railways were running in Ellan now, and down the sweet valleys that +used to be green with grass, and through the little crofts that +used to be red with fuchsia, there was a long raw welt of upturned +earth.</p> +<p>At the station of our village my father's carriage was waiting +for us and a strange footman shrugged his shoulders in answer to +some whispered question of Father Dan's, and from that I gathered +that my mother's condition was unchanged.</p> +<p>We reached home at dusk, just as somebody was lighting a line of +new electric lamps that had been set up in the drive to show the +way for the carriage under the chestnuts in which the rooks used to +build and caw.</p> +<p>I knew the turn of the path from which the house could be first +seen, and I looked for it, remembering the last glimpse I had of my +mother at her window. Father Dan looked, too, but for another +reason—to see if the blinds were down.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget was in the hall, and when Father Dan, who had grown +more and more excited as we approached the end of our journey, +asked how my mother was now, poor thing, she answered:</p> +<p>"Worse; distinctly worse; past recognising anybody; so all this +trouble and expense has been wasted."</p> +<p>As she had barely recognised me I ran upstairs with a timid and +quiet step and without waiting to take off my outer clothes made my +way to my mother's bedroom.</p> +<p>I remember the heavy atmosphere of the room as I opened the +door. I remember the sense I had of its being lower and smaller +than I thought. I remember the black four-foot bedstead with the +rosary hanging on a brass nail at the pillow end. I remember my +little cot which still stood in the same place and contained some +of the clothes I had worn as a child, and even some of the toys I +had played with.</p> +<p>A strange woman, in the costume of a nurse, turned to look at me +as I entered, but I did not at first see my mother, and when at +length I did see her, with her eyes closed, she looked so white and +small as to be almost hidden in the big white bed.</p> +<p>Presently Father Dan came in, followed by Doctor Conrad and Aunt +Bridget, and finally my father, who was in his shirt sleeves and +had a pen in his ear, I remember.</p> +<p>Then Father Dan, who was trembling very much, took me by the +hand and led me to my mother's side, where stooping over her, and +making his voice very low, yet speaking as one who was calling into +a long tunnel, he said:</p> +<p>"My daughter! My daughter! Here is our little Mary. She has come +home to see you."</p> +<p>Never shall I forget what followed. First, my mother's long +lashes parted and she looked at me with a dazed expression as if +still in a sort of dream. Then her big eyes began to blaze like +torches in dark hollows, and then (though they had thought her +strength was gone and her voice would never be heard again) she +raised herself in her bed, stretched out her arms to me, and cried +in loud strong tones:</p> +<p>"Mally veen! My Mally veen!"</p> +<p>How long I lay with my arms about my mother, and my mother's +arms about me I do not know. I only know that over my head I heard +Father Dan saying, as if speaking to a child:</p> +<p>"You are happy now, are you not?"</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, I am happy now," my mother answered.</p> +<p>"You have everything you want?"</p> +<p>"Everything—everything!"</p> +<p>Then came my father's voice, saying:</p> +<p>"Well, you've got your girl, Isabel. You wanted her, so we sent +for her, and here she is."</p> +<p>"You have been very good to me, Daniel," said my mother, who was +kissing my forehead and crying in her joy.</p> +<p>When I raised my head I found Father Dan in great +excitement.</p> +<p>"Did you see that then?" he was saying to Doctor Conrad.</p> +<p>"I would have gone on my knees all the way to Blackwater to see +it."</p> +<p>"I couldn't have believed it possible," the Doctor replied.</p> +<p>"Ah, what children we are, entirely. God confounds all our +reckoning. We can't count with His miracles. And the greatest of +all miracles is a mother's love for her child."</p> +<p>"Let us leave her now, though," said the Doctor. "She's like +herself again, but still . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes, let us leave them together," whispered Father Dan, and +having swept everybody out before him (I thought Aunt Bridget went +away ashamed) he stepped off himself on tiptoe, as if treading on +holy ground.</p> +<p>Then my mother, who was holding my hand and sometimes putting it +to her lips, said:</p> +<p>"Tell me everything that has happened."</p> +<p>As soon as my little tongue was loosed I told her all about my +life at the Convent—about the Reverend Mother and the nuns +and the novices and the girls (all except Sister Angela and Alma) +and the singing of the hymn to the Virgin—talking on and on +and on, without observing that, after a while, my mother's eyes had +closed again, and that her hand had become cold and moist.</p> +<p>At length she said: "Is it getting dark, Mary?"</p> +<p>I told her it was night and the lamp was burning.</p> +<p>"Is it going out then?" she asked, and when I answered that it +was not she did not seem to hear, so I stopped talking, and for +some time there was silence in which I heard nothing but the +ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece, the barking of a sheep dog +a long way off, and the husky breathing in my mother's throat.</p> +<p>I was beginning to be afraid when the nurse returned. She was +going to speak quite cheerfully, but after a glance at my mother +she went out quickly and came back in a moment with Doctor Conrad +and Father Dan.</p> +<p>I heard the doctor say something about a change, whereupon +Father Dan hurried away, and in a moment there was much confusion. +The nurse spoke of taking me to another room but the doctor +said:</p> +<p>"No, our little woman will be brave," and then leading me aside +he whispered that God was sending for my mother and I must be quiet +and not cry.</p> +<p>Partly undressing I climbed into my cot and lay still for the +next half hour, while the doctor held his hand on my mother's pulse +and the nurse spread a linen cloth over a table and put four or +five lighted candles on it.</p> +<p>I remember that I was thinking that if "God sending for my +mother" meant that she was to be put into a box and buried under +the ground it was terrible and cruel, and perhaps if I prayed to +our Lady He would not find it in His heart to do so. I was trying +to do this, beginning under my breath, "O Holy Virgin, thou art so +lovely, thou art so gracious . . ." when the nurse said:</p> +<p>"Here they are back again."</p> +<p>Then I heard footsteps outside, and going to the window I saw a +sight not unlike that which I had seen on the night of the +Waits.</p> +<p>A group of men were coming towards the house, with Father Dan in +the middle of them. Father Dan, with his coat hung over his arms +like a cloak, was carrying something white in both hands, and the +men were carrying torches to light him on his way.</p> +<p>I knew what it was—it was the Blessed Sacrament, which +they were bringing to my mother, and when Father Dan had come into +the room, saying "Peace be to this house," and laid a little white +box on the table, and thrown off his coat, he was wearing his +priest's vestments underneath.</p> +<p>Then the whole of my father's household—all except my +father himself—came into my mother's room, including Aunt +Bridget, who sat with folded arms in the darkness by the wall, and +the servants, who knelt in a group by the door.</p> +<p>Father Dan roused my mother by calling to her again, and after +she had opened her eyes he began to read. Sometimes his voice +seemed to be choked with sobs, as if the heart of the man were +suffering, and sometimes it pealed out loudly as if the soul of the +priest were inspiring him.</p> +<p>After Communion he gave my mother Extreme +Unction—anointing the sweet eyes which had seen no evil, the +dear lips which had uttered no wrong, and the feet which had walked +in the ways of God.</p> +<p>All this time there was a solemn hush in the house like that of +a church—no sound within except my father's measured tread in +the room below, and none without except the muffled murmur which +the sea makes when it is far away and going out.</p> +<p>When all was over my mother seemed more at ease, and after +asking for me and being told I was in the cot, she said:</p> +<p>"You must all go and rest. Mary and I will be quite right +now."</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards my mother and I were alone once more, +and then she called me into her bed and clasped her arms about me +and I lay with my face hidden in her neck.</p> +<p>What happened thereafter seems to be too sacred to write of, +almost too sacred to think about, yet it is all as a memory of +yesterday, while other events of my life have floated away to the +ocean of things that are forgotten and lost.</p> +<p>"Listen, darling," she said, and then, speaking in whispers, she +told me she had heard all I had said about the Convent, and +wondered if I would not like to live there always, becoming one of +the good and holy nuns.</p> +<p>I must have made some kind of protest, for she went on to say +how hard the world was to a woman and how difficult she had found +it.</p> +<p>"Not that your father has been to blame—you must never +think that, Mary, yet still . . ."</p> +<p>But tears from her tender heart were stealing down her face and +she had to stop.</p> +<p>Even yet I had not realised all that the solemn time foreboded, +for I said something about staying with my mother; and then in her +sweet voice, she told me nervously, breaking the news to me gently, +that she was going to leave me, that she was going to heaven, but +she would think of me when she was there, and if God permitted she +would watch over me, or, if that might not be, she would ask our +Lady to do so.</p> +<p>"So you see we shall never be parted, never really. We shall +always be together. Something tells me that wherever you are, and +whatever you are doing, I shall know all about it."</p> +<p>This comforted me, and I think it comforted my mother also, +though God knows if it would have done so, if, with her dying eyes, +she could have seen what was waiting for her child.</p> +<p>It fills my heart brimful to think of what happened next.</p> +<p>She told me to say a <i>De Profundis</i> for her sometimes, and +to think of her when I sang the hymn to the Virgin. Then she kissed +me and told me to go to sleep, saying she was going to sleep too, +and if it should prove to be the eternal sleep, it would be only +like going to sleep at night and awaking in the morning, and then +we should be together again, and "the time between would not seem +long."</p> +<p>"So good-night, darling, and God bless you," she said.</p> +<p>And as well as I could I answered her "Good-night!"</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>When I awoke from the profound slumber of childhood it was noon +of the next day and the sun was shining. Doctor Conrad was lifting +me out of bed, and Father Dan, who had just thrown open the window, +was saying in a tremulous voice:</p> +<p>"Your dear mother has gone to God."</p> +<p>I began to cry, but he checked me and said:</p> +<p>"Don't call her back. She's on her way to God's beautiful +Paradise after all her suffering. Let her go!"</p> +<p>So I lost her, my mother, my saint, my angel.</p> +<p>It was Easter Eve, and the church bells were ringing the +Gloria.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>After my mother's death there was no place left for me in my +father's house.</p> +<p>Betsy Beauty (who was now called Miss Betsy and gave herself +more than ever the airs of the daughter of the family) occupied +half her days with the governess who had been engaged to teach her, +and the other half in driving, dressed in beautiful clothes, to the +houses of the gentry round about.</p> +<p>Nessy MacLeod, called the young mistress, had become my father's +secretary, and spent most of her time in his private room, a +privilege which enlarged her pride without improving her +manners.</p> +<p>Martin Conrad I did not see, for in reward for some success at +school the doctor had allowed him to spend his Easter holidays in +London in order to look at Nansen's ship, the <i>Fram</i>, which +had just then arrived in the Thames.</p> +<p>Hence it happened that though home made a certain tug at me, +with its familiar sights and sounds, and more than once I turned +with timid steps towards my father's busy room, intending to say, +"Please, father, don't send me back to school," I made no demur +when, six or seven days after the funeral, Aunt Bridget began to +prepare for my departure.</p> +<p>"There's odds of women," said Tommy the Mate, when I went into +the garden to say good bye to him "They're like sheep's broth, is +women. If there's a head and a heart in them they're good, and if +there isn't you might as well be supping hot water. Our Big Woman +is hot water—but she'll die for all."</p> +<p>Within a fortnight I was back at the Convent, and there the +Reverend Mother atoned to me for every neglect.</p> +<p>"I knew you would come back to me," she said, and from that hour +onward she seemed to be trying to make up to me for the mother I +had lost.</p> +<p>I became deeply devoted to her. As a consequence her spirit +became my spirit, and, little by little, the religious side of the +life of the Convent took complete possession of me.</p> +<p>At first I loved the church and its services because the +Reverend Mother loved them, and perhaps also for the sake of the +music, the incense, the flowers and the lights on the altar; but +after I had taken my communion, the mysteries of our religion took +hold of me—the Confessional with its sense of cleansing and +the unutterable sweetness of the Mass.</p> +<p>For a long time there was nothing to disturb this religious side +of my mind. My father never sent for me, and as often as the +holidays came round the Reverend Mother took me with her to her +country home at Nemi.</p> +<p>That was a beautiful place—a sweet white cottage, some +twenty kilometres from Rome, at the foot of Monte Cavo, in the +middle of the remains of a mediæval village which contained a +castle and a monastery, and had a little blue lake lying like an +emerald among the green and red of the grass and poppies in the +valley below.</p> +<p>In the hot months of summer the place was like a Paradise to me, +with its roses growing wild by the wayside; its green lizards +running on the rocks; its goats; its sheep; its vineyards; its +brown-faced boys in velvet, and its gleesome girls in smart red +petticoats and gorgeous outside stays; its shrines and its blazing +sunsets, which seemed to girdle the heavens with quivering bands of +purple and gold.</p> +<p>Years went by without my being aware of their going, for after a +while I became entirely happy.</p> +<p>I heard frequently from home. Occasionally it was from Betsy +Beauty, who had not much to say beyond stories of balls at +Government House, where she had danced with the young Lord Raa, and +of hunts at which she had ridden with him. More rarely it was from +Aunt Bridget, who usually began by complaining of the +ever-increasing cost of my convent clothes and ended with accounts +of her daughter's last new costume and how well she looked in +it.</p> +<p>From Nessy MacLeod and my father I never heard at all, but +Father Dan was my constant correspondent and he told me +everything.</p> +<p>First of my father himself—that he had carried out many of +his great enterprises, his marine works, electric railways, +drinking and dancing palaces, which had brought tens of thousands +of visitors and hundreds of thousands of pounds to Ellan, though +the good Father doubted the advantage of such innovations and +lamented the decline of piety which had followed on the lust for +wealth.</p> +<p>Next of Aunt Bridget—that she was bringing up her daughter +in the ways of worldly vanity and cherishing a serpent in her bosom +(meaning Nessy MacLeod) who would poison her heart some day.</p> +<p>Next, of Tommy the Mate—that he sent his "best respec's" +to the "lil-missy" but thought she was well out of the way of the +Big Woman who "was getting that highty-tighty" that "you couldn't +say Tom to a cat before her but she was agate of you to make it +Thomas."</p> +<p>Then of Martin Conrad—that he was at college "studying for +a doctor," but his heart was still at the North Pole and he was +"like a sea-gull in the nest of a wood pigeon," always longing to +be out on the wild waves.</p> +<p>Finally of the young Lord Raa—that the devil's dues must +be in the man, for after being "sent down" from Oxford he had +wasted his substance in riotous living in London and his guardian +had been heard to say he must marry a rich wife soon or his estates +would go to the hammer.</p> +<p>Such was the substance of the news that reached me over a period +of six years. Yet welcome as were Father Dan's letters the life +they described seemed less and less important to me as time went +on, for the outer world was slipping away from me altogether and I +was becoming more and more immersed in my spiritual exercises.</p> +<p>I spent much of my time reading religious books—the life +of Saint Teresa, the meditations of Saint Francis of Sales, and, +above all, the letters and prayers of our Blessed Margaret Mary +Alacoque, whose love of the Sacred Heart was like a flaming torch +to my excited spirit.</p> +<p>The soul of Rome, too, seemed to enter into my soul—not +the new Rome, for of that I knew nothing, but the old Rome, the +holy city, that could speak to me in the silence of the night +within the walls of my convent-school, with its bells of the +Dominican and Franciscan monasteries on either side, its stories of +miracles performed on the sick and dying by the various shrines of +the Madonna, its accounts of the vast multitudes of the faithful +who came from all ends of the earth to the ceremonials at St. +Peter's, and, above all, its sense of the immediate presence of the +Pope, half a mile away, the Vicar and mouthpiece of God +Himself.</p> +<p>The end of it all was that I wished to become a nun. I said +nothing of my desire to anybody, not even to the Reverend Mother, +but day by day my resolution grew.</p> +<p>Perhaps it was natural that the orphaned and homeless girl +should plunge with all this passion into the aurora of a new +spiritual life; but when I think how my nature was made for love, +human love, the love of husband and children, I cannot but wonder +with a thrill of the heart whether my mother in heaven, who, while +she was on earth, had fought so hard with my father for the body of +her child, was now fighting with him for her soul.</p> +<p>I was just eighteen years of age when my desire to become a nun +reached its highest point, and then received its final +overthrow.</p> +<p>Mildred Bankes, who had returned to Rome, and was living as a +novice with the Little Sisters of the Poor, was about to make her +vows, and the Reverend Mother took me to see the ceremony.</p> +<p>Never shall I forget the effect of it. The sweet summer morning, +tingling with snow-white sunshine, the little white chapel in the +garden of the Convent, covered with flowers, the altar with its +lighted tapers, the friends from without clad in gay costumes as +for a festival, the bishop in his bright vestments, and then, +Mildred herself, dressed as a bride in a beautiful white gown with +a long white veil and attended by other novices as bridesmaids.</p> +<p>It was just like a marriage to look upon, except for the absence +of a visible bridegroom, the invisible one being Christ. And the +taking of the vows was like a marriage service too—only more +solemn and sacred and touching—the bride receiving the ring +on her finger, and promising to serve and worship her celestial +lover from that day forward, for better for worse, for richer for +poorer, in sickness and in health, as long as life should last and +through the eternity that was to follow it.</p> +<p>I cried all through the ceremony for sheer joy of its +loveliness; and when it was over and we went into the refectory, +and Mildred told me she was returning to England to work among the +fallen girls of London, I vowed in my heart, though I hardly +understood what she was going to do, that I would follow her +example.</p> +<p>It was something of a jar to go back into the streets, so full +of noise and bustle; and all the way home with the Reverend Mother +I was forming the resolution of telling her that very night that I +meant to be a nun, for, stirred to the depths of my soul by what I +had seen and remembering what my poor mother had wished for me, I +determined that no other life would I live under any +circumstances.</p> +<p>Then came the shock.</p> +<p>As we drew up at our door a postman was delivering letters. One +of them was for the Reverend Mother and I saw in a moment that it +was in my father's handwriting. She read it in silence, and in +silence she handed it to me. It ran:</p> +<p>"<i>Madam</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>I have come to Rome to take back my daughter. I believe her +education will now be finished, and I reckon the time has arrived +to prepare her for the change in life that is before her</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>The Bishop of our diocese has come with me, and we propose +to pay our respects to you at ten o'clock prompt to-morrow +morning</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Yours, Madam</i>,</p> +<p>"DANIEL O'NEILL."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETEENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I saw, as by a flash of light, what was before me, and my whole +soul rose in rebellion against it. That my father after all the +years during which he had neglected me, should come to me now, when +my plans were formed, and change the whole current of my life, was +an outrage—an iniquity. It might be his right—his +natural right—but if so his natural right was a spiritual +wrong—and I would resist it—to my last breath and my +last hour I would resist it.</p> +<p>Such were the brave thoughts with which I passed that night, but +at ten o'clock next morning, when I was summoned to meet my father +himself, it was on trembling limbs and with a quivering heart that +I went down to the Reverend Mother's room.</p> +<p>Except that his hair was whiter than before my father was not +much changed. He rose as I entered, saying, "Here she is herself," +and when I went up to him he put his hands on my shoulders and +looked into my face.</p> +<p>"Quite a little Italian woman grown! Like your mother though," +he said, and then speaking over my head to the Bishop, who sat on +the other side of the room, he added:</p> +<p>"Guess this will do, Bishop, eh?"</p> +<p>"Perfectly," said the Bishop.</p> +<p>I was colouring in confusion at the continued scrutiny, with a +feeling of being looked over for some unexplained purpose, when the +Reverend Mother called me, and turning to go to her I saw, by the +look of pain on her face that she, too, had been hurt by it.</p> +<p>She put me to sit on a stool by the side of her chair, and +taking my right hand she laid it in her lap and held it there +during the whole of the interview.</p> +<p>The Bishop, whom I had never seen before, was the first to +speak. He was a type of the fashionable ecclesiastic, suave, +smiling, faultlessly dressed in silk soutane and silver buckled +shoes, and wearing a heavy gold chain with a jewelled cross.</p> +<p>"Reverend Mother," he said, "you would gather from Mr. O'Neill's +letter that he wishes to remove his daughter immediately—I +presume there will be no difficulty in his doing so?"</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother did not speak, but I think she must have +bent her head.</p> +<p>"Naturally," said the Bishop, "there will be a certain delay +while suitable clothes are being made for her, but I have no doubt +you will give Mr. O'Neill your help in these preparations."</p> +<p>My head was down, and I did not see if the Reverend Mother bowed +again. But the two gentlemen, apparently satisfied with her +silence, began to talk of the best date for my removal, and just +when I was quivering with fear that without a word of protest I was +to be taken away, the Reverend Mother said:</p> +<p>"Monsignor!"</p> +<p>"Reverend Mother!"</p> +<p>"You are aware that this child"—here she patted my +trembling hand—"has been with me for ten years?"</p> +<p>"I am given to understand so."</p> +<p>"And that during that time she has only once been home?"</p> +<p>"I was not aware—but no doubt it is as you say."</p> +<p>"In short, that during the greater part of her life she has been +left to my undivided care?"</p> +<p>"You have been very good to her, very, and I'm sure her family +are extremely grateful."</p> +<p>"In that case, Monsignor, doesn't it seem to you that I am +entitled to know why she is being so suddenly taken away from me, +and what is the change in life which Mr. O'Neill referred to in his +letter?"</p> +<p>The smile which had been playing upon the Bishop's face was +smitten away from it by that question, and he looked anxiously +across at my father.</p> +<p>"Tell her," said my father, and then, while my heart thumped in +my bosom and the Reverend Mother stroked my hand to compose me, the +Bishop gave a brief explanation.</p> +<p>The time had not come when it would be prudent to be more +definite, but he might say that Mr. O'Neill was trying to arrange a +happy and enviable future for his daughter, and therefore he wished +her to return home to prepare for it.</p> +<p>"Does that mean marriage?" said the Reverend Mother.</p> +<p>"It may be so. I am not quite prepared to . . ."</p> +<p>"And that a husband has already been found for her?"</p> +<p>"That too perhaps. I will not say . . ."</p> +<p>"Monsignor," said the Reverend Mother, sitting up with dignity +"is that fair?"</p> +<p>"Fair?"</p> +<p>"Is it fair that after ten years in which her father has done +nothing for her, he should determine what her life is to be, +without regard to her wish and will?"</p> +<p>I raised my eyes and saw that the Bishop looked aghast.</p> +<p>"Reverend Mother, you surprise me," he said. "Since when has a +father ceased to be the natural guardian of his child? Has he not +been so since the beginning of the world? Doesn't the Church itself +build its laws on that foundation?"</p> +<p>"Does it?" said the Reverend Mother shortly. And then (I could +feel her hand trembling as she spoke): "Some of its servants do, I +know. But when did the Church say that anybody—no matter +who—a father or anybody else—should take the soul of +another, and control it and govern it, and put it in prison? . . +."</p> +<p>"My good lady," said the Bishop, "would you call it putting the +girl in prison to marry her into an illustrious family, to give her +an historic name, to surround her with the dignity and distinction +. . ."</p> +<p>"Bishop," said my father, raising his hand, "I guess it's my +right to butt in here, isn't it?"</p> +<p>I saw that my father's face had been darkening while the +Reverend Mother spoke, and now, rolling his heavy body in his chair +so as to face her, he said:</p> +<p>"Excuse me, ma'am, but when you say I've done nothing for my gel +here I suppose you'll allow I've kept her and educated her?"</p> +<p>"You've kept and educated your dogs and horses, also, I dare +say, but do you claim the same rights over a human being?"</p> +<p>"I do, ma'am—I think I do. And when the human being +happens to be my own daughter I don't allow that anybody else has +anything to say."</p> +<p>"If her mother were alive would <i>she</i> have nothing to +say?"</p> +<p>I thought my father winced at that word, but he answered:</p> +<p>"Her mother would agree to anything I thought best."</p> +<p>"Her mother, so far as I can see, was a most unselfish, most +submissive, most unhappy woman," said the Reverend Mother.</p> +<p>My father glanced quickly at me and then, after a moment, he +said:</p> +<p>"I'm obliged to you, ma'am, much obliged. But as I'm not a man +to throw words away I'll ask you to tell me what all this means. +Does it mean that you've made plans of your own for my daughter +without consulting me?"</p> +<p>"No, sir."</p> +<p>"Then perhaps it means that the gel herself . . ."</p> +<p>"That may be so or not—I cannot say. But when you sent +your daughter to a convent-school . . ."</p> +<p>"Wrong, ma'am, wrong for once. It was my wife's sister—who +thinks the gel disobedient and rebellious and unruly . . ."</p> +<p>"Then your wife's sister is either a very stupid or a very +bad-hearted woman."</p> +<p>"Ma'am?"</p> +<p>"I have known your daughter longer than she has, and there isn't +a word of truth in what she says."</p> +<p>It was as much as I could do not to fall on the Reverend +Mother's neck, but I clung to her hand with a convulsive grasp.</p> +<p>"May be so, ma'am, may be no," said my father. "But when you +talk about my sending my daughter to a convent-school I would have +you know that I've been so busy with my business . . ."</p> +<p>"That you haven't had time to take care of the most precious +thing God gave you."</p> +<p>"Ma'am," said my father, rising to his feet, "may I ask what +right you have to speak to me as if . . ."</p> +<p>"The right of one who for ten years has been a mother to your +motherless child, sir, while you have neglected and forgotten +her."</p> +<p>At that my father, whose bushy eyebrows were heavily contracted, +turned to the Bishop.</p> +<p>"Bishop," he said, "is this what I've been paying my money for? +Ten years' fees, and middling high ones too, I'm thinking?"</p> +<p>And then the Bishop, apparently hoping to make peace, said +suavely:</p> +<p>"But aren't we crossing the river before we reach the bridge? +The girl herself may have no such objections. Have you?" he asked, +turning to me.</p> +<p>I was trembling more than ever now, and at first I could not +reply.</p> +<p>"Don't you wish to go back home with your father?"</p> +<p>"No, sir," I answered.</p> +<p>"And why not, please?"</p> +<p>"Because my father's home is no home to me—because my aunt +has always been unkind to me, and because my father has never cared +for me or protected me, and because . . ."</p> +<p>"Well, what else?"</p> +<p>"Because . . . because I wish to become a nun."</p> +<p>There was silence for a moment, and then my father broke into +bitter laughter.</p> +<p>"So that's it, is it? I thought as much. You want to go into +partnership with the Mother in the nun business, eh?"</p> +<p>"My mother wished me to become a nun, and I wish it myself, +sir."</p> +<p>"Your mother was a baby—that's what she was."</p> +<p>"My mother was an angel, sir," I said, bridling up, "and when +she was dying she hoped I should become a nun, and I can never +become anything else under any circumstance."</p> +<p>"Bah!" said my father, with a contemptuous lift of the hand, and +then turning to the Reverend Mother he said:</p> +<p>"Hark here, ma'am. There's an easy way and a hard way in most +everything. I take the easy way first, and if it won't work I take +the hard way next, and then it's stiff pulling for the people who +pull against me. I came to Rome to take my daughter home. I don't +feel called upon to explain why I want to take her home, or what +I'm going to do with her when I get her there. I believe I've got +the rights of a father to do what I mean to do, and that it will be +an ugly business for anybody who aids and abets my daughter in +resisting her father's will. So I'll leave her here a week longer, +and when I come back, I'll expect her to be ready and waiting and +willing—ready and waiting and willing, mind you—to go +along with me."</p> +<p>After saying this my father faced about and with his heavy flat +step went out of the room, whereupon the Bishop bowed to the +Reverend Mother and followed him.</p> +<p>My heart was by this time in fierce rebellion—all that the +pacifying life of the convent-school had done for me in ten years +being suddenly swept away—and I cried:</p> +<p>"I won't do it! I won't do it!"</p> +<p>But I had seen that the Reverend Mother's face had suddenly +become very white while my father spoke to her at the end and now +she said, in a timid, almost frightened tone:</p> +<p>"Mary, we'll go out to Nemi to-day. I have something to say to +you."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTIETH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTIETH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>In the late afternoon of the same day we were sitting together +for the last time on the terrace of the Reverend Mother's +villa.</p> +<p>It was a peaceful evening, a sweet and holy time. Not a leaf was +stirring, not a breath of wind was in the air; but the voice of a +young boy, singing a love-song, came up from somewhere among the +rocky ledges of the vineyards below, and while the bell of the +monastic church behind us was ringing the Ave Maria, the far-off +bell of the convent church at Gonzano was answering from the other +side of the lake—like angels calling to each other from long +distances in the sky.</p> +<p>"Mary," said the Reverend Mother, "I want to tell you a story. +It is the story of my own life—mine and my sister's and my +father's."</p> +<p>I was sitting by her side and she was holding my hand in her +lap, and patting it, as she had done during the interview of the +morning.</p> +<p>"They say the reason so few women become nuns is that a woman is +too attached to her home to enter the holy life until she has +suffered shipwreck in the world. That may be so with most women. It +was not so with me.</p> +<p>"My father was what is called a self-made man. But his fortune +did not content him. He wanted to found a family. If he had had a +son this might have been easy. Having only two daughters, he saw no +way but that of marrying one of us into the Italian nobility.</p> +<p>"My sister was the first to disappoint him. She fell in love +with a young Roman musician. The first time the young man asked for +my sister he was contemptuously refused; the second time he was +insulted; the third time he was flung out of the house. His nature +was headstrong and passionate, and so was my father's. If either +had been different the result might not have been the same. Yet who +knows? Who can say?"</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother paused for a moment. The boy's voice in the +vineyard was going on.</p> +<p>"To remove my sister from the scene of temptation my father took +her from Rome to our villa in the hills above Albano. But the young +musician followed her. Since my father would not permit him to +marry her he was determined that she should fly with him, and when +she hesitated to do so he threatened her. If she did not meet him +at a certain hour on a certain night my father would be dead in the +morning."</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother paused again. The boy's voice had ceased; +the daylight was dying out.</p> +<p>"My sister could not bring herself to sacrifice either her +father or her lover. Hence she saw only one way left—to +sacrifice herself."</p> +<p>"Herself?"</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother patted my hand. "Isn't that what women in +tragic circumstances are always doing?" she said.</p> +<p>"By some excuse—I don't know what—she persuaded our +father to change rooms with her that night—he going upstairs +to her bedroom in the tower, and she to his on the ground floor at +the back, opening on to the garden and the pine forest that goes up +the hill.</p> +<p>"What happened after that nobody ever knew exactly. In the +middle of the night the servants heard two pistol shots, and next +morning my sister was found dead—shot to the heart through an +open window as she lay in my father's bed.</p> +<p>"The authorities tried in vain to trace the criminal. Only one +person had any idea of his identity. That was my father, and in his +fierce anger he asked himself what he ought to do in order to +punish the man who had killed his daughter.</p> +<p>"Then a strange thing happened. On the day before the funeral +the young musician walked into my father's room. His face was white +and wasted, and his eyes were red and swollen. He had come to ask +if he might be allowed to be one of those to carry the coffin. My +father consented. 'I'll leave him alone,' he thought. 'The man is +punished enough.'</p> +<p>"All the people of Albano came to the funeral and there was not +a dry eye as the cortège passed from our chapel to the +grave. Everybody knew the story of my sister's hopeless love, but +only two in the world knew the secret of her tragic death—her +young lover, who was sobbing aloud as he staggered along with her +body on his shoulder, and her old father, who was walking +bareheaded and in silence, behind him."</p> +<p>My heart was beating audibly and the Reverend Mother stroked my +hand to compose me—perhaps to compose herself also. It was +now quite dark, the stars were coming out, and the bells of the two +monasteries on opposite sides of the lake were ringing the first +hour of night.</p> +<p>"That's my sister's story, Mary," said the Reverend Mother after +a while, "and the moral of my own is the same, though the incidents +are different.</p> +<p>"I was now my father's only child and all his remaining hopes +centred in me. So he set himself to find a husband for me before +the time came when I should form an attachment for myself. His +choice fell on a middle-aged Roman noble of distinguished but +impoverished family.</p> +<p>"'He has a great name; you will have a great fortune—what +more do you want?' said my father.</p> +<p>"We were back in Rome by this time, and there—at school or +elsewhere—I had formed the conviction that a girl must +passionately love the man she marries, and I did not love the Roman +noble. I had also been led to believe that a girl should be the +first and only passion of the man who marries her, and, young as I +was, I knew that my middle-aged lover had had other domestic +relations.</p> +<p>"Consequently I demurred, but my father threatened and stormed, +and then, remembering my sister's fate, I pretended to agree, and I +was formally engaged.</p> +<p>"I never meant to keep my promise, and I began to think out +schemes by which to escape from it. Only one way seemed open to me +then, and cherishing the thought of it in secret, I waited and +watched and made preparations for carrying out my purpose.</p> +<p>"At length the moment came to me. It was mid-Lent, and a masked +ball was given by my fiancé's friends in one of the old +Roman palaces. I can see it still—the great hall, ablaze with +glowing frescoes, beautiful Venetian candelabras, gilded furniture, +red and yellow damask and velvet, and then the throng of handsome +men in many uniforms and beautiful women with rows of pearls +falling from their naked throats.</p> +<p>"I had dressed myself as a Bacchante in a white tunic +embroidered in gold, with bracelets on my bare arms, a tiger-skin +band over my forehead, and a cluster of grapes in my hair.</p> +<p>"I danced every dance, I remember, most of them with my +middle-aged lover, and I suppose no one seemed so gay and happy and +heedless. At three o'clock in the morning I returned home in my +father's carriage. At six I had entered a convent.</p> +<p>"Nobody in the outer world ever knew what had become of me, and +neither did I know what happened at home after I left it. The rule +of the convent was very strict. Sometimes, after morning prayers, +the Superior would say, 'The mother of one of you is +dead—pray for her soul,' and that was all we ever heard of +the world outside.</p> +<p>"But nature is a mighty thing, my child, and after five years I +became restless and unhappy. I began to have misgivings about my +vocation, but the Mother, who was wise and human, saw what was +going on in my heart. 'You are thinking about your father,' she +said, 'that he is growing old, and needing a daughter to take care +of him. Go out, and nurse him, and then come back to your cell and +pray.'</p> +<p>"I went, but when I reached my father's house a great shock +awaited me. A strange man was in the porter's lodge, and our +beautiful palace was let out in apartments. My father was +dead—three years dead and buried. After my disappearance he +had shut himself up in his shame and grief, for, little as I had +suspected it and hard and cruel as I had thought him, he had really +and truly loved me. During his last days his mind had failed him +and he had given away all his fortune—scattered it, no one +knew how, as something that was quite useless—and then he +died, alone and broken-hearted."</p> +<p>That was the end of the Reverend Mother's narrative. She did not +try to explain or justify or condemn her own or her sister's +conduct, neither did she attempt to apply the moral of her story to +my own circumstances. She left me to do that for myself.</p> +<p>I had been spell-bound while she spoke, creeping closer and +closer to her until my head was on her breast.</p> +<p>For some time longer we sat like this in the soft Italian night, +while the fire-flies came out in clouds among the unseen flowers of +the garden and the dark air seemed to be alive with sparks of +light.</p> +<p>When the time came to go to bed the Reverend Mother took me to +my room, and after some cheerful words she left me. But hardly had +I lain down, shaken to the heart's core by what I had heard, and +telling myself that the obedience of a daughter to her father, +whatever he might demand of her, was an everlasting and +irreversible duty, imposed by no human law-giver, and that marriage +was a necessity, which was forced upon most women by a mysterious +and unyielding law of God, when the door opened and the Reverend +Mother, with a lamp in her hand, came in again.</p> +<p>"Mary," she said, "I forgot to tell you that I am leaving the +Sacred Heart. The Sisters of my old convent have asked me to go +back as Superior. I have obtained permission to do so and am going +shortly, so that in any case we should have been parted soon. It is +the Convent of. . . ."</p> +<p>Here she gave me the name of a private society of cloistered +nuns in the heart of Rome.</p> +<p>"I hope you will write to me as often as possible, and come to +see me whenever you can. . . . And if it should ever occur that . . +. but no, I will not think of that. Marriage is a sacred tie, too, +and under proper conditions God blesses and hallows it."</p> +<p>With that she left me in the darkness. The church bell was +ringing, the monks of the Passionist monastery were getting up for +their midnight offices.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>A week later I was living with my father in the Hotel Europa on +the edge of the Piazza di Spagna.</p> +<p>He was kinder to me than he had ever been before, but he did not +tell me what the plans were which he had formed for my future, and +I was left to discover them for myself.</p> +<p>Our apartment was constantly visited by +ecclesiastics—Monsignori, Archbishops, even one of the +Cardinals of the Propaganda, brought there by Bishop Walsh (the +Bishop of our own diocese), and I could not help but hear portions +of their conversation.</p> +<p>"It will be difficult, extremely difficult," the Cardinal would +say. "Such marriages are not encouraged by the Church, which holds +that they are usually attended by the worst consequences to both +wife and husband. Still—under the exceptional +circumstances—that the bridegroom's family was Catholic +before it was Protestant—it is possible, just possible. . . +."</p> +<p>"Cardinal," my father would answer, while his strong face was +darkening, "excuse me, sir, but I'm kind of curious to get the hang +of this business. Either it can be done or it can't. If it can, +we'll just sail in and do it. But if it can't, I believe I'll go +home quick and spend my money another way."</p> +<p>Then there would be earnest assurances that in the end all would +be right, only Rome moved slowly, and it would be necessary to have +patience and wait.</p> +<p>My father waited three weeks, and meantime he occupied himself +in seeing the sights of the old city.</p> +<p>But the mighty remains which are the luminous light-houses of +the past—the Forum with the broken columns of its dead +centuries; the Coliseum with its gigantic ruins, like the desolate +crater of a moon; the Campagna with its hollow, crumbling tombs and +shattered aqueducts,—only vexed and irritated him.</p> +<p>"Guess if I had my way," he said, "I would just clean out this +old stone-yard of monuments to dead men, and make it more fit for +living ones."</p> +<p>At length the Bishop came to say that the necessary business had +been completed, and that to mark its satisfactory settlement the +Pope had signified his willingness to receive in private audience +both my father and myself.</p> +<p>This threw me into a state of the greatest nervousness, for I +had begun to realise that my father's business concerned myself, so +that when, early the following morning (clad according to +instructions, my father in evening dress and I in a long black +mantilla), we set out for the Vatican, I was in a condition of +intense excitement.</p> +<p>What happened after we got out of the carriage at the bronze +gate near St. Peter's I can only describe from a vague and feverish +memory. I remember going up a great staircase, past soldiers in +many-coloured coats, into a vast corridor, where there were other +soldiers in other costumes. I remember going on and on, through +salon after salon, each larger and more luxurious than the last, +and occupied by guards still more gorgeously dressed than the +guards we had left behind. I remember coming at length to a door at +which a Chamberlain, wearing a sword, knelt and knocked softly, and +upon its being opened announced our names. And then I remember that +after all this grandeur as of a mediæval court I found myself +in a plain room like a library with a simple white figure before +me, and . . . I was in the presence of the Holy Father himself.</p> +<p>Can I ever forget that moment?</p> +<p>I had always been taught in the Convent to think of the Pope +with a reverence only second to that which was due to the Saints, +so at first I thought I should faint, and how I reached the Holy +Father's feet I do not know. I only know that he was very sweet and +kind to me, holding out the delicate white hand on which he wore +the fisherman's emerald ring, and smoothing my head after I had +kissed it.</p> +<p>When I recovered myself sufficiently to look up I saw that he +was an old man, with a very pale and saintly face; and when he +spoke it was in such a soft and fatherly voice that I loved and +worshipped him.</p> +<p>"So this is the little lady," he said, "who is to be the +instrument in the hands of Providence in bringing back an erring +family into the folds of Mother Church."</p> +<p>Somebody answered him, and then he spoke to me about marriage, +saying it was a holy state, instituted by the Almighty under a +natural law and sanctioned by our divine Redeemer into the dignity +of a Sacrament, so that those who entered it might live together in +peace and love.</p> +<p>"It is a spiritual and sacred union, my child," he said, "a type +of the holy mystery of Christ's relation to His Church."</p> +<p>Then he told me I was to make the best possible preparation for +marriage in order to obtain the abundant graces of God, and to +approach the altar only after penance and communion.</p> +<p>"And when you leave the church, my daughter," he said, "do not +profane the day of your marriage by any sinful thought or act, but +remember to bear yourself as if Jesus Christ Himself were with you, +as He was at the marriage-feast in Cana of Galilee."</p> +<p>Then he warned me that when I entered into the solemn contract +of holy matrimony I was to do so in the full consciousness that it +could not be broken but by death.</p> +<p>"Whom God has joined together let no man put +asunder—remember that, too, my daughter."</p> +<p>Finally he said something about children—that a Catholic +marrying a person of another religion must not enter into any +agreement whereby any of her children should be brought up in any +other than the Catholic faith.</p> +<p>After that, and something said to my father which I cannot +recall, he gave me his blessing, in words so beautiful and a voice +so sweet that it fell on me like the soft breeze that comes out of +the rising sun on a summer morning.</p> +<p>"May the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob +be with you, my daughter. May your marriage be a yoke of love and +peace, and may you see your children's children to the third and +fourth generation."</p> +<p>Then he raised me to my feet, and at a touch from the +Chamberlain, I backed out of the room.</p> +<p>When the door had closed on me I drew a deep breath, feeling as +if I had come out of the Holy of Holies, and when I reached the +Piazza of St. Peter's and came again upon the sight and sound of +common things—the cabs and electric cars—it was the +same as if I had suddenly descended from heaven to earth.</p> +<p>After my audience with the Pope, following on the Reverend +Mother's story, all my objections to marriage had gone, and I +wished to tell my father so, but an opportunity did not arise until +late the same night and then it was he who was the first to +speak.</p> +<p>Being in good spirits, after a dinner to the ecclesiastics, he +said, as soon as his guests had gone—speaking in the tone of +one who believed he was doing a great thing for me—</p> +<p>"Mary, matters are not quite settled yet, but you might as well +know right here what we're trying to fix up for you."</p> +<p>Then he told me.</p> +<p>I was to marry the young Lord Raa!</p> +<p>I was stunned. It was just as if the power of thought had been +smitten out of me.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>That night, and during the greater part of the following day, I +felt, without quite knowing why, as if I were living under the dark +cloud of a gathering thunderstorm. All my fear of the world, and my +desire to escape from it, had fallen upon me afresh. Hence it was +not altogether by the blind leading of fate that half an hour +before Ave Maria I entered the church of the Convent which the +Reverend Mother had given me the name of.</p> +<p>The church was empty when I pushed past the leather hanging that +covered the door, but the sacristan was lighting the candles for +Benediction, so I went up to the bronze screen, the Cancello, that +divides the public part from the part occupied by the Sisters, and +knelt on the nearest step.</p> +<p>After a while the church-bell rang overhead, and then (the +congregation having gathered in the meantime) the nuns came in by +way of a corridor which seemed to issue out of the darkness from +under a figure of the Virgin and Child.</p> +<p>They were all in white, snow-white from head to foot, with a +glimmer of blue scapular beneath their outer garment, and they wore +long thick veils which entirely concealed their features when they +entered but were raised when they reached their seats and faced the +altar.</p> +<p>Familiar as I was with similar scenes this one moved me as I had +never before been moved—the silent white figures, with hands +clasped on their breasts, coming in one by one with noiseless and +unhurried footsteps, like a line of wraiths from another world.</p> +<p>But a still deeper emotion was to come to me.</p> +<p>As the last of the nuns entered, the Superior as I knew she +would be, I recognised her instantly. It was my own Reverend Mother +herself; and when, after kneeling to the altar, she came down to +her seat nearest to the screen, immediately in front of the place +where I knelt, I knew by the tremor of the clasped hands which held +the rosary, that she had seen and recognised me.</p> +<p>I trembled and my heart thumped against my breast.</p> +<p>Then the priest entered and the Litany began. It was sung +throughout. Almost the whole of the service was sung. Never had +Benediction seemed so beautiful, so pathetic, so appealing, so +irresistible.</p> +<p>By the time the <i>Tantum ergo</i> had been reached and the +sweet female voices, over the soft swell of the organ, were rising +to the vaulted roof in sorrowful reparation for the sins of all +sinners in the world who did not pray for themselves, the religious +life was calling to me as it had never called before.</p> +<p>"Come away from the world," it seemed to say. "Obedience to your +heavenly Father cancels all duty to your earthly one. Leave +everything you fear behind you, and find peace and light and +love."</p> +<p>The service was over, the nuns had dropped their veils and gone +out as slowly and noiselessly as they had come in (the last of them +with her head down): the sacristan with his long rod was +extinguishing the candles on the altar; the church was growing dark +and a lay-sister in black was rattling a bunch of keys at the door +behind me before I moved from my place beside the rails.</p> +<p>Then I awoke as from a dream, and looking longingly back at the +dark corridor down which the nuns had disappeared, I was turning to +go when I became aware that a young man was standing beside me and +smiling into my face.</p> +<p>"Mally," he said very softly, and he held out his hand.</p> +<p>Something in the voice made me giddy, something in the blue eyes +made me tremble. I looked at him but did not speak.</p> +<p>"Don't you know me, Mally?" he said.</p> +<p>I felt as if a rosy veil were falling over my face and neck. A +flood of joy was sweeping through me. At last I knew who it +was.</p> +<p>It was Martin Conrad, grown to be a man, a tall, powerful, manly +man, but with the same face still—an elusive ghost of the +boy's face I used to look up to and love.</p> +<p>A few minutes later we were out on the piazza in front of the +church, and with a nervous rush of joyous words he was telling me +what had brought him to Rome.</p> +<p>Having just "scraped through" his examinations, and taken his +degree—couldn't have done so if the examiners had not been +"jolly good" to him—he had heard that Lieut. . . .—was +going down to the great ice barrier that bounds the South Pole, to +investigate the sources of winds and tides, so he had offered +himself as doctor to the expedition and been accepted.</p> +<p>Sailing from the Thames ten days ago they had put into Naples +that morning for coal, and taking advantage of the opportunity he +had run up to Rome, remembering that I was at school here, but +never expecting to see me, and coming upon me by the merest +accident in the world—something having said to him, "Let's go +in here and look at this queer old church."</p> +<p>He had to leave to-morrow at two, though, having to sail the +same night, but of course it would be luck to go farther south than +Charcot and make another attack on the Antarctic night.</p> +<p>I could see that life was full of faith and hope and all good +things for him, and remembering some episodes of the past I +said:</p> +<p>"So you are going 'asploring' in earnest at last?"</p> +<p>"At last," he answered, and we looked into each other's eyes and +laughed as we stood together on the church steps, with little +tender waves of feeling from our childhood sweeping to our +feet.</p> +<p>"And you?" he said. "You look just the same. I knew you +instantly. Yet you are changed too. So grown and so . . . so +wonderfully. . . ."</p> +<p>I knew what he meant to say, and being too much of a child to +pretend not to know, and too much of a woman (notwithstanding my +nun-like impulses) not to find joy in it, I said I was glad.</p> +<p>"You've left the Convent, I see. When did that happen?"</p> +<p>I told him three weeks ago—that my father had come for me +and we were going back to Ellan.</p> +<p>"And then? What are you going to do then?" he asked.</p> +<p>For a moment I felt ashamed to answer, but at last I told him +that I was going home to be married.</p> +<p>"Married? When? To whom?"</p> +<p>I said I did not know when, but it was to be to the young Lord +Raa.</p> +<p>"Raa? Did you say Raa? That . . . Good G—— But +surely you know. . . ."</p> +<p>He did not finish what he was going to say, so I told him I did +not know anything, not having seen Lord Raa since I came to school, +and everything having been arranged for me by my father.</p> +<p>"Not seen him since . . . everything arranged by your +father?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>Then he asked me abruptly where I was staying, and when I told +him he said he would walk back with me to the hotel.</p> +<p>His manner had suddenly changed, and several times as we walked +together up the Tritoni and along the Du Marcelli he began to say +something and then stopped.</p> +<p>"Surely your father knows. . . ."</p> +<p>"If he does, I cannot possibly understand. . . ."</p> +<p>I did not pay as much attention to his broken exclamations as I +should have done but for the surprise and confusion of coming so +suddenly upon him again; and when, as we reached the hotel, he +said:</p> +<p>"I wonder if your father will allow me to speak. . . ."</p> +<p>"I'm sure he'll be delighted," I said, and then, in my great +impatience, I ran upstairs ahead of him and burst into my father's +room, crying:</p> +<p>"Father, whom do you think I have brought to see +you—look!"</p> +<p>To my concern and discomfiture my father's reception of Martin +was very cool, and at first he did not even seem to know him.</p> +<p>"You don't remember me, sir?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"I'm afraid I can't just place you," said my father.</p> +<p>After I had made them known to each other they sat talking about +the South Pole expedition, but it was a chill and cheerless +interview, and after a few minutes Martin rose to go.</p> +<p>"I find it kind of hard to figure you fellows out," said my +father. "No money that I know of has ever been made in the Unknown, +as you call it, and if you discover both Poles I don't just see how +they're to be worth a two-cent stamp to you. But you know best, so +good-bye and good luck to you!"</p> +<p>I went out to the lift with Martin, who asked if he could take +me for a walk in the morning. I answered yes, and inquired what +hour he would call for me.</p> +<p>"Twelve o'clock," he replied, and I said that would suit me +exactly.</p> +<p>The Bishop came to dine with us that night, and after dinner, +when I had gone to the window to look out over the city for the +three lights on the Loggia of the Vatican, he and my father talked +together for a long time in a low tone. They were still talking +when I left them to go to bed.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At breakfast next morning my father told me that something +unexpected had occurred to require that we should return home +immediately, and therefore he had sent over to Cook's for seats by +the noon express.</p> +<p>I was deeply disappointed, but I knew my father too well to +demur, so I slipped away to my room and sent a letter to Martin, +explaining the change in our plans and saying good-bye to him.</p> +<p>When we reached the station, however, I found Martin waiting on +the platform in front of the compartment that was labelled with our +name.</p> +<p>I thought my father was even more brusque with him than before, +and the Bishop, who was to travel with us, was curt almost to +rudeness. But Martin did not seem to mind that this morning, for +his lower lip had the stiff setting which I had seen in it when he +was a boy, and after I stepped into the carriage he stepped in +after me, leaving the two men on the platform.</p> +<p>"Shall you be long away?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Too long unfortunately. Six months, nine—perhaps twelve, +worse luck! Wish I hadn't to go at all," he answered.</p> +<p>I was surprised and asked why, whereupon he stammered some +excuse, and then said abruptly:</p> +<p>"I suppose you'll not be married for some time at all +events?"</p> +<p>I told him I did not know, everything depending on my +father.</p> +<p>"Anyhow, you'll see and hear for yourself when you reach home, +and then perhaps you'll. . . ."</p> +<p>I answered that I should have to do what my father desired, +being a girl, and therefore. . . .</p> +<p>"But surely a girl has some rights of her own," he said, and +then I was silent and a little ashamed, having a sense of female +helplessness which I had never felt before and could find no words +for.</p> +<p>"I'll write to your father," he said, and just at that moment +the bell rang, and my father came into the compartment, saying:</p> +<p>"Now then, young man, if you don't want to be taken up to the +North Pole instead of going down to the South one. . . ."</p> +<p>"That's all right, sir. Don't you trouble about <i>me</i>. I can +take care of myself," said Martin.</p> +<p>Something in his tone must have said more than his words to my +father and the Bishop, for I saw that they looked at each other +with surprise.</p> +<p>Then the bell rang again, the engine throbbed, and Martin said, +"Good-bye! Good-bye!"</p> +<p>While the train moved out of the station he stood bareheaded on +the platform with such a woebegone face that looking back at him my +throat began to hurt me as it used to do when I was a child.</p> +<p>I was very sad that day as we travelled north. My adopted +country had become dear to me during my ten years' exile from home, +and I thought I was seeing the last of my beautiful Italy, crowned +with sunshine and decked with flowers.</p> +<p>But there was another cause of my sadness, and that was the +thought of Martin's uneasiness about my marriage the feeling that +if he had anything to say to my father he ought to have said it +then.</p> +<p>And there was yet another cause of which I was quite +unconscious—that like every other girl before love dawns on +her, half of my nature was still asleep, the half that makes life +lovely and the world dear.</p> +<p>To think that Martin Conrad was the one person who could have +wakened my sleeping heart! That a word, a look, a smile from him +that day could have changed the whole current of my life, and that. +. . .</p> +<p>But no, I will not reproach him. Have I not known since the day +on St. Mary's Rock that above all else he is a born gentleman?</p> +<p>And yet. . . . And yet. . . .</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</h2> +<p>And yet I was a fool, or in spite of everything I should have +spoken to Daniel O'Neill before he left Rome. I should have said to +him:</p> +<p>"Do you know that the man to whom you are going to marry your +daughter is a profligate and a reprobate? If you <i>do</i> know +this, are you deliberately selling her, body and soul, to gratify +your lust of rank and power and all the rest of your rotten +aspirations?"</p> +<p>That is what I ought to have done, but didn't do. I was afraid +of being thought to have personal motives—of interfering +where I wasn't wanted, of butting in when I had no right.</p> +<p>Yet I felt I <i>had</i> a right, and I had half a mind to throw +up everything and go back to Ellan. But the expedition was the big +chance I had been looking forward to and I could not give it +up.</p> +<p>So I resolved to write. But writing isn't exactly my job, and it +took me a fortnight to get anything done to my satisfaction. By +that time we were at Port Said, and from there I posted three +letters,—the first to Daniel O'Neill, the second to Bishop +Walsh, the third to Father Dan.</p> +<p>Would they reach in time? If so, would they be read and +considered or resented and destroyed?</p> +<p>I did not know. I could not guess. And then I was going down +into the deep Antarctic night, where no sound from the living world +could reach me.</p> +<p>What would happen before I could get back? Only God could +say.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SECOND_PART" id="SECOND_PART"></a>SECOND PART</h2> +<h3>MY MARRIAGE</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Notwithstanding my father's anxiety to leave Rome we travelled +slowly and it was a week before we reached Ellan. By that time my +depression had disappeared, and I was quivering with mingled +curiosity and fear at the thought of meeting the man who was to be +my husband.</p> +<p>My father, for reasons of his own, was equally excited, and as +we sailed into the bay at Blackwater he pointed out the +developments which had been made under his direction—the +hotels, theatres, dancing palaces and boarding houses that lined +the sea-front, and the electric railways that ran up to the tops of +the mountains.</p> +<p>"See that?" he cried. "I told them I could make this old island +hum."</p> +<p>On a great stone pier that stood deep into the bay, a crowd of +people were waiting for the arrival of the steamer.</p> +<p>"That's nothing," said my father. "Nothing to what you see at +the height of the season."</p> +<p>As soon as we had drawn up alongside the pier, and before the +passengers had landed, four gentlemen came aboard, and my heart +thumped with the thought that my intended husband would be one of +them; but he was not, and the first words spoken to my father +were—</p> +<p>"His lordship's apologies, sir. He has an engagement to-day, but +hopes to see you at your own house to-morrow morning."</p> +<p>I recognised the speaker as the guardian (grown greyer and even +less prepossessing) who had crossed with the young Lord Raa when he +was going up to Oxford; and his companions were a smooth-faced man +with searching eyes who was introduced as his lordship's solicitor +from London, a Mr. Curphy, whom I knew to be my father's advocate, +and my dear old Father Dan.</p> +<p>I was surprised to find Father Dan a smaller man than I had +thought him, very plain and provincial, a little country parish +priest, but he had the tender smile I always remembered, and the +sweet Irish roll of the vowels that I could never forget.</p> +<p>"God bless you," he said. "How well you're looking! And how like +your mother, Lord rest her soul! I knew the Blessed Virgin would +take care of you, and she has, she has."</p> +<p>Three conveyances were waiting for us—a grand brougham for +the Bishop, a big motor-car for the guardian and the London lawyer, +and a still bigger one for ourselves.</p> +<p>"Well, s'long until to-morrow then," cried my father, getting up +into the front row of his own ear, with the advocate beside him and +Father Dan and myself behind.</p> +<p>On the way home Father Dan talked of the business that had +brought me back, saying I was not to think too much of anything he +might have said of Lord Raa in his letters, seeing that he had +spoken from hearsay, and the world was so censorious—and then +there was no measuring the miraculous influence that might be +exercised by a good woman.</p> +<p>He said this with a certain constraint, and was more at ease +when he spoke of the joy that ought to come into a girl's life at +her marriage—her first love, her first love-letter, her +wedding-day and her first baby, all the sweet and wonderful things +of a new existence which a man could never know.</p> +<p>"Even an old priest may see that," he said, with a laugh and a +pat of my hand.</p> +<p>We dropped Mr. Curphy at his house in Holmtown, and then my +father sat with us at the back, and talked with tremendous energy +of what he had done, of what he was going to do, and of all the +splendours that were before me.</p> +<p>"You'll be the big woman of the island, gel, and there won't be +a mother's son that dare say boo to you."</p> +<p>I noticed that, in his excitement, his tongue, dropping the +suggestion of his adopted country, reverted to the racy speech of +his native soil; and I had a sense of being with him before I was +born, when he returned home from America with millions of dollars +at his back, and the people who had made game of his father went +down before his face like a flood.</p> +<p>Such of them as had not done so then (being of the "aristocracy" +of the island and remembering the humble stock he came from) were +to do so now, for in the second generation, and by means of his +daughter's marriage, he was going to triumph over them all.</p> +<p>"We'll beat 'em, gel! My gough, yes, we'll beat 'em!" he cried, +with a flash of his black eyes and a masterful lift of his +eyebrows.</p> +<p>As we ran by the mansions of the great people of Ellan, he +pointed them out to me with a fling of the arm and spoke of the +families in a tone of contempt.</p> +<p>"See that? That's Christian of Balla-Christian. The man snubbed +me six months ago. He'll know better six months to come. . . . +That's Eyreton. His missus was too big to call on your +mother—she'll call on you, though, you go bail. See yonder +big tower in the trees? That's Folksdale, where the Farragans live. +The daughters have been walking over the world like peacocks, but +they'll crawl on it like cockroaches. . . . Hulloh, here's ould +Balgean of Eagle Hill, in his grand carriage with his English +coachman. . . . See that, though? See him doff his hat to you, the +ould hypocrite? He knows something. He's got an inkling. Things +travel. We'll beat 'em, gel, we'll beat 'em! They'll be round us +like bees about a honeypot."</p> +<p>It was impossible not to catch the contagion of my father's +triumphant spirits, and in my different way I found myself tingling +with delight as I recognised the scenes associated with my +childhood—the village, the bridge, the lane to Sunny Lodge +and Murphy's Mouth, and the trees that bordered our drive.</p> +<p>Nearly everything looked smaller or narrower or lower than I had +thought, but I had forgotten how lovely they all were, lying so +snugly under the hill and with the sea in front of them.</p> +<p>Our house alone when we drove up to it seemed larger than I had +expected, but my father explained this by saying:</p> +<p>"Improvements, gel! I'll show you over them to-morrow +morning."</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget (white-headed now and wearing spectacles and a +white cap), Betsy Beauty (grown tall and round, with a kind of +country comeliness) and Nessy MacLeod (looking like a premature old +maid who was doing her best to be a girl) were waiting at the open +porch when our car drew up, and they received me with surprising +cordiality.</p> +<p>"Here she is at last!" said Aunt Bridget.</p> +<p>"And such luck as she has come home to!" said Betsy Beauty.</p> +<p>There were compliments on the improvement in my appearance (Aunt +Bridget declaring she could not have believed it, she really could +not), and then Nessy undertook to take me to my room.</p> +<p>"It's the same room still, Mary," said my Aunt, calling to me as +I went upstairs. "When they were changing everything else I +remembered your poor dear mother and wouldn't hear of their +changing that. It isn't a bit altered."</p> +<p>It was not. Everything was exactly as I remembered it. But just +as I was beginning for the first time in my life to feel grateful +to Aunt Bridget, Nessy said:</p> +<p>"No thanks to her, though. If she'd had her way, she would have +wiped out every trace of your mother, and arranged this marriage +for her own daughter instead."</p> +<p>More of the same kind she said which left me with the impression +that my father was now the god of her idolatry, and that my return +was not too welcome to my aunt and cousin; but as soon as she was +gone, and I was left alone, home began to speak to me in soft and +entrancing whispers.</p> +<p>How my pulses beat, how my nerves tingled! Home! Home! Home!</p> +<p>From that dear spot everything seemed to be the same, and +everything had something to say to me. What sweet and tender and +touching memories!</p> +<p>Here was the big black four-post bed, with the rosary hanging at +its head; and here was the praying-stool with the figure of Our +Lady on the wall above it.</p> +<p>I threw up the window, and there was the salt breath of the sea +in the crisp island air; there was the sea itself glistening in the +afternoon sunshine; there was St Mary's Rock draped in its garment +of sea-weed, and there were the clouds of white sea-gulls whirling +about it.</p> +<p>Taking off my hat and coat I stepped downstairs and out of the +house—going first into the farm-yard where the spring-less +carts were still clattering over the cobble-stones; then into the +cow-house, where the milkmaids were still sitting on low stools +with their heads against the sides of the slow-eyed Brownies, and +the milk rattling in their noisy pails; then into the farm-kitchen, +where the air was full of the odour of burning turf and the still +sweeter smell of cakes baking on a griddle; and finally into the +potting-shed in the garden, where Tommy the Mate (more than ever +like a weather-beaten old salt) was still working as before.</p> +<p>The old man looked round with his "starboard eye," and +recognised me instantly.</p> +<p>"God bless my sowl," he cried, "if it isn't the lil' missy! +Well, well! Well, well! And she's a woman grown! A real lady too! +My gracious; yes," he said, after a second and longer look, "and +there hasn't been the match of her on this island since they laid +her mother under the sod!"</p> +<p>I wanted to ask him a hundred questions, but Aunt Bridget, who +had been watching from a window, called from the house to say she +was "mashing" a cup of tea for me, so I returned to the +drawing-room where (my father being busy with his letters in the +library) Betsy Beauty talked for half an hour about Lord Raa, his +good looks, distinguished manners and general accomplishments.</p> +<p>"But aren't you just dying to see him?" she said.</p> +<p>I saw him the following morning.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I was sitting in my own room, writing to the Reverend Mother, to +tell her of my return home, when I heard the toot of a horn and +raising my eyes saw a motor-car coming up the drive. It contained +three gentlemen, one of them wore goggles and carried a +silver-haired terrier on his knees.</p> +<p>A little later Nessy MacLeod came to tell me that Lord Raa and +his party had arrived and I was wanted immediately.</p> +<p>I went downstairs hesitatingly, with a haunting sense of coming +trouble. Reaching the door of the drawing-room I saw my intended +husband for the first time—there being nothing in his +appearance to awaken in me the memory of ever having seen him +before.</p> +<p>He was on the hearthrug in front of the fire, talking to Betsy +Beauty, who was laughing immoderately. To get a better look at him, +and at the same time to compose myself, I stopped for a moment to +speak to the three gentlemen (the two lawyers and Lord Raa's +trustee or guardian) who were standing with my father in the middle +of the floor.</p> +<p>He was undoubtedly well-dressed and had a certain air of +breeding, but even to my girlish eyes he betrayed at that first +sight the character of a man who had lived an irregular, perhaps a +dissipated life.</p> +<p>His face was pale, almost puffy, his grey eyes were slow and +heavy, his moustache was dark and small, his hair was thin over his +forehead, and he had a general appearance of being much older than +his years, which I knew to be thirty-three.</p> +<p>His manners, when I approached him, were courteous and gentle, +almost playful and indulgent, but through all their softness there +pierced a certain hardness, not to say brutality, which I +afterwards learned (when life had had its tug at me) to associate +with a man who has spent much of his time among women of loose +character.</p> +<p>Betsy Beauty made a great matter of introducing us; but in a +drawling voice, and with a certain play of humour, he told her it +was quite unnecessary, since we were very old friends, having made +each other's acquaintance as far back as ten years ago, when I was +the prettiest little woman in the world, he remembered, though +perhaps my manners were not quite cordial.</p> +<p>"We had a slight difference on the subject of kisses. Don't you +remember it?"</p> +<p>Happily there was no necessity to reply, for my father came to +say that he wished to show his lordship the improvements he had +been making, and the rest of us were at liberty to follow them.</p> +<p>The improvements consisted chiefly of a new wing to the old +house, containing a dining room, still unfurnished, which had been +modelled, as I found later, on the corresponding room in Castle +Raa.</p> +<p>With a proud lift of his white head my father pointed out the +beauties of his new possession, while my intended husband, with his +monocle to his eye, looked on with a certain condescension, and +answered with a languid humour that narrowly bordered on +contempt.</p> +<p>"Oak, sir, solid oak," said my father, rapping with his knuckles +on the tall, dark, heavy wainscoting.</p> +<p>"As old as our hearts and as hard as our heads, I suppose," said +Lord Raa.</p> +<p>"Harder than some, sir," said my father.</p> +<p>"Exactly," said Lord Raa in his slow drawl, and then there was +general laughter.</p> +<p>The bell rang for luncheon, and we went into the plain old +dining room, where Aunt Bridget placed her principal guest on her +right and told him all about her late husband, the Colonel, his +honours and military achievements.</p> +<p>I could see that Lord Raa was soon very weary of this, and more +than once, sitting by his side, I caught the cynical and rather +supercilious responses to which, under the gloss of his gracious +manners, Aunt Bridget seemed quite oblivious.</p> +<p>I was so nervous and embarrassed that I spoke very little during +luncheon, and even Aunt Bridget observed this at last.</p> +<p>"Mary, dear, why don't you speak?" she said.</p> +<p>But without waiting for my reply she proceeded to explain to his +lordship that the strangest change had come over me since I was a +child, when I had been the sauciest little chatterbox in the world, +whereas now I was so shy that it was nearly impossible to get a +word out of me.</p> +<p>"Hope I shall be able to get one word out of her, at least," +said his lordship, whereupon Aunt Bridget smiled significantly and +Betsy Beauty burst into fits of laughter.</p> +<p>Almost before the meal was over, my father rose from his seat at +the head of the table, and indicating the lawyers who sat near to +him, he said:</p> +<p>"These gentlemen and I have business to fix up—money +matters and all that—so I guess we'll step into the library +and leave you young people to look after yourselves."</p> +<p>Everybody rose to leave the room.</p> +<p>"All back for tea-time," said Aunt Bridget.</p> +<p>"Of course you don't want <i>me</i>," said Betsy Beauty with a +giggle, and at the next moment I was alone with his lordship, who +drew a long breath that was almost like a yawn, and said:</p> +<p>"Is there no quiet place we can slip away to?"</p> +<p>There was the glen at the back of the house (the Cape Flora of +Martin Conrad), so I took him into that, not without an increasing +sense of embarrassment. It was a clear October day, the glen was +dry, and the air under the shadow of the thinning trees was full of +the soft light of the late autumn.</p> +<p>"Ah, this is better," said his lordship.</p> +<p>He lit a cigar and walked for some time by my side without +speaking, merely flicking the seeding heads off the dying thistles +with his walking stick, and then ruckling it through the withered +leaves with which the path was strewn.</p> +<p>But half way up the glen he began to look aslant at me through +his monocle, and then to talk about my life in Rome, wondering how +I could have been content to stay so long at the Convent, and +hinting at a rumour which had reached him that I had actually +wished to stay there altogether.</p> +<p>"Extraordinary! 'Pon my word, extraordinary! It's well enough +for women who have suffered shipwreck in their lives to live in +such places, but for a young gal with any fortune, any looks . . . +why I wonder she doesn't die of <i>ennui</i>."</p> +<p>I was still too nervous and embarrassed to make much protest, so +he went on to tell me with what difficulty he supported the boredom +of his own life even in London, with its clubs, its race-meetings, +its dances, its theatres and music halls, and the amusement to be +got out of some of the ladies of society, not to speak of certain +well-known professional beauties.</p> +<p>One of his great friends—his name was Eastcliff—was +going to marry the most famous of the latter class (a foreign +dancer at the "Empire"), and since he was rich and could afford to +please himself, why shouldn't he?</p> +<p>When we reached the waterfall at the top of the glen (it had +been the North Cape of Martin Conrad), we sat on a rustic seat +which stands there, and then, to my still deeper embarrassment, his +lordship's conversation came to close quarters.</p> +<p>Throwing away his cigar and taking his silver-haired terrier on +his lap he said:</p> +<p>"Of course you know what the business is which the gentlemen are +discussing in the library?"</p> +<p>As well as I could for the nervousness that was stifling me, I +answered that I knew.</p> +<p>He stroked the dog with one hand, prodded his stick into the +gravel with the other, and said:</p> +<p>"Well, I don't know what your views about marriage are. Mine, I +may say, are liberal."</p> +<p>I listened without attempting to reply.</p> +<p>"I think nine-tenths of the trouble that attends married +life—the breakdowns and what not—come of an irrational +effort to tighten the marriage knot."</p> +<p>Still I said nothing.</p> +<p>"To imagine that two independent human beings can be tied +together like a couple of Siamese twins, neither to move without +the other, living precisely the same life, year in, year out . . . +why, it's silly, positively silly."</p> +<p>In my ignorance I could find nothing to say, and after another +moment my intended husband swished the loosened gravel with his +stick and said:</p> +<p>"I believe in married people leaving each other free—each +going his and her own way—what do you think?"</p> +<p>I must have stammered some kind of answer—I don't know +what—for I remember that he said next:</p> +<p>"Quite so, that's my view of matrimony, and I'm glad to see you +appear to share it. . . . Tell the truth, I was afraid you +wouldn't," he added, with something more about the nuns and the +convent.</p> +<p>I wanted to say that I didn't, but my nervousness was increasing +every moment, and before I could find words in which to protest he +was speaking to me again.</p> +<p>"Our friends in the library seem to think that you and I could +get along together, and I'm disposed to think they're +right—aren't you?"</p> +<p>In my ignorance and helplessness, and with the consciousness of +what I was expected to do, I merely looked at him without +speaking.</p> +<p>Then he fixed his monocle afresh, and, looking back at me in a +curious way, he said:</p> +<p>"I don't think I should bore you, my dear. In fact, I should be +rather proud of having a good-looking woman for my wife, and I +fancy I could give you a good time. In any case"—this with a +certain condescension—"my <i>name</i> might be of some use to +you."</p> +<p>A sort of shame was creeping over me. The dog was yawning in my +face. My intended husband threw it off his knee.</p> +<p>"Shall we consider it a settled thing, then?" he asked, and when +in my confusion I still made no reply (having nothing which I felt +myself entitled to say), he said something about Aunt Bridget and +what she had told him at luncheon about my silence and shyness, and +then rising to his feet he put my arm through his own, and turned +our faces towards home.</p> +<p>That was all. As I am a truthful woman, that was everything. Not +a word from me, nay, not half a word, merely a passive act of +silent acquiescence, and in my youthful and almost criminal +innocence I was committed to the most momentous incident of my +life.</p> +<p>But if there was no love-making, no fondling, no kissing, no +courtship of any kind, and none of the delirious rapture which used +to be described in Alma's novels, I was really grateful for that, +and immensely relieved to find that matters could he completed +without them.</p> +<p>When we reached the house, the bell was ringing for tea and my +father was coming out of the library, followed by the lawyers.</p> +<p>"So that's all right, gentlemen?" he was saying.</p> +<p>"Yes, that's all right, sir," they were answering; and then, +seeing us as we entered, my father said to Lord Raa:</p> +<p>"And what about you two?"</p> +<p>"We're all right also," said his lordship in his drawling +voice.</p> +<p>"Good!" said my father, and he slapped his lordship sharply on +the back, to his surprise, and I think, discomfiture.</p> +<p>Then with a cackle of light laughter among the men, we all +trooped into the drawing room.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget in her gold-rimmed spectacles and new white cap, +poured out the tea from our best silver tea-pot, while Nessy +MacLeod with a geranium in her red hair, and Betsy Beauty, with +large red roses in her bosom, handed round the cups. After a +moment, my father, with a radiant face, standing back to the fire, +said in a loud voice:</p> +<p>"Friends all, I have something to tell you."</p> +<p>Everybody except myself looked up and listened, though everybody +knew what was coming.</p> +<p>"We've had a stiff tussle in the library this afternoon, but +everything is settled satisfactory—and the marriage is as +good as made."</p> +<p>There was a chorus of congratulations for me, and a few for his +lordship, and then my father said again:</p> +<p>"Of course there'll be deeds to draw up, and I want things done +correct, even if it costs me a bit of money. But we've only one +thing more to fix up to-day, and then we're through—the +wedding. When is it to come off?"</p> +<p>An appeal was made to me, but I felt it was only formal, so I +glanced across to Lord Raa without speaking.</p> +<p>"Come now," said my father, looking from one to the other. "The +clean cut is the short cut, you know, and when I'm sot on doing a +thing, I can't take rest till it's done. What do you say to this +day next month?"</p> +<p>I bowed and my intended husband, in his languid way, said:</p> +<p>"Agreed!"</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards the motor was ordered round, and the +gentlemen prepared to go. Then the silver-haired terrier was +missed, and for the first time that day his lordship betrayed a +vivid interest, telling us its price and pedigree and how much he +would give rather than lose it. But at the last moment Tommy +appeared with the dog in his arms and dropped it into the car, +whereupon my intended husband thanked him effusively.</p> +<p>"Yes," said Tommy, "I thought you set store by <i>that</i>, +sir."</p> +<p>At the next moment the car was gone.</p> +<p>"Well, you <i>are</i> a lucky girl," said Betsy Beauty; and Aunt +Bridget began to take credit to herself for all that had come to +pass, and to indicate the methods by which she meant to manage +Castle Raa as soon as ever I became mistress of it.</p> +<p>Thus in my youth, my helplessness, my ignorance, and my +inexperience I became engaged to the man who had been found and +courted for me. If I acquiesced, I had certainly not been +consulted. My father had not consulted me. My intended husband had +not consulted me. Nobody consulted me. I am not even sure that I +thought anybody was under any obligation to consult me. Love had +not spoken to me, sex was still asleep in me, and my marriage was +arranged before my deeper nature knew what was being done.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The next weeks were full of hurry, hubbub and perturbation. Our +house was turned upside down. Milliners, sewing-maids and +dressmakers were working day and night. Flowers, feathers and silk +remnants were flowing like sea-wrack into every room. Orders were +given, orders were retracted and given again, and then again +retracted.</p> +<p>Such flying up and down stairs! Everybody so breathless! +Everybody so happy! Every face wearing a smile! Every tongue +rippling with laughter! The big grey mansion which used to seem so +chill and cold felt for the first time like a house of joy.</p> +<p>In the midst of these busy preparations I had no time to think. +My senses were excited. I was dazed, stunned, wrapped round by a +kind of warm air of hot-house happiness, and this condition of +moral intoxication increased as the passing of the days brought +fresh developments.</p> +<p>Our neighbours began to visit us. My father had been right about +the great people of the island. Though they had stood off so long, +they found their account in my good fortune, and as soon as my +marriage was announced they came in troops to offer their +congratulations.</p> +<p>Never, according to Tommy the Mate, had the gravel of our +carriage drive been so rucked up by the pawing feet of high-bred +horses. But their owners were no less restless. It was almost +pitiful to see their shamefacedness as they entered our house for +the first time, and to watch the shifts they were put to in order +to account for the fact that they had never been there before.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget's vanity was too much uplifted by their presence to +be particular about their excuses, but my father's contempt of +their subterfuges was naked and undisguised, and I hardly know +whether to feel amused or ashamed when I think of how he scored off +them, how he lashed them to the bone, with what irony and sarcasm +he scorched their time-serving little souls.</p> +<p>When they were very great folks, the "aristocracy" of Ellan, he +pretended not to know who they were, and asked their names, their +father's names, and what parishes they came from.</p> +<p>"Some of the Christians of Balla-Christian, are you? Think of +that now. And me a born Ellanman, and not knowing you from +Adam!"</p> +<p>When they were very near neighbours, with lands that made +boundary with our own, he pretended to think they had been twenty +years abroad, or perhaps sick, or even dead and buried.</p> +<p>"Too bad, ma'am, too bad," he would say. "And me thinking you +were under the sod through all the lonely years my poor wife was +ill and dying."</p> +<p>But when they were insular officials, who "walked on the stars," +and sometimes snubbed him in public, the rapier of ridicule was too +light for his heavy hand, and he took up the sledge-hammer, telling +them he was the same man to-day as yesterday, and only his +circumstances were different—his daughter being about to +become the lady of the first house in the island, and none of them +being big enough to be left out of it.</p> +<p>After such scenes Aunt Bridget, for all her despotism within her +own doors, used to tremble with dread of our neighbours taking +lasting offence, but my father would say:</p> +<p>"Chut, woman, they'll come again, and make no more faces about +it."</p> +<p>They did, and if they were shy of my father they were gracious +enough to me, saying it was such a good thing for society in the +island that Castle Raa was to have a lady, a real lady, at the head +of it at last.</p> +<p>Then came their wedding presents—pictures, books, silver +ornaments, gold ornaments, clocks, watches, chains, jewellery, +until my bedroom was blocked up with them. As each fresh parcel +arrived there would be a rush of all the female members of our +household to open it, after which Betsy Beauty would say:</p> +<p>"What a lucky girl you are!"</p> +<p>I began to think I was. I found it impossible to remain +unaffected by the whirlwind of joyous turmoil in which I lived. The +refulgence of the present hour wiped out the past, which seemed to +fade away altogether. After the first few days I was flying about +from place to place, and wherever I went I was a subject for +congratulation and envy.</p> +<p>If there were moments of misgiving, when, like the cold wind out +of a tunnel, there came the memory of the Reverend Mother and the +story she had told me at Nemi, there were other moments when I felt +quite sure that, in marrying Lord Raa, I should be doing a +self-sacrificing thing and a kind of solemn duty.</p> +<p>One such moment was when Mr. Curphy, my father's advocate, who +with his clammy hands always made me think of an over-fatted fish, +came to tell him that, after serious legal difficulties, the civil +documents had been agreed to, for, after he had finished with my +father, he drew me aside and said, as he smoothed his long brown +beard:</p> +<p>"You ought to be a happy girl, Mary. I suppose you know what you +are doing for your father? You are wiping out the greatest +disappointment of his life, and rectifying the cruelty—the +inevitable cruelty—of the law, when you were born a daughter +after he had expected a son."</p> +<p>Another such moment was when the Bishop came, in his grand +carriage, to say that after much discussion he had persuaded his +lordship to sign the necessary declaration that all the children of +our union, irrespective of sex, should be brought up as Catholics, +for taking me aside, as the advocate had done the day before, he +said, in his suave voice, fingering his jewelled cross:</p> +<p>"I congratulate you, my child. Yours is a great and precious +privilege—the privilege of bringing back to the Church a +family which has been estranged from it for nineteen years."</p> +<p>At the end of a fortnight we signed the marriage settlement. The +little ceremony took place in the drawing-room of my father's +house. My intended husband, who had not been to see me in the +meantime, brought with him (as well as his trustee and lawyer) a +lady and a gentleman.</p> +<p>The lady was his maiden aunt, Lady Margaret Anslem, a fair woman +of about forty, fashionably dressed, redolent of perfume, and +(except to me, to whom she talked quite amicably) rather reserved +and haughty, as if the marriage of her nephew into our family were +a bitter pill which she had compelled herself to swallow.</p> +<p>The gentleman was a tall young man wearing a very high collar +and cravat, and using a handkerchief with embroidered initials in +the corner of it. He turned out to be the Hon. Edward +Eastcliff—the great friend who, being rich enough to please +himself, was about to marry the professional beauty.</p> +<p>I noticed that Aunt Bridget, with something of the instinct of +the fly about the flame, immediately fixed herself upon the one, +and that Betsy Beauty attached herself to the other.</p> +<p>Lord Raa himself looked as tired as before, and for the first +half-hour he behaved as if he did not quite know what to do with +himself for wretchedness and <i>ennui</i>.</p> +<p>Then the deeds were opened and spread out on a table, and though +the gentlemen seemed to be trying not to discuss the contents aloud +I could not help hearing some of the arrangements that had been +made for the payment of my intended husband's debts, and certain +details of his annual allowance.</p> +<p>Looking back upon that ugly hour, I wonder why, under the +circumstances, I should have been so wounded, but I remember that a +sense of discomfort amounting to shame came upon me at sight of the +sorry bargaining. It seemed to have so little to do with the +spiritual union of souls, which I had been taught to think marriage +should be. But I had no time to think more about that before my +father, who had signed the documents himself in his large, heavy +hand, was saying.</p> +<p>"Now, gel, come along, we're waiting for your signature."</p> +<p>I cannot remember that I read anything. I cannot remember that +anything was read to me. I was told where to sign, and I signed, +thinking what must be must be, and that was all I had to do with +the matter.</p> +<p>I was feeling a little sick, nevertheless, and standing by the +tire with one foot on the fender, when Lord Raa came up to me at +the end, and said in his drawling voice:</p> +<p>"So it's done."</p> +<p>"Yes, it's done," I answered.</p> +<p>After a moment he talked of where we were to live, saying we +must of course pass most of our time in London.</p> +<p>"But have you any choice about the honeymoon," he said, "where +we should spend it, I mean?"</p> +<p>I answered that he would know best, but when he insisted on my +choosing, saying it was my right to do so, I remembered that during +my time in the Convent the one country in the world I had most +desired to see was the Holy Land.</p> +<p>Never as long as I live shall I forget the look in his +lordship's grey eyes when I gave this as my selection.</p> +<p>"You mean Jerusalem—Nazareth—the Dead Sea and all +that?" he asked.</p> +<p>I felt my face growing red as at a frightful <i>faux pas</i>, +but his lordship only laughed, called me his "little nun," and said +that since I had been willing to leave the choice to him he would +suggest Egypt and Italy, and Berlin and Paris on the way back, with +the condition that we left Ellan for London on the day of our +marriage.</p> +<p>After the party from Castle Raa had gone, leaving some of their +family lace and pearls behind for the bride to wear at her wedding, +and after Aunt Bridget had hoped that "that woman" (meaning Lady +Margaret) didn't intend to live at the Castle after my marriage, +because such a thing would not fit in with her plans "at all, at +all," I mentioned the arrangements for the honeymoon, whereupon +Betsy Beauty, to whom Italy was paradise, and London glimmered in +an atmosphere of vermillion and gold, cried out as usual:</p> +<p>"What a lucky, lucky girl you are!"</p> +<p>But the excitement which had hitherto buoyed me up was partly +dispelled by this time, and I was beginning to feel some doubt of +it.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>As my wedding-day approached and time ran short, the air of joy +which had pervaded our house was driven out by an atmosphere of +irritation. We were all living on our nerves. The smiles that used +to be at everybody's service gave place to frowns, and, in Aunt +Bridget's case, to angry words which were distributed on all sides +and on all occasions.</p> +<p>As a consequence I took refuge in my room, and sat long hours +there in my dressing-gown and slippers, hearing the hubbub that was +going on in the rest of the house, but taking as little part in it +as possible. In this semi-conventual silence and solitude, the +excitement which had swept me along for three weeks subsided +rapidly.</p> +<p>I began to think, and above all to feel, and the one thing I +felt beyond everything else was a sense of something wanting.</p> +<p>I remembered the beautiful words of the Pope about marriage as a +mystic relation, a sacred union of souls, a bond of love such as +Christ's love for His Church, and I asked myself if I felt any such +love for the man who was to become my husband.</p> +<p>I knew I did not. I reminded myself that I had had nearly no +conversation with him, that our intercourse had been of the +briefest, that I had seen him only three times altogether, and that +I scarcely knew him at all.</p> +<p>And yet I was going to marry him! In a few days more I should be +his wife, and we should be bound together as long as life should +last!</p> +<p>Then I remembered what Father Dan had said about a girl's first +love, her first love-letter, and all the sweet, good things that +should come to her at the time of her marriage.</p> +<p>None of them had come to me. I do not think my thoughts of love +were ever disturbed by any expectation of the delights of the +heart—languors of tenderness, long embraces, sighs and +kisses, and the joys and fevers of the flesh—for I knew +nothing about them. But, nevertheless, I asked myself if I had +mistaken the matter altogether. Was love really necessary? In all +their busy preparations neither my father, nor my husband, nor the +lawyers, nor the Bishop himself, had said anything about that.</p> +<p>I began to sleep badly and to dream. It was always the same +dream. I was in a frozen region of the far north or south, living +in a ship which was stuck fast in the ice, and had a great frowning +barrier before it that was full of dangerous crevasses. Then for +some reason I wanted to write a letter, but was unable to do so, +because somebody had trodden on my pen and broken it.</p> +<p>It seems strange to me now as I look back upon that time, that I +did not know what angel was troubling the waters of my +soul—that Nature was whispering to me, as it whispers to +every girl at the first great crisis of her life. But neither did I +know what angel was leading my footsteps when, three mornings +before my wedding-day, I got up early and went out to walk in the +crisp salt air.</p> +<p>Almost without thinking I turned down the lane that led to the +shore, and before I was conscious of where I was going, I found +myself near Sunny Lodge. The chimney was smoking for breakfast, and +there was a smell of burning turf coming from the house, which was +so pretty and unchanged, with the last of the year's roses creeping +over the porch and round the windows of the room in which I had +slept when a child.</p> +<p>Somebody was digging in the garden. It was the doctor in his +shirt sleeves.</p> +<p>"Good morning, doctor," I called, speaking over the fence.</p> +<p>He rested on his spade and looked up, but did not speak for a +moment.</p> +<p>"Don't you know who I am?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Why yes, of course; you must be. . . ."</p> +<p>Without finishing he turned his head towards the porch and +cried:</p> +<p>"Mother! Mother! Come and see who's here at last!"</p> +<p>Martin's mother came out of the porch, a little smaller, I +thought, but with the same dear womanly face over her light print +frock, which was as sweet as may-blossom.</p> +<p>She held up both hands at sight of me and cried:</p> +<p>"There, now! What did I tell you, doctor! Didn't I say they +might marry her to fifty lords, but she wouldn't forget her old +friends!"</p> +<p>I laughed, the doctor laughed, and then she laughed, and the +sweetest part of it was that she did not know what we were laughing +at.</p> +<p>Then I opened the gate and stepped up and held out my hand, and +involuntarily she wiped her own hand (which was covered with meal +from the porridge she was making) before taking mine.</p> +<p>"Goodness me, it's Mary O'Neill."</p> +<p>"Yes, it's I."</p> +<p>"But let me have a right look at you," she said, taking me now +by both hands. "They were saying such wonderful things about the +young misthress that I wasn't willing to believe them. But, no, +no," she said, after a moment, "they didn't tell me the half."</p> +<p>I was still laughing, but it was as much as I could do not to +cry, so I said:</p> +<p>"May I come in?"</p> +<p>"My goodness yes, and welcome," she said, and calling to the +doctor to wash his hands and follow us, she led the way into the +kitchen-parlour, where the kettle was singing from the "slowery" +and a porridge-pot was bubbling over the fire.</p> +<p>"Sit down. Take the elbow-chair in the chiollagh [the hearth +place]. There! That's nice. Aw, yes, you know the house."</p> +<p>Being by this time unable to speak for a lump in my throat that +was hurting me, I looked round the room, so sweet, so homely, so +closely linked with tender memories of my childhood, while Martin's +mother (herself a little nervous and with a touching softness in +her face) went on talking while she stirred the porridge with a +porridge-stick.</p> +<p>"Well, well! To think of all the years since you came singing +carols to my door! You remember it, don't you? . . . Of course you +do. 'Doctor,' I said, 'don't talk foolish. <i>She'll</i> not +forget. <i>I</i> know Mary O'Neill. She may be going to be a great +lady, but haven't I nursed her on my knee?'"</p> +<p>"Then you've heard what's to happen?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Aw yes, woman, yes," she answered in a sadder tone, I thought. +"Everybody's bound to hear it—what with the bands practising +for the procession, and the bullocks roasting for the poor, and the +fireworks and the illuminations, and I don't know what."</p> +<p>She was silent for a moment after that, and then in her simple +way she said:</p> +<p>"But it's all as one if you love the man, even if he <i>is</i> a +lord."</p> +<p>"You think that's necessary, don't you?"</p> +<p>"What, <i>millish?</i>"</p> +<p>"Love. You think it's necessary to love one's husband?"</p> +<p>"Goodness sakes, girl, yes. If you don't have love, what have +you? What's to keep the pot boiling when the fire's getting low and +the winter's coming on, maybe? The doctor's telling me some of the +fine ladies in London are marrying without it—just for money +and titles and all to that. But I can't believe it, I really can't! +They've got their troubles same as ourselves, poor things, and +what's the use of their fine clothes and grand carriages when the +dark days come and the night's falling on them?"</p> +<p>It was harder than ever to speak now, so I got up to look at +some silver cups that stood on the mantelpiece.</p> +<p>"Martin's," said his mother, to whom they were precious as +rubies. "He won them at swimming and running and leaping and +climbing and all to that. Aw, yes, yes! He was always grand at +games, if he couldn't learn his lessons, poor boy. And now he's +gone away from us—looking for South Poles somewheres."</p> +<p>"I know—I saw him in Rome," said I.</p> +<p>She dropped her porridge-stick and looked at me with big +eyes.</p> +<p>"Saw him? In Rome, you say? After he sailed, you mean?"</p> +<p>I nodded, and then she cried excitedly to the doctor who was +just then coming into the house, after washing his hands under the +pump.</p> +<p>"Father, she saw himself in Rome after he sailed."</p> +<p>There was only one <i>himself</i> in that house, therefore it +was not difficult for the doctor to know who was meant. And so +great was the eagerness of the old people to hear the last news of +the son who was the apple of their eye that I had to stay to +breakfast and tell them all about our meeting.</p> +<p>While Martin's mother laid the tables with oat-cake and honey +and bowls of milk and deep plates for the porridge, I told the +little there was to tell, and then listened to their simple +comments.</p> +<p>"There now, doctor! Think of that! Those two meeting in foreign +parts that used to be such friends when they were children! Like +brother and sister, you might say. And whiles and whiles we were +thinking that some day . . . but we'll say no more about that now, +doctor."</p> +<p>"No, we'll say no more about that now, Christian Ann," said the +doctor.</p> +<p>Then there was a moment of silence, and it was just as if they +had been rummaging among half-forgotten things in a dark corner of +their house, and had come upon a cradle, and the child that had +lived in it was dead.</p> +<p>It was sweet, but it was also painful to stay long in that house +of love, and as soon as I had eaten my oat-cake and honey I got up +to go. The two good souls saw me to the door saying I was not to +expect either of them at the Big House on my wedding-day, because +she was no woman for smart clothes, and the doctor, who was growing +rheumatic, had given up his night-calls, and therefore his gig, so +as to keep down expenses.</p> +<p>"We'll be at the church, though," said Martin's mother. "And if +we don't see you to speak to, you'll know we're there and wishing +you happiness in our hearts."</p> +<p>I could not utter a word when I left them; but after I had +walked a little way I looked back, intending to wave my farewell, +and there they were together at the gate still, and one of her +hands was on the doctor's shoulder—the sweet woman who had +chosen love against the world, and did not regret it, even now when +the night was falling on her.</p> +<p>I had to pass the Presbytery on my way home, and as I did so, I +saw Father Dan in his study. He threw up the window sash and called +in a soft voice, asking me to wait until he came down to me.</p> +<p>He came down hurriedly, just as he was, in his worn and +discoloured cassock and biretta, and walked up the road by my side, +breathing rapidly and obviously much agitated.</p> +<p>"The Bishop is staying with me over the wedding, and he is in +such a fury that . . . Don't worry. It will be all right. But . . +."</p> +<p>"Yes?"</p> +<p>"Did you see young Martin Conrad while you were in Rome?"</p> +<p>I answered that I did.</p> +<p>"And did anything pass between you . . . about your marriage, I +mean?"</p> +<p>I told him all that I had said to Martin, and all that Martin +had said to me.</p> +<p>"Because he has written a long letter to the Bishop denouncing +it, and calling on him to stop it."</p> +<p>"To stop it?"</p> +<p>"That's so. He says it is nothing but trade and barter, and if +the Church is willing to give its blessing to such rank +commercialism, let it bless the Stock Exchange, let it sanctify the +slave market."</p> +<p>"Well?"</p> +<p>"The Bishop threatens to tell your father. 'Who is this young +man,' he says, 'who dares to . . .' But if I thought there was +nothing more to your marriage than . . . If I imagined that what +occurred in the case of your dear mother . . . But that's not +all."</p> +<p>"Not all?"</p> +<p>"No. Martin has written to me too, saying worse—far +worse."</p> +<p>"What does he say, Father Dan?"</p> +<p>"I don't really know if I ought to tell you, I really don't. Yet +if it's true . . . if there's anything in it . . ."</p> +<p>I was trembling, but I begged him to tell me what Martin had +said. He told me. It was about my intended husband—that he +was a man of irregular life, a notorious loose liver, who kept up a +connection with somebody in London, a kind of actress who was +practically his wife already, and therefore his marriage with me +would be—so Martin had said—nothing but "legalised and +sanctified concubinage."</p> +<p>With many breaks and pauses my dear old priest told me this +story, as if it were something so infamous that his simple and +innocent heart could scarcely credit it.</p> +<p>"If I really thought it was true," he said, "that a man living +such a life could come here to marry my little . . . But no, God +could not suffer a thing like that. I must ask, though. I must make +sure. We live so far away in this little island that . . . But I +must go back now. The Bishop will be calling for me."</p> +<p>Still deeply agitated, Father Dan left me by the bridge, and at +the gate of our drive I found Tommy the Mate on a ladder, covering, +with flowers from the conservatory, a triumphal arch which the +joiner had hammered up the day before.</p> +<p>The old man hardly noticed me as I passed through, and this +prompted me to look up and speak to him.</p> +<p>"Tommy," I said, "do you know you are the only one who hasn't +said a good word to me about my marriage?"</p> +<p>"Am I, missy?" he answered, without looking down. "Then maybe +that's because I've had so many bad ones to say to other +people."</p> +<p>I asked which other people.</p> +<p>"Old Johnny Christopher, for one. I met him last night at the +'Horse and Saddle.' 'Grand doings at the Big House, they're telling +me,' says Johnny. 'I won't say no,' I says. 'It'll be a proud day +for the grand-daughter of Neill the Lord when she's mistress of +Castle Raa,' says Johnny. 'Maybe so,' I says, 'but it'll be a +prouder day for Castle Raa when she sets her clane little foot in +it.'"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I should find it difficult now, after all that has happened +since, to convey an adequate idea of the sense of shame and +personal dishonour which was produced in me by Father Dan's account +of the contents of Martin's letter. It was like opening a door out +of a beautiful garden into a stagnant ditch.</p> +<p>That Martin's story was true I had never one moment's doubt, +first because Martin had told it, and next because it agreed at all +points with the little I had learned of Lord Raa in the only real +conversation I had yet had with him.</p> +<p>Obviously he cared for the other woman, and if, like his friend +Eastcliff, he had been rich enough to please himself, he would have +married her; but being in debt, and therefore in need of an +allowance, he was marrying me in return for my father's money.</p> +<p>It was shocking. It was sinful. I could not believe that my +father, the lawyers and the Bishop knew anything about it.</p> +<p>I determined to tell them, but how to do so, being what I was, a +young girl out of a convent, I did not know.</p> +<p>Never before had I felt so deeply the need of my mother. If she +had been alive I should have gone to her, and with my arms about +her neck and my face in her breast, I should have told her all my +trouble.</p> +<p>There was nobody but Aunt Bridget, and little as I had ever +expected to go to her under any circumstances, with many misgivings +and after much hesitation I went.</p> +<p>It was the morning before the day of my marriage. I followed my +aunt as she passed through the house like a biting March wind, +scolding everybody, until I found her in her own room.</p> +<p>She was ironing her new white cap, and as I entered (looking +pale, I suppose) she flopped down her flat iron on to its stand and +cried:</p> +<p>"Goodness me, girl, what's amiss? Caught a cold with your +morning walks, eh? Haven't I enough on my hands without that? We +must send for the doctor straight. We can't have <i>you</i> laid up +now, after all this trouble and expense."</p> +<p>"It isn't that, Auntie."</p> +<p>"Then in the name of goodness what is it?"</p> +<p>I told her, as well as I could for the cold grey eyes that kept +looking at me through their gold-rimmed spectacles. At first my +aunt listened with amazement, and then she laughed outright.</p> +<p>"So <i>you've</i> heard that story, have you? Mary O'Neill," she +said, with a thump of her flat iron, "I'm surprised at you."</p> +<p>I asked if she thought it wasn't true.</p> +<p>"How do I know if it's true? And what do I care whether it is or +isn't? Young men will be young men, I suppose."</p> +<p>She went on with her ironing as she added:</p> +<p>"Did you expect you were marrying a virgin? If every woman asked +for that there would be a nice lot of old maids in the world, +wouldn't there?"</p> +<p>I felt myself flushing up to the forehead, yet I managed to +say:</p> +<p>"But if he is practically married to the other woman. . . ."</p> +<p>"Not he married. Whoever thinks about marriage in company like +that? You might as well talk about marriage in the hen coop."</p> +<p>"But all the same if he cares for her, Auntie. . . ."</p> +<p>"Who says he cares for her? And if he does he'll settle her off +and get rid of her before he marries you."</p> +<p>"But will that be right?" I said, whereupon my aunt rested her +iron and looked at me as if I had said something shameful.</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, what do you mean? Of course it will be right. He +shouldn't have two women, should he? Do you think the man's a +barn-door rooster?"</p> +<p>My confusion was increasing, but I said that in any case my +intended husband could not care for <i>me</i>, or he would have +seen more of me.</p> +<p>"Oh, you'll see enough of him by and by. Don't you worry about +that."</p> +<p>I said I was not sure that he had made me care much for him.</p> +<p>"Time enough for that, too. You can't expect the man to work +miracles."</p> +<p>Then, with what courage was left me, I tried to say that I had +been taught to think of marriage as a sacrament, instituted by the +Almighty so that those who entered it might live together in union, +peace and love, whereas . . .</p> +<p>But I had to stop, for Aunt Bridget, who had been looking at me +with her hard lip curled, said:</p> +<p>"Tut! That's all right to go to church with on Sunday, but on +weekdays marriage is no moonshine, I can tell you. It's a practical +matter. Just an arrangement for making a home, and getting a +family, and bringing up children—that's what marriage is, if +you ask me."</p> +<p>"But don't you think love is necessary?"</p> +<p>"Depends what you mean by love. If you mean what they talk about +in poetry and songs—bleeding hearts and sighs and kisses and +all that nonsense—no!" said my aunt, with a heavy bang on her +ironing.</p> +<p>"That's what people mean when they talk about marrying for love, +and it generally ends in poverty and misery, and sensible women +have nothing to do with it. Look at me," she said, spitting on the +bottom of her iron, "do you think I married for love when I married +the colonel? No indeed! 'Here's a quiet respectable man with a nice +income,' I said, 'and if I put my little bit to his little bit +we'll get along comfortably if he <i>is</i> a taste in years,' I +said. Look at your mother, though. She was one of the +marrying-for-love kind, and if we had let her have her way where +would she have been afterwards with her fifteen years as an +invalid? And where would you have been by this time? No," said Aunt +Bridget, bringing down her flat-iron with a still heavier bang, "a +common-sense marriage, founded on suitability of position and +property, and all that, is the only proper sort of match. And +that's what's before you now, girl, so for goodness' sake don't go +about like the parish pan, letting every busybody make mischief +with you. My Betsy wouldn't if she had your chance—I can tell +you that much, my lady."</p> +<p>I did not speak. There was another bang or two of the flat-iron, +and then,</p> +<p>"Besides, love will come. Of course it will. It will come in +time. If you don't exactly love your husband when you marry him +you'll love him later on. A wife ought to teach herself to love her +husband. I know I had to, and if. . . ."</p> +<p>"But if she can't, Auntie?"</p> +<p>"Then she ought to be ashamed of herself, and say nothing about +it."</p> +<p>It was useless to say more, so I rose to go.</p> +<p>"Yes, go," said Aunt Bridget. "I'm so bothered with other +people's business that my head's all through-others. And, Mary +O'Neill," she said, looking after me as I passed through the door, +"for mercy's sake do brighten up a hit, and don't look as if +marrying a husband was like taking a dose of jalap. It isn't as bad +as that, anyway."</p> +<p>It served me right. I should have known better. My aunt and I +spoke different languages; we stood on different ground.</p> +<p>Returning to my room I found a letter from Father Dan. It +ran—</p> +<p>"<i>Dear Daughter in Jesus</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>I have been afraid to go far into the story we spoke about +from fear of offending my Bishop, but I have inquired of your +father and he assures me that there is not a word of truth in +it</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>So I am compelled to believe that our good Martin must have +been misinformed, and am dismissing the matter from my mind. +Trusting you will dismiss it from your mind also</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>Yours in Xt.</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>D.D.</i>"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="TWENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"TWENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>TWENTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I could not do as Father Dan advised, being now enmeshed in the +threads of innumerable impulses unknown to myself, and therefore +firmly convinced that Martin's story was not only true, but a part +of the whole sordid business whereby a husband was being bought for +me.</p> +<p>With this thought I went about all day, asking myself what I +could do even yet, but finding no answer until nine o'clock at +night, when, immediately after supper (we lived country fashion), +Aunt Bridget said:</p> +<p>"Now then, off to bed, girls. Everybody must be stirring early +in the morning."</p> +<p>And then I slipped upstairs to my room, and replied to Father +Dan.</p> +<p>Never had I written such a letter before. I poured my whole +heart on to the paper, saying what marriage meant to me, as the +Pope himself had explained it, a sacrament implying and requiring +love as the very soul of it, and since I did not feel this love for +the man I was about to marry, and had no grounds for thinking he +felt it for me, and being sure that other reasons had operated to +bring us together, I begged Father Dan, by his memory of my mother, +and his affection for me, and his desire to see me good and happy, +to intervene with my father and the Bishop, even at this late hour, +and at the church door itself to stop the ceremony.</p> +<p>It was late before I finished, and I thought the household was +asleep, but just as I was coming to an end I heard my father moving +in the room below, and then a sudden impulse came to me, and with a +new thought I went downstairs and knocked at his door.</p> +<p>"Who's there?" he cried. "Come in."</p> +<p>He was sitting in his shirt sleeves, shaving before a +looking-glass which was propped up against two ledgers. The lather +on his upper lip gave his face a fierce if rather grotesque +expression.</p> +<p>"Oh, it's you," he said. "Sit down. Got to do this +to-night—goodness knows if I'll have time for it in the +morning."</p> +<p>I took the seat in the ingle which Father Dan occupied on the +night of my birth. The fire had nearly burnt out.</p> +<p>"Thought you were in bed by this time. Guess I should have been +in bed myself but for this business. Look there"—he pointed +with the handle of his razor to the table littered with +papers—"that's a bit of what I've had to do for you. I kind +o' think you ought to be grateful to your father, my gel."</p> +<p>I told him he was very kind, and then, very nervously, said:</p> +<p>"But are you sure it's quite right, sir?"</p> +<p>Not catching my meaning he laughed.</p> +<p>"Right?" he said, holding the point of his nose aside between +the tips of his left thumb and first finger. "Guess it's about as +right as law and wax can make it."</p> +<p>"I don't mean that, sir. I mean. . . ."</p> +<p>"What?" he said, facing round.</p> +<p>Then trembling and stammering I told him. I did not love Lord +Raa. Lord Raa did not love me. Therefore I begged him for my sake, +for his sake, for everybody's sake (I think I said for my mother's +sake also) to postpone our marriage.</p> +<p>At first my father seemed unable to believe his own ears.</p> +<p>"Postpone? Now? After all this money spent? And everything +signed and sealed and witnessed!"</p> +<p>"Yes, if you please, sir, because. . . ."</p> +<p>I got no farther, for flinging down his razor my father rose in +a towering rage.</p> +<p>"Are you mad? Has somebody been putting the evil eye on you? The +greatest match this island has ever seen, and you say +postpone—put it off, stop it, that's what you mean. Do you +want to make a fool of a man? At the last moment, too. Just when +there's nothing left but to go to the High Bailiff and the Church! +. . . But I see—I see what it is. It's that young +Conrad—he's been writing to you."</p> +<p>I tried to say no, but my father bore me down.</p> +<p>"Don't go to deny it, ma'am. He has been writing to every +one—the Bishop, Father Dan, myself even. Denouncing the +marriage if you plaze."</p> +<p>My father, in his great excitement, was breaking with withering +scorn into his native speech.</p> +<p>"Aw yes, though, denouncing and damning it, they're telling me! +Mighty neighbourly of him, I'm sure! Just a neighbour lad without a +penny at his back to take all that throuble! If I had known he felt +like that about it I might have axed his consent! The imperence, +though! The imperence of sin! A father has no rights, it seems! A +daughter is a separate being, and all to that! Well, well! Amazing +thick, isn't it?"</p> +<p>He was walking up and down the room with his heavy tread, making +the floor shake.</p> +<p>"Then that woman in Rome—I wouldn't trust but she has been +putting notions into your head, too. All the new-fangled fooleries, +I'll go bail. Women and men equal, not a ha'p'orth of difference +between them! The blatherskites!"</p> +<p>I was silenced, and I must have covered my face and cried, for +after a while my father softened, and touching my shoulder he asked +me if a man of sixty-five was not likely to know better than a girl +of nineteen what was good for her, and whether I supposed he had +not satisfied himself that this marriage was a good thing for me +and for him and for everybody.</p> +<p>"Do you think I'm not doing my best for you, gel—my very +best?"</p> +<p>I must have made some kind of assent, for he said:</p> +<p>"Then don't moither me any more, and don't let your Aunt Bridget +moither me—telling me and telling me what I might have done +for her own daughter instead."</p> +<p>At last, with a kind of rough tenderness, he took me by the arm +and raised me to my feet.</p> +<p>"There, there, go to bed and get some sleep. We'll have to start +off for the high Bailiff's early in the morning."</p> +<p>My will was broken down. I could resist no longer. Without a +word more I left him.</p> +<p>Returning to my room I took the letter I had been writing to +Father Dan and tore it up piece by piece. As I did so I felt as if +I were tearing up a living thing—something of myself, my +heart and all that was contained in it.</p> +<p>Then I threw open the window and leant out. I could hear the +murmur of the sea. I felt as if it were calling to me, though I +could not interpret its voice. The salt air was damp and it +refreshed my eyelids.</p> +<p>At length I got into bed, shivering with cold. When I had put +out the light I noticed that the moon, which was near the full, had +a big yellow ring of luminous vapour around it.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTIETH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTIETH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My sleep that night was much troubled by dreams. It was the same +dream as before, again and again repeated—the dream of frozen +regions and of the great ice barrier, and then of the broken +pen.</p> +<p>When I awoke in the hazy light of the dawn I thought of what the +Pope had said about beginning my wedding-day with penance and +communion, so I rose at once to go to church.</p> +<p>The dawn was broadening, but the household was still asleep, +only the servants in the kitchen stirring when I stepped through a +side door, and set out across the fields.</p> +<p>The dew was thick on the grass, and under the gloom of a heavy +sky the day looked cold and cheerless. A wind from the south-east +had risen during the night, the sea was white with breakers, and +from St. Mary's Rock there came the far-off moaning of surging +waves.</p> +<p>The church, too, when I reached it, looked empty and chill. The +sacristan in the dim choir was arranging lilies and marguerites +about the high altar, and only one poor woman, with a little red +and black shawl over her head and shoulders, was kneeling in the +side chapel where Father Dan was saying Mass, with a sleepy little +boy in clogs to serve him.</p> +<p>The woman was quite young, almost as young as myself, but she +was already a widow, having lately lost her husband "at the +herrings" somewhere up by Stornoway, where he had gone down in a +gale, leaving her with one child, a year old, and another soon to +come.</p> +<p>All this she told me the moment I knelt near her. The poor thing +seemed to think I ought to have remembered her, for she had been at +school with me in the village.</p> +<p>"I'm Bella Quark that was," she whispered. "I married Willie +Shimmin of the Lhen, you recollect. It's only a month this morning +since he was lost, but it seems like years and years. There isn't +nothing in the world like it."</p> +<p>She knew about my marriage, and said she wished me joy, though +the world was "so dark and lonely for some." Then she said +something about her "lil Willie." She had left him asleep in her +cottage on the Curragh, and he might awake and cry before she got +back, so she hoped Father Dan wouldn't keep her long.</p> +<p>I was so touched by the poor thing's trouble that I almost +forgot my own, and creeping up to her side I put my arm through +hers as we knelt together, and that was how the Father found us +when he turned to put the holy wafer on our tongues.</p> +<p>The wind must have risen higher while I was in the church, for +when I was returning across the fields it lashed my skirts about my +legs so that I could scarcely walk. A mist had come down and made a +sort of monotonous movement in the mountains where they touched the +vague line of the heavy sky.</p> +<p>I should be afraid to say that Nature was still trying to speak +to me in her strange inarticulate voice, but I cannot forget that a +flock of yearlings, which had been sheltering under a hedge, +followed me bleating to the last fence, and that the moaning of the +sea about St. Mary's Rock was the last sound I heard as I +re-entered the house.</p> +<p>Everything there was running like a mill-race by this time. The +servants were flying to and fro, my cousins were calling downstairs +in accents of alarm, Aunt Bridget was answering them in tones of +vexation, and my father was opening doors with a heavy push and +closing them with a clash.</p> +<p>They were all so suddenly pacified when I appeared that it +flashed upon me at the moment that they must have thought I had run +away.</p> +<p>"Goodness gracious me, girl, where have you been?" said Aunt +Bridget.</p> +<p>I told her, and she was beginning to reproach me for not +ordering round the carriage, instead of making my boots and +stockings damp by traipsing across the grass, when my father +said:</p> +<p>"That'll do, that'll do! Change them and take a snack of +something. I guess we're due at Holmtown in half an hour."</p> +<p>I ate my breakfast standing, the car was brought round, and by +eight o'clock my father and I arrived at the house of the High +Bailiff, who had to perform the civil ceremony of my marriage +according to the conditions required by law.</p> +<p>The High Bailiff was on one knee before the fire in his office, +holding a newspaper in front of it to make it burn.</p> +<p>"Nobody else here yet?" asked my father.</p> +<p>"Traa dy liooar" (time enough), the High Bailiff muttered.</p> +<p>He was an elderly man of intemperate habits who spent his nights +at the "Crown and Mitre," and was apparently out of humour at +having been brought out of bed so early.</p> +<p>His office was a room of his private house. It had a high desk, +a stool and a revolving chair. Placards were pinned on the walls, +one over another, and a Testament, with the binding much worn, lay +on a table. The place looked half like a doctor's consulting room, +and half like a small police court.</p> +<p>Presently Mr. Curphy, my father's advocate, came in, rather +irritatingly cheerful in that chill atmosphere, and, half an hour +late, my intended husband arrived, with his London lawyer and his +friend Eastcliff.</p> +<p>My mind was far from clear and I had a sense of seeing things by +flashes only, but I remember that I thought Lord Raa was very +nervous, and it even occurred to me that early as it was he had +been drinking.</p> +<p>"Beastly nuisance, isn't it?" he said to me aside, and then +there was something about "this legal fuss and fuddlement."</p> +<p>With the air of a man with a grievance the High Bailiff took a +big book out of the desk, and a smaller one off a shelf, and then +we sat in a half circle, and the ceremony began.</p> +<p>It was very brief and cold like a matter of business. As far as +I can remember it consisted of two declarations which Lord Raa and +I made first to the witnesses present and afterwards to each other. +One of them stated that we knew of no lawful impediment why we +should not be joined together in matrimony, and the other declared +that we were there and then so joined.</p> +<p>I remember that I repeated the words automatically, as the High +Bailiff in his thick alcoholic voice read them out of the smaller +of his books, and that Lord Raa, in tones of obvious impatience, +did the same.</p> +<p>Then the High Bailiff opened the bigger of his books, and after +writing something in it himself he asked Lord Raa to sign his name, +and this being done he asked me also.</p> +<p>"Am I to sign, too?" I asked, vacantly.</p> +<p>"Well, who else do you think?" said Mr. Curphy with a laugh. +"Betsy Beauty perhaps, eh?"</p> +<p>"Come, gel, come," said my father, sharply, and then I +signed.</p> +<p>I had no longer any will of my own. In this as in everything I +did whatever was asked of me.</p> +<p>It was all as dreary and lifeless as an empty house. I can +remember that it made no sensible impression upon my heart. My +father gave some money (a few shillings I think) to the High +Bailiff, who then tore a piece of perforated blue paper out of the +bigger of his books and offered it to me, saying:</p> +<p>"This belongs to you."</p> +<p>"To me?" I said.</p> +<p>"Who else?" said Mr. Curphy, who was laughing again, and then +something was said by somebody about marriage lines and no one +knowing when a wise woman might not want to use them.</p> +<p>The civil ceremony of my marriage was now over, and Lord Raa, +who had been very restless, rose to his feet, saying:</p> +<p>"Beastly early drive. Anything in the house to steady one's +nerves, High Bailiff?"</p> +<p>The High Bailiff made some reply, at which the men laughed, all +except my father. Then they left me and went into another room, the +dining-room, and I heard the jingling of glasses and the drinking +of healths while I sat before the fire with my foot on the fender +and my marriage lines in my hand.</p> +<p>My brain was still numbed. I felt as one might feel if drowned +in the sea and descending, without quite losing consciousness, to +the depths of its abyss.</p> +<p>I remember I thought that what I had just gone through differed +in no respect from the signing of my marriage settlement, except +that in the one case I had given my husband rights over my money, +my father's money, whereas in this case I seemed to have given him +rights over myself.</p> +<p>Otherwise it was all so cold, so drear, so dead, so +unaffecting.</p> +<p>The blue paper had slipped out of my hand on to the worn +hearthrug when my helpless meditations were interrupted by the +thrumming and throbbing of the motor-car outside, and by my father, +who was at the office door, saying in his loud, commanding +voice:</p> +<p>"Come, gel, guess it's time for you to be back."</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards I was in my own room at home, and given +over to the dressmakers. I was still being moved +automatically—a creature without strength or will.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I have only an indefinite memory of floating vaguely through the +sights and sounds of the next two hours—of everybody except +myself being wildly excited; of my cousins railing repeatedly from +unseen regions of the house: of Aunt Bridget scolding +indiscriminately; of the dressmakers chattering without ceasing as +they fitted on my wedding dress; of their standing off from me at +intervals with cries of delight at the success of their efforts; of +the wind roaring in the chimney; of the church-bells ringing in the +distance; of the ever-increasing moaning of the sea about St. +Mary's Rock; and finally of the rumbling of the rubber wheels of +several carriages and the plash of horses' hoofs on the gravel of +the drive.</p> +<p>When the dressmakers were done with me I was wearing an ivory +satin dress, embroidered in silver, with a coronal of myrtle and +orange blossoms under the old Limerick lace of the family veil, as +well as a string of pearls and one big diamond of the noble house I +was marrying into. I remember they said my black hair shone with a +blue lustre against the sparkling gem, and I dare say I looked gay +on the outside anyway.</p> +<p>At last I heard a fluttering of silk outside my room, and a +running stream of chatter going down the stairs, followed by the +banging of carriage doors, and then my father's deep voice, +saying:</p> +<p>"Bride ready? Good! Time to go, I guess."</p> +<p>He alone had made no effort to dress himself up, for he was +still wearing his every-day serge and his usual heavy boots. There +was not even a flower in his button-hole.</p> +<p>We did not speak very much on our way to church, but I found a +certain comfort in his big warm presence as we sat together in the +carriage with the windows shut, for the rising storm was beginning +to frighten me.</p> +<p>"It will be nothing," said my father. "Just a puff of wind and a +slant of rain maybe."</p> +<p>The little church was thronged with people. Even the galleries +were full of the children from the village school. There was a +twittering overhead like that of young birds in a tree, and as I +walked up the nave on my father's arm I could not help but hear +over the sound of the organ the whispered words of the people in +the pews on either side of us.</p> +<p>"Dear heart alive, the straight like her mother she is, bless +her!"</p> +<p>"Goodness yes, it's the poor misfortunate mother come to life +again."</p> +<p>"Deed, but the daughter's in luck, though."</p> +<p>Lord Raa was waiting for me by the communion rail. He looked yet +more nervous than in the morning, and, though he was trying to bear +himself with his usual composure, there was (or I thought there +was) a certain expression of fear in his face which I had never +seen before.</p> +<p>His friend and witness, Mr. Eastcliff, wearing a carnation +button-hole, was by his side, and his aunt, Lady Margaret, carrying +a sheaf of beautiful white flowers, was standing near.</p> +<p>My own witnesses and bridesmaids, Betsy Beauty and Nessy +MacLeod, in large hats, with soaring black feathers, were behind +me. I could hear the rustle of their rose-coloured skirts and the +indistinct buzz of their whispered conversation, as well as the +more audible reproofs of Aunt Bridget, who in a crinkly black silk +dress and a bonnet like a half moon, was telling them to be silent +and to look placid.</p> +<p>At the next moment I was conscious that a bell had been rung in +the chancel; that the organ had stopped; that the coughing and +hemming in the church had ceased; that somebody was saying "Stand +here, my lord"; that Lord Raa, with a nervous laugh, was asking +"Here?" and taking a place by my side; that the lighted altar, +laden with flowers, was in front of me; and that the Bishop in his +vestments, Father Dan in his surplice and white stole, and a clerk +carrying a book and a vessel of holy water were beginning the +service.</p> +<p>Surely never was there a sadder ceremony. Never did any girl +under similar circumstances feel a more vivid presentiment of the +pains and penalties that follow on a forced and ill-assorted +marriage. And yet there came to me in the course of the service +such a startling change of thought as wiped out for a while all my +sadness, made me forget the compulsion that had been put upon me, +and lifted me into a realm of spiritual ecstasy.</p> +<p>The Bishop began with a short litany which asked God's blessing +on the ceremony which was to join together two of His children in +the bonds of holy wedlock. While that was going on I was conscious +of nothing except the howling of the wind about the church windows +and the far-off tolling of the bell on St. Mary's +Rock—nothing but this and a voice within me which seemed to +say again and again, "I don't love him! I don't love him!"</p> +<p>But hardly had the actual ceremony commenced when I began to be +overawed by the solemnity and divine power of the service, and by +the sense of God leaning over my littleness and guiding me +according to His will.</p> +<p>What did it matter how unworthy were the preparations that had +led up to this marriage if God was making it? God makes all +marriages that are blessed by His Church, and therefore He +overrules to His own good ends all human impulses, however sordid +or selfish they may be.</p> +<p>After that thought came to me nothing else seemed to matter, and +nothing, however jarring or incongruous, was able to lower the +exaltation of my spirit.</p> +<p>But the service, which had this effect upon me, appeared to have +an exactly opposite effect on Lord Raa. His nervousness increased +visibly, though he did his best to conceal it by a lightness of +manner that sometimes looked like derision.</p> +<p>Thus when the Bishop stepped down to us and said:</p> +<p>"James Charles Munster, wilt thou take Mary here present for thy +lawful wife, according to the rite of our holy Mother the Church," +my husband halted and stammered over his answer, saying beneath his +breath, "I thought I was a heretic."</p> +<p>But when the corresponding question was put to me, and Father +Dan thinking I must be nervous, leaned over me and whispered, +"Don't worry, child, take your time," I replied a loud, clear, +unfaltering voice:</p> +<p>"I will."</p> +<p>And again, when my husband had to put the ring and the gold and +silver on the salver (he fumbled and dropped them as he did so, and +fumbled and dropped them a second time when he had to take them up +after they had been blessed, laughing too audibly at his own +awkwardness), and then repeat after the Bishop:</p> +<p>"With this ring I thee wed; this gold and silver I thee give; +with my body I thee worship; and with all my worldly goods I thee +endow," he tendered the ring slowly and with an obvious effort.</p> +<p>But I took it without trembling, because I was thinking that, in +spite of all I had heard of his ways of life, this solemn and +sacred sacrament made him mine and no one else's.</p> +<p>It is all very mysterious; I cannot account for it; I only know +it was so, and that, everything considered, it was perhaps the +strangest fact of all my life.</p> +<p>I remember that more than once during the ceremony Father Dan +spoke to me softly and caressingly, as if to a child, but I felt no +need of his comforting, for my strength was from a higher +source.</p> +<p>I also remember that it was afterwards said that all through the +ceremony the eyes of the newly-wedded couple seemed sedulously to +shun each other, but if I did not look at my husband it was because +my marriage was like a prayer to me, carrying me back, with its +sense of purity and sanctity, to the little sunlit church in Rome +where Mildred Bankes had taken her vows.</p> +<p>After the marriage service there was Nuptial Mass and +Benediction (special dispensation from Rome), and that raised to a +still higher pitch the spiritual exaltation which sustained me.</p> +<p>Father Dan read the Epistle beginning "Let wives be subject to +their husbands," and then the Bishop read the Gospel, concluding, +"Therefore now they are not two, but one flesh: what therefore God +hath joined together, let not man put asunder."</p> +<p>I had trembled when I thought of these solemn and sonorous words +in the solitude of my own room, but now that they were spoken +before the congregation I had no fear, no misgiving, nothing but a +sense of rapture and consecration.</p> +<p>The last words being spoken and Lord Raa and I being man and +wife, we stepped into the sacristy to sign the register, and not +even there did my spirit fail me. I took up the pen and signed my +name without a tremor. But hardly had I done so when I heard a +rumbling murmur of voices about me—first the Bishop's voice +(in such a worldly tone) and then my father's and then my +husband's, and then the voices of many others, in light +conversation mingled with trills of laughter. And then, in a +moment, in a twinkling, as fast as a snowflake melts upon a stream, +the spell of the marriage service seemed to break.</p> +<p>I have heard since that my eyes were wet at that moment and I +seemed to have been crying all through the ceremony. I know nothing +about that, but I do know that I felt a kind of internal shudder +and that it was just as if my soul had suddenly awakened from an +intoxicating drug.</p> +<p>The organ began to play the Wedding March, and my husband, +putting my arm through his, said, "Come."</p> +<p>There was much audible whispering among the people waiting for +us in the church, and as we walked towards the door I saw ghostly +faces smiling at me on every side, and heard ghostly voices +speaking in whispers that were like the backward plash of wavelets +on the shore.</p> +<p>"Sakes alive, how white's she's looking, though," said somebody, +and then somebody else said—I could not help but hear +it—</p> +<p>"Dear heart knows if her father has done right for all +that."</p> +<p>I did not look at anybody, but I saw Martin's mother at the +back, and she was wiping her eyes and saying to some one by her +side—it must have been the doctor—</p> +<p>"God bless her for the sweet child veen she always was, +anyway."</p> +<p>The storm had increased during the service; and the sacristan, +who was opening the door for us, had as much as he could do to hold +it against the wind, which came with such a rush upon us when we +stepped into the porch that my veil and the coronal of myrtle and +orange blossoms were torn off my head and blown back into the +church.</p> +<p>"God bless my sowl," said somebody—it was Tommy's friend, +Johnny Christopher—"there's some ones would he calling that +bad luck, though."</p> +<p>A band of village musicians, who were ranged up in the road, +struck up "The Black and Grey" as we stepped out of the churchyard, +and the next thing I knew was that my husband and I were in the +carriage going home.</p> +<p>He had so far recovered from the frightening effects of the +marriage service that he was making light of it, and saying:</p> +<p>"When will this mummery come to an end, I wonder?"</p> +<p>The windows of the carriage were rattling with the wind, and my +husband had begun to talk of the storm when we came upon the trunk +of a young tree which had been torn up by the roots and was lying +across the road, so that our coachman had to get down and remove +it.</p> +<p>"Beastly bad crossing, I'm afraid. Hope you're a good sailor. +Must be in London to-morrow morning, you know."</p> +<p>The band was playing behind us. The leafless trees were beating +their bare boughs in front. The wedding bells were pealing. The +storm was thundering through the running sky. The sea was very +loud.</p> +<p>At my father's gate Tommy the Mate, with a serious face, was +standing, cap in hand, under his triumphal arch, which (as well as +it could for the wind that was tearing its flowers and scattering +them on the ground) spelled out the words "God bless the Happy +Bride."</p> +<p>When we reached the open door of the house a group of maids were +waiting for us. They were holding on to their white caps and trying +to control their aprons, which were swirling about their black +frocks. As I stepped out of the carriage they addressed me as "My +lady" and "Your ladyship." The seagulls, driven up from the sea, +were screaming about the house.</p> +<p>My husband and I went into the drawing-room, and as we stood +together on the hearthrug I caught a glimpse of my face in the +glass over the mantelpiece. It was deadly white, and had big +staring eyes and a look of faded sunshine. I fixed afresh the +pearls about my neck and the diamond in my hair, which was much +disordered.</p> +<p>Almost immediately the other carriages returned, and relatives +and guests began to pour into the room and offer us their +congratulations. First came my cousins, who were too much troubled +about their own bedraggled appearance to pay much attention to +mine. Then Aunt Bridget, holding on to her half-moon bonnet and +crying:</p> +<p>"You happy, happy child! But what a wind! There's been nothing +like it since the day you were born."</p> +<p>My father came next, like a gale of wind himself, saying:</p> +<p>"I'm proud of you, gel. Right proud I am. You done well."</p> +<p>Then came Lady Margaret, who kissed me without saying many +words, and finally a large and varied company of gaily-dressed +friends and neighbours, chiefly the "aristocracy" of our island, +who lavished many unnecessary "ladyships" upon me, as if the great +name reflected a certain glory upon themselves.</p> +<p>I remember that as I stood on the hearthrug with my husband, +receiving their rather crude compliments, a vague gaiety came over +me, and I smiled and laughed, although my heart was growing sick, +for the effect of the wedding-service was ebbing away into a cold +darkness like that of a night tide when the moonlight has left +it.</p> +<p>It did not comfort me that my husband, without failing in good +manners, was taking the whole scene and company with a certain +scarcely-veiled contempt which I could not help but see.</p> +<p>And neither did it allay my uneasiness to glance at my father, +where he stood at the end of the room, watching, with a look of +triumph in his glistening black eyes, his proud guests coming up to +me one by one, and seeming to say to himself, "They're here at +last! I've bet them! Yes, by gough, I've bet them!"</p> +<p>Many a time since I have wondered if his conscience did not stir +within him as he looked across at his daughter in the jewels of the +noble house he had married her into—the pale bride with the +bridegroom he had bought for her—and thought of the mockery +of a sacred union which he had brought about to gratify his pride, +his vanity, perhaps his revenge.</p> +<p>But it was all over now. I was married to Lord Raa. In the eyes +equally of the law, the world and the Church, the knot between us +was irrevocably tied.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>I am no mystic and no spiritualist, and I only mention it as one +of the mysteries of human sympathy between far-distant friends, +that during a part of the time when my dear one was going through +the fierce struggle she describes, and was dreaming of frozen +regions and a broken pen, the ship I sailed on had got itself stuck +fast in a field of pack ice in latitude 76, under the ice barrier +by Charcot Bay, and that while we were lying like helpless logs, +cut off from communication with the world, unable to do anything +but groan and swear and kick our heels in our bunks at every fresh +grinding of our crunching sides, my own mind, sleeping and waking, +was for ever swinging back, with a sort of yearning prayer to my +darling not to yield to the pressure which I felt so damnably sure +was being brought to bear on her.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRD_PART" id="THIRD_PART"></a>THIRD PART</h2> +<h3>MY HONEYMOON</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When the Bishop and Father Dan arrived, the bell was rung and we +went in to breakfast.</p> +<p>We breakfasted in the new dining-room, which was now finished +and being used for the first time.</p> +<p>It was a gorgeous chamber beblazoned with large candelabra, huge +mirrors, and pictures in gold frames—resembling the room it +was intended to imitate, yet not resembling it, as a woman +over-dressed resembles a well-dressed woman.</p> +<p>My father sat at the head of his table with the Bishop, Lady +Margaret and Aunt Bridget on his right, and myself, my husband, +Betsy Beauty and Mr. Eastcliff on his left. The lawyers and the +trustee were midway down, Father Dan with Nessy MacLeod was at the +end, and a large company of our friends and neighbours, wearing +highly-coloured flowers on their breasts and in their buttonholes, +sat between.</p> +<p>The meal was very long, and much of the food was very +large—large fish, large roasts of venison, veal, beef and +mutton, large puddings and large cheeses, all cut on the table and +served by waiters from Blackwater. There were two long black lines +of them—a waiter behind the chair of nearly every other +guest.</p> +<p>All through the breakfast the storm raged outside. More than +once it drowned the voices of the people at the table, roaring like +a wild beast in the great throat of the wide chimney, swirling +about the lantern light, licking and lashing and leaping at the +outsides of the walls like lofty waves breaking against a +breakwater, and sending up a thunderous noise from the sea itself, +where the big bell of St. Mary's Rock was still tolling like a +knell.</p> +<p>Somebody—it must have been Aunt Bridget again—said +there had been nothing like it since the day of my birth, and it +must be "fate."</p> +<p>"Chut, woman!" said my father. "We're living in the twentieth +century. Who's houlding with such ould wife's wonders now?"</p> +<p>He was intensely excited, and, his excitement betrayed itself, +as usual, in reversion to his native speech. Sometimes he surveyed +in silence, with the old masterful lift of his eyebrows, his +magnificent room and the great guests who were gathered within it; +sometimes he whispered to the waiters to be smarter with the +serving of the dishes; and sometimes he pitched his voice above the +noises within and without and shouted, in country-fashion, to his +friends at various points of the table to know how they were +faring.</p> +<p>"How are you doing, Mr. Curphy, sir?"</p> +<p>"Doing well, sir. Are you doing well yourself, Mr. O'Neill, +sir?"</p> +<p>"Lord-a-massy yes, sir. I'm always doing well, sir."</p> +<p>Never had anybody in Ellan seen so strange a mixture of grandeur +and country style. My husband seemed to be divided between amused +contempt for it, and a sense of being compromised by its pretence. +More than once I saw him, with his monocle in his eye, look round +at his friend Eastcliff, but he helped himself frequently from a +large decanter of brandy and drank healths with everybody.</p> +<p>There were the usual marriage pleasantries, facetious +compliments and chaff, in which to my surprise (the solemnity of +the service being still upon me) the Bishop permitted himself to +join.</p> +<p>I was now very nervous, and yet I kept up a forced gaiety, +though my heart was cold and sick. I remember that I had a +preternatural power of hearing at the same time nearly every +conversation that was going on at the table, and that I joined in +nearly all the laughter.</p> +<p>At a more than usually loud burst of wind somebody said it would +be a mercy if the storm did not lift the roof off.</p> +<p>"Chut, man!" cried my father. "Solid oak and wrought iron here. +None of your mouldy old monuments that have enough to do to keep +their tiles on."</p> +<p>"Then nobody," said my husband with a glance at his friend, +"need be afraid of losing his head in your house, sir?"</p> +<p>"Not if he's got one to come in with, sir."</p> +<p>Betsy Beauty, sitting next to Mr. Eastcliff, was wondering if he +would do us the honour to visit the island oftener now that his +friend had married into it.</p> +<p>"But, my dear Betsy," said my husband, "who would live in this +God-forsaken place if he could help it?"</p> +<p>"God-forsaken, is it?" said my father. "Maybe so, sir—but +that's what the cuckoo said after he had eaten the eggs out of the +thrush's nest and left a mess in it."</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget was talking in doleful tones to Lady Margaret about +my mother, saying she had promised her on her death-bed to take +care of her child and had been as good as her word, always putting +me before her own daughter, although her ladyship would admit that +Betsy was a handsome girl, and, now that his lordship was married, +there were few in the island that were fit for her.</p> +<p>"Why no, Mrs. MacLeod," said my husband, after another +significant glance at his friend, "I dare say you've not got many +who can make enough to keep a carriage?"</p> +<p>"Truth enough, sir," said my father. "We've got hundreds and +tons that can make debts though."</p> +<p>The breakfast came to an end at length, and almost before the +last of the waiters had left the room my father rose to speak.</p> +<p>"Friends all," he said, "the young married couple have to leave +us for the afternoon steamer."</p> +<p>"In this weather?" said somebody, pointing up to the lantern +light through which the sky was now darkening.</p> +<p>"Chut! A puff of wind and a slant of rain, as I've been saying +to my gel here. But my son-in-law, Lord Raa," (loud cheers followed +this description, with some laughter and much hammering on the +table), "my son-in-law says he has to be in London to-morrow, and +this morning my daughter has sworn obedience. . . . What's that, +Monsignor? Not obedience exactly? Something like it then, so she's +bound to go along with him. So fill up your glasses to the brim and +drink to the bride and bridegroom."</p> +<p>As soon as the noise made by the passing of decanters had died +down my father spoke again.</p> +<p>"This is the proudest day of my life. It's the day I've worked +for and slaved for and saved for, and it's come to pass at +last."</p> +<p>There was another chorus of applause.</p> +<p>"What's that you were saying in church, Mr. Curphy, sir? Time +brings in its revenges? It does too. Look at me."</p> +<p>My father put his thumbs in the arm-pits of his waistcoat.</p> +<p>"You all know what I am, and where I come from."</p> +<p>My husband put his monocle to his eye and looked up.</p> +<p>"I come from a mud cabin on the Curragh, not a hundred miles +from here. My father was kill . . . but never mind about that now. +When he left us it was middling hard collar work, I can tell +you—what with me working the bit of a croft and the mother +weeding for some of you—some of your fathers I +mane—ninepence a day dry days, and sixpence all weathers. +When I was a lump of a lad I was sworn at in the high road by a +gentleman driving in his grand carriage, and the mother was lashed +by his . . . but never mind about that neither. I guess I've +hustled round considerable since then, and this morning I've +married my daughter into the first family in the island."</p> +<p>There was another burst of cheering at this, but it was almost +drowned by the loud rattling of the rain which was now falling on +the lantern light.</p> +<p>"Monsignor," cried my father, pitching his voice still higher, +"what's that you were saying in Rome about the mills of God?"</p> +<p>Fumbling his jewelled cross and smiling blandly the Bishop gave +my father the familiar quotation.</p> +<p>"Truth enough, too. The mills of God grind slowly but they're +grinding exceeding small. Nineteen years ago I thought I was as +sure of what I wanted as when I got out of bed this morning. If my +gel here had been born a boy, my son would have sat where his +lordship is now sitting. But all's well that ends well! If I +haven't got a son I've got a son-in-law, and when I get a grandson +he'll be the richest man that ever stepped into Castle Raa, and the +uncrowned king of Ellan."</p> +<p>At that there was a tempest of cheers, which, mingling with the +clamour of the storm, made a deafening tumult.</p> +<p>"They're saying a dale nowadays about fathers and +children—daughters being separate beings, and all to that. +But show me the daughter that could do better for herself than my +gel's father has done for her. She has a big fortune, and her +husband has a big name, and what more do they want in this world +anyway?"</p> +<p>"Nothing at all," came from various parts of the room.</p> +<p>"Neighbours," said my father, looking round him with a satisfied +smile, "I'm laying you dry as herrings in a hould, but before I +call on you to drink this toast I'll ask the Bishop to spake to +you. He's a grand man is the Bishop, and in fixing up this marriage +I don't in the world know what I could have done without him."</p> +<p>The Bishop, still fingering his jewelled cross and smiling, +spoke in his usual suave voice. He firmly believed that the Church +had that morning blessed a most propitious and happy union. +Something might be said against mixed marriages, but under proper +circumstances the Church had never forbidden them and his lordship +(this with a deep bow to my husband) had behaved with great +liberality of mind.</p> +<p>As for what their genial and rugged host had said of certain +foolish and dangerous notions about the relations of father and +child, he was reminded that there were still more foolish and +dangerous ones about the relations of husband and wife.</p> +<p>From the earliest ages of the Church, however, those relations +had been exactly defined. "Let wives be subject to their husbands," +said the Epistle we had read this morning, and no less conclusive +had been our closing prayer, asking that the wife keep true faith +with her husband, being lovely in his eyes even as was Rachel, wise +as was Rebecca, and dutiful as was Sara.</p> +<p>"Beautiful!" whispered Aunt Bridget to Lady Margaret. "It's what +I always was myself in the days of the dear Colonel."</p> +<p>"And now," said the Bishop, "before you drink this toast and +call upon the noble bridegroom to respond to it," (another deep bow +to my husband), "I will ask for a few words from the two legal +gentlemen who have carried out the admirably judicious financial +arrangements without which this happy marriage would have been +difficult if not impossible."</p> +<p>Then my husband's lawyer, with a supercilious smile on his +clean-shaven face, said it had been an honour to him to assist in +preparing the way for the "uncrowned king of Ellan." ("It +<i>has</i>, sir," cried my father in a loud voice which +straightened the gentleman's face instantly); and finally Mr. +Curphy, speaking through his long beard, congratulated my father +and my husband equally on the marriage, and gave it as his opinion +that there could be no better use for wealth than to come to the +rescue of an historic family which had fallen on evil times and +only required a little money to set it on its feet again.</p> +<p>"The bride and bridegroom!" cried my father; and then everybody +rose and there was much cheering, with cries of "His lordship," +"His lordship."</p> +<p>All through the speech-making my husband had rolled uneasily in +his chair. He had also helped himself frequently from the decanter, +so that when he got up to reply he was scarcely sober.</p> +<p>In his drawling voice he thanked the Bishop, and said that +having made up his mind to the marriage he had never dreamt of +raising difficulties about religion. As to the modern notions about +the relations of husband and wife, he did not think a girl brought +up in a convent would give him much trouble on that subject.</p> +<p>"Not likely," cried my father. "I'll clear her of that +anyway."</p> +<p>"So I thank you for myself and for my family," continued my +husband, "and . . . Oh, yes, of course," (this to Lady Margaret). +"I thank you for my wife also, and . . . and that's all."</p> +<p>I felt sick and cold and ashamed. A rush of blood came under the +skin of my face that must have made me red to the roots of my +hair.</p> +<p>In all this speaking about my marriage there had not been one +word about myself—myself really, a living soul with all her +future happiness at stake. I cannot say what vague impulse took +possession of me, but I remember that when my husband sat down I +made a forced laugh, though I knew well that I wanted to cry.</p> +<p>In an agony of shame I was beginning to feel a wild desire to +escape from the room and even from the house, that I might breathe +in some of the free wind outside, when all at once I became aware +that somebody else was speaking.</p> +<p>It was Father Dan. He had risen unannounced from his seat at the +end of the table. I saw his sack coat which was much worn at the +seams; I saw his round face which was flushed; I heard the +vibrating note in his soft Irish voice which told me he was deeply +moved; and then I dropped my head, for I knew what was coming.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>"Mr. O'Neill," said Father Dan, "may your parish priest take the +liberty of speaking without being spoken to?"</p> +<p>My father made some response, and then a hush fell over the +dining-room. Either the storm ceased for a time, or in my great +agitation it seemed to do so, for I did not hear it.</p> +<p>"We have heard a great deal about the marriage we have +celebrated to-day, but have we not forgotten something? What +<i>is</i> marriage? Is it the execution of a contract? Is it the +signing of a register? Is it even the taking of an oath before an +altar? No. Marriage is the sacred covenant which two souls make +with each other, the woman with the man, the man with the woman, +when she chooses him from all other men, when he chooses her from +all other women, to belong to each other for ever, so that no +misfortune, no storm of life, no sin on either side shall ever put +them apart. That's what marriage is, and all we have been doing +to-day is to call on God and man to bear witness to that holy +bond."</p> +<p>My heart was beating high. I raised my head, and I think my eyes +must have been shining. I looked across at the Bishop. His face was +showing signs of vexation.</p> +<p>"Mr. O'Neill, sir," cried Father Dan, raising his trembling +voice, "you say your daughter has a big fortune and her husband has +a big name, and what more do they want in this world? I'll tell you +what they want, sir. They want love, love on both sides, if they +are to be good and happy, and if they've got that they've got +something which neither wealth nor rank can buy."</p> +<p>I had dropped my head again, but under my eyelashes I could see +that the company were sitting spell-bound. Only my husband was +shuffling in his seat, and the Bishop was plucking at his gold +chain.</p> +<p>"My Bishop," said Father Dan, "has told us of the submission a +wife owes to her husband, and of her duty to be lovely and wise and +faithful in his eyes. But isn't it the answering thought that the +husband on his part owes something to the wife? Aren't we told that +he shall put away everything and everybody for her sake, and cleave +to her and cling to her and they shall be one flesh? Isn't that, +too, a divine commandment?"</p> +<p>My heart was throbbing so loud by this time that the next words +were lost to me. When I came to myself again Father Dan was +saying:</p> +<p>"Think what marriage means to a woman—a young girl +especially. It means the breaking of old ties, the beginning of a +new life, the setting out into an unknown world on a voyage from +which there can be no return. In her weakness and her helplessness +she leaves one dependency for another, the shelter of a father for +the shelter of a husband. What does she bring to the man she +marries? Herself, everything she is, everything she can be, to be +made or marred by him, and never, never, never to be the same to +any other man whatsoever as long as life shall last."</p> +<p>More than ever now, but for other reasons, I wanted to fly from +the room.</p> +<p>"Friends," cried Father Dan, "we don't know much of the +bridegroom in this parish, but we know the bride. We've known her +all her life. We know what she is. I do, anyway. If you are her +father, Mr. O'Neill, sir, I am her father also. I was in this house +when she was born. I baptized her. I took her out of the arms of +the angel who bore her. So she's my child too, God bless her. . . +."</p> +<p>His voice was breaking—I was sobbing—though he was +speaking so loudly I could scarcely hear him—I could scarcely +see him—I only knew that he was facing about in our direction +and raising his trembling hand to my husband.</p> +<p>"She is my child, too, I say, and now that she is leaving us, +now that you are taking her away from us, I charge you, my lord, to +be good and faithful to her, as you will have to answer for her +soul some day."</p> +<p>What else he said I do not know. From that moment I was blind +and deaf to everything. Nevertheless I was conscious that after +Father Dan had ceased to speak there was a painful silence. I +thought the company seemed to be startled and even a little annoyed +by the emotion so suddenly shot into their midst. The Bishop looked +vexed, my father looked uncomfortable, and my husband, who had been +drinking glass after glass of brandy, was muttering something about +"a sermon."</p> +<p>It had been intended that Mr. Eastcliff should speak for the +bridesmaids, and I was afterwards told by Betsy Beauty that he had +prepared himself with many clever epigrams, but everybody felt +there could be no more speaking of any kind now. After a few +awkward moments my father looked at his watch and said it was about +time for us to start if we were to catch the steamer, so I was +hurried upstairs to change for our journey.</p> +<p>When I came down again, in my tailor-made travelling dress with +sables, the whole company was in the hall and everybody seemed to +be talking at the same time, making a noise like water in a +weir.</p> +<p>I was taken possession of by each in turn. Nessy MacLeod told me +in an aside what an excellent father I had. Betsy Beauty whispered +that Mr. Eastcliff was so handsome and their tastes were so similar +that she hoped I would invite him to Castle Raa as soon as I came +back. Aunt Bridget, surrounded by a group of sympathising ladies +(including Lady Margaret, who was making an obvious effort to be +gracious) was wiping her eyes and saying I had always been her +favourite and she had faithfully done her duty by me.</p> +<p>"Mary, my love," she said, catching my eye, "I'm just telling +her ladyship I don't know in the world what I'll do when you are +gone."</p> +<p>My husband was there too, wearing a heavy overcoat with the +collar up, and receiving from a group of insular gentlemen their +cheerful prognostics of a bad passage.</p> +<p>"'Deed, but I'm fearing it will be a dirty passage, my +lord."</p> +<p>"Chut!" said my father. "The wind's from the south-west. They'll +soon get shelter."</p> +<p>The first of our two cars came round and my husband's valet went +off in advance with our luggage. Then the second car arrived, and +the time came for our departure. I think I kissed everybody. +Everybody seemed to be crying—everybody except myself, for my +tears were all gone by this time.</p> +<p>Just as we were about to start, the storm, which must certainly +have fallen for a while, sprang up suddenly, and when Tommy the +Mate (barely recognisable in borrowed black garments) opened the +door the wind came rushing into the house with a long-drawn +whirr.</p> +<p>I had said good-bye to the old man, and was stepping into the +porch when I remembered Father Dan. He was standing in his shabby +sack coat with a sorrowful face in a dark corner by the door, as if +he had placed himself there to see the last of me. I wanted to put +my arms around his neck, but I knew that would be wrong, so I +dropped to my knees and kissed his hand and he gave me his +blessing.</p> +<p>My husband, who was waiting by the side of the throbbing +automobile, said impatiently:</p> +<p>"Come, come, dear, don't keep me in the rain."</p> +<p>I got into the landaulette, my husband got in after me, the car +began to move, there were cries from within the house ("Good-bye!" +"Good luck") which sounded like stifled shrieks as they were +carried off by the wind without, and then we were under weigh.</p> +<p>As we turned the corner of the drive something prompted me to +look back at my mother's window—with its memories of my first +going to school.</p> +<p>At the next moment we were crossing the bridge—with its +memories of Martin Conrad and William Rufus.</p> +<p>At the next we were on the road.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>"Thank God, that's over," said my husband. Then, half +apologetically, he added: "You didn't seem to enjoy it any more +than myself, my dear."</p> +<p>At the entrance to our village a number of men stood firing +guns; in the middle a group of girls were stretching a rope across +the road; a number of small flags, torn by the wind and wet with +the rain, were rattling on flagstaffs hung out from some of the +window sills; a few women, with shawls over their heads, were +sheltering on the weather side of their porches to see us pass.</p> +<p>My husband was impatient of our simple island customs. Once or +twice he lowered the window of the car, threw out a handful of +silver and at the same time urged the chauffeur to drive quicker. +As soon as we were clear of the village he fell back in his seat, +saying:</p> +<p>"Heavens, how sleepy I am! No wonder either! Late going to bed +last night and up so early this morning."</p> +<p>After a moment he began to yawn, and almost before he could have +been aware of it he had closed his eyes. At the next moment he was +asleep.</p> +<p>It was a painful, almost a hideous sleep. His cheeks swelled and +sank; his lips parted, he was breathing heavily, and sometimes +gaping like a carp out of water.</p> +<p>I could not detach my eyes from his face, which, without eyes to +relieve it, seemed to be almost repulsive now. It would be +difficult to describe my sensations. I felt dreadfully humiliated. +Even my personal pride was wounded. I remembered what Father Dan +had said about husband and wife being one flesh, and told myself +that <i>this</i> was what I belonged to, what belonged to +me—<i>this!</i> Then I tried to reproach and reprove myself, +but in order to do so I had to turn my eyes away.</p> +<p>Our road to Blackwater lay over the ridge of a hill much exposed +to the wind from the south-west. When we reached this point the +clouds seemed to roll up from the sea like tempestuous battalions. +Torrential rain fell on the car and came dripping in from the +juncture of the landaulette roof. Some of it fell on the sleeper +and he awoke with a start.</p> +<p>"Damn—"</p> +<p>He stopped, as if, caught in guilt, and began to apologise +again.</p> +<p>"Was I asleep? I really think I must have been. Stupid, isn't +it? Excuse me."</p> +<p>He blinked his eyes as if to empty them of sleep, looked me over +for a moment or two in silence, and then said with a smile which +made me shudder:</p> +<p>"So you and I are man and wife, my dear!"</p> +<p>I made no answer, and, still looking fixedly at me, he said:</p> +<p>"Well, worse things might have happened after all—what do +<i>you</i> think?"</p> +<p>Still I did not answer him, feeling a certain shame, not to say +disgust. Then he began to pay me some compliments on my +appearance.</p> +<p>"Do you know you're charming, my dear, really charming!"</p> +<p>That stung me, and made me shudder, I don't know why, unless it +was because the words gave me the sense of having been used before +to other women. I turned my eyes away again.</p> +<p>"Don't turn away, dear. Let me see those big black eyes of +yours. I adore black eyes. They always pierce me like a +gimlet."</p> +<p>He reached forward as he spoke and drew me to him. I felt +frightened and pushed him off.</p> +<p>"What's this?" he said, as if surprised.</p> +<p>But after another moment he laughed, and in the tone of a man +who had had much to do with women and thought he knew how to deal +with them, he said:</p> +<p>"Wants to be coaxed, does she? They all do, bless them!"</p> +<p>Saying this he pulled me closer to him, putting his arm about my +waist, but once more I drew and forcibly pushed him from me.</p> +<p>His face darkened for an instant, and then cleared again.</p> +<p>"Oh, I see," he said. "Offended, is she? Paying me out for +having paid so little court to her? Well, she's right there too, +bless her! But never mind! You're a decidedly good-looking little +woman, my dear, and if I have neglected you thus far, I intend to +make up for it during the honeymoon. So come, little gal, let's be +friends."</p> +<p>Taking hold of me again, he tried to kiss me, putting at the +same time his hand on the bosom of my dress, but I twisted my face +aside and prevented him.</p> +<p>"Oh! Oh! Hurt her modesty, have I?" he said, laughing like a man +who was quite sure both of himself and of me. "But my little nun +will get over that by and by. Wait awhile! Wait awhile!"</p> +<p>By this time I was trembling with the shock of a terror that was +entirely new to me. I could not explain to myself the nature of it, +but it was there, and I could not escape from it.</p> +<p>Hitherto, when I had thought of my marriage to Lord Raa I had +been troubled by the absence of love between us; and what I meant +to myself by love—the love of husband and wife—was the +kind of feeling I had for the Reverend Mother, heightened and +deepened and spiritualised, as I believed, by the fact (with all +its mysterious significance) that the one was a man and the other a +woman.</p> +<p>But this was something quite different. Not having found in +marriage what I had expected, I was finding something else, for +there could be no mistaking my husband's meaning when he looked at +me with his passionate eyes and said, "Wait awhile!"</p> +<p>I saw what was before me, and in fear of it I found myself +wishing that something might happen to save me. I was so frightened +that if I could have escaped from the car I should have done so. +The only thing I could hope for was that we should arrive at +Blackwater too late for the steamer, or that the storm would +prevent it from sailing. What relief from my situation I should +find in that, beyond the delay of one day, one night (in which I +imagined I might be allowed to return home), I did not know. But +none the less on that account I began to watch the clouds with a +feverish interest.</p> +<p>They were wilder than ever now—rolling up from the +south-west in huge black whorls which enveloped the mountains and +engulfed the valleys. The wind, too, was howling at intervals like +a beast being slaughtered. It was terrible, but not so terrible as +the thing I was thinking of. I was afraid of the storm, and yet I +was fearfully, frightfully glad of it.</p> +<p>My husband, who, after my repulse, had dropped back into his own +corner of the car, was very angry. He talked again of our +"God-forsaken island," and the folly of living in it, said our +passage would be a long one in any case, and we might lose our +connection to London.</p> +<p>"Damnably inconvenient if we do. I've special reasons for being +there in the morning," he said.</p> +<p>At a sharp turn of the road the wind smote the car as with an +invisible wing. One of the windows was blown in, and to prevent the +rain from driving on to us my husband had to hold up a cushion in +the gap.</p> +<p>This occupied him until we ran into Blackwater, and then he +dropped the cushion and put his head out, although the rain was +falling heavily, to catch the first glimpse of the water in the +bay.</p> +<p>It was in terrific turmoil. My heart leapt up at the sight of +it. My husband swore.</p> +<p>We drew up on the drenched and naked pier. My husband's valet, +in waterproofs, came to the sheltered side of the car, and, +shouting above the noises of the wind in the rigging of the +steamer, he said:</p> +<p>"Captain will not sail to-day, my lord. Inshore wind. Says he +couldn't get safely out of the harbour."</p> +<p>My husband swore violently. I was unused to oaths at that time +and they cut me like whipcord, but all the same my pulse was +bounding joyfully.</p> +<p>"Bad luck, my lord, but only one thing to do now," shouted the +valet.</p> +<p>"What's that?" said my husband, growling.</p> +<p>"Sleep in Blackwater to-night, in hopes of weather mending in +the morning."</p> +<p>Anticipating this course, he had already engaged rooms for us at +the "Fort George."</p> +<p>My heart fell, and I waited for my husband's answer. I was +stifling.</p> +<p>"All right, Hobson. If it must be, it must," he answered.</p> +<p>I wanted to speak, but I did not know what to say. There seemed +to be nothing that I could say.</p> +<p>A quarter of an hour afterwards we arrived at the hotel, where +the proprietor, attended by the manageress and the waiters, +received us with rather familiar smiles.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When I began to write I determined to tell the truth and the +whole truth. But now I find that the whole truth will require that +I should invade some of the most sacred intimacies of human +experience. At this moment I feel as if I were on the threshold of +one of the sanctuaries of a woman's life, and I ask myself if it is +necessary and inevitable that I should enter it.</p> +<p>I have concluded that it <i>is</i> necessary and +inevitable—necessary to the sequence of my narrative, +inevitable for the motive with which I am writing it.</p> +<p>Four times already I have written what is to follow. In the +first case I found that I had said too much. In the second I had +said too little. In the third I was startled and shocked by the +portrait I had presented of myself and could not believe it to be +true. In the fourth I saw with a thrill of the heart that the +portrait was not only true, but too true. Let me try again.</p> +<p>I entered our rooms at the hotel, my husband's room and mine, +with a sense of fear, almost of shame. My sensations at that moment +had nothing in common with the warm flood of feeling which comes to +a woman when she finds herself alone for the first time with the +man she loves, in a little room which holds everything that is of +any account to her in the world. They were rather those of a young +girl who, walking with a candle through the dark corridors of an +empty house at night, is suddenly confronted by a strange face. I +was the young girl with the candle; the strange face was my +husband's.</p> +<p>We had three rooms, all communicating, a sitting-room in the +middle with bedrooms right and left. The bedroom on the right was +large and it contained a huge bed with a covered top and +tail-boards. That on the left was small, and it had a plain brass +and iron bedstead, which had evidently been meant for a lady's +maid. I had no maid yet. It was intended that I should engage a +French one in London.</p> +<p>Almost immediately on entering the sitting-room my husband, who +had not yet recovered from his disappointment, left me to go +downstairs, saying with something like a growl that he had +telegrams to send to London and instructions to give to his man +Hobson.</p> +<p>Without taking off my outer things I stepped up to the windows, +which were encrusted with salt from the flying spray. The hotel +stood on a rocky ledge above the harbour, and the sound of the sea, +beating on the outer side of the pier, came up with a deafening +roar. The red-funnelled steamer we should have sailed by lay on the +pier's sheltered side, letting down steam, swaying to her creaking +hawsers, and heaving to the foam that was surging against her +bow.</p> +<p>I was so nervous, so flurried, so preoccupied by vague fears +that I hardly saw or heard anything. Porters came up with our +trunks and asked me where they were to place them, but I scarcely +know how I answered them, although I was aware that +everything—both my husband's luggage and mine—was being +taken into the large bedroom. A maid asked if she ought to put a +light to the fire, and I said "Yes . . . no . . . yes," and +presently I heard the fire crackling.</p> +<p>After awhile my husband came back in a better temper and +said:</p> +<p>"Confounded nuisance, but I suppose we must make the best of +it."</p> +<p>He laughed as he said this, and coming closer and looking me +over with a smile which was at the same time passionate and proud, +he whispered:</p> +<p>"Dare say we'll not find the time long until to-morrow morning. +What do <i>you</i> think, my little beauty?"</p> +<p>Something in his voice rather than in his question made my heart +beat, and I could feel my face growing hot.</p> +<p>"Not taken off your things yet?" he said. "Come, let me help +you."</p> +<p>I drew out my hat-pins and removed my hat. At the same moment my +husband removed my sables and cloak, and as he did so he put his +arms about me, and held me close to him.</p> +<p>I shuddered. I tried not to, but I could not help it. My husband +laughed again, and said:</p> +<p>"Not got over it yet, little woman? Perhaps that's only because +you are not quite used to me."</p> +<p>Still laughing he pulled me still closer to him, and putting one +of his hands under my chin he kissed me on the mouth.</p> +<p>It will be difficult and perhaps it will be ridiculous to say +how my husband's first kiss shocked me. My mouth felt parched, I +had a sense of intense disgust, and before I was quite aware of +what I was doing I had put up both hands to push him off.</p> +<p>"Come, come, this is going too far," he said, in a tone that was +half playful, half serious. "It was all very well in the +automobile; but here, in your own rooms, you know. . . ."</p> +<p>He broke off and laughed again, saying that if my modesty only +meant that nobody had ever kissed me before it made me all the more +charming for him.</p> +<p>I could not help feeling a little ashamed of my embarrassment, +and crossing in front of my husband I seated myself in a chair +before the fire. He looked after me with a smile that made my heart +tremble, and then, coming behind my chair, he put his arms about my +shoulders and kissed my neck.</p> +<p>A shiver ran through me. I felt as if I had suffered a kind of +indecency. I got up and changed my place. My husband watched me +with the look of a man who wanted to roar with laughter. It was the +proud and insolent as well as passionate look of one who had never +so much as contemplated resistance.</p> +<p>"Well, this is funny," he said. "But we'll see presently! We'll +see!"</p> +<p>A waiter came in for orders, and early as it was my husband +asked for dinner to be served immediately. My heart was fluttering +excitedly by this time and I was glad of the relief which the +presence of other people gave me.</p> +<p>While the table was being laid my husband talked of the doings +of the day. He asked who was "the seedy old priest" who had given +us "the sermon" at the wedding breakfast—he had evidently +forgotten that he had seen the Father before.</p> +<p>I told him the "seedy old priest" was Father Dan, and he was a +saint if ever there was one.</p> +<p>"A saint, is he?" said my husband. "Wish saint were not +synonymous with simpleton, though."</p> +<p>Then he gave me his own views of "the holy state of matrimony." +By holding people together who ought to be apart it often caused +more misery and degradation of character than a dozen entirely +natural adulteries and desertions, which a man had sometimes to +repair by marriage or else allow himself to be regarded as a +seducer and a scoundrel.</p> +<p>I do not think my husband was conscious of the naive coarseness +of all this, as spoken to a young girl who had only just become his +wife. I am sure he was not aware that he was betraying himself to +me in every word he uttered and making the repugnance I had begun +to feel for him deepen into horror.</p> +<p>My palms became moist, and again and again I had to dry them +with my handkerchief. I was feeling more frightened and more +ashamed than I had ever felt before, but nevertheless when we sat +down to dinner I tried to compose myself. Partly for the sake of +appearance before the servants, and partly because I was taking +myself to task for the repugnance I felt towards my husband, I +found something to say, though my voice shook.</p> +<p>My husband ate ravenously and drank a good deal. Once or twice, +when he insisted on pouring out champagne for me, I clinked glasses +with him. Although every moment at table was increasing my fear and +disgust, I sometimes allowed myself to laugh.</p> +<p>Encouraged by this he renewed his endearments even before the +waiters had left the room, and when they had gone, with orders not +to return until he rang, and the door was closed behind them, he +switched off the lights, pushed a sofa in front of the fire, put me +to sit on it, sat down beside me and redoubled his tenderness.</p> +<p>"How's my demure little nun now?" he said. "Frightened, wasn't +she? They're all frightened at first, bless them!"</p> +<p>I could smell the liquor he had been drinking. I could see by +the firelight the prominent front tooth (partly hidden by his +moustache) which I had noticed when I saw him first, and the down +of soft hair which grew as low on his hands as his knuckles. Above +all I thought I could feel the atmosphere of other women about +him—loose women, bad women as it seemed to me—and my +fear and disgust began to be mixed with a kind of physical +horror.</p> +<p>For a little while I tried to fight against this feeling, but +when he began to put his arms about me, calling me by endearing +names, complaining of my coldness, telling me not to be afraid of +him, reminding me that I belonged to him now, and must do as he +wished, a faintness came over me, I trembled from head to foot and +made some effort to rise.</p> +<p>"Let me go," I said.</p> +<p>"Nonsense," he said, laughing and holding me to my seat. "You +bewitching little woman! You're only teasing me. How they love to +tease, these charming little women!"</p> +<p>The pupils of his eyes were glistening. I closed my own eyes in +order to avoid his look. At the next moment I felt his hand stray +down my body and in a fury of indignation I broke out of his arms +and leapt to my feet.</p> +<p>When I recovered my self-possession I was again looking out of +the window, and my husband, who was behind me, was saying in a tone +of anger and annoyance:</p> +<p>"What's the matter with you? I can't understand. What have I +done? Good heavens, we are man and wife, aren't we?"</p> +<p>I made no answer. My heart which had been hot with rage was +becoming cold with dread. It seemed to me that I had suffered an +outrage on my natural modesty as a human being, a sort of offence +against my dignity as a woman.</p> +<p>It was now dark. With my face to the window I could see nothing. +The rain was beating against the glass. The sea was booming on the +rocks. I wanted to fly, but I felt caged—morally and +physically caged.</p> +<p>My husband had lit a cigarette and was walking up and down the +sitting-room, apparently trying to think things out. After awhile +he approached me, out his hand on my shoulder and said:</p> +<p>"I see how it is. You're tired, and no wonder. You've had a long +and exhausting day. Better go to bed. We'll have to be up +early."</p> +<p>Glad to escape from his presence I allowed him to lead me to the +large bedroom. As I was crossing the threshold he told me to +undress and get into bed, and after that he said something about +waiting. Then he closed the door softly and I was alone.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>There was a fire in the bedroom and I sat down in front of it. +Many forces were warring within me. I was trying to fix my thoughts +and found it difficult to do so.</p> +<p>Some time passed. My husband's man came in with the noiseless +step of all such persons, opened one of the portmanteaux and laid +out his master's combs and brushes on the dressing table and his +sleeping suit on the bed. A maid of the hotel followed him, and +taking my own sleeping things out of the top tray of my trunk she +laid them out beside my husband's.</p> +<p>"Good-night, my lady," they said in their low voices as they +went out on tiptoe.</p> +<p>I hardly heard them. My mind, at first numb, was now going at +lightning speed. Brought face to face for the first time with one +of the greatest facts of a woman's life I was asking myself why I +had not reckoned with it before.</p> +<p>I had not even thought of it. My whole soul had been so much +occupied with one great spiritual issue—that I did not love +my husband (as I understood love), that my husband did not love +me—that I had never once plainly confronted, even in my own +mind, the physical fact that is the first condition of matrimony, +and nobody had mentioned it to me or even hinted at it.</p> +<p>I could not plead that I did not know of this condition. I was +young but I was not a child. I had been brought up in a convent, +but a convent is not a nursery. Then why had I not thought of +it?</p> +<p>While sitting before the fire, gathering together these dark +thoughts, I was in such fear that I was always conscious of my +husband's movements in the adjoining room. At one moment there was +the jingling of his glass against the decanter, at another moment +the smell of his cigarette smoke. From time to time he came to the +door and called to me in a sort of husky whisper, asking if I was +in bed.</p> +<p>"Don't keep me long, little girl."</p> +<p>I shuddered but made no reply.</p> +<p>At last he knocked softly and said he was coming in. I was still +crouching over the fire as he came up behind me.</p> +<p>"Not in bed yet?" he said. "Then I must put you to bed."</p> +<p>Before I could prevent him he had lifted me in his arms, +dragged me on to his knee and was pulling down my hair, laughing as +he did so, calling me by coarse endearing names and telling me not +to fight and struggle.</p> +<p>But the next thing I knew I was back in the sitting-room, where +I had switched up the lights, and my husband, whose face was +distorted by passion, was blazing out at me.</p> +<p>"What do you mean?" he said. "I'm your husband, am I not? You +are my wife, aren't you? What did you marry for? Good heavens, can +it be possible that you don't know what the conditions of matrimony +are? Is that what comes of being brought up in a convent? But has +your father allowed you to marry without. . . . And your +Aunt—what in God's name has the woman been doing?"</p> +<p>I crossed towards the smaller bedroom intending to enter it, but +my husband intercepted me.</p> +<p>"Don't be a fool," he said, catching at my wrist. "Think of the +servants. Think what they'd say. Think what the whole island would +say. Do you want to make a laughing stock of both of us?"</p> +<p>I returned and sat by the table. My husband lit another +cigarette. Nervously flicking the ends off with the index finger of +his left hand, and speaking quickly, as if the words scorched his +lips, he told me I was mistaken if I supposed that he wanted a +scene like this. He thought he could spend his time better. I was +equally mistaken if I imagined that he had desired our marriage at +all. Something quite different might have happened if he could have +afforded to please himself.</p> +<p>He had made sacrifices to marry me, too. Perhaps I had not +thought of that, but did I suppose a man of his class wanted a +person like my father for his father-in-law. And then my Aunt and +my cousins—ugh!</p> +<p>The Bishop, too! Was it nothing that a man had been compelled to +make all those ridiculous declarations? Children to be brought up +Catholics! Wife not to be influenced! Even to keep an open mind +himself to all the muss and mummery of the Church!</p> +<p>It wasn't over either. That seedy old "saint" was probably my +confessor. Did any rational man want another man to come between +him and his wife—knowing all he did and said, and everything +about him?</p> +<p>I was heart-sick as I listened to all this. Apparently the moral +of it was that if I had been allowed to marry without being +instructed in the first conditions of married life my husband had +suffered a gross and shocking injustice.</p> +<p>The disgust I felt was choking me. It was horribly humiliating +and degrading to see my marriage from my husband's point of view, +and when I remembered that I was bound fast to the man who talked +to me like this, and that he could claim rights in me, to-night, +to-morrow, as long as I lived, until death parted us, a wild +impulse of impotent anger at everybody and everything made me drop +my head on to the table and burst into tears.</p> +<p>My husband misunderstood this, as he misunderstood everything. +Taking my crying for the last remnant of my resistance he put his +arms round my shoulders again and renewed his fondling.</p> +<p>"Come, don't let us have any more conjugal scenes," he said. +"The people of the hotel will hear us presently, and there will be +all sorts of ridiculous rumours. If your family are rather common +people you are a different pair of shoes altogether."</p> +<p>He was laughing again, kissing my neck (in spite of my +shuddering) and saying:</p> +<p>"You really please me very much, you do indeed, and if they've +kept you in ignorance, what matter? Come now, my sweet little +woman, we'll soon repair that."</p> +<p>I could bear no more. I <i>must</i> speak and I did. Leaping up +and facing round on him I told him my side of the story—how I +had been married against my will, and had not wanted him any more +than he had wanted me; how all my objections had been overruled, +all my compunctions borne down; how everybody had been in a +conspiracy to compel me, and I had been bought and sold like a +slave.</p> +<p>"But you can't go any farther than that," I said. "Between you, +you have forced me to marry you, but nobody can force me to obey +you, because I won't."</p> +<p>I saw his face grow paler and paler as I spoke, and when I had +finished it was ashen-white.</p> +<p>"So that's how it is, is it?" he said, and for some minutes more +he tramped about the room, muttering inaudible words, as if trying +to account to himself for my conduct. At length he approached me +again and said, in the tone of one who thought he was making +peace:</p> +<p>"Look here, Mary. I think I understand you at last. You have +some other attachment—that's it, I suppose. Oh, don't think +I'm blaming you. I may be in the same case myself for all you know +to the contrary. But circumstances have been too strong for us and +here we are. Well, we're in it, and we've got to make the best of +it and why shouldn't we? Lots of people in my class are in the same +position, and yet they get along all right. Why can't we do the +same? I'll not be too particular. Neither will you. For the rest of +our lives let each of us go his and her own way. But that's no +reason why we should be strangers exactly. Not on our wedding-day +at all events. You're a damned pretty woman and I'm. . . . Well, +I'm not an ogre, I suppose. We are man and wife, too. So look here, +we won't expect too much affection from each other—but let's +stop this fooling and be good friends for a little while anyway. +Come, now."</p> +<p>Once more he took hold of me, as if to draw me back, kissing my +hands as he did so, but his gross misinterpretation of my +resistance and the immoral position he was putting me into were +stifling me, and I cried:</p> +<p>"No, I will not. Don't you see that I hate and loathe you?"</p> +<p>There could be no mistaking me this time. The truth had fallen +on my husband with a shock. I think it was the last thing his pride +had expected. His face became shockingly distorted. But after a +moment, recovering himself with a cruel laugh that made my hot +blood run cold, he said:</p> +<p>"Nevertheless, you shall do as I wish. You are my wife, and as +such you belong to me. The law allows me to compel you and I +will."</p> +<p>The words went shrieking through and through me. He was coming +towards me with outstretched arms, his teeth set, and his pupils +fixed. In the drunkenness of his rage he was laughing brutally.</p> +<p>But all my fear had left me. I felt an almost murderous impulse. +I wanted to strike him on the face.</p> +<p>"If you attempt to touch me I will throw myself out of the +window," I said.</p> +<p>"No fear of that," he said, catching me quickly in his arms.</p> +<p>"If you do not take your hands off me I'll shriek the house +down," I cried.</p> +<p>That was enough. He let me go and dropped back from me. At the +next moment I was breathing with a sense of freedom. Without +resistance on my husband's part I entered the little bedroom to the +left and locked the door behind me.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Some further time passed. I sat by the fireless grate with my +chin in my hand. If the storm outside was still raging I did not +hear it. I was listening to the confused sounds that came from the +sitting-room.</p> +<p>My husband was pacing to and fro, muttering oaths, knocking +against the furniture, breaking things. At one moment there was a +crash of glass, as if he had helped himself to brandy and then in +his ungovernable passion flung the decanter into the fire +grate.</p> +<p>Somebody knocked at the sitting-room. It must have been a +waiter, for through the wall I heard the muffled sound of a voice +asking if there had been an accident. My husband swore at the man +and sent him off. Hadn't he told him not to come until he was rung +for?</p> +<p>At length, after half an hour perhaps, my husband knocked at the +door of my little room.</p> +<p>"Are you there?" he asked.</p> +<p>I made no answer.</p> +<p>"Open the door."</p> +<p>I sat motionless.</p> +<p>"You needn't be afraid. I'm not going to do anything. I've +something to say."</p> +<p>Still I made no reply. My husband went away for a moment and +then came back.</p> +<p>"If you are determined not to open the door I must say what I've +got to say from here. Are you listening?"</p> +<p>Sitting painfully rigid I answered that I was.</p> +<p>Then he told me that what I was doing would entitle him to annul +our marriage—in the eyes of the Church at all events.</p> +<p>If he thought that threat would intimidate me he was +mistaken—a wave of secret joy coursed through me.</p> +<p>"It won't matter much to me—I'll take care it +won't—but it will be a degrading business for +you—invalidity and all that. Are you prepared for it?"</p> +<p>I continued to sit silent and motionless.</p> +<p>"I daresay we shall both be laughed at, but I cannot help that. +We can't possibly live together on terms like these."</p> +<p>Another wave of joy coursed through me.</p> +<p>"Anyhow I intend to know before I leave the island how things +are to be. I'm not going to take you away until I get some +satisfaction. You understand?"</p> +<p>I listened, almost without breathing, but I did not reply.</p> +<p>"I'm think of writing a letter to your father, and sending +Hobson with it in the car immediately. Do you hear me?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Well, you know what your father is. Unless I'm much mistaken +he's not a man to have much patience with your semi-romantic, +semi-religious sentiments. Are you quite satisfied?"</p> +<p>"Quite."</p> +<p>"Very well! That's what I'll do, then."</p> +<p>After this there was a period of quiet in which I assumed that +my husband was writing his letter. Then I heard a bell ring +somewhere in the corridor, and shortly afterwards there was a +second voice in the sitting-room, but I could not hear the words +that were spoken. I suppose it was Hobson's low voice, for after +another short interval of silence there came the thrum and throb of +a motor-car and the rumble of india-rubber wheels on the wet gravel +of the courtyard in front of the hotel.</p> +<p>Then my husband knocked at my door again.</p> +<p>"I've written that letter and Hobson is waiting to take it. Your +father will probably get it before he goes to bed. It will be a bad +break on the festivities he was preparing for the village people. +But you are still of the same mind, I suppose?"</p> +<p>I did not speak, but I rose and went over to the window. For +some reason difficult to explain, that reference to the festivities +had cut me to the quick.</p> +<p>My husband must have been fuming at my apparent indifference, +and I felt as if I could see him looking at me, passionate and +proud.</p> +<p>"Between the lot of you I think you've done me a great +injustice. Have you nothing to say?"</p> +<p>Even then I did not answer.</p> +<p>"All right! As you please."</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards I heard the motor-car turning and +driving away.</p> +<p>The wind had fallen, the waves were rolling into the harbour +with that monotonous moan which is the sea's memory of a storm, and +a full moon, like a white-robed queen, was riding through a +troubled sky.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The moon had died out; a new day had dawned; the sea was lying +as quiet as a sleeping child; far out on the level horizon the sky +was crimsoning before the rising sun, and clouds of white sea-gulls +were swirling and jabbering above the rocks in the harbour below +the house before I lay down to sleep.</p> +<p>I was awakened by a hurried knocking at my door, and by an +impatient voice crying:</p> +<p>"Mary! Mary! Get up! Let me in!"</p> +<p>It was Aunt Bridget who had arrived in my husband's automobile. +When I opened the door to her she came sailing into the room with +her new half-moon bonnet a little awry, as if she had put it on +hurriedly in the dim light of early morning, and, looking at me +with her cold grey eyes behind their gold-rimmed spectacles, she +began to bombard me with mingled ridicule and indignant +protest.</p> +<p>"Goodness me, girl, what's all this fuss about? You little +simpleton, tell me what has happened!"</p> +<p>She was laughing. I had hardly ever heard Aunt Bridget laugh +before. But her vexation soon got the better of her merriment.</p> +<p>"His lordship's letter arrived in the middle of the night and +nearly frightened us out of our senses. Your father was for coming +away straight, and it would have been worse for you if he had. But +I said: 'No, this is work for a woman, I'll go,' and here I am. And +now tell me, what in the name of goodness does this ridiculous +trouble mean?"</p> +<p>It was hard to say anything on such a subject under such +circumstances, especially when so challenged, but Aunt Bridget, +without waiting for my reply, proceeded to indicate the substance +of my husband's letter.</p> +<p>From this I gathered that he had chosen (probably to save his +pride) to set down my resistance to ignorance of the first +conditions of matrimony, and had charged my father first and Aunt +Bridget afterwards with doing him a shocking injustice in +permitting me to be married to him without telling me what every +girl who becomes a wife ought to know.</p> +<p>"But, good gracious," said my Aunt Bridget, "who would have +imagined you <i>didn't</i> know. I thought every girl in the world +knew before she put up her hair and came out of short frocks. My +Betsy did, I'm sure of that. And to think that you—you whom +we thought so cute, so cunning. . . . Mary O'Neill, I'm ashamed of +you. I really, really am! Why, you goose" (Aunt Bridget was again +trying to laugh), "how did you suppose the world went on?"</p> +<p>The coarse ridicule of what was supposed to be my maidenly +modesty cut me like a knife, but I could not permit myself to +explain, so my Aunt Bridget ran on talking.</p> +<p>"I see how it has been. It's the fault of that Reverend Mother +at the convent. What sort of a woman is she? Is she a woman at all, +I wonder, or only a piece of stucco that ought to be put up in a +church corner! To think she could have you nine years and never say +one word about. . . . Well, well! What has she been doing with you? +Talking about the mysteries, I suppose—prayers and retreats +and novenas, and the spiritual bridegroom and the rest of it, while +all the while. . . . But you must put the convent out of your head, +my girl. You are a married woman now. You've got to think of your +husband, and a husband isn't a spiritual bridegroom I can tell you. +He's flesh and blood, that's what a husband is, and you can't +expect <i>him</i> to spend his time talking about eternity and the +rosary. Not on his wedding-day, anyway."</p> +<p>I was hot in my absurd embarrassment, and I dare say my face was +scarlet, but Aunt Bridget showed me no mercy.</p> +<p>"The way you have behaved is too silly for anything. . . . It +really is. A husband's a husband, and a wife's a wife. The wife has +to obey her husband. Of course she has. Every wife has to. Some +don't like it. I can't say that I liked it very much myself. But to +think of anybody objecting. Why, it's shocking! Nobody ever heard +of such a thing."</p> +<p>I must have flushed up to my forehead, for I became conscious +that in my Aunt Bridget's eyes there had been a kind of indecency +in my conduct.</p> +<p>"But, come," she said, "we must be sensible. It's timidity, +that's what it is. I was a little timid myself when I was first +married, but I soon got over it. Once get over your timidity and +you will be all right. Sakes alive, yes, you'll be as happy as the +day is long, and before this time to-morrow you'll wonder what on +earth you made all this fuss about."</p> +<p>I tried to say that what she predicted could never be, because I +did not love my husband, and therefore . . . but my Aunt Bridget +broke in on me, saying:</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, don't be a fool. Your maiden days are over now, +and you ought to know what your husband will do if you +persist."</p> +<p>I jumped at the thought that she meant he would annul our +marriage, but that was not what she was thinking of.</p> +<p>"He'll find somebody else—that's what he'll do. Serve you +right, too. You'll only have yourself to blame for it. Perhaps you +think you'll be able to do the same, but you won't. Women can't. +He'll be happy enough, and you'll be the only one to suffer, so +don't make a fool of yourself. Accept the situation. You may not +like your husband too much. I can't say I liked the Colonel +particularly. He took snuff, and no woman in the world could keep +him in clean pocket handkerchiefs. But when a sensible person has +got something at stake, she puts up with things. And that's what +you must do. He who wants fresh eggs must raise his own chickens, +you know."</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget ran on for some time longer, telling me of my +father's anger, which was not a matter for much surprise, seeing +how he had built himself upon my marriage, and how he had expected +that I should have a child, a son, to carry on the family.</p> +<p>"Do you mean to disappoint him after all he has done for you? It +would be too silly, too stupid. You'd be the laughing-stock of the +whole island. So get up and get dressed and be ready and willing to +go with his lordship when he sails by this afternoon's +steamer."</p> +<p>"I can't," I said.</p> +<p>"You can't? You mean you won't?"</p> +<p>"Very well, Auntie, I won't."</p> +<p>At that Aunt Bridget stormed at me for several minutes, telling +me that if my stubborn determination not to leave the island with +my husband meant that I intended to return home she might inform me +at once that I was not wanted there and I need not come.</p> +<p>"I've enough on my hands in that house already, what with Betsy +unmarried, and your father doing nothing for her, and that nasty +Nessy MacLeod making up to him. You ungrateful minx! You are +ruining everything! After all I've done for you too! But no matter! +If you <i>will</i> make your bed I shall take care that you lie on +it."</p> +<p>With that, and the peak of her half-moon bonnet almost dancing +over her angry face, Aunt Bridget flounced out of my room.</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards, when I went into the sitting-room, I +found my father's advocate, Mr. Curphy, waiting for me. He looked +down at me with an indulgent and significant smile, which brought +the colour rushing back to my face, put me to sit by his side, +touched my arm with one of his large white clammy hands, stroked +his long brown beard with the other, and then in the half-reproving +tone which a Sunday-school teacher might have used to a wayward +child, he began to tell me what the consequences would be if I +persisted in my present conduct.</p> +<p>They would be serious. The law was very clear on marital rights. +If a wife refused to live with her husband, except on a plea of +cruelty or something equally plausible, he could apply to the court +and compel her to do so; and if she declined, if she removed +herself from his abode, or having removed, refused to return, the +Court might punish her—it might even imprison her.</p> +<p>"So you see, the man is the top dog in a case like this, my +dear, and he can compel the woman to obey him."</p> +<p>"Do you mean," I said, "that he can use force to compel +her?"</p> +<p>"Reasonable force, yes. I think that's so. And quite right, too, +when you come to think of it. The woman has entered into a serious +contract, and it is the duty of the law to see that she fulfills +the conditions of it."</p> +<p>I remembered how little I had known of the conditions of the +contract I had entered into, but I was too heart-sick and ashamed +to say anything about that.</p> +<p>"Aw yes, that's so," said the advocate, "force, reasonable +force! You may say it puts a woman in a worse position as a wife +than she would be if she were a mistress. That's true, but it's the +law, and once a woman has married a man, the only escape from this +condition of submission is imprisonment."</p> +<p>"Then I would rather that—a thousand times rather," I +said, for I was hot with anger and indignation.</p> +<p>Again the advocate smiled indulgently, patted my arm, and +answered me as if I were a child.</p> +<p>"Tut, tut, my dear, tut, tut! You've made a marriage that is +founded on suitability of position, property and education, and +everything will come right by and by. Don't act on a fit of pique +or spleen, and so destroy your happiness, and that of everybody +about you. Think of your father. Remember what he has done to make +this marriage. I may tell you that he has paid forty thousand +pounds to discharge your husband's debts and undertaken +responsibility for an allowance of six thousand a year beside. Do +you want him to lose all that money?"</p> +<p>I was so sick with disgust at hearing this that I could not +speak, and the advocate, who, in his different way, was as dead to +my real feelings as my husband had been, went on to say:</p> +<p>"Come, be reasonable. You may have suffered some slight, some +indignity. No doubt you have. Your husband is proud and he has +peculiarities of temper which we have all to make allowances for. +But even if you could establish a charge of cruelty against him and +so secure a separation—which you can't—what good would +that do you? None at all—worse than none! The financial +arrangements would remain the same. Your father would be a +frightful loser. And what would you be? A married widow! The worst +condition in the world for a woman—especially if she is young +and attractive, and subject to temptations. Ask anybody who +knows—anybody."</p> +<p>I felt as if I would suffocate with shame.</p> +<p>"Come now," said the advocate in his superior way, taking my +hand as if he were going to lead me like a child to my husband, +"let us put an end to this little trouble. His lordship is +downstairs and he has consented—kindly and generously +consented—to wait an hour for your answer. But he must leave +the island by the afternoon steamer, and if. . . ."</p> +<p>"Then tell him he must leave it without me," I said, as well as +I could for the anger that was choking me.</p> +<p>The advocate looked steadily into my face. I think he understood +the situation at last.</p> +<p>"You mean that—really and truly mean it?" he asked.</p> +<p>"I do," I answered, and unable to say or hear any more without +breaking out on him altogether I left the room.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THIRTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"THIRTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>THIRTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Down to this moment I had put on a brave front though my very +heart had been trembling; but now I felt that all the weight of +law, custom, parental authority and even religion was bearing me +down, down, down, and unless help came I must submit in the long +run.</p> +<p>I was back in the small bedroom, with my hot forehead against +the cold glass of the window, looking out yet seeing nothing, when +somebody knocked at the door, softly almost timidly. It was Father +Dan, and the sight of his dear face, broken up with emotion, was +the same to me as the last plank of a foundering ship to a sailor +drowning at sea.</p> +<p>My heart was so full that, though I knew I ought not, I threw my +arms about his neck and burst into a flood of tears. The good old +priest did not put me away. He smoothed my drooping head and patted +my shoulders and in his sweet and simple way he tried to comfort +me.</p> +<p>"Don't cry! Don't worry! It will be all right in the end, my +child."</p> +<p>There was something almost grotesque in his appearance. Under +his soft clerical outdoor hat he was wearing his faded old cassock, +as if he had come away hurriedly at a sudden call. I could see what +had happened—my family had sent him to reprove me and +remonstrate with me.</p> +<p>He sat on a chair by my bed and I knelt on the floor at his +feet, just as my mother used to do when I was a child and she was +making her confession. Perhaps he thought of that at the same +moment as myself, for the golden light of my mother's memory lay +always about him. For some moments we did not speak. I think we +were both weeping.</p> +<p>At length I tried to tell him what had happened—hiding +nothing, softening nothing, speaking the simple and naked truth. I +found it impossible to do so. My odd-sounding voice was not like my +own, and even my words seemed to be somebody else's. But Father Dan +understood everything.</p> +<p>"I know! I know!" he said, and then, to my great relief, +interrupting my halting explanations, he gave his own +interpretation of my husband's letter.</p> +<p>There was a higher love and there was a lower love and both were +necessary to God's plans and purposes. But the higher love must +come first, or else the lower one would seem to be cruel and gross +and against nature.</p> +<p>Nature was kind to a young girl. Left to itself it awakened her +sex very gently. First with love, which came to her like a whisper +in a dream, like the touch of an angel on her sleeping eyelids, so +that when she awoke to the laws of life the mysteries of sex did +not startle or appal her.</p> +<p>But sex in me had been awakened rudely and ruthlessly. Married +without love I had been suddenly confronted by the lower passion. +What wonder that I had found it brutal and barbarous?</p> +<p>"That's it, my child! That's it! I know! I know!"</p> +<p>Then he began to blame himself for everything, saying it was all +his fault and that he should have held out longer. When he saw how +things stood between me and my husband he should have said to my +father, to the Bishop, and to the lawyers, notwithstanding all +their bargainings: "This marriage must not go on. It will lead to +disaster. It begins to end badly."</p> +<p>"But now it is all over, my child, and there's no help for +it."</p> +<p>I think the real strength of my resistance to Aunt Bridget's +coarse ridicule and the advocate's callous remonstrance must have +been the memory of my husband's threat when he talked about the +possible annulment of our marriage. The thought of that came back +to me now, and half afraid, half ashamed, with a fluttering of the +heart, I tried to mention it.</p> +<p>"Is there no way out?" I asked.</p> +<p>"What way can there be?" said Father Dan. "God knows I know what +pressure was put upon you; but you are married, you have made your +vows, you have given your promises. That's all the world sees or +cares about, and in the eyes of the law and the Church you are +responsible for all that has happened."</p> +<p>With my head still buried in Father Dan's cassock I got it out +at last.</p> +<p>"But annulment! Isn't that possible—under the +circumstances?" I asked.</p> +<p>The good old priest seemed to be too confused to speak for a +moment. Then he explained that what I hoped for was quite out of +the question.</p> +<p>"I don't say that in the history of the Church marriages have +not been annulled on equally uncertain grounds, but in this case +the civil law would require proof—something to justify +nullity. Failing that there would have to be collusion either on +one side or both, and that is not possible—not to you, my +child, not to the daughter of your mother, that dear saint who +suffered so long and was silent."</p> +<p>More than ever now I felt like a ship-broken man with the last +plank sinking under him. The cold mysterious dread of my husband +was creeping back, and the future of my life with him stood before +me with startling vividness. In spite of all my struggling and +fighting of the night before I saw myself that very night, the next +night, and the next, and every night and day of my life thereafter, +a victim of the same sickening terror.</p> +<p>"Must I submit, then?" I said.</p> +<p>Father Dan smoothed my head and told me in his soft voice that +submission was the lot of all women. It always had been so in the +history of the world, and perhaps it always would be.</p> +<p>"Remember the Epistle we read in church yesterday morning: +'Wives submit yourselves to your husbands.'"</p> +<p>With a choking sensation in my throat I asked if he thought I +ought to go away with my husband when he left the island by the +afternoon steamer.</p> +<p>"I see no escape from it, my poor child. They sent me to reprove +you. I can't do that, but neither can I encourage you to resist. It +would be wrong. It would be cruel. It would only lead you into +further trouble."</p> +<p>My mouth felt parched, but I contrived to say:</p> +<p>"Then you can hold out no hope for me?"</p> +<p>"God knows I can't."</p> +<p>"Although I do not love this man I must live with him as his +wife?"</p> +<p>"It is hard, very hard, but there seems to be no help for +it."</p> +<p>I rose to my feet, and went back to the window. A wild impulse +of rebellion was coming over me.</p> +<p>"I shall feel like a bad woman," I said.</p> +<p>"Don't say that," said Father Dan. "You are married to the man +anyway."</p> +<p>"All the same I shall feel like my husband's mistress—his +married mistress, his harlot."</p> +<p>Father Dan was shocked, and the moment the words were out of my +mouth I was more frightened than I had ever been before, for +something within seemed to have forced them out of me.</p> +<p>When I recovered possession of my senses Father Dan, nervously +fumbling with the silver cross that hung over his cassock, was +talking of the supernatural effect of the sacrament of marriage. It +was God Who joined people together, and whom God joined together no +man might put asunder. No circumstances either, no trial or +tribulation. Could it be thought that a bond so sacred, so +indissoluble, was ever made without good effect? No, the Almighty +had His own ways with His children, and this great mystery of holy +wedlock was one of them.</p> +<p>"So don't lose heart, my child. Who knows what may happen yet? +God works miracles now just as He did in the old days. You may come +. . . yes, you may come to love your husband, and then—then +all will be well."</p> +<p>Suddenly out of my despair and my defiance a new thought came to +me. It came with the memory of the emotion I had experienced during +the marriage service, and it thrilled me through and through.</p> +<p>"Father Dan?" I said, with a nervous cry, for my heart was +fluttering again.</p> +<p>"What is it, my child?"</p> +<p>It was hard to say what I was thinking about, but with a great +effort I stammered it out at last. I should be willing to leave the +island with my husband, and live under the same roof with him, and +bear his name, so that there might be no trouble, or scandal, and +nobody except ourselves might ever know that there was anything +dividing us, any difference of any kind between us, if he, on his +part, would promise—firmly and faithfully promise—that +unless and until I came to love him he would never claim my +submission as a wife.</p> +<p>While I spoke I hardly dared to look at Father Dan, fearing he +would shake his head again, perhaps reprove me, perhaps laugh at +me. But his eyes which had been moist began to sparkle and +smile.</p> +<p>"You mean that?" he asked.</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"And you will go away with him on that condition?"</p> +<p>"Yes, yes."</p> +<p>"Then he must agree to it."</p> +<p>The pure-minded old priest saw no difficulties, no dangers, no +risks of breakdown in my girlish scheme. Already my husband had got +all he had bargained for. He had got my father's money in exchange +for his noble name, and if he wanted more, if he wanted the love of +his wife, let him earn it, let him win it.</p> +<p>"That's only right, only fair. It will be worth winning, +too—better worth winning than all your father's gold and +silver ten times over. I can tell him that much anyway."</p> +<p>He had risen to his feet in his excitement, the simple old +priest with his pure heart and his beautiful faith in me.</p> +<p>"And you, my child, you'll try to love him in +return—promise you will."</p> +<p>A shiver ran through me when Father Dan said that—a sense +of the repugnance I felt for my husband almost stifled me.</p> +<p>"Promise me," said Father Dan, and though my face must have been +scarlet, I promised him.</p> +<p>"That's right. That alone will make him a better man. He may be +all that people say, but who can measure the miraculous influence +of a good woman?"</p> +<p>He was making for the door.</p> +<p>"I must go downstairs now and speak to your husband. But he'll +agree. Why shouldn't he? I know he's afraid of a public scandal, +and if he attempts to refuse I'll tell him that. . . . But no, that +will be quite unnecessary. Good-bye, my child! If I don't come back +you'll know that everything has been settled satisfactorily. You'll +be happy yet. I'm sure you will. Ah, what did I say about the +mysterious power of that solemn and sacred sacrament? +Good-bye!"</p> +<p>I meant what I had said. I meant to do what I had promised. God +knows I did. But does a woman ever know her own heart? Or is heaven +alone the judge of it?</p> +<p>At four o'clock that afternoon my husband left Ellan for +England. I went with him.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTIETH_CHAPTER" id="FORTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTIETH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Having made my bargain I set myself to fulfil the conditions of +it. I had faithfully promised to try to love my husband and I +prepared to do so.</p> +<p>Did not love require that a wife should look up to and respect +and even reverence the man she had married? I made up my mind to do +that by shutting my eyes to my husband's obvious faults and seeing +only his better qualities.</p> +<p>What disappointments were in store for me! What crushing and +humiliating disillusionments!</p> +<p>On the night of our arrival in London we put up at a fashionable +hotel in a quiet but well-known part of the West-end, which is +inhabited chiefly by consulting physicians and celebrated surgeons. +Here, to my surprise, we were immediately discovered, and lines of +visitors waited upon my husband the following morning.</p> +<p>I thought they were his friends, and a ridiculous little spurt +of pride came to me from heaven knows where with the idea that my +husband must be a man of some importance in the metropolis.</p> +<p>But I discovered they were his creditors, money-lenders and +bookmakers, to whom he owed debts of "honour" which he had been +unable or unwilling to disclose to my father and his advocate.</p> +<p>One of my husband's visitors was a pertinacious little man who +came early and stayed late. He was a solicitor, and my husband was +obviously in some fear of him. The interviews between them, while +they were closeted together morning after morning in one of our two +sitting-rooms, were long and apparently unpleasant, for more than +once I caught the sound of angry words on both sides, with oaths +and heavy blows upon the table.</p> +<p>But towards the end of the week, my husband's lawyer arrived in +London, and after that the conversations became more pacific.</p> +<p>One morning, as I sat writing a letter in the adjoining room, I +heard laughter, the popping of corks, the jingling of glasses, and +the drinking of healths, and I judged that the, difficult and +disagreeable business had been concluded.</p> +<p>At the close of the interview I heard the door opened and my +husband going into the outer corridor to see his visitors to the +lift, and then something prompted me—God alone knows +what—to step into the room they had just vacated.</p> +<p>It was thick with tobacco smoke. An empty bottle of champagne +(with three empty wine glasses) was on the table, and on a desk by +the window were various papers, including a sheet of foolscap which +bore a seal and several signatures, and a thick packet of old +letters bound together with a piece of purple ribbon.</p> +<p>Hardly had I had time to recognise these documents when my +husband returned to the room, and by the dark expression of his +face I saw instantly that he thought I had looked at them.</p> +<p>"No matter!" he said, without any preamble. "I might as well +tell you at once and have done with it."</p> +<p>He told me. The letters were his. They had been written to a +woman whom he had promised to marry, and he had had to buy them +back from her. Although for three years he had spent a fortune on +the creature she had shown him no mercy. Through her solicitor, who +was a scoundrel, she had threatened him, saying in plain words that +if he married anybody else she would take proceedings against him +immediately. That was why, in spite of the storm, we had to come up +to London on the day after our wedding.</p> +<p>"Now you know," said my husband. "Look here" (holding out the +sheet of foolscap), "five thousand pounds—that's the price +I've had to pay for marrying."</p> +<p>I can give no idea of the proud imperiousness and the impression +of injury with which my husband told his brutal story. But neither +can I convey a sense of the crushing shame with which I listened to +it. There was not a hint of any consciousness on his part of my +side of the case. Not a suggestion of the clear fact that the woman +he had promised to marry had been paid off by money which had come +through me. Not a thought of the humiliation he had imposed upon +his wife in dragging her up to London at the demand of his cast-off +mistress.</p> +<p>When my husband had finished speaking I could not utter a word. +I was afraid that my voice would betray the anger that was boiling +in me. But I was also degraded to the very dust in my own eyes, and +to prevent an outburst of hysterical tears I ran back to my room +and hid my face in my pillow.</p> +<p>What was the good of trying to make myself in love with a man +who was separated from me by a moral chasm that could never be +passed? What was the good? What was the good?</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>But next morning, having had time to think things out in my +simple and ignorant way, I tried to reconcile myself to my +position. Remembering what Aunt Bridget had said, both before my +marriage and after it, about the different moralities of men and +women, I told myself I had placed my standard too high.</p> +<p>Perhaps a husband was not a superior being, to be regarded with +respect and reverence, but a sort of grown-up child whom it was the +duty of a wife to comfort, coax, submit to and serve.</p> +<p>I determined to do this. Still clinging to the hope of falling +in love with my husband, I set myself to please him by every means +within my power, even to the length of simulating sentiments which +I did not feel.</p> +<p>But what a task I was setting myself! What a steep and stony +Calvary I was attempting to climb!</p> +<p>After the degrading business with the other woman had been +concluded I thought we should have left England immediately on the +honeymoon tour which my husband had mapped out for us, but he told +me that would not be convenient and we must remain in London a +little longer. We stayed six weeks altogether, and never did a +young wife pass a more cheerless and weary time.</p> +<p>I had no friends of my own within reach, and to my deep if +secret mortification no woman of my husband's circle called upon +me. But a few of his male friends were constantly with us, +including Mr. Eastcliff, who had speedily followed us from Ellan, +and a Mr. Vivian, who, though the brother of a Cabinet Minister, +seemed to me a very vain and vapid person, with the eyes of a mole, +a vacant smile, a stupid expression, an abrupt way of speaking +through his teeth, and a shrill voice which gave the impression of +screeching against the wind.</p> +<p>With these two men, and others of a similar kind, we passed many +hours of nearly every day, lunching with them, dining with them, +walking with them, driving with them, and above all playing bridge +with them in one of our sitting rooms in the hotel.</p> +<p>I knew nothing of the game to begin with, never having touched a +card in my life, but in accordance with the theories which I +believed to be right and the duties I had imposed upon myself, I +took a hand with my husband when he could find nobody better to be +his partner.</p> +<p>The results were very disheartening. In spite of my desire to +please I was slow to learn, and my husband's impatience with my +mistakes, which confused and intimidated me, led to some painful +humiliations. First he laughed, next he sneered, then he snapped me +up in the midst of my explanations and apologies, and finally, at a +moment of loss, he broke out on me with brutal derision, saying he +had never had much opinion of my intellect, but was now quite sure +that I had no more brains than a rabbit and could not say Boo to a +goose.</p> +<p>One day when we were alone, and he was lying on the couch with +his vicious little terrier by his side, I offered to sing to him. +Remembering how my voice had been praised, I thought it would be +pleasant to my husband to see that there was something I really +could do. But nine years in a convent had left me with next to no +music but memories of the long-breathed harmonies of some of the +beautiful masses of our Church, and hardly had I begun on these +when my husband cried:</p> +<p>"Oh, stop, stop, for heaven's sake stop, or I shall think we're +attending a funeral."</p> +<p>Another day I offered to read to him. The Reverend Mother used +to say I was the best reader she had ever heard, but perhaps it was +not altogether my husband's fault if he formed a different opinion. +And indeed I cannot but think that the holy saints themselves would +have laughed if they had heard me reading aloud, in the voice and +intonation which I had assumed for the meditations of St. Francis +of Assisi, the mystic allusions to "certs," and "bookies," and +"punters," and "evens," and "scratchings," which formed the +substance of the sporting journals that were my husband's only +literature.</p> +<p>"Oh, stop it, stop it," he cried again. "You read the 'Winning +Post' as if it were the Book of Revelation."</p> +<p>As time passed the gulf that separated me from my husband became +still greater. If I could have entertained him with any kind of +gossip we might have got on better. But I had no conversation that +interested him, and he had little or none that I could pretend to +understand. He loved the town; I loved the country; he loved the +night and the blaze of electric lights; I loved the morning and the +sweetness of the sun.</p> +<p>At the bottom of my heart I knew that his mind was common, low +and narrow, and that his tastes were gross and vulgar, but I was +determined to conquer the repulsion I felt for him.</p> +<p>It was impossible. If I could have struck one spark from the +flint of his heart the relations between us might have been +different. If his look could have met my look in a single glance of +understanding I could have borne with his impatience and struggled +on.</p> +<p>But nothing of this kind ever happened, and when one dreary +night after grumbling at the servants, cursing his fate and abusing +everybody and everything, he put on his hat and went out saying he +had "better have married Lena [the other woman] after all," for in +that case he would have had "some sort of society anyway," the +revulsion I had felt on the night of my marriage came sweeping over +me like a wave of the sea, and I asked myself again, "What's the +good? What's the good?"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Nevertheless next day I found myself taking my husband's side +against myself.</p> +<p>If he had sacrificed anything in order to marry me it was my +duty to make it up to him.</p> +<p>I resolved that I <i>should</i> make it up to him. I would study +my husband's likes and dislikes in every little thing. I would +share in his pleasures and enter into his life. I would show him +that a wife was something other and better than any hired woman in +the world, and that when she cast in her lot with her husband it +was for his own sake only and not for any fortune he could spend on +her.</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, that's what I'll do," I thought, and I became more +solicitous of my husband's happiness than if I had really and truly +loved him.</p> +<p>A woman would smile at the efforts which I made in my +inexperience to make my husband forget his cast-off mistress, and +indeed some of them were very childish.</p> +<p>The first was a ridiculous failure.</p> +<p>My husband's birthday was approaching and I wished to make him a +present. It was difficult to know what to select, for I knew little +or nothing of his tastes or wants; but walking one day in a street +off Oxford Street I saw, in the window of a shop for the sale of +objects of ecclesiastical <i>vertu</i>, among crosses and +crucifixes and rosaries, a little ivory ink-stand and paper-holder, +which was surmounted by a figure of the Virgin.</p> +<p>I cannot for the life of me conceive why I thought this would be +a suitable present for my husband, except that the face of Our Lady +was so young, so sweet, so beautiful, and so exquisitely feminine +that it seemed impossible that any man in the world should not love +her. But however that might be I bought her, and carrying her home +in a cab, I set her on my husband's desk without a word, and then +stood by, like the mother of Moses, to watch the result.</p> +<p>There was no result—at first at all events. My husband was +several hours in the room with my treasure without appearing to be +aware of its presence. But towards evening his two principal +friends came to play bridge with him, and then, from the ambush of +my own apartments, I heard the screechy voice of Mr. Vivian +saying:</p> +<p>"Dash it all, Jimmy, you don't say you're going to be a +Pape?"</p> +<p>"Don't fret yourself, old fellow," replied my husband. "That's +my wife's little flutter. Dare say the poor fool has had to promise +her priest to make me a 'vert.'"</p> +<p>My next experiment was perhaps equally childish but certainly +more successful.</p> +<p>Seeing that my husband was fond of flowers, and was rarely +without a rose in his buttonhole, I conceived the idea of filling +his room with them in honour of his birthday. With this view I got +up very early, before anybody in the hotel was stirring, and +hurried off to Covent Garden, through the empty and echoing +streets, while the air of London was fresh with the breath of +morning and the big city within its high-built walls seemed to +dream of the green fields beyond.</p> +<p>I arrived at the busy and noisy square just as the waggons were +rolling in from the country with huge crates of red and white +roses, bright with the sunshine and sparkling with the dew. Then +buying the largest and loveliest and costliest bunch of them (a +great armful, as much as I could hold), I hurried back to the hotel +and set them in vases and glasses in every part of my husband's +room—his desk, his sideboard, his mantelpiece, and above all +his table, which a waiter was laying for breakfast—until the +whole place was like a bridal bower.</p> +<p>"Ah, this is something like," I heard my husband say as he came +out of his bedroom an hour or two afterwards with his vicious +terrier at his heels.</p> +<p>I heard no more until he had finished breakfast, and then, while +drawing on his gloves for his morning walk, he said to the waiter, +who was clearing the table,</p> +<p>"Tell your Manageress I am much obliged to her for the charming +flowers with which she has decorated my room this morning."</p> +<p>"But it wasn't the manageress, my lord," said the waiter.</p> +<p>"Then who was it?"</p> +<p>"It was her . . . her ladyship," said the waiter.</p> +<p>"O-oh!" said my husband in a softer, if more insinuating tone, +and a few minutes afterwards he went out whistling.</p> +<p>God knows that was small reward for the trouble I had taken, but +I was so uplifted by the success of my experiment that I determined +to go farther, and when towards evening of the same day a group of +my husband's friends came to tell him that they had booked a box at +a well-known musical comedy theatre, I begged to be permitted to +join them.</p> +<p>"Nonsense, my dear! Brompton Oratory would suit you better," +said my husband, chucking me under the chin.</p> +<p>But I persisted in my importunities, and at length Mr. Eastcliff +said:</p> +<p>"Let her come. Why shouldn't she?"</p> +<p>"Very well," said my husband, pinching my cheek. "As you please. +But if you don't like it don't blame <i>me</i>."</p> +<p>It did not escape me that as a result of my change of front my +husband had risen in his own esteem, and that he was behaving +towards me as one who thought he had conquered my first repugnance, +or perhaps triumphantly ridden over it. But in my simplicity I was +so fixed in my determination to make my husband forget the loss of +his mistress that I had no fear of his familiarities and no +misgivings about his mistakes.</p> +<p>All that was to come later, with a fresh access of revulsion and +disgust.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I had seen enough of London by this time to know that the +dresses which had been made for me at home were by no means the +<i>mode</i>; but after I had put on the best-fitting of my simple +quaker-like costumes with a string of the family pearls about my +neck and another about my head, not all the teaching of the good +women of the convent could prevent me from thinking that my husband +and his friends would have no reason to be ashamed of me.</p> +<p>We were a party of six in all, whereof I was the only woman, and +we occupied a large box on the first tier near the stage, a +position of prominence which caused me a certain embarrassment, +when, as happened at one moment of indefinable misery, the opera +glasses of the people in the dress-circle and stalls were turned in +our direction.</p> +<p>I cannot say that the theatre impressed me. Certainly the +building itself did not do so, although it was beautifully +decorated in white and gold, for I had seen the churches of Rome, +and in my eyes they were much more gorgeous.</p> +<p>Neither did the audience impress me, for though I had never +before seen so many well-dressed people in one place, I thought too +many of the men, when past middle life, seemed fat and overfed, and +too many of the women, with their plump arms and bare shoulders, +looked as if they thought of nothing but what to eat and what to +put on.</p> +<p>Nor did the performers impress me, for though when the curtain +rose, disclosing the stage full of people, chiefly girls, in +delicate and beautiful toilettes, I thought I had never before seen +so many lovely and happy faces, after a while, when the faces fell +into repose, I thought they were not really lovely and not really +happy, but hard and strained and painful, as if life had been very +cruel.</p> +<p>And, above all, I was not impressed by the play, for I thought, +in my ignorance of such productions, that I had never heard +anything so frivolous and foolish, and more than once I found +myself wondering whether my good nuns, if they could have been +present, would not have concluded that the whole company had taken +leave of their senses.</p> +<p>There was, however, one thing which did impress me, and that was +the leading actor. It was a woman, and when she first came on to +the stage I thought I had never in my life seen anybody so +beautiful, with her lovely soft round figure, her black eyes, her +red lips, her pearly white teeth, and a smile so sunny that it had +the effect of making everybody in the audience smile with her.</p> +<p>But the strange thing was—I could not account for +it—that after a few minutes I thought her extremely ugly and +repellent, for her face seemed to be distorted by malice and envy +and hatred and nearly every other bad passion.</p> +<p>Nevertheless she was a general favourite, for not only was she +applauded before she did anything, but everything she said, though +it was sometimes very silly, was accompanied by a great deal of +laughter, and everything she sang, though her voice was no great +matter, was followed by a chorus of applause.</p> +<p>Seeing this, and feeling that her appearance had caused a +flutter of interest in the box behind me, I laughed and applauded +also, in accordance with the plan I had prepared for myself, of +sharing my husband's pleasures and entering into his life, although +at the bottom of my heart I really thought the joy was not very +joyful or the mirth very merry.</p> +<p>This went on for nearly an hour, and then a strange thing +happened. I was leaning forward on the velvet barrier of the box in +front of me, laughing and clapping my hands with the rest, when all +at once I became aware that the lady had wheeled about, and, +walking down the stage in the direction of our box, was looking +boldly back at me.</p> +<p>I could not at first believe it to be so, and even now I cannot +say whether it was something in her face, or something whispered at +my back which flashed it upon my mind that this was the woman my +husband ought to have married, the woman whose place I had taken, +the woman of the foolscap document and the letters in the purple +ribbon.</p> +<p>After that I could play my poor little part no longer, and +though I continued to lean on the yellow velvet of the barrier in +front of me I dropped my eyes as often as that woman was on the +stage, and hoped and prayed for the end of the performance.</p> +<p>It came at length with a crash of instruments and voices, and a +few minutes afterwards my husband and I were in the cab on our way +back to the hotel.</p> +<p>I was choking with mingled anger and shame—anger at my +husband for permitting me to come to a place in which I could be +exposed to a public affront from his cast-off mistress, shame at +the memory of the pitiful scheme for entering into his life which +had fallen to such a welter of wreck and ruin.</p> +<p>But my husband himself was only choking with laughter.</p> +<p>"It was as good as a play," he said. "Upon my soul it was! I +never saw anything funnier in the whole course of my life."</p> +<p>That served him, repeated again and again, until we reached the +hotel, when he ordered a bottle of wine to be sent upstairs, and +then shook with suppressed laughter as we went up in the lift.</p> +<p>Coming to our floor I turned towards my bedroom, wishing to be +alone with my outraged feelings, but my husband drew me into one of +our sitting-rooms, telling me he had something to say.</p> +<p>He put me to sit in an arm-chair, threw off his overcoat, lit a +cigarette, as well as he could for the spurts and gusts of his +laughter, and then, standing back to the fire-place, with one hand +in his pocket and his coat-tail over his arm, he told me the cause +of his merriment.</p> +<p>"I don't mind telling you that was Lena," he said. "The +good-looking girl in the scarlet dress and the big diamonds. She +spotted me the moment she stepped on to the stage. Must have +guessed who you were, too. Did you see how she looked at you? +Thought I had brought you there to walk over her. I'm sure she +did!"</p> +<p>There was another gust of laughter and then—</p> +<p>"She'd been going about saying I had married an old frump for +the sake of her fortune, and when she saw that you could wipe her +off the face of the earth without a gown that was worth wearing, +she was ready to die with fury."</p> +<p>There was another gust of laughter through the smoke that was +spurting from his mouth and then—</p> +<p>"And you, too, my dear! Laughing and applauding! She thought you +were trying to crow over her! On her own particular barn-door, too! +Upon my soul, it was too amusing. I wonder she didn't throw +something at you. She's like that when she's in her tantrums."</p> +<p>The waiter came in with the wine and my husband poured out a +glass for me.</p> +<p>"Have a drink. No? Well, here's to your health, my dear. I can't +get over it. I really can't. Lena's too funny for anything. Why, +what else do you think she's been saying? She's been saying I'll +come back to her yet. Yes, 'I'll give him six months to come +crawling back to me,' she said to Eastcliff and Vivian and some of +the other fellows at the Club. Wonder if she thinks so now? . . . I +wonder?"</p> +<p>He threw away his cigarette, drank another glass of the wine, +came close up to me and said in a lower tone, which made my skin +creep as with cold.</p> +<p>"Whether she's right or wrong depends on you, though."</p> +<p>"On me?"</p> +<p>"Why, yes, of course. That's only natural. One may have all the +goodwill in the world, but a man's a man, you know."</p> +<p>I felt my lips quivering with anger, and in an effort to control +myself I rose to go, but my husband drew me back into my chair and +sat on the arm of it.</p> +<p>"Don't go yet. By the way, dear, I've never thanked you for the +beautiful flowers with which you decorated my room this morning. +Charming! But I always knew you would soon come round to it."</p> +<p>"Come round to what?" I said, but it was just as if somebody +else were speaking.</p> +<p>"<i>You</i> know. Of course you know. When that simple old +priest proposed that ridiculous compact I agreed, but I knew quite +well that it would soon break down. Not on my side, though. Why +should it? A man can afford to wait. But I felt sure you would soon +tire of your resistance. And you have, haven't you? Oh, I'm not +blind. I've seen what's been going on, though I've said nothing +about it."</p> +<p>Again I tried to rise, and again my husband held me to my seat, +saying:</p> +<p>"Don't be ashamed. There's no reason for that. You were rather +hard on me, you know, but I'm going to forget all about it. Why +shouldn't I? I've got the loveliest little woman in the world, so I +mean to meet her half way, and she's going to get over her +convent-bred ideas and be my dear little darling wife. Now isn't +she?"</p> +<p>I could have died of confusion and the utter degradation of +shame. To think that my poor efforts to please him, my vain +attempts to look up to him and reverence him, my bankrupt appeals +to the spiritual woman in me that I might bring myself to love him, +as I thought it was my duty to do, should have been perverted by +his gross and vulgar mind into overtures to the animal man in +him—this was more than I could bear. I felt the tears gushing +to my eyes, but I kept them back, for my self-pity was not so +strong as my wrath.</p> +<p>I rose this time without being aware of his resistance.</p> +<p>"Let me go to bed," I said.</p> +<p>"Certainly! Most certainly, my dear, but. . . ."</p> +<p>"Let me go to bed," I said again, and at the next moment I +stepped into my room.</p> +<p>He did not attempt to follow me. I saw in a mirror in front what +was taking place behind me.</p> +<p>My husband was standing where I had left him with a look first +of amazement and then of rage.</p> +<p>"I can't understand you," he said. "Upon my soul I can't! There +isn't a man in the world who could." After that he strode into his +own bedroom and clashed the door after him.</p> +<p>"Oh, what's the good?" I thought again.</p> +<p>It was impossible to make myself in love with my husband. It was +no use trying.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I must leave it to those who know better than I do the way to +read the deep mysteries of a woman's heart, to explain how it came +to pass that the only result of this incident was to make me sure +that if we remained in London much longer my husband would go back +to the other woman, and to say why (seeing that I did not love him) +I should have become feverishly anxious to remove him from the +range of this temptation.</p> +<p>Yet so it was, for the very next morning, I wrote to my father +saying I had been unwell and begging him to use his influence with +my husband to set out on the Egyptian trip without further +delay.</p> +<p>My father's answer was prompt. What he had read between the +lines of my letter I do not know; what he said was this—</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>"Daughter—Certainly! I am writing to son-in-law telling +him to quit London quick. I guess you've been too long there +already. And while you are away you can draw on me yourself for as +much as you please, for where it is a matter of money you must +never let nobody walk over you.</p> +</div> +<p><span style="margin-left: 21em;">Yours—&c."</span></p> +<p>The letter to my husband produced an immediate result. Within +twenty-four hours, the telephone was at work with inquiries about +trains and berths on steamers; and within a week we were on our way +to Marseilles to join the ship that was to take us to Port +Said.</p> +<p>Our state-rooms were on the promenade deck of the steamer with a +passage-way between them. This admitted of entirely separate +existences, which was well, for knowing or guessing my share in our +altered arrangements, my husband had become even more morose than +before, and no conversation could be sustained between us.</p> +<p>He spent the greater part of his time in his state-room, +grumbling at the steward, abusing his valet, beating his +bad-tempered terrier and cursing the luck that had brought him on +this senseless voyage.</p> +<p>More than ever now I felt the gulf that divided us. I could not +pass one single hour with him in comfort. My life was becoming as +cold as an empty house, and I was beginning to regret the eagerness +with which I had removed my husband from a scene in which he had at +least lived the life of a rational creature, when an unexpected +event brought me a thrill of passing pleasure.</p> +<p>Our seats in the saloon were at the top of the doctor's table, +and the doctor himself was a young Irishman of three or +four-and-twenty, as bright and breezy as a March morning and as +racy of the soil as new-cut peat.</p> +<p>Hearing that I was from Ellan he started me by asking if by +chance I knew Martin Conrad.</p> +<p>"Martin Conrad?" I repeated, feeling (I hardly knew why) as if a +rosy veil were falling over my face and neck.</p> +<p>"Yes, Mart Conrad, as we call him. The young man who has gone +out as doctor with Lieutenant ——'s expedition to the +South Pole?"</p> +<p>A wave of tender feeling from my childhood came surging up to my +throat and I said:</p> +<p>"He was the first of my boy friends—in fact the only +one."</p> +<p>The young doctor's eyes sparkled and he looked as if he wanted +to throw down his soup-spoon, jump up, and grasp me by both +hands.</p> +<p>"God bless me, is that so?" he said.</p> +<p>It turned out that Martin and he had been friends at Dublin +University. They had worked together, "roomed" together, and taken +their degrees at the same time.</p> +<p>"So you know Mart? Lord alive, the way things come out!"</p> +<p>It was easy to see that Martin was not only his friend but his +hero. He talked of him with a passionate love and admiration with +which men, whatever they feel, rarely speak of each other.</p> +<p>Martin was the salt of the earth. He was the finest fellow and +the staunchest friend and the bravest-hearted chap that walked +under the stars of God.</p> +<p>"The greatest chum I have in the world, too, and by the holy +Immaculate Mother I'm destroyed at being away from him."</p> +<p>It was like music to hear him speak. A flood of joy went +sweeping through me at every word of praise he gave to Martin. And +yet—I cannot explain why, unless it was the woman in me, the +Irish-woman, or something like it—but I began to depreciate +Martin, in order to "hoosh" him on, so that he might say more on +the same subject.</p> +<p>"Then he <i>did</i> take his degree," I said. "He was never very +clever at his lessons, I remember, and I heard that he was only +just able to scrape through his examinations."</p> +<p>The young doctor fell to my bait like a darling. With a flaming +face and a nervous rush of racy words which made me think that if I +closed my eyes I should be back on the steps of the church in Rome +talking to Martin himself, he told me I was mistaken if I thought +his friend was a numskull, for he had had "the biggest brain-pan in +College Green," and the way he could learn things when he wanted to +was wonderful.</p> +<p>He might be a bit shaky in his spelling, and perhaps he couldn't +lick the world in Latin, but his heart was always in exploring, and +the way he knew geography, especially the part of it they call the +"Unknown," the Arctic, and the Antarctic, and what Charcot had done +there, and Biscoe and Bellamy and D'Urville and Greely and Nansen +and Shackleton and Peary, was enough to make the provost and +professors look like fools of the earth by the side of him.</p> +<p>"Why, what do you think?" said the doctor. "When he went to +London to apply for his billet, the Lieutenant said to him: 'You +must have been down there before, young man.' 'No such luck,' said +Martin. 'But you know as much about the Antarctic already as the +whole boiling of us put together,' said the Lieutenant. Yes, by St. +Patrick and St. Thomas, he's a geographer any way."</p> +<p>I admitted that much, and to encourage the doctor to go on I +told him where I had seen Martin last, and what he had said of his +expedition.</p> +<p>"In Rome you say?" said the doctor, with a note of jealousy. +"You beat me there then. I saw him off from London, though. A few +of us Dublin boys, being in town at the time, went down to Tilbury +to see him sail, and when they were lifting anchor and the tug was +hitching on, we stood on the pier—sixteen strong—and +set up some of our college songs. 'Stop your noising, boys,' said +he, 'the Lieutenant will be hearing you.' But not a bit of it. We +sang away as long as we could see him going out with the tide, and +then we went back in the train, smoking our pipes like so many +Vauxhall chimneys, and narra a word out of the one of us. . . . +Yes, yes, there are some men like that. They come like the stars of +night and go like the light of heaven. Same as there are some women +who walk the world like the sun, and leave the grass growing green +wherever their feet have trod."</p> +<p>It was very ridiculous, I did not then understand why it should +be so, but the tears came gushing into my eyes while the doctor +spoke, and it was as much as I could do to preserve my +composure.</p> +<p>What interpretation my husband put upon my emotion I do not +know, but I saw that his face darkened, and when the doctor turned +to him to ask if he also knew Martin he answered curtly and +brusquely,</p> +<p>"Not I. No loss either, I should say."</p> +<p>"No loss?" said the doctor. "Show me the man under the stars of +God that's fit to hold a candle to Martin Conrad, and by the angel +Gabriel I'll go fifty miles out of my way to put a sight on +him."</p> +<p>More than ever after this talk about Martin Conrad I was feeling +defenceless, and at the mercy of my husband's wishes and whims, +when something happened which seemed to change his character +altogether.</p> +<p>The third day out, on a bright and quiet morning, we called at +Malta, and while my husband went ashore to visit some friends in +the garrison, I sat on deck watching the life of the little port +and looking at the big warships anchored in the bay.</p> +<p>A Maltese woman came on board to sell souvenirs of the island, +and picking out of her tray a tiny twisted thing in coral, I asked +what it was.</p> +<p>"That's a charm, my lady," said the woman.</p> +<p>"A charm for what?"</p> +<p>"To make my lady's husband love her."</p> +<p>I felt my face becoming crimson, but my heart was sore, so in my +simplicity I bought the charm and was smuggling it into my bag when +I became aware that one of my fellow-passengers, a lady, was +looking down at me.</p> +<p>She was a tall, singularly handsome woman, fashionably and +(although on shipboard) almost sumptuously dressed. A look in her +face was haunting me with a memory I could not fix when she stooped +and said:</p> +<p>"Aren't you Mary O'Neill?"</p> +<p>The voice completed the identification, and I knew who it was. +It was Alma Lier.</p> +<p>She was now about seven-and-twenty and in the prime of her young +womanhood. Her beautiful auburn hair lay low over her broad +forehead, almost descending to her long sable-coloured eyebrows. +Her cheeks were very white, (rather beyond the whiteness of nature, +I thought), and her lips were more than commonly red, with the +upper one a little thin and the lower slightly set forward. But her +eyes were still her distinguishing feature, being larger and +blacker than before and having that vivid gaze that looked through +and through you and made you feel that few women and no man in the +world would have the power to resist her.</p> +<p>Her movements were almost noiseless, and as she sank into the +chair by my side there was a certain over-sweetness in the soft +succulent tones of the voice with which she began to tell me what +had happened to her since I had seen her last.</p> +<p>It was a rather painful story. After two or three years in a +girls' college in her own country she had set out with her mother +for a long tour of the European capitals. In Berlin, at what was +falsely called a Charity Ball, she had met a young Russian Count +who was understood to be rich and related to one of the Grand Ducal +families. Against the protests of her father (a shrewd American +banker), she had married the Count, and they had returned to New +York, where her mother had social ambitions.</p> +<p>There they had suffered a serious shock. It turned out that her +husband had deceived them, and that he was really a poor and quite +nameless person, only remotely related to the family he claimed to +belong to.</p> +<p>Nevertheless Alma had "won out" at last. By digging deep into +her father's treasury she got rid of her treacherous husband, and +going "way out west," she had been able, in due time, to divorce +him.</p> +<p>Since then she had resumed her family name, being known as +Madame Lier, and now she was on her way to Egypt to spend the +season at Cairo.</p> +<p>"And you?" she said. "You stayed long at the +convent—yes?"</p> +<p>I answered that I had, and then in my fluttering voice (for some +of the old spell of her presence had come sweeping back upon me) I +replied one by one to the questions she asked about the Reverend +Mother, the "Reverend Mother Mildred," Sister Angela and Father +Giovanni, not to speak of myself, whom she had always thought of as +"Margaret Mary" because I had looked so innocent and nun-like.</p> +<p>"And now you are married!" she said. "Married so splendidly, +too! We heard all about it. Mother was so interested. What a lucky +girl you are! Everybody says your husband is so handsome and +charming. He is, isn't he?"</p> +<p>I was doing my utmost to put the best face upon my condition +without betraying the facts or simulating sentiments which I could +not feel, when a boat from the shore pulled up at the ship's side, +and my husband stepped on to the deck.</p> +<p>In his usual morose manner he was about to pass without speaking +on his way to his state-room, when his eyes fell on Alma sitting +beside me. Then he stopped and looked at us, and, stepping up, he +said, in a tone I had never heard from him before:</p> +<p>"Mary, my dear, will you not present me to your friend?"</p> +<p>I hesitated, and then with a quivering of the lips I did so. But +something told me as I introduced my husband to Alma, and Alma to +my husband, and they stood looking into each other's eyes and +holding each other's hands (for Alma had risen and I was sitting +between them), that this was the most momentous incident of my life +thus far—that for good or ill my hour had struck and I could +almost hear the bell.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>From that hour forward my husband was a changed man. His manner +to me, so brusque before, became courteous, kind, almost +affectionate. Every morning he would knock at the door of my +state-room to ask if I had slept well, or if the movement of the +steamer had disturbed me.</p> +<p>His manner to Alma was charming. He was up before breakfast +every day, promenading the deck with her in the fresh salt air. I +would slide back my window and hear their laughter as they passed, +above the throb of the engines and the wash of the sea. Sometimes +they would look in upon me and joke, and Alma would say:</p> +<p>"And how's Margaret Mary this morning?"</p> +<p>Our seats in the saloon had been changed. Now we sat with Alma +at the Captain's table, and though I sorely missed the doctor's +racy talk about Martin Conrad I was charmed by Alma's bright wit +and the fund of her personal anecdotes. She seemed to know nearly +everybody. My husband knew everybody also, and their conversation +never flagged.</p> +<p>Something of the wonderful and worshipful feeling I had had for +Alma at the Sacred Heart came back to me, and as for my husband it +seemed to me that I was seeing him for the first time.</p> +<p>He persuaded the Captain to give a dance on our last night at +sea, so the awnings were spread, the electric lights were turned +on, and the deck of the ship became a scene of enchantment.</p> +<p>My husband and Alma led off. He danced beautifully and she was +dressed to perfection. Not being a dancer myself I stood with the +Captain in the darkness outside, looking in on them in the bright +and dazzling circle, while the moon-rays were sweeping the waters +like a silver fan and the little waves were beating the ship's side +with friendly pats.</p> +<p>I was almost happy. In my simplicity I was feeling grateful to +Alma for having wrought this extraordinary change, so that when, on +our arrival at Port Said, my husband said,</p> +<p>"Your friend Madame Lier has made no arrangements for her rooms +at Cairo—hadn't I better telegraph to our hotel, dear?" I +answered, "Yes," and wondered why he had asked me.</p> +<p>Our hotel was an oriental building, situated on an island at the +further side of the Nile. Formerly the palace of a dead Khedive, +who had built it in honour of the visit of an Empress, it had a +vast reception hall with a great staircase.</p> +<p>There, with separated rooms, as in London, we remained for three +months. I was enthralled. Too young and inexperienced to be +conscious of the darker side of the picture before me, I found +everything beautiful. I was seeing fashionable life for the first +time, and it was entrancing.</p> +<p>Lovely and richly-dressed ladies in silk, velvet, lace, and no +limit of jewellery—the dark French women, the blonde German +women, the stately English women, and the American women with their +flexuous grace. And then the British soldiers in their various +uniforms, the semi-Turks in their red tarbooshes, and the diplomats +of all nationalities, Italian, Austrian, French, German—what +a cosmopolitan world it was, what a meeting-place of all +nations!</p> +<p>Every hour had its interest, but I liked best the hour of tea on +the terrace, for that was the glorious hour of woman, when every +condition invested her dress with added beauty and her smile with +greater charm.</p> +<p>Such a blaze of colour in the sunshine! Such a sea of muslin, +flowers, and feathers! Such lovely female figures in diaphanous +clouds of toilettes, delicate as gossamer and varied as the colours +in the rainbow! They were like a living bouquet, as they sat under +the shade of the verandah, with the green lawns and the palm trees +in front, the red-coated orchestra behind, and the noiseless forms +of swarthy Bednouins and Nubians moving to and fro.</p> +<p>Although I had been brought up in such a different world +altogether I could not help being carried away by all this beauty. +My senses burgeoned out and my heart seemed to expand.</p> +<p>As for Alma and my husband, they seemed to belong to the scene +of themselves. She would sit at one of the tea-tables, swishing +away the buzzing flies with a little whip of cord and cowries, and +making comments on the crowd in soft undertones which he alone +seemed to catch. Her vivid and searching eyes, with their constant +suggestion of laughter, seemed to be picking out absurdities on +every side and finding nearly everybody funny.</p> +<p>She found me funny also. My innocence and my convent-bred ideas +were a constant subject of jest with her.</p> +<p>"What does our dear little Margaret Mary think of that?" she +would say with a significant smile, at sights that seemed to me +quite harmless.</p> +<p>After a while I began to have a feeling of indefinable +uneasiness about Alma. She was daily redoubling her cordiality, +always calling me her "dearest sweetest girl," and "the oldest +friend she had in the world." But little by little I became +conscious of a certain commerce between her and my husband in which +I had no part. Sometimes I saw her eyes seeking his, and +occasionally I heard them exchange a few words about me in French, +which (because I did not speak it, being uncertain of my accent) +they thought I did not understand.</p> +<p>Perhaps this helped to sharpen my wits, for I began to see that +I had gone the wrong way to work with my husband. Instead of trying +to make myself fall in love with my husband, I should have tried to +make my husband fall in love with me.</p> +<p>When I asked myself how this was to be done I found one obvious +answer—I must become the sort of woman my husband admired and +liked; in short I must imitate Alma.</p> +<p>I resolved to do this, and after all that has happened since I +feel a little ashamed to tell of the efforts I made to play a part +for which I was so ill-fitted by nature and education.</p> +<p>Some of them were silly enough perhaps, but some were almost +pathetic, and I am not afraid that any good woman will laugh at the +futile shifts I was put to, in my girlish ignorance, to make my +husband love me.</p> +<p>"I must do it," I thought. "I must, I must!"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Hitherto I had attended to myself, but now I determined to have +a maid. I found one without much difficulty. Her name was Price. +She was a very plain woman of thirty, with piercing black eyes; and +when I engaged her she seemed anxious above all else to make me +understand that she "never saw anything."</p> +<p>I soon discovered that she saw everything, especially the +relations between myself and my husband, and that she put her own +interpretation (not a very flattering one) on our separated +apartments. She also saw the position of Alma, and putting her own +interpretation upon that also, she tortured me with many +pin-pricks.</p> +<p>Under the guidance of my maid I began to haunt the shops of the +dressmakers, the milliners and the jewellers. It did not require +the memory of my father's letter to make me spend his money—I +spent it like water. Feeling ashamed of my quaker-cut costumes +(Alma had a costume for every day of the week, and wore a large +gold snake on her arm), I bought the most costly toilettes, and +loaded myself with bracelets, rings and necklaces.</p> +<p>I was dressing for my husband, and for him I did many things I +had never dreamt of doing before. For him I filed my nails, put +cream on my skin, perfume on my handkerchief, and even rouge on my +lips. Although I did not allow myself to think of it so, I was +running a race with Alma.</p> +<p>My maid knew that before I did, and the first night she put me +into one of my uncomfortable new gowns she stood off from me and +said:</p> +<p>"His lordship must be a strange gentleman if he can resist you +<i>now</i>."</p> +<p>I felt ashamed, yet pleased too, and went downstairs with a +certain confidence.</p> +<p>The result was disappointing. My husband smiled rather +condescendingly, and though Alma praised me beyond measure I saw +that she was secretly laughing as she said:</p> +<p>"Our Margaret Mary is coming out, isn't she?"</p> +<p>Nevertheless I persevered. Without too much preparation for so +perilous an enterprise, I threw myself into the gaieties of Cairo, +attending polo matches, race-meetings, picnics at the Pyramids, +dances at the different hotels, and on the island of Roda, where +according to tradition, Pharaoh's daughter found Moses in the +bulrushes.</p> +<p>I think I may say that I drew the eyes of other men upon me, +particularly those of the colonel commanding on the Citadel, a fine +type of Scotsman, who paid me the most worshipful attention. But I +thought of nobody but my husband, being determined to make him +forget Alma and fall in love with me.</p> +<p>It was a hopeless task, and I had some heart-breaking hours. One +day, calling at a jeweller's to see a diamond necklace which I +greatly coveted, I was told in confidence that my husband had been +pricing it, but had had to give it up because it was a thousand +francs too dear for him. I was foolish enough to pay the thousand +francs myself, under a pledge of secrecy, and to tell the jeweller +to send the necklace to my husband, feeling sure in my simplicity +that it had been meant for me.</p> +<p>Next night I saw it on Alma's neck, and could have died of +mortification and shame.</p> +<p>I daresay it was all very weak and very childish, but I really +think my last attempt, if rather ridiculous, was also very +pitiful.</p> +<p>Towards the end of our stay the proprietors of the hotel gave a +Cotillon. As this was the event of the season, and nearly every +woman was giving a dinner in honour of it, I resolved that I too +would give one, inviting the gayest of the gay acquaintances I had +made in Cairo.</p> +<p>Feeling that it would be my last battle, and that so much +depended upon it, I dressed myself with feverish care, in a soft +white satin gown, which was cut lower than I had ever worn before, +with slippers to match, a tight band of pearls about my throat and +another about my head.</p> +<p>When Price had finished dressing me she said:</p> +<p>"Well, if his lordship prefers anybody else in the world +to-night I shan't know where he puts his eyes."</p> +<p>The compliment was a crude one, but I had no time to think of +that, for my heart was fluttering with hopes and fears, and I think +any woman would forgive me under the circumstances if I told +myself, as I passed the tall mirrors on the stairs, that I too was +beautiful.</p> +<p>The dining-room was crowded when I entered it with my guests, +and seeing that we were much observed it flashed upon me that my +husband and I had become a subject of gossip. Partly for that +reason I strangled the ugly thing that was writhing in my bosom, +and put Alma (who had flown to me with affectionate rapture) next +to my husband, and the colonel commanding on the Citadel in the +seat beside me.</p> +<p>Throughout the dinner, which was very long, I was very nervous, +and though I did my best to keep up conversation with the colonel, +I knew quite well that I was listening to what was being said at +the other side of my big round table, and as often as any mention +was made of "Margaret Mary" I heard it.</p> +<p>More than once Alma lifted her glass with a gracious nod and +smile, crying, "Mary dearest!" and then in another moment gave my +husband one of her knowing glances which seemed to me to say, "Look +at that foolish little wife of yours!"</p> +<p>By the time we returned to the hall for coffee we were rather a +noisy party, and even the eyes of the ladies betrayed the fact that +they had dined. The talk, which had grown louder, was also a little +more free, and God forgive me, I joined in it, being feverishly +anxious to outdo Alma, and be looked upon as a woman of the +world.</p> +<p>Towards eleven o'clock, the red-coated orchestra began to play a +waltz, and then the whole variegated company of ladies, soldiers, +and diplomats stood up to dance, and the colonel asked me to join +him.</p> +<p>I was ashamed to tell him that I had never danced except with a +schoolgirl, so I took his hand and started. But hardly had we +begun, when I made mistakes, which I thought everybody saw (I am +sure Alma saw them), and before we had taken many turns my partner +had to stop, whereupon I retired to my seat with a forced laugh and +a sense of confusion.</p> +<p>It was nearly twelve when they began the Cotillon, which Alma +and my husband led with supreme self-possession. As one of the +hostesses I sat in the front row of the square, and when I was +taken out I made further mistakes, which also Alma saw and +communicated by smiles to my husband.</p> +<p>Before the Cotillon came to an end the night was far spent and +then the company, which had become very boisterous, began to look +for some new excitement, no matter how foolish. One or other +started "turkey trot" and "grizzly bear" and finally Alma, with +memories of the winter sports at St. Moritz, proposed that they +should toboggan down the great staircase.</p> +<p>The suggestion was welcomed with a shout, and a broad board was +immediately laid on the first long flight of stairs for people to +slide on.</p> +<p>Soldiers went first, and then there were calls for the ladies, +when Alma took her turn, tucking her dress under her at the top and +alighting safely on her feet at the bottom. Other ladies followed +her example, with similar good fortune, and then Alma, who had been +saying "Such fun! Such lots of fun!" set up a cry of "Margaret +Mary."</p> +<p>I refused at first, feeling ashamed of even looking at such +unwomanly folly, but something Alma said to my husband and +something that was conveyed by my husband's glance at me set my +heart afire and, poor feverish and entangled fool that I was, I +determined to defy them.</p> +<p>So running up to the top and seating myself on the toboggan I +set it in motion. But hardly had I done so when it swayed, reeled, +twisted and threw me off, with the result that I rolled downstairs +to the bottom.</p> +<p>Of course there were shrieks of laughter, and if I had been in +the spirit of the time and place I suppose I should have laughed +too, and there would have been an end of the matter. But I had been +playing a part, a tragic part, and feeling that I had failed and +covered myself with ridicule, I was overwhelmed with confusion.</p> +<p>I thought my husband would be angry with me, and feel +compromised by my foolishness, but he was not; he was amused, and +when at last I saw his face it was running in rivulets from the +laughter he could not restrain.</p> +<p>That was the end of all things, and when Alma came up to me, +saying everything that was affectionate and insincere, about her +"poor dear unfortunate Margaret Mary" (only women know how to wound +each other so), I brushed her aside, went off to my bedroom, and +lay face down on the sofa, feeling that I was utterly beaten and +could fight no more.</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards my husband came in, and though I did not +look up I heard him say, in a tone of indulgent sympathy that cut +me to the quick:</p> +<p>"You've been playing the wrong part, my child. A Madonna, yes, +but a Venus, no! It's not your <i>métier</i>."</p> +<p>"What's the good? What's the good? What's the good?" I asked +myself.</p> +<p>I thought my heart was broken.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>With inexpressible relief I heard the following day that we were +to leave for Rome immediately.</p> +<p>Alma was to go with us, but that did not matter to me in the +least. Outside the atmosphere of this place, so artificial, so +unrelated to nature, her power over my husband would be gone. Once +in the Holy City everything would be different. Alma would be +different, I should be different, above all my husband would be +different. I should take him to the churches and basilicas; I +should show him the shrines and papal processions, and he would see +me in my true "part" at last!</p> +<p>But what a deep disappointment awaited me!</p> +<p>On reaching Rome we put up at a fashionable hotel in the new +quarter of the Ludovisi, and although that was only a few hundred +yards from the spot on which I had spent nine happy years it seemed +to belong to another world altogether. Instead of the church domes +and the monastery bells, there were the harsh clang of electric +trams, the thrum and throb of automobiles, the rattle of cars and +the tramp of soldiers.</p> +<p>Then I realised that there were two Romes—an old Rome and +a new one, and that the Rome we had come to hardly differed from +the Cairo we had left behind.</p> +<p>There was the same varied company of people of all nations, +English, Americans, French, German; the same nomad tribes of the +rich and dissolute, pitching their tents season by season in the +sunny resorts of Europe; the same aimless society, the same debauch +of fashion, the same callous and wicked luxury, the same thirst for +selfish pleasures, the same busy idleness, the same corruption of +character and sex.</p> +<p>This made me very unhappy, but from first to last Alma was in +the highest spirits. Everybody seemed to be in Rome that spring, +and everybody seemed to be known either to her or to my husband. +For Alma's sake we were invited everywhere, and thus we saw not +only the life of the foreign people of the hotels but that of a +part (not the better part) of the Roman aristocracy.</p> +<p>Alma was a great success. She had the homage of all the men, and +being understood to be rich, and having the gift of making every +man believe he was her special favourite, she was rarely without a +group of Italian noblemen about her chair.</p> +<p>With sharper eyes the Italian women saw that her real reckoning +lay with my husband, but they seemed to think no worse of her for +that. They seemed to think no worse of him either. It was nothing +against him that, having married me (as everybody appeared to know) +for the settlement of his financial difficulties, he had +transferred his attentions, even on his honeymoon, to this +brilliant and alluring creature.</p> +<p>As for me, I was made to realise that I was a person of a +different class altogether. When people wished to be kind they +called me <i>spirituelle</i>, and when they were tempted to be the +reverse they voted me insipid.</p> +<p>As a result I became very miserable in this company, and I can +well believe that I may have seemed awkward and shy and stupid when +I was in some of their grey old palaces full of tapestry and +bronze, for I sometimes found the talk there so free (especially +among the women) that the poisoned jokes went quivering through +me.</p> +<p>Things I had been taught to think sacred were so often derided +that I had to ask myself if it could be Rome, my holy and beloved +Rome—this city of license and unbelief.</p> +<p>But Alma was entirely happy, especially when the talk turned on +conjugal fidelity, and the faithful husband was held up to +ridicule. This happened very often in one house we used to go +to—that of a Countess of ancient family who was said to have +her husband and her lover at either side of her when she sat down +to dinner.</p> +<p>She was a large and handsome person of middle age, with a great +mass of fair hair, and she gave me the feeling that in her case the +body of a woman was inhabited by the soul of a man.</p> +<p>She christened me her little Irish <i>bambino</i>, meaning her +child; and one night in her drawing-room, after dinner, before the +men had joined us, she called me to her side on the couch, lit a +cigarette, crossed her legs, and gave us with startling candour her +views of the marriage bond.</p> +<p>"What can you expect, you women?" she said. "You run after the +men for their titles—they've very little else, except debts, +poor things—and what is the result? The first result is that +though you have bought them you belong to them. Yes, your husband +owns his beautiful woman, just as he owns his beautiful horse or +his beautiful dog."</p> +<p>This was so pointed that I felt my face growing crimson, but +Alma and the other women only laughed, so the Countess went on:</p> +<p>"What then? Once in a blue moon each goes his and her own way +without sin. You agree to a sort of partnership for mutual +advantage in which you live together in chastity under the same +roof. What a life! What an ice-house!"</p> +<p>Again the other women laughed, but I felt myself blushing +deeply.</p> +<p>"But in the majority of cases it is quite otherwise. The +business purpose served, each is open to other emotions. The man +becomes unfaithful, and the woman, if she has any spirit, pays him +out tit for tat—and why shouldn't she?"</p> +<p>After that I could bear no more, and before I knew what I was +saying I blurted out:</p> +<p>"But I find that wrong and wicked. Infidelity on the part of the +man does not justify infidelity in the woman. The prayer-book says +so."</p> +<p>Alma burst out laughing, and the Countess smiled and +continued:</p> +<p>"Once in a hundred years there comes a great passion—Dante +and Beatrice, Petrarch and Laura. The woman meets the right man too +late. What a tragedy! What a daily and hourly crucifixion! Unless," +said the Countess with emphasis, "she is prepared to renounce the +law and reject society and live a life of complete emancipation. +But in a Catholic country, where there is no divorce, what woman +can afford to do that? Nobody in the higher classes +can—especially if she has to sacrifice her title. So the wise +woman avoids scandal, keeps her little affair with her lover to +herself, and . . . and that's marriage, my dears."</p> +<p>A twitter of approval, led by Alma, came from the other women, +but I was quivering with anger and I said:</p> +<p>"Then marriage is an hypocrisy and an imposture. If I found I +loved somebody better than my husband, I should go to him in spite +of the law, and society, and title and . . . and everything."</p> +<p>"Of course you would, my dear," said the Countess, smiling at me +as at a child, "but that's because you are such a sweet, simple, +innocent little Irish <i>bambino</i>."</p> +<p>It must have been a day or two after this that we were invited +to the Roman Hunt. I had no wish to go, but Alma who had begun to +use me in order to "save her face" in relation to my husband, +induced me to drive them out in a motor-car to the place on the +Campagna where they were to mount their horses.</p> +<p>"Dear sweet girl!" said Alma. "How could we possibly go without +you?"</p> +<p>It was Sunday, and I sat between Alma in her riding habit and my +husband in his riding breeches, while we ran through the Porta San +Giovanni, and past the <i>osterie</i> where the pleasure-loving +Italian people were playing under the pergolas with their children, +until we came to the meeting-ground of the Hunt, by the Trappist +monastery of Tre Fontane.</p> +<p>A large company of the Roman aristocracy were gathered there +with their horses and hounds, and they received Alma and my husband +with great cordiality. What they thought of me I do not know, +except that I was a childish and complacent wife; and when at the +sound of the horn the hunt began, and my husband and Alma went +prancing off with the rest, without once looking back, I asked +myself in my shame and distress if I could bear my humiliation much +longer.</p> +<p>But then came a moment of unexpected pleasure. A cheerful voice +on the other side of the car said:</p> +<p>"Good morning, Lady Raa."</p> +<p>It was the young Irish doctor from the steamer. His ship had put +into Naples for two days, and, like Martin Conrad before my +marriage, he had run up to look at Rome.</p> +<p>"But have you heard the news?" he cried.</p> +<p>"What news?"</p> +<p>"About the South Pole Expedition—they're on their way +home."</p> +<p>"So soon?"</p> +<p>"Yes, they reached New Zealand on Saturday was a week."</p> +<p>"And . . . and . . . and Martin Conrad?"</p> +<p>"He's well, and what's better, he has distinguished +himself."</p> +<p>"I . . . I . . . I knew he would."</p> +<p>"So did I! The way I was never fearing that if they gave Mart +half a chance he would come out top! Do or die—that was his +watch-word."</p> +<p>"I know! I know!"</p> +<p>His eyes were sparkling and so I suppose were mine, while with a +joyous rush of racy words, (punctuated by me with "Yes," "Yes," +"Yes") he told of a long despatch from the Lieutenant published by +one of the London papers, in which Martin had been specially +mentioned—how he had been put in command of some difficult +and perilous expedition, and had worked wonders.</p> +<p>"How splendid! How glorious! How perfectly magnificent!" I +said.</p> +<p>"Isn't it?" said the doctor, and for a few moments more we +bandied quick questions and replies like children playing at +battledore and shuttlecock. Then he said:</p> +<p>"But I'm after thinking it's mortal strange I never heard him +mention you. There was only one chum at home he used to talk about +and that was a man—a boy, I mean. Mally he was calling +him—that's short for Maloney, I suppose."</p> +<p>"For Mary," I said.</p> +<p>"Mary, is it? Why, by the saints, so it is! Where in the name of +St. Patrick has been the Irish head at me that I never thought of +that before? And you were . . . Yes? Well, by the powers, ye've a +right to be proud of him, for he was thinking pearls and diamonds +of you. I was mortal jealous of Mally, I remember. 'Mally's a +stunner,' he used to say. 'Follow you anywhere, if you wanted it, +in spite of the devil and hell.'"</p> +<p>The sparkling eyes were growing misty by this time but the woman +in me made me say—I couldn't help it—</p> +<p>"I dare say he's had many girl friends since my time, +though?"</p> +<p>"Narra a one. The girls used to be putting a glime on him in +Dublin—they're the queens of the world too, those Dublin +girls—but never a skute of the eye was he giving to the one +of them. I used to think it was work, but maybe it wasn't . . . +maybe it was. . . ."</p> +<p>I dare not let him finish what I saw he was going to say—I +didn't know what would happen to me if he did—so I jumped in +by telling him that, if he would step into the car, I would drive +him back to Rome.</p> +<p>He did so, and all the way he talked of Martin, his courage and +resource and the hardships he had gone through, until (with +backward thoughts of Alma and my husband riding away over the +Campagna) my heart, which had been leaping like a lamb, began to +ache and ache.</p> +<p>We returned by the Old Appian Way, where the birds were building +their nests among the crumbling tombs, through the Porta San Paolo, +and past the grave of the "young English poet" of whom I have +always thought it was not so sad that he died of consumption as in +the bitterness of a broken heart.</p> +<p>All this time I was so much at home with the young Irish doctor, +who was Martin's friend, that it was not until I was putting him +down at his hotel that I remembered I did not even know his +name.</p> +<p>It was O'Sullivan.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Every day during our visit to Rome I had reminded myself of the +Reverend Mother's invitation to call on her, and a sense of moral +taint had prevented me, but now I determined to see her at least by +going to Benediction at her Convent church the very next day.</p> +<p>It happened, however, that this was the time when the Artists' +Club of Rome were giving a Veglione (a kind of fancy-dress ball), +and as Alma and my husband desired to go to it, and were still in +the way of using me to keep themselves in countenance, I consented +to accompany them on condition that I did not dress or dance, and +that they would go with me to Benediction the following day.</p> +<p>"Dear sweet girl!" said Alma. "We'll do whatever you like. Of +course we will."</p> +<p>I wore my soft satin without any ornaments, and my husband +merely put scarlet facings on the lapels of his evening coat, but +Alma was clad in a gorgeous dress of old gold, with Oriental skirts +which showed her limbs in front but had a long train behind, and +made her look like a great vampire bat.</p> +<p>It was eleven o'clock before we reached the theatre, but already +the auditorium was full, and so well had the artists done their +work of decoration, making the air alive with floating specks of +many-coloured lights, like the fire-flies at Nemi, that the scene +was one of enchantment.</p> +<p>It was difficult to believe that on the other side of the walls +was the street, with the clanging electric bells and people +hurrying by with their collars up, for the night was cold, and it +had begun to rain as we came in, and one poor woman, with a child +under her shawl, was standing by the entrance trying to sell +evening papers.</p> +<p>I sat alone in a box on the ground tier while Alma and my +husband and their friends were below on the level of the +<i>poltroni</i> (the stalls) that had been arranged for the +dancing, which began immediately after we arrived and went on +without a break until long after midnight.</p> +<p>Then there was supper on the stage, and those who did not eat +drank a good deal until nearly everybody seemed to be under the +influence of alcohol. As a consequence many of the people, +especially some of the women (not good women I fear), seemed to +lose all control of themselves, singing snatches of noisy songs, +sipping out of the men's glasses, taking the smoke of cigarettes +out of the men's mouths, sitting on the men's knees, and even +riding astride on the men's arms and shoulders.</p> +<p>I bore these sights as long as I could, making many fruitless +appeals to my husband to take me home; and I was just about to +leave of myself, being sick of the degradation of my sex, when a +kind of rostrum, with an empty chair on top of it, was carried in +on the shoulders of a number of men.</p> +<p>This was for the enthronement of the Queen of Beauty, and as it +passed round the arena, with the mock judges in paper coronets, +walking ahead to make their choice, some of the women, lost to all +sense of modesty, were shouting "Take <i>me</i>! Take +<i>me</i>!"</p> +<p>I felt sure they would take Alma, so I reached forward to get a +better view of her, where she stood below my box; but as they +approached her, with the chair still empty, I saw her make a +movement in my direction and say something to the judges about "the +little nun," which made my husband nod his head and then laugh +uproariously.</p> +<p>At the next moment, before I knew what they were doing, six or +seven men jumped into my box, lifted me on to the rostrum and +placed me in the chair, whereupon the whole noisy company in the +theatre broke into wild shouts of salutation and pelted me with +flowers and confetti.</p> +<p>If there was any pride there was more mortification in the +position to which Alma and my husband had exposed me, for as I was +being carried round the arena, with the sea of foaming faces below +me, all screaming out of their hot and open mouths, I heard the men +cry:</p> +<p>"Smile, Signorina!"</p> +<p>"Not so serious, Mademoiselle!"</p> +<p>It would do no good to say what memories of other scenes flashed +back on my mind as I was being borne along in the mad procession. I +felt as if it would last for ever. But it came to an end at length, +and as soon as I was released, I begged my husband again to take me +home, and when he said, "Not yet; we'll all be going by-and-by," I +stole away by myself, found a cab, and drove back to the hotel.</p> +<p>The day was dawning as I passed through the stony streets, and +when I reached my room, and pulled down my dark green blinds, the +bell of the Capuchin monastery in the Via Veneto was ringing and +the monks were saying the first of their offices.</p> +<p>I must have been some time in bed, hiding my hot face in the +bed-clothes, when Price, my maid, came in to apologise for not +having seen me come back alone. The pain of the woman's scrutiny +was more than I could bear at that moment, so I tried to dismiss +her, but I could not get her to go, and at last she said:</p> +<p>"If you please, my lady, I want to say something."</p> +<p>I gave her no encouragement, yet she continued.</p> +<p>"I daresay it's as much as my place is worth, but I'm bound to +say it."</p> +<p>Still I said nothing, yet she went on:</p> +<p>"His Lordship and Madame have also arrived. . . . They came back +half an hour ago. And just now . . . I saw his lordship . . . +coming out of Madame's room."</p> +<p>"Go away, woman, go away," I cried in the fierce agony of my +shame, and she went out at last, closing the door noisily behind +her.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>We did not go next day to Benediction at the Reverend Mother's +church. But late the same night, when it was quite dark, I crept +out of my room into the noisy streets, hardly knowing where my +footsteps were leading me, until I found myself in the piazza of +the Convent of the Sacred Heart.</p> +<p>It was quiet enough there. Only the Carabinieri were walking on +the paved way with measured steps, and the bell of the Dominican +monastery was slowly ringing under the silent stars. I could see +the light on the Pope's loggia at the Vatican and hear the clock of +St. Peter's striking nine.</p> +<p>There were lights in the windows of some of the dormitories +also, and by that I knew that the younger children, the children of +the Infant Jesus, were going to bed. There was a light too, in the +large window of the church, and that told me that the bigger girls +were saying their night prayers.</p> +<p>Creeping close to the convent wall I heard the girls' voices +rising and falling, and then through the closed door of the church +came the muffled sound of their evening hymn—</p> +<p>"<i>Ave maris stella<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Dei Mater +Alma—"</span><br /></i></p> +<p>I did not know why I was putting myself wilfully to this bitter +pain—the pain of remembering the happy years in which I +myself was a girl singing so, and then telling myself that other +girls were there now who knew nothing of me.</p> +<p>I thought of the Reverend Mother, and then of my own mother, my +saint, my angel, who had told me to think of her when I sang that +hymn; and then I remembered where I was and what had happened to +me.</p> +<p>"<i>Virgin of all virgins,<br /> +To thy shelter take me</i>."</p> +<p>I felt like an outcast. A stifling sensation came into my throat +and I dropped to my knees in the darkness. I thought I was +broken-hearted.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FORTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FORTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>FORTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Not long after that we left Italy on our return to England. We +were to reach home by easy stages so as to see some of the great +capitals of Europe, but I had no interest in the journey.</p> +<p>Our first stay was at Monte Carlo, that sweet garden of the +Mediterranean which God seems to smile upon and man to curse.</p> +<p>If I had been allowed to contemplate the beautiful spectacle of +nature I think I could have been content, but Alma, with her +honeyed and insincere words, took me to the Casino on the usual +plea of keeping her in countenance.</p> +<p>I hated the place from the first, with its stale air, its chink +of louis d'or, its cry of the croupiers, its strained faces about +the tables, and its general atmosphere of wasted hopes and fears +and needless misery and despair.</p> +<p>As often as I could I crept out to look at the flower +fêtes in the streets, or to climb the hill of La Turbie and +think I was on my native rocks with Martin Conrad, or even to sit +in my room and watch the poor wounded pigeons from the pigeon-traps +as they tumbled and ducked into the sea after the shots fired, by +cruel and unsportsmanlike sportsmen, from the rifle-range +below.</p> +<p>In Monte Carlo my husband's vices seemed to me to grow rank and +fast. The gambling fever took complete possession of him. At first +he won and then he drank heavily, but afterwards he lost and then +his nature became still more ugly and repulsive.</p> +<p>One evening towards eight o'clock, I was in my room, trying to +comfort a broken-winged pigeon which had come floundering through +the open window, when my husband entered with wild eyes.</p> +<p>"The red's coming up at all the tables," he cried breathlessly. +"Give me some money, quick!"</p> +<p>I told him I had no money except the few gold pieces in my +purse.</p> +<p>"You've a cheque book—give me a cheque, then."</p> +<p>I told him that even if I gave him a cheque he could not cash it +that night, the banks being closed.</p> +<p>"The jewellers are open though, and you have jewels, haven't +you? Stop fooling with that creature, and let me have some of them +to pawn."</p> +<p>The situation was too abject for discussion, so I pointed to the +drawer in which my jewels were kept, and he tore it open, took what +he wanted and went out hurriedly without more words.</p> +<p>After that I saw no more of him for two days, when with black +rings about his eyes he came in to say he must leave "this accursed +place" immediately or we should all be ruined.</p> +<p>Our last stopping-place was Paris, and in my ignorance of the +great French capital which has done so much for the world, I +thought it must be the sink of every kind of corruption.</p> +<p>We put up at a well-known hotel in the Champs Elysées, +and there (as well as in the cafés in the Bois and at the +races at Longchamps on Sundays) we met the same people again, most +of them English and Americans on their way home after the winter. +It seemed to me strange that there should be so many men and women +in the world with nothing to do, merely loafing round it like +tramps—the richest being the idlest, and the idlest the most +immoral.</p> +<p>My husband knew many Frenchmen of the upper classes, and I think +he spent several hours every day at their clubs, but (perhaps at +Alma's instigation) he made us wallow through the filth of Paris by +night.</p> +<p>"It will be lots of fun," said Alma. "And then who is to know us +in places like those?"</p> +<p>I tolerated this for a little while, and then refused to be +dragged around any longer as a cloak for Alma's pleasures. Telling +myself that if I continued to share my husband's habits of life, +for any reason or under any pretext, I should become like him, and +my soul would rot inch by inch, I resolved to be clean in my own +eyes and to resist the contaminations of his company.</p> +<p>As a consequence, he became more and more reckless, and Alma +made no efforts to restrain him, so that it came to pass at last +that they went together to a scandalous entertainment which was for +a while the talk of the society papers throughout Europe.</p> +<p>I know no more of this entertainment than I afterwards learned +from those sources—that it was given by a notorious woman, +who was not shut out of society because she was "the good friend" +of a King; that she did the honours with clever imitative elegance; +that her salon that night was crowded with such male guests as one +might see at the court of a queen—princes, dukes, marquises, +counts, English noblemen and members of parliament, as well as some +reputable women of my own and other countries; that the tables were +laid for supper at four o'clock with every delicacy of the season +and wines of the rarest vintage; that after supper dancing was +resumed with increased animation; and that the dazzling and +improper spectacle terminated with a <i>Chaîne diabolique</i> +at seven in the morning, when the sun was streaming through the +windows and the bells of the surrounding churches were ringing for +early mass.</p> +<p>I had myself risen early that morning to go to communion at the +Madeleine, and never shall I forget the effect of cleansing +produced upon me by the sacred sacrament. From the moment +when—the priest standing at the foot of the altar—the +choir sang the <i>Kyrie eleison</i>, down to the solemn silence of +the elevation, I had a sense of being washed from all the taint of +the contaminating days since my marriage.</p> +<p>The music was Perosi's, I remember, and the voices in the +<i>Gloria in excelsis</i>, which I used to sing myself, seemed to +carry up the cry of my sorrowful heart to the very feet of the +Virgin whose gracious figure hung above me.</p> +<p>"Cleanse me and intercede for me, O Mother of my God."</p> +<p>It was as though our Blessed Lady did so, for as I walked out of +the church and down the broad steps in front of it, I had a feeling +of purity and lightness that I had never known since my time at the +Sacred Heart.</p> +<p>It was a beautiful day, with all the freshness and fragrance of +early morning in summer, when the white stone houses of Paris seem +to blush in the sunrise; and as I walked up the Champs +Elysées on my way back to the hotel, I met under the +chestnut trees, which were then in bloom, a little company of young +girls returning to school after their first communion.</p> +<p>How sweet they looked! In their white muslin frocks, white shoes +and stockings and gloves, white veils and coronets of white +flowers, they were twittering away as merrily as the little birds +that were singing unseen in the leaves above them.</p> +<p>It made me feel like a child myself to look at their sweet +faces; but turning into the hotel I felt like a woman too, for I +thought the great and holy mystery, the sacrament of union and +love, had given me such strength that I could meet any further +wrong I might have to endure in my walk through the world with +charity and forgiveness.</p> +<p>But how little a woman knows of her heart until it is tried in +the fires of passion!</p> +<p>As I entered the salon which (as usual) divided my husband's +bedroom from mine, I came upon my maid, Price, listening intently +at my husband's closed door. This seemed to me so improper that I +was beginning to reprove her, when she put her finger to her lip +and coming over to me with her black eyes ablaze she said:</p> +<p>"I know you will pack me off for what I'm going to say, yet I +can't help that. You've stood too much already, my lady, but if you +are a woman and have any pride in yourself as a wife, go and listen +at that door and see if you can stand any more."</p> +<p>With that she went out of the salon, and I tried to go to my own +room, but I could not stir. Something held me to the spot on which +I stood, and I found myself listening to the voices which I could +distinctly hear in my husband's bedroom.</p> +<p>There were two voices, one a man's, loud and reckless, the other +a woman's soft and cautious.</p> +<p>There was no need to tell myself whose voices they were, and +neither did I ask myself any questions. I did not put to my mind +the pros and cons of the case for myself or the case for my +husband. I only thought and felt and behaved as any other wife +would think and feel and behave at such a moment. An ugly and +depraved thing, which my pride or my self-respect had never +hitherto permitted me to believe in, suddenly leapt into life.</p> +<p>I was outraged. I was a victim of the treachery, the duplicity, +the disloyalty, and the smothered secrecy of husband and +friend.</p> +<p>My heart and soul were aflame with a sense of wrong. All the +sweetening and softening and purifying effects of the sacrament +were gone in an instant, and, moving stealthily across the carpet +towards my husband's door, I swiftly turned the handle.</p> +<p>The door was locked.</p> +<p>I heard a movement inside the room and in a moment I hurried +from the salon into the corridor, intending to enter by another +door. As I was about to do so I heard the lock turned back by a +cautious hand within. Then I swung the door open and boldly entered +the room.</p> +<p>Nobody was there except my husband.</p> +<p>But I was just in time to catch the sound of rustling skirts in +the adjoining apartment and to see a door closed gently behind +them.</p> +<p>I looked around. Although the sun was shining, the blinds were +down and the air was full of a rank odour of stale tobacco such as +might have been brought back in people's clothes from that +shameless woman's salon.</p> +<p>My husband, who had clearly been drinking, was looking at me +with a half-senseless grin. His thin hair was a little disordered. +His prominent front teeth showed hideously. I saw that he was +trying to carry things off with an air.</p> +<p>"This <i>is</i> an unexpected pleasure. I think it must be the +first time . . . the very first time that. . . ."</p> +<p>I felt deadly cold; I almost swooned; I could scarcely breathe, +but I said:</p> +<p>"Is that all you've got to say to me?"</p> +<p>"All? What else, my dear? I don't understand. . . ."</p> +<p>"You understand quite well," I answered, and then looking +towards the door of the adjoining apartment, I said, "both of you +understand."</p> +<p>My husband began to laugh—a drunken, idiotic laugh.</p> +<p>"Oh, you mean that . . . perhaps you imagine that. . . ."</p> +<p>"Listen," I said. "This is the end of everything between you and +me."</p> +<p>"The end? Why, I thought that was long ago. In fact I thought +everything ended before it began."</p> +<p>"I mean. . . ." I knew I was faltering . . . "I mean that I can +no longer keep up the farce of being your wife."</p> +<p>"Farce!" Again he laughed. "I congratulate you, my dear. Farce +is exactly the word for it. Our relations have been a farce ever +since the day we were married, and if anything has gone wrong you +have only yourself to blame for it. What's a man to do whose wife +is no company for anybody but the saints and angels?"</p> +<p>His coarse ridicule cut me to the quick. I was humiliated by the +thought that after all in his own gross way my husband had +something to say for himself.</p> +<p>Knowing I was no match for him I wanted to crawl away without +another word. But my silence or the helpless expression of my face +must have been more powerful than my speech, for after a few +seconds in which he went on saying in his drawling way that I had +been no wife to him, and if anything had happened I had brought it +on myself, he stopped, and neither of us spoke for a moment.</p> +<p>Then feeling that if I stayed any longer in that room I should +faint, I turned to go, and he opened the door for me and bowed low, +perhaps in mockery, as I passed out.</p> +<p>When I reached my own bedroom I was so weak that I almost +dropped, and so cold that my maid had to give me brandy and put hot +bottles to my feet.</p> +<p>And then the tears came and I cried like a child.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTIETH_CHAPTER" id="FIFTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTIETH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I was far from well next morning and Price wished to keep me in +bed, but I got up immediately when I heard that my husband was +talking of returning to London.</p> +<p>Our journey was quite uneventful. We three sat together in the +railway carriage and in the private cabin on the steamer, with no +other company than Bimbo, my husband's terrier, and Prue, Alma's +Pekinese spaniel.</p> +<p>Although he made no apology for his conduct of the day before my +husband was quiet and conciliatory, and being sober he looked +almost afraid, as if telling himself that he might have to meet my +father soon—the one man in the world of whom he seemed to +stand in fear.</p> +<p>Alma looked equally frightened, but she carried off her +nervousness with a great show of affection, saying she was sorry I +was feeling "badly," that France and the South did not agree with +me, and that I should be ever so much better when I was "way up +north."</p> +<p>We put up at a well-known hotel near Trafalgar Square, the same +that in our girlhood had been the subject of Alma's dreams of +future bliss, and I could not help observing that while my husband +was selecting our rooms she made a rather ostentatious point of +asking for an apartment on another floor.</p> +<p>It was late when we arrived, so I went to bed immediately, being +also anxious to be alone that I might think out my course of +action.</p> +<p>I was then firmly resolved that one way or other my life with my +husband should come to an end; that I would no longer be befouled +by the mire he had been dragging me through; that I should live a +clean life and drink a pure draught, and oh, how my very soul +seemed to thirst for it!</p> +<p>This was the mood in which I went to sleep, but when I awoke in +the morning, almost before the dawn, the strength of my resolution +ebbed away. I listened to the rumble of the rubber-bound wheels of +the carriages and motor-cars that passed under my window and, +remembering that I had not a friend in London, I felt small and +helpless. What could I do alone? Where could I turn for +assistance?</p> +<p>Instinctively I knew it would be of no use to appeal to my +father, for though it was possible that he might knock my husband +down, it was not conceivable that he would encourage me to separate +from him.</p> +<p>In my loneliness and helplessness I felt like a shipwrecked +sailor, who, having broken away from the foundering vessel that +would have sucked him under, is yet tossing on a raft with the +threatening ocean on every side, and looking vainly for a sail.</p> +<p>At last I thought of Mr. Curphy, my father's advocate, and +decided to send a telegram to him asking for the name of some +solicitor in London to whom I could apply for advice.</p> +<p>To carry out this intention I went down to the hall about nine +o'clock, when people were passing into the breakfast-room, and +visitors were calling at the bureau, and livened page-boys were +shouting names in the corridors.</p> +<p>There was a little writing-room at one side of the hall and I +sat there to write my telegram. It ran—</p> +<p>"Please send name and address reliable solicitor London whom I +can consult on important business."</p> +<p>I was holding the telegraph-form in my hand and reading my +message again and again to make sure that it would lead to no +mischief, when I began to think of Martin Conrad.</p> +<p>It seemed to me that some one had mentioned his name, but I told +myself that must have been a mistake,—that, being so helpless +and so much in need of a friend at that moment, my heart and not my +ears had heard it.</p> +<p>Nevertheless as I sat holding my telegraph-form I became +conscious of somebody who was moving about me. It was a man, for I +could smell the sweet peaty odour of his Harris tweeds.</p> +<p>At length with that thrill which only the human voice can bring +to us when it is the voice of one from whom we have been long +parted, I heard somebody say, from the other side of the desk:</p> +<p>"Mary, is it you?"</p> +<p>I looked up, the blood rushed to my face and a dazzling mist +floated before my eyes, so that for a moment I could hardly see who +was there. But I <i>knew</i> who it was—it was Martin +himself.</p> +<p>He came down on me like a breeze from the mountain, took me by +both hands, telegram and all, and said:</p> +<p>"My goodness, this is stunning!"</p> +<p>I answered, as well as I could for the confusion that +overwhelmed me.</p> +<p>"I'm so glad, so glad!"</p> +<p>"How well you are looking! A little thin, perhaps, but such a +colour!"</p> +<p>"I'm so glad, so glad!" I repeated, though I knew I was only +blushing.</p> +<p>"When did you arrive?"</p> +<p>I told him, and he said:</p> +<p>"<i>We</i> came into port only yesterday. And to think that you +and I should come to the same hotel and meet on the very first +morning! It's like a fate, as our people in the island say. But +it's stunning, perfectly stunning!"</p> +<p>A warm tide of joy was coursing through me and taking away my +breath, but I managed to say:</p> +<p>"I've heard about your expedition. You had great hardships."</p> +<p>"That was nothing! Just a little pleasure-trip down to the +eighty-sixth latitude."</p> +<p>"And great successes?"</p> +<p>"That was nothing either. The chief was jolly good, and the boys +were bricks."</p> +<p>"I'm so glad, so glad!" I said again, for a kind of dumb joy had +taken possession of me, and I went on saying the same thing over +and over again, as people do when they are very happy.</p> +<p>For two full minutes I felt happier than I had ever been in my +life before; and then an icy chill came over me, for I remembered +that I had been married since I saw Martin Conrad last and I did +not know how I was to break the news to him.</p> +<p>Just then my husband and Alma came down the lift, and seeing me +with a stranger, as they crossed the hall to go into the +breakfast-room, they came up and spoke.</p> +<p>I had to introduce them and it was hard to do, for it was +necessary to reveal everything in a word. I looked at Martin Conrad +when I presented him to my husband and he did not move a muscle. +Then I looked at my husband and under a very small bow his face +grew dark.</p> +<p>I could not help seeing the difference between the two men as +they stood together—Martin with his sea-blue eyes and his +look of splendid health, and my husband with his sallow cheeks and +his appearance of wasted strength—and somehow from some +unsearchable depths of my soul the contrast humbled me.</p> +<p>When I introduced Alma she took Martin's hand and held it while +she gazed searchingly into his eyes from under her eyebrows, as she +always did when she was being presented to a man; but I saw that in +this instance her glance fell with no more effect on its object +than a lighted vesta on a running stream.</p> +<p>After the usual banal phrases my husband inquired if Martin was +staying in the house, and then asked if he would dine with us some +day.</p> +<p>"Certainly! Delighted! With all the pleasure in the world," said +Martin.</p> +<p>"Then," said my husband with rather frigid politeness, "you will +see more of your friend Mary."</p> +<p>"Yes," said Alma, in a way that meant much, "you will see more +of your friend Mary."</p> +<p>"Don't you worry about that, ma'am. You <i>bet</i> I will," said +Martin, looking straight into Alma's eyes; and though she laughed +as she passed into the breakfast-room with my husband, I could see +that for the first time in her life a man's face had frightened +her.</p> +<p>"Then you knew?" I said, when they were gone.</p> +<p>"Yes; a friend of mine who met you abroad came down to see us +into port and he . . ."</p> +<p>"Dr. O'Sullivan?"</p> +<p>"That's the man! Isn't he a boy? And, my gracious, the way he +speaks of you! But now . . . now you must go to breakfast yourself, +and I must be off about my business."</p> +<p>"Don't go yet," I said.</p> +<p>"I'll stay all day if you want me to; but I promised to meet the +Lieutenant on the ship in half an hour, and . . ."</p> +<p>"Then you must go."</p> +<p>"Not yet. Sit down again. Five minutes will do no harm. And by +the way, now that I look at you again, I'm not so sure that you . . +. Italy, Egypt, there's enough sun down there, but you're pale . . +. a little pale, aren't you?"</p> +<p>I tried to make light of my pallor but Martin looked uneasy, and +after a moment he asked:</p> +<p>"How long are you staying in London?"</p> +<p>I told him I did not know, whereupon he said:</p> +<p>"Well, I'm to be here a month, making charts and tables and +reports for the Royal Geographical Society, but if you want me for +anything . . . do you want me now?"</p> +<p>"No-o, no, not now," I answered.</p> +<p>"Well, if you <i>do</i> want me for anything—anything at +all, mind, just pass the word and the charts and the tables and the +reports and the Royal Geographical Society may go to the . . . +Well, somewhere."</p> +<p>I laughed and rose and told him he ought to go, though at the +bottom of my heart I was wishing him to stay, and thinking how +little and lonely I was, while here was a big brave man who could +protect me from every danger.</p> +<p>We walked together to the door, and there I took his hand and +held it, feeling, like a child, that if I let him go he might be +lost in the human ocean outside and I should see no more of +him.</p> +<p>At last, struggling hard with a lump that was gathering in my +throat, I said:</p> +<p>"Martin, I have been so happy to see you. I've never been so +happy to see anybody in my life. You'll let me see you again, won't +you?"</p> +<p>"Won't I? Bet your life I will," he said, and then, as if seeing +that my lip was trembling and my eyes were beginning to fill, he +broke into a cheerful little burst of our native tongue, so as to +give me a "heise" as we say in Ellan and to make me laugh at the +last moment.</p> +<p>"Look here—keep to-morrow for me, will ye? If them ones" +(my husband and Alma) "is afther axing ye to do anything else just +tell them there's an ould shipmate ashore, and he's wanting ye to +go 'asploring.' See? So-long!"</p> +<p>It had been like a dream, a beautiful dream, and as soon as I +came to myself in the hall, with the visitors calling at the bureau +and the page-boys shouting in the corridors, I found that my +telegraph-form, crumpled and crushed, was still in the palm of my +left hand.</p> +<p>I tore it up and went in to breakfast.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FOURTH_PART" id="FOURTH_PART"></a>FOURTH PART</h2> +<h3>I FALL IN LOVE</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>During our first day in London my husband had many visitors, +including Mr. Eastcliff and Mr. Vivian, who had much to tell and +arrange about.</p> +<p>I dare say a great many events had happened during our six +months' absence from England; but the only thing I heard of was +that Mr. Eastcliff had married his dancing-girl, that she had +retired from the stage, and that her public appearances were now +confined to the box-seat of a four-in-hand coach, which he drove +from London to Brighton.</p> +<p>This expensive toy he proposed to bring round to the hotel the +following day, which chanced to be Derby Day, when a party was to +be made up for the races.</p> +<p>In the preparations for the party, Alma, who, as usual, +attracted universal admiration, was of course included, but I did +not observe that any provision was made for me, though that +circumstance did not distress me in the least, because I was +waiting for Martin's message.</p> +<p>It came early next morning in the person of Martin himself, who, +running into our sitting-room like a breath of wind from the sea, +said his fellow officers were separating that day, each going to +his own home, and their commander had invited me to lunch with them +on their ship, which was lying off Tilbury.</p> +<p>It did not escape me that my husband looked relieved at this +news, and that Alma's face brightened as she said in her most +succulent tones:</p> +<p>"I should go if I were you, Mary. The breeze on the river will +do you a world of good, dear."</p> +<p>I was nothing loath to take them at their word, so I let them go +off in their four-in-hand coach, a big and bustling party, while +with a fast-beating heart I made ready to spend the day with +Martin, having, as I thought, so much and such serious things to +say to him.</p> +<p>A steam launch from the ship was waiting for us at the +Westminster Pier, and from the moment I stepped into it I felt like +another woman. It was a radiant day in May, when the climate of our +much-maligned London is the brightest and best, and the biggest +city in the world is also the most beautiful.</p> +<p>How I loved it that day! The sunlight, the moving river, the +soft air of early summer, the passing panorama of buildings, old +and new—what a joy it was to me I sat on a side seat, dipping +my hand over the gunwale into the cool water, while Martin, with a +rush of racy words, was pointing out and naming everything.</p> +<p>St. Paul's was soon past, with the sun glistening off the golden +cross on its dome; then London Bridge; then the Tower, with its +Traitors' Gate; then the new Thames Bridge; and then we were in the +region of the barges and wharfs and warehouses, with their colliers +and coasting traders, and with the scum of coal and refuse floating +on the surface of the stream.</p> +<p>After that came uglier things still, which we did not mind, and +then the great docks with the hammering of rivets and the cranking +noise of the lightermen's donkey engines, loading and unloading the +big steamers and sailing ships; and then the broad reaches of the +river where the great liners, looking so high as we steamed under +them, lay at anchor to their rusty cable-chains, with their +port-holes gleaming in the sun like rows of eyes, as Martin said, +in the bodies of gigantic fish.</p> +<p>At last we came out in a fresh breadth of water, with marshes on +either side and a far view of the sea, and there, heaving a little +to the flowing tide, and with a sea-gull floating over her mizzen +mast, lay Martin's ship.</p> +<p>She was a wooden schooner, once a Dundee whaler called the +<i>Mary</i> but now re-christened the <i>Scotia</i>, and it would +be silly to say how my eyes filled at sight of her, just because +she had taken Martin down into the deep Antarctic and brought him +safely back again.</p> +<p>"She's a beauty, isn't she?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"Isn't she?" I answered, and in spite of all my troubles I felt +entirely happy.</p> +<p>We had steamed down against a strong tide, so we were half an +hour late for luncheon, and the officers had gone down to the +saloon, but it was worth being a little after time to see the way +they all leapt up and received me like a queen—making me +feel, as I never felt before, the difference between the politeness +of the fashionable idlers and the manners of the men who do +things.</p> +<p>"Holloa!" they cried.</p> +<p>"Excuse us, won't you? We thought something had happened and +perhaps you were not coming," said the commander, and then he put +me to sit between himself and Martin.</p> +<p>The strange thing was that I was at home in that company in a +moment, and if anybody imagines that I must have been embarrassed +because I was the only member of my sex among so many men he does +not know the heart of a woman.</p> +<p>They were such big, bronzed manly fellows with the note of +health and the sense of space about them—large space—as +if they had come out of the heroic youth of the world, that they +set my blood a-tingling to look at them.</p> +<p>They were very nice to me too, though I knew that I only stood +for the womankind that each had got at home and was soon to go back +to, but none the less it was delightful to feel as if I were taking +the first fruits of their love for them.</p> +<p>So it came to pass that within a few minutes I, who had been +called insipid and was supposed to have no conversation, was +chattering away softly and happily, making remarks about the things +around me and asking all sorts of questions.</p> +<p>Of course I asked many foolish ones, which made the men laugh +very much; but their laughter did not hurt me the least bit in the +world, because everybody laughed on that ship, even the sailors who +served the dishes, and especially one grizzly old salt, a cockney +from Wapping, who for some unexplained reason was called +Treacle.</p> +<p>It made me happy to see how they all deferred to Martin, saying: +"Isn't that so, Doctor?" or "Don't you agree, Doctor?" and though +it was strange and new to hear Martin (my "Mart of Spitzbergen") +called "Doctor," it was also very charming.</p> +<p>After luncheon was over, and while coffee was being served, the +commander sent Treacle to his cabin for a photograph of all hands +which had been taken when they were at the foot of Mount Erebus; +and when it came I was called upon to identify one by one, the +shaggy, tousled, unkempt, bearded, middle-aged men in the picture +with the smart, clean-shaven young officers who sat round me at the +table.</p> +<p>Naturally I made shockingly bad shots, and the worst of them was +when I associated Treacle with the commander, which made the latter +rock in his seat and the former shake and shout so much that he +spilled the coffee.</p> +<p>"But what about the fourth man in the front row from the left?" +asked the commander.</p> +<p>"Oh, I should recognise him if I were blindfolded," I +answered.</p> +<p>"By what?"</p> +<p>"By his eyes," I said, and after this truly Irish and feminine +answer the men shrieked with laughter.</p> +<p>"She's got you there, doc," cried somebody.</p> +<p>"She has sure," said Martin, who had said very little down to +that moment, but was looking supremely happy.</p> +<p>At length the time came for the men to go, and I went up on deck +to see them off by the launch, and then nobody was left on the ship +except Martin and myself, with the cook, the cabin-boy and a few of +the crew, including Treacle.</p> +<p>I knew that that was the right time to speak, but I was too +greedy of every moment of happiness to break in on it with the +story of my troubles, so when Martin proposed to show me over the +ship, away I went with him to look at the theodolites and +chronometers and sextants, and sledges and skis, and the aeronautic +outfit and the captive balloon, and the double-barrelled guns, and +the place where they kept the petroleum and the gun cotton for +blasting the ice, and the hold forward for the men's provisions in +hermetically-sealed tins, and the hold aft for the dried fish and +biscuit that were the food for the Siberian dogs, and the empty +cage for the dogs themselves, which had just been sent up to the +Zoo to be taken care of.</p> +<p>Last of all he showed me his own cabin, which interested me more +than anything else, being such a snug little place (though I +thought I should like to tidy it up a bit), with his medical +outfit, his books, his bed like a shelf, and one pretty photograph +of his mother's cottage with the roses growing over it, that I +almost felt as if I would not mind going to the Antarctic myself if +I could live in such comfortable quarters.</p> +<p>Two hours passed in this way, though they had flown like five +minutes, when the cabin-boy came to say that tea was served in the +saloon, and then I skipped down to it as if the ship belonged to +me. And no sooner had I screwed myself into the commander's chair, +which was fixed to the floor at the head of the narrow table, and +found the tea-tray almost on my lap, than a wave of memory from our +childhood came sweeping back on me, and I could not help giving way +to the coquetry which lies hidden in every girl's heart so as to +find out how much Martin had been thinking of me.</p> +<p>"I'll bet you anything," I said, (I had caught Martin's style) +"you can't remember where you and I first saw each other."</p> +<p>He could—it was in the little dimity-white room in his +mother's house with its sweet-smelling "scraas" under the sloping +thatch.</p> +<p>"Well, you don't remember what you were doing when we held our +first conversation?"</p> +<p>He did—he was standing on his hands with his feet against +the wall and his inverted head close to the carpet.</p> +<p>"But you've forgotten what happened next?"</p> +<p>He hadn't—I had invited William Rufus and himself into +bed, and they had sat up on either side of me.</p> +<p>Poor William Rufus! I heard at last what had become of him. He +had died of distemper soon after I was sent to school. His master +had buried him in the back-garden, and, thinking I should be as +sorry as he was for the loss of our comrade, he had set up a stone +with an inscription in our joint names—all of his own +inditing. It ran—he spelled it out to me—</p> +<p>"HERE LICE WILYAM ROOFUS WRECKTED<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">BY IZ OLE FRENS MARTIN +CONRAD</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">AND MARY O'NEILL."</span></p> +<p>Two big blinding beads came into my eyes at that story, but they +were soon dashed away by Martin who saw them coming and broke into +the vernacular. I broke into it, too, (hardly knowing that the well +of my native speech was still there until I began to tap it), and +we talked of Tommy the Mate and his "starboard eye," called each +other "bogh mulish," said things were "middling," spoke of the +"threes" (trees) and the "tunder" (thunder), and remembered that +"our Big Woman was a wicked devil and we wouldn't trust but she'd +burn in hell."</p> +<p>How we laughed! We laughed at everything; we laughed at nothing; +we laughed until we cried; but I have often thought since that this +was partly because we knew in our secret hearts that we were always +hovering on the edge of tragic things.</p> +<p>Martin never once mentioned my husband or my marriage, or his +letters to my father, the Bishop and Father Dan, which had turned +out so terribly true; but we had our serious moments for all that, +and one of them was when we were bending over a large chart which +he had spread out on the table to show me the course of the ship +through the Great Unknown, leaning shoulder to shoulder, so close +that our heads almost touched, and I could see myself in his eyes +as he turned to speak to me.</p> +<p>"You were a little under the weather yesterday, +shipmate—what was the cause of it?" he asked.</p> +<p>"Oh, we . . . we can talk of that another time, can't we?" I +answered, and then we both laughed again, goodness knows why, +unless it was because we felt we were on the verge of unlocking the +doors of each other's souls.</p> +<p>Oh that joyful, wonderful, heart-swelling day! But no day ever +passed so quickly. At half-past six Martin said we must be going +back, or I should be late for dinner, and a few minutes afterwards +we were in the launch, which had returned to fetch us.</p> +<p>I had had such a happy time on the ship that as we were steaming +off I kissed my hand to her, whereupon Treacle, who was standing at +the top of the companion, taking the compliment to himself, +returned the salute with affectionate interest, which sent Martin +and me into our last wild shriek of laughter.</p> +<p>The return trip was just as delightful as the coming out had +been, everything looking different the other way round, for the +sunset was like a great celestial fire which had been lighted in +the western sky, and the big darkening city seemed to have turned +its face to it.</p> +<p>Martin talked all the way back about a scheme he had afoot for +going down to the region of the Pole again in order to set up some +machinery that was to save life and otherwise serve humanity, and +while I sat close up to him, looking into his flashing +eyes—they were still as blue as the bluest sea—I said, +again and again: "How splendid! How glorious! What a great, great +thing it will be for the world."</p> +<p>"Won't it?" he said, and his eyes sparkled like a boy's.</p> +<p>Thus the time passed without our being aware how it was going, +and we were back at Westminster Pier before I bethought me that of +the sad and serious subject I had intended to speak about I had +said nothing at all.</p> +<p>But all London seemed to have been taking holiday that day, for +as we drove in a taxi up Parliament Street streams of vehicles full +of happy people were returning from the Derby, including costers' +donkey carts in which the girls were carrying huge boughs of May +blossom, and the boys were wearing the girls' feathery hats, and at +the top of their lusty lungs they were waking the echoes of the +stately avenue with the "Honeysuckle and the Bee."</p> +<p>"<i>Yew aw the enny, Oi em ther bee,<br /> +Oi'd like ter sip ther enny from those red lips, yew see</i>."</p> +<p>As we came near our hotel we saw a rather showy four-in-hand +coach, called the "Phoebus," drawing up at the covered way in front +of it, and a lady on top, in a motor veil, waving her hand to +us.</p> +<p>It was Alma, with my husband's and Mr. Eastcliff's party back +from the races, and as soon as we met on the pavement she began to +pay me high compliments on my improved appearance.</p> +<p>"Didn't I say the river air would do you good, dearest?" she +said, and then she added something else, which would have been very +sweet if it had been meant sweetly, about there being no surer way +to make a girl beautiful than to make her happy.</p> +<p>There was some talk of our dining together that night, but I +excused myself, and taking leave of Martin, who gave my hand a +gentle pressure, I ran upstairs without waiting for the lift, being +anxious to get to my own room that I might be alone and go over +everything in my mind.</p> +<p>I did so, ever so many times, recalling all that had been said +and done by the commander and his comrades, and even by Treacle, +but above all by Martin, and laughing softly to myself as I lived +my day over again in a world of dream.</p> +<p>My maid came in once or twice, with accounts of the gorgeous +Derby dinner that was going on downstairs, but that did not matter +to me in the least, and as soon as I had swallowed a little food I +went to bed early—partly in order to get rid of Price that I +might go over everything again and yet again.</p> +<p>I must have done so far into the night, and even when the wings +of my memory were weary of their fluttering and I was dropping off +at last, I thought I heard Martin calling "shipmate," and I said +"Yes," quite loud, as if he had been with me still in that vague +and beautiful shadow-land which lies on the frontier of sleep.</p> +<p>How mysterious, how magical, how wonderful!</p> +<p>Looking back I cannot but think it strange that even down to +that moment I did not really know what was happening to me, being +only conscious of a great flood of joy. I cannot but think it +strange that, though Nature had been whispering to me for months, I +did not know what it had been saying. I cannot but think it strange +that, though I had been looking for love so long without finding +it, I did not recognise it immediately when it had come to me of +itself.</p> +<p>But when I awoke early in the morning, very early, while the +sunrise was filling my bedroom with a rosy flush, and the thought +of Martin was the first that was springing from the mists of sleep +to my conscious mind, and I was asking myself how it happened that +I was feeling so glad, while I had so many causes for grief, then +suddenly—suddenly as the sun streams through the cloud-scud +over the sea—I knew that what had long been predestined had +happened, that the wondrous new birth, the great revelation, the +joyous mystery which comes to every happy woman in the world had +come at last to me.</p> +<p>I was in love.</p> +<p>I was in love with Martin Conrad.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My joy was short-lived. No sooner had I become aware that I +loved Martin Conrad, than my conscience told me I had no right to +do so. I was married, and to love another than my husband was +sin.</p> +<p>It would be impossible to say with what terror this thought +possessed me. It took all the sunlight out of my sky, which a +moment before had seemed so bright. It came on me like a storm of +thunder and lightning, sweeping my happiness into the abyss.</p> +<p>All my religion, everything I had been taught about the sanctity +of the sacrament of marriage seemed to rise up and accuse me. It +was not that I was conscious of any sin against my husband. I was +thinking only of my sin against God.</p> +<p>The first effect was to make me realise that it was no longer +possible for me to speak to Martin about my husband and Alma. To do +this now that I knew I loved him would be deceitful, mean, almost +treacherous.</p> +<p>The next effect was to make me see that all thought of a +separation must now be given up. How could I accuse my husband when +I was myself in the same position? If he loved another woman, I +loved another man.</p> +<p>In my distress and fright I saw only one means of escape either +from the filthy burden to which I was bound or the consciousness of +a sinful heart, and that was to cure myself of my passion. I +determined to do so. I determined to fight against my love for +Martin Conrad, to conquer it and to crush it.</p> +<p>My first attempt to do this was feeble enough. It was an effort +to keep myself out of the reach of temptation by refusing to see +Martin alone.</p> +<p>For three or four days I did my best to carry out this purpose, +making one poor excuse after another, when (as happened several +times a day) he came down to see me—that I was just going out +or had just come in, or was tired or unwell.</p> +<p>It was tearing my heart out to deny myself so, but I think I +could have borne the pain if I had not realised that I was causing +pain to him also.</p> +<p>My maid, whose head was always running on Martin, would come +hack to my room, after delivering one of my lying excuses, and +say:</p> +<p>"You should have seen his face, when I told him you were ill. It +was just as if I'd driven a knife into him."</p> +<p>Everybody seemed to be in a conspiracy to push me into Martin's +arms—Alma above all others. Being a woman she read my secret, +and I could see from the first that she wished to justify her own +conduct in relation to my husband by putting me into the same +position with Martin.</p> +<p>"Seen Mr. Conrad to-day?" she would ask.</p> +<p>"Not to-day," I would answer.</p> +<p>"Really? And you such old friends! And staying in the same +hotel, too!"</p> +<p>When she saw that I was struggling hard she reminded my husband +of his intention of asking Martin to dinner, and thereupon a night +was fixed and a party invited.</p> +<p>Martin came, and I was only too happy to meet him in company, +though the pain and humiliation of the contrast between him and my +husband and his friends, and the difference of the atmosphere in +which he lived from that to which I thought I was doomed for ever, +was almost more than I could bear.</p> +<p>I think they must have felt it themselves, for though their +usual conversation was of horses and dogs and race-meetings, I +noticed they were silent while Martin in his rugged, racy poetic +way (for all explorers are poets) talked of the beauty of the great +Polar night, the cloudless Polar day, the midnight calm and the +moonlight on the glaciers, which was the loveliest, weirdest, most +desolate, yet most entrancing light the world could show.</p> +<p>"I wonder you don't think of going back to the Antarctic, if +it's so fascinating," said Alma.</p> +<p>"I do. Bet your life I do," said Martin, and then he told them +what he had told me on the launch, but more fully and even more +rapturously—the story of his great scheme for saving life and +otherwise benefiting humanity.</p> +<p>For hundreds of years man, prompted merely by the love of +adventure, the praise of achievement, and the desire to know the +globe he lived on, had been shouldering his way to the hitherto +inviolable regions of the Poles; but now the time had come to turn +his knowledge to account.</p> +<p>"How?" said my husband.</p> +<p>"By putting himself into such a position," said Martin, "that he +will be able to predict, six, eight, ten days ahead, the weather of +a vast part of the navigable and habitable world—by +establishing installations of wireless telegraphy as near as +possible to the long ice-barrier about the Pole from which +ice-floes and icebergs and blizzards come, so that we can say in +ten minutes from the side of Mount Erebus to half the southern +hemisphere, 'Look out. It's coming down,' and thus save millions of +lives from shipwreck, and hundreds of millions of money."</p> +<p>"Splendid, by Jove!" said Mr. Eastcliff.</p> +<p>"Yes, ripping, by jingo!" said Mr. Vivian.</p> +<p>"A ridiculous dream!" muttered my husband, but not until Martin +had gone, and then Alma, seeing that I was all aglow, said:</p> +<p>"What a lovely man! I wonder you don't see more of him, Mary, my +love. He'll be going to the ends of the earth soon, and then you'll +be sorry you missed the chance."</p> +<p>Her words hurt me like the sting of a wasp, but I could not +resist them, and when some days later Martin called to take me to +the Geographical Society, where his commander, Lieutenant +—— was to give an account of their expedition, I could +not find it in my heart to refuse to go.</p> +<p>Oh, the difference of this world from that in which I had been +living for the past six months! All that was best in England seemed +to be there, the men who were doing the work of the world, and the +women who were their wives and partners.</p> +<p>The theatre was like the inside of a dish, and I sat by Martin's +side on the bottom row of seats, just in front of the platform and +face to face with the commander.</p> +<p>His lecture, which was illustrated by many photographic lantern +slides of the exploring party, (including the one that had been +shown to me on the ship) was very interesting, but terribly +pathetic; and when he described the hardships they had gone through +in a prolonged blizzard on a high plateau, with food and fuel +running low, and no certainty that they would ever see home again, +I found myself feeling for Martin's hand to make sure that he was +there.</p> +<p>Towards the end the commander spoke very modestly of himself, +saying he could never have reached the 87th parallel if he had not +had a crew of the finest comrades that ever sailed on a ship.</p> +<p>"And though they're all splendid fellows," he said, "there's one +I can specially mention without doing any wrong to the rest, and +that's the young doctor of our expedition—Martin Conrad. +Martin has a scheme of his own for going down to the Antarctic +again to make a great experiment in the interests of humanity, and +if and when he goes I say, 'Good luck to him and God bless +him!'"</p> +<p>At these generous words there was much applause, during which +Martin sat blushing like a big boy when he is introduced to the +girl friends of his sister.</p> +<p>As for me I did not think any speech could have been so +beautiful, and I felt as if I could have cried for joy.</p> +<p>When I got back to the hotel I <i>did</i> cry, but it was for +another reason. I was thinking of my father and wondering why he +did not wait.</p> +<p>"Why, why, why?" I asked myself.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Next day, Martin came rushing down to my sitting-room with a +sheaf of letters in his hand, saying:</p> +<p>"That was jolly good of the boss, but look what he has let me in +for?"</p> +<p>They were requests from various newspapers for portraits and +interviews, and particularly from one great London journal for a +special article to contain an account of the nature and object of +the proposed experiment.</p> +<p>"What am I to do?" he said. "I'm all right for stringing gabble, +but I couldn't <i>write</i> anything to save my soul. Now, you +could. I'm sure you could. You could write like Robinson Crusoe. +Why shouldn't you write the article and I'll tell you what to put +into it?"</p> +<p>There was no resisting that. And down at the bottom of my secret +heart I was glad of the excuse to my conscience that I could not +any longer run away from Martin because I was necessary to help +him.</p> +<p>So we sat together all day long, and though it was like shooting +the rapids to follow Martin's impetuous and imaginative speech, I +did my best to translate his disconnected outbursts into more +connected words, and when the article was written and read aloud to +him he was delighted.</p> +<p>"Stunning! Didn't I say you could write like Robinson +Crusoe?"</p> +<p>In due course it was published and made a deep impression, for +wherever I went people were talking of it, and though some said +"Fudge!" and others, like my husband, said "Dreams!" the practical +result was that the great newspaper started a public subscription +with the object of providing funds for the realisation of Martin's +scheme.</p> +<p>This brought him an immense correspondence, so that every +morning he came down with an armful of letters and piteous appeals +to me to help him to reply to them.</p> +<p>I knew it would be dangerous to put myself in the way of so much +temptation, but the end of it was that day after day we sat +together in my sitting-room, answering the inquiries of the +sceptical, the congratulations of the convinced, and the offers of +assistance that came from people who wished to join in the +expedition.</p> +<p>What a joy it was! It was like the dawn of a new life to me. But +the highest happiness of all was to protect Martin against himself, +to save him from his over-generous impulses—in a word, to +mother him.</p> +<p>Many of the letters he received were mere mendicancy. He was not +rich, yet he could not resist a pitiful appeal, especially if it +came from a woman, and it was as much as I could do to restrain him +from ruining himself.</p> +<p>Sometimes I would see him smuggle a letter into his side pocket, +with—</p> +<p>"H'm! That will do later."</p> +<p>"What is it?" I would ask.</p> +<p>"Oh, nothing, nothing!" he would answer.</p> +<p>"Hand it out, sir," I would say, and then I would find a fierce +delight in sending six freezing words of refusal to some impudent +woman who was trying to play upon the tender side of my big-hearted +boy.</p> +<p>Oh, it was delightful! My whole being seemed to be renewed. If +only the dear sweet hours could go on and on for ever!</p> +<p>Sometimes my husband and Alma would look in upon us at our work, +and then, while the colour mounted to my eyes, Martin would +say:</p> +<p>"I'm fishing with another man's floats, you see."</p> +<p>"I see," my husband would reply, fixing his monocle and showing +his front teeth in a painful grin.</p> +<p>"Just what dear Mary loves, though," Alma would say. "I do +believe she would rather he sitting in this sunless room, writing +letters for Mr. Conrad, than wearing her coronet at a King's +coronation."</p> +<p>"Just so, ma'am; there <i>are</i> women like that," Martin would +answer, looking hard at her; and when she had gone, (laughing +lightly but with the frightened look I had seen before) he would +say, as if speaking to himself:</p> +<p>"I hate that woman. She's like a snake. I feel as if I want to +put my foot on it."</p> +<p>At length the climax came. One day Martin rushed downstairs +almost beside himself in his boyish joy, to say that all the money +he needed had been subscribed, and that in honour of the maturing +of the scheme the proprietor of the newspaper was to give a public +luncheon at one of the hotels, and though no women were to be +present at the "feed" a few ladies were to occupy seats in a +gallery, and I was to be one of them.</p> +<p>I had played with my temptation too long by this time to shrink +from the dangerous exaltation which I knew the occasion would +cause, so when the day came I went to the hotel in a fever of +pleasure and pride.</p> +<p>The luncheon was nearly over, the speeches were about to begin, +and the ladies' gallery was buzzing like a hive of bees, when I +took my seat in it. Two bright young American women sitting next to +me were almost as excited as myself, and looking down at the men +through a pair of opera-glasses they were asking each other which +was Martin, whereupon my vanity, not to speak of my sense of +possession, was so lifted up that I pointed him out to them, and +then borrowed their glasses to look at the chairman.</p> +<p>He seemed to me to have that light of imagination in his eyes +which was always blazing in Martin's, and when he began to speak I +thought I caught the note of the same wild passion.</p> +<p>He said they were that day opening a new chapter in the +wonderful book of man's story, and though the dangers of the great +deep might never be entirely overcome, and the wind would continue +to blow as it listed, yet the perils of the one and the movements +of the other were going to be known to, and therefore checked by, +the human family.</p> +<p>After that, and a beautiful tribute to Martin as a man, (that +everybody who had met him had come to love him, and that there must +be something in the great solitudes of the silent white world to +make men simple and strong and great, as the sea made them staunch +and true) he drank to the success of the expedition, and called on +Martin to respond to the toast.</p> +<p>There was a great deal of cheering when Martin rose, but I was +so nervous that I hardly heard it. He was nervous too, as I could +plainly see, for after a few words of thanks, he began to fumble +the sheets of a speech which he and I had prepared together, trying +to read it, but losing his place and even dropping his papers.</p> +<p>Beads of perspiration were starting from my forehead and I knew +I was making noises in my throat, when all at once Martin threw his +papers on the table and said, in quite another voice:</p> +<p>"Ship-mates, I mean gentlemen, I never could write a speech in +my life, and you see I can't read one, but I know what I want to +say and if you'll take it as it comes here goes."</p> +<p>Then in the simple style of a sailor, not always even +grammatical yet splendidly clear and bold and natural, blundering +along as he used to do when he was a boy at school and could not +learn his lessons, but with his blue eyes ablaze, he told of his +aims and his expectations.</p> +<p>And when he came to the end he said:</p> +<p>"His lordship, the chairman, has said something about the good +effects of the solitudes of Nature on a man's character. I can +testify to that. And I tell you this—whatever you are when +you're up here and have everything you want, it's wonderful strange +the way you're asking the Lord to stretch out His hand and help you +when you're down there, all alone and with an empty hungry +stomach.</p> +<p>"I don't know where you were last Christmas Day, shipmates . . . +I mean gentlemen, but I know where I was. I was in the 85th +latitude, longitude 163, four miles south and thirty west of Mount +Darwin. It was my own bit of an expedition that my commander has +made too much of, and I believe in my heart my mates had had enough +of it. When we got out of our sleeping bags that morning there was +nothing in sight but miles and miles of rolling waves of snow, +seven thousand feet up on a windy plateau, with glaciers full of +crevasses shutting us off from the sea, and not a living thing in +sight as far as the eye could reach.</p> +<p>"We were six in company and none of us were too good for +Paradise, and one—he was an old Wapping sailor, we called him +Treacle—had the name of being a shocking old rip ashore. But +we remembered what day it was, and we wanted to feel that we +weren't cut off entirely from the world of Christian men—our +brothers and sisters who would be going to church at home. So I dug +out my little prayer-book that my mother put in my kit going away, +and we all stood round bare-headed in the snow—a shaggy old +lot I can tell you, with chins that hadn't seen a razor for a +month—and I read the prayers for the day, the first and +second Vespers, and Laudate Dominum and then the De Profundis.</p> +<p>"I think we felt better doing that, but they say the comical and +the tragical are always chasing each other, which can get in first, +and it was so with us, for just as I had got to an end with the +solemn words, 'Out of the depths we cry unto thee, O Lord, Lord +hear our cry,' in jumps old Treacle in his thickest cockney, 'And +Gawd bless our pore ole wives and sweethearts fur a-wye.'"</p> +<p>If Martin said any more nobody heard it. The men below were +blowing their noses, and the women in the gallery were crying +openly.</p> +<p>"Well, the man who can talk like that may open all my letters +and telegrams," said one of the young American women, who was +wiping her eyes without shame.</p> +<p>What I was doing, and what I was looking like, I did not know +until the lady, who had lent me the opera-glasses leaned over to me +and said:</p> +<p>"Excuse me, but are you his wife, may I ask?"</p> +<p>"Oh no, no," I said nervously and eagerly, but only God knows +how the word went through and through me.</p> +<p>I had taken the wrong course, and I knew it. My pride, my joy, +my happiness were all accusing me, and when I went to bed that +night I felt as if I had been a guilty woman.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I tried to take refuge in religion. Every day and all day I +humbly besought the pardon of heaven for the sin of loving Martin +Conrad.</p> +<p>The little religious duties which I had neglected since my +marriage (such as crossing myself at rising from the table) I began +to observe afresh, and being reminded by Martin's story that I had +promised my mother to say a De Profundis for her occasionally I now +said one every day. I thought these exercises would bring me a +certain relief, but they did not.</p> +<p>I searched my Missal for words that applied to my sinful state, +and every night on going to bed I prayed to God to take from me all +unholy thoughts, all earthly affections. But what was the use of my +prayers when in the first dream of the first sleep I was rushing +into Martin's arms?</p> +<p>It was true that my love for Martin was what the world would +call a pure love; it had no alloy of any kind; but all the same I +thought I was living in a condition of adultery—adultery of +the heart.</p> +<p>Early every morning I went to mass, but the sense I used to have +of returning from the divine sacrifice to the ordinary occupations +of life with a new spirit and a clean heart I could feel no +longer.</p> +<p>I went oftener to confession than I had done before—twice +a week to begin with, then every other day, then every day. But the +old joy, the sense of purity and cleansing, did not come. I thought +at first the fault might be with my Confessor, for though I knew I +was in the presence of God, the whispering voice behind the +grating, which used to thrill me with a feeling of the +supernatural, was that of a young man, and I asked myself what a +young priest could know by experience of the deep temptations of +human love.</p> +<p>This was at the new Cathedral at Westminster, so I changed to a +little Catholic church in a kind of mews in Mayfair, and there my +Confessor was an older man whose quivering voice seemed to search +the very depths of my being. He was deeply alarmed at my condition +and counselled me to pray to God night and day to strengthen me +against temptation.</p> +<p>"The Evil One is besieging your soul, my child," he said. "Fight +with him, my daughter."</p> +<p>I tried to follow my ghostly father's direction, but how hard it +was to do so! Martin had only to take my hand and look into my eyes +and all my good resolutions were gone in a moment.</p> +<p>As a result of the fierce struggle between my heart and my soul +my health began to fail me. From necessity now, and not from +design, I had to keep my room, but even there my love for Martin +was always hanging like a threatening sword over my head.</p> +<p>My maid Price was for ever singing his praises. He was so +bright, so cheerful, so strong, so manly; in fact, he was perfect, +and any woman in the world might be forgiven if she fell in love +with him.</p> +<p>Her words were like music in my ears, and sometimes I felt as if +I wanted to throw my arms about her neck and kiss her. But at other +moments I reproved her, telling her it was very wicked of her to +think so much of the creature instead of fixing her mind on the +Creator—a piece of counsel which made Price, who was all +woman, open her sparkling black eyes in bewilderment.</p> +<p>Nearly every morning she brought me a bunch of flowers, which +Martin had bought at Covent Garden, all glittering from the +sunshine and damp with the dew. I loved to have them near me, but, +finding they tempted me to think more tenderly of him who sent +them, I always contrived by one excuse or another to send them into +the sitting-room that they might be out of my sight at all +events.</p> +<p>After a while Price, remembering my former artifice, began to +believe that I was only pretending to be ill, in order to draw +Martin on, and then taking a certain liberty with me, as with a +child, she reproved me.</p> +<p>"If I were a lady I couldn't have the heart," she said, "I +really couldn't. It's all very well for us women, but men don't +understand such ways. They're only children, men are, when you come +to know them."</p> +<p>I began to look upon poor Price as a honeyed fiend sent by Satan +to seduce me, and to say the truth she sometimes acted up to the +character. One day she said:</p> +<p>"If I was tied to a man I didn't love, and who didn't love me, +and somebody else, worth ten of him was ready and waiting, I would +take the sweet with the bitter, I would. We women must follow our +hearts, and why shouldn't we?"</p> +<p>Then I scolded her dreadfully, asking if she had forgotten that +she was speaking to her mistress, and a married woman; but all the +while I knew that it was myself, not my maid, I was angry with, for +she had only been giving voice to the thoughts that were secretly +tormenting me.</p> +<p>I had been in bed about a week when Price came with a letter in +her hand and a look of triumph in her black eyes and said:</p> +<p>"There, my lady! What did I tell you? You've had it all your own +way and now you've driven him off. He has left the hotel and gone +to live on his ship."</p> +<p>This frightened me terribly, and partly for that reason I +ordered her out of the room, telling her she must leave me +altogether if she ever took such liberties again. But I'm sure she +saw me, as she was going through the door, take up Martin's letter, +which I had thrown on to the table, and press it to my lips.</p> +<p>The letter was of no consequence, it was merely to tell me that +he was going down to Tilbury for a few days, to take possession of +his old ship in the name of his company, but it said in a +postscript:</p> +<p>"If there's anything I can do for you, pass me the word and I'll +come up like quick-sticks."</p> +<p>"What can I do? What can I do?" I thought. Everything my heart +desired my soul condemned as sinful, and religion had done nothing +to liberate me from the pains of my guilty passion.</p> +<p>All this time my husband and Alma were busy with the gaieties of +the London season, which was then in full swing, with the houses in +Mayfair being ablaze every night, the blinds up and the windows +open to cool the overheated rooms in which men and women could be +seen dancing in closely-packed crowds.</p> +<p>One night, after Alma and my husband had gone to a reception in +Grosvenor Square, I had a sudden attack of heart-strain and had to +be put to bed, whereupon Price, who had realised that I was really +ill, told Hobson, my husband's valet, to go after his master and +bring him back immediately.</p> +<p>"It'll be all as one, but I'll go if you like," said Hobson.</p> +<p>In half an hour he came back with my husband's answer. "Send for +a doctor."</p> +<p>This put Price into a fever of mingled anger and perplexity, and +not knowing what else to do she telegraphed to Martin on his ship, +telling him that I was ill and asking what doctor she ought to call +in to see me.</p> +<p>Inside an hour a reply came not from Tilbury but from Portsmouth +saying:</p> +<p>"Call Doctor —— of Brook Street. Am coming up at +once."</p> +<p>All this I heard for the first time when Price, with another +triumphant look, came into my bedroom flourishing Martin's telegram +as something she had reason to be proud of.</p> +<p>"You don't mean to say that you telegraphed to Mr. Conrad?" I +said.</p> +<p>"Why <i>not?</i>" said Price. "When a lady is ill and her +husband pays no attention to her, and there's somebody else not far +off who would give his two eyes to save her a pain in her little +finger, what is a woman to do?"</p> +<p>I told her what she was <i>not</i> to do. She was not to call +the doctor under any circumstances, and when Martin came she was to +make it plain to him that she had acted on her own +responsibility.</p> +<p>Towards midnight he arrived, and Price brought him into my room +in a long ulster covered with dust. I blushed and trembled at sight +of him, for his face betrayed the strain and anxiety he had gone +through on my account, and when he smiled at seeing that I was not +as ill as he had thought, I was ashamed to the bottom of my +heart.</p> +<p>"You'll be sorry you've made such a long journey now that you +see there's so little amiss with me," I said.</p> +<p>"Sorry?" he said. "By the holy saints, I would take a longer one +every night of my life to see you looking so well at the end of +it."</p> +<p>His blue eyes were shining like the sun from behind a cloud, and +the cruellest looks could not have hurt me more.</p> +<p>I tried to keep my face from expressing the emotion I desired to +conceal, and asked if he had caught a train easily from Portsmouth, +seeing he had arrived so early.</p> +<p>"No. Oh no, there was no train up until eleven o'clock," he +said.</p> +<p>"Then how did you get here so soon?" I asked, and though he +would not tell me at first I got it out of him at last—he had +hired a motor-car and travelled the ninety miles to London in two +hours and a half.</p> +<p>That crushed me. I could not speak. I thought I should have +choked. Lying there with Martin at arm's length of me, I was afraid +of myself, and did not know what I might do next. But at last, with +a great effort to control myself, I took his hand and kissed it, +and then turned my face to the wall.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>That was the beginning of the end, and when, next day towards +noon, my husband came with drowsy eyes to make a kind of ungracious +apology, saying he supposed the doctor had been sent for, I +said:</p> +<p>"James, I want you to take me home."</p> +<p>"Home? You mean . . . Castle Raa?"</p> +<p>"Y-es."</p> +<p>He hesitated, and I began to plead with him, earnestly and +eagerly, not to deny me what I asked.</p> +<p>"Take me home, I beg, I pray."</p> +<p>At length, seeming to think I must be homesick, he said:</p> +<p>"Well, you know my views about that God-forsaken place, but the +season's nearly at an end, and I don't mind going back on one +condition—that you raise no objection to my inviting a few +friends to liven it up a bit?"</p> +<p>"It is your house," I said. "You must do as you please in +it."</p> +<p>"Very good; that's settled," he said, getting up to go. "And I +dare say it will do you no harm to be out of the way of all this +church-going and confessing to priests, who are always depressing +people even when they're not making mischief."</p> +<p>Hardly had my husband left me when Alma came into my +sitting-room in the most affectionate and insincere of her +moods.</p> +<p>"My poor, dear sweet child," she said. "If I'd had the least +idea you were feeling so badly I shouldn't have allowed Jimmy to +stay another minute at that tiresome reception. But how good it was +of Mr. Conrad to come all that way to see you! That's what I call +being a friend now!"</p> +<p>Then came the real object of her visit—I saw it +coming.</p> +<p>"I hear you're to have a house-party at Castle Raa. Jimmy's in +his room writing piles of invitations. He has asked me and I should +love to go, but of course I cannot do so without <i>you</i> wish +it. Do you?"</p> +<p>What could I say? What I <i>did</i> say I scarcely know. I only +know that at the next minute Alma's arms were round my neck, and +she was saying:</p> +<p>"You dear, sweet, unselfish little soul! Come let me kiss +you."</p> +<p>It was done. I had committed myself. After all what right had I +to raise myself on a moral pinnacle now? And what did it matter, +anyway? I was flying from the danger of my own infidelities, not to +save my husband from his.</p> +<p>Price had been in the room during this interview and when it was +over I was ashamed to look at her.</p> +<p>"I can't understand you, my lady; I really can't," she said.</p> +<p>Next day I wrote a little letter to Martin on the <i>Scotia</i> +telling him of our change of plans, but forbidding him to trouble +to come up to say good-bye, yet half hoping he would disregard my +injunction.</p> +<p>He did. Before I left my bedroom next morning I heard his voice +in the sitting-room talking to Price, who with considerable +emphasis was giving her views of Alma.</p> +<p>When I joined him I thought his face (which had grown to be very +powerful) looked hard and strained; but his voice was as soft as +ever while he said I was doing right in going home and that my +native air must be good for me.</p> +<p>"But what's this Price tells me—that Madame is going with +you?"</p> +<p>I tried to make light of that, but I broke down badly, for his +eyes were on me, and I could see that he thought I was concealing +the truth.</p> +<p>For some minutes he looked perplexed, as if trying to understand +how it came to pass that sickening, as he believed I was, at the +sight of my husband's infidelities I was yet carrying the +provocative cause of them away with me, and then he said again:</p> +<p>"I hate that woman. She's like a snake. I feel as if I want to +put my foot on it. I will, too, one of these days—bet your +life I will."</p> +<p>It hurt me to hide anything from him, but how could I tell him +that it was not from Alma I was flying but from himself?</p> +<p>When the day came for our departure I hoped I might get away +without seeing Martin again. We did get out of the hotel and into +the railway station, yet no sooner was I seated in the carriage +than (in the cruel war that was going on within me) I felt +dreadfully down that he was not there to see me off.</p> +<p>But at the very last moment, just as Alma with her spaniel under +her arm, and my husband with his terrier on a strap, were about to +step into the train, up came Martin like a gust of mountain +wind.</p> +<p>"Helloa!" he cried. "I shall be seeing you soon. Everything's +settled about the expedition. We're to sail the first week in +September, so as to get the summer months in the Antarctic. But +before that I must go over to the island to say good-bye to the old +folks, and I'll see you at your father's I suppose."</p> +<p>Then Alma gave my husband a significant glance and said:</p> +<p>"But, Mary, my love, wouldn't it be better for Mr. Conrad to +come to Castle Raa? You won't be able to go about very much. +Remember your delicate condition, you know."</p> +<p>"Of course, why of course," said my husband. "That's quite true, +and if Mr. Conrad will do me the honour to accept my hospitality +for a few days. . . ."</p> +<p>It was what I wanted above everything on earth, and yet I +said:</p> +<p>"No, no! It wouldn't be fair. Martin will be too busy at the +last moment."</p> +<p>But Martin himself jumped in eagerly with:</p> +<p>"Certainly! Delighted! Greatest pleasure in the world."</p> +<p>And then, while Alma gave my husband a look of arch triumph to +which he replied with a painful smile, Martin leaned over to me and +whispered"</p> +<p>"Hush! I want to! I must!" though what he meant by that I never +knew.</p> +<p>He continued to look at me with a tender expression until we +said good-bye; but after the carriage door had been closed and the +engine had throbbed, and the guard had whistled, I thought I had +never seen his strong face so stern as when the train moved from +the platform.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>We reached Ellan towards the close of the following day. It was +the height of the holiday season, and the island seemed to be +ablaze with lights.</p> +<p>Two motor-cars were waiting for us at the pier, and in a little +while we were driving out of Blackwater through congested masses of +people who were rambling aimlessly through the principal +streets.</p> +<p>Our way was across a stone bridge that crossed the harbour at +its inner end, and then up a hill that led to a headland +overlooking the sea. Within half an hour we drew up at a pair of +large gate posts which were much decayed and leaning heavily out of +the perpendicular.</p> +<p>The chauffeur of the first of our ears got down to open the +gate, and after it had clashed to behind us, we began to ascend a +very steep drive that was bordered by tall elm trees. It was now +almost dark, and the rooks, which had not yet gone off to the +mountains, were making their evening clamour.</p> +<p>"Well, my dear, you're at home at last, and much good may it do +you," said my husband.</p> +<p>I made no answer to this ungracious speech, but Alma was all +excitement.</p> +<p>"So this is Castle Raa! What a fascinating old place!" she said, +and as we drove through the park she reached out of the car to +catch a first glimpse of the broad terraces and winding ways to the +sea which had been reflected in her memory since she was a +child.</p> +<p>I felt no such anxiety. Never did a young bride approach the +home of her husband with less curiosity, but as our motor-car +toiled up the drive I could not help seeing the neglected condition +of the land, with boughs of trees lying where they had fallen in +the storms, as well as broken gates half off their hinges and +swinging to the wind.</p> +<p>The house itself, when we came in sight of it, was a large +castellated building with many lesser turrets and one lofty +octagonal tower, covered entirely with ivy, which, being apparently +unshorn for years, hung in long trailers down the walls, and gave +the whole pile the appearance of a huge moss-covered rock of the +sea planted on a promontory of the land.</p> +<p>As our car went thundering up to the great hall door nearly the +whole of the servants and some of the tenant farmers (under the +direction of the tall, sallow man who had been my husband's +guardian in former days, and was now his steward) were waiting to +welcome us, as well as Lady Margaret Anselm, who was still reserved +and haughty in her manner, though pleasant enough with me.</p> +<p>My husband nodded to all, shook hands with some, presented Alma +to his aunt as "one of Mary's old school friends," (a designation +which, as I could see, had gone ahead of her) and then we passed +into the house.</p> +<p>I found the inside corresponded with the outside in its +appearance of neglect and decay, the big square hall having rusty +and disjointed armour on its wainscotted walls and the mark of +water on the floor, which had come from a glass dome over the well +of the stairs, for it had rained while we were on the sea.</p> +<p>The drawing-room had faded curtains over the windows, faded +velvet on the square sofa and stiff chairs, faded carpets, faded +samplers, and faded embroidery on faded screens.</p> +<p>The dining-room (the sedate original of my father's rather +garish copy) was a panelled chamber, hung round with rubicund +portraits of the male O'Neills from the early ones of the family +who had been Lords of Ellan down to the "bad Lord Raa," who had +sworn at my grandmother on the high road.</p> +<p>I felt as if no woman could have made her home here for at least +a hundred years, and I thought the general atmosphere of the house +was that of the days when spendthrift noblemen, making the island a +refuge from debt, spent their days in gambling and their nights in +drinking bumpers from bowls of whiskey punch to the nameless +beauties they had left "in town."</p> +<p>They were all gone, all dead as the wood of the worm-eaten +wainscotting, but the sound of their noisy merry-making seemed to +cling to the rafters still, and as I went up to my rooms the broad +oaken staircase seemed to be creaking under their drunken +footsteps.</p> +<p>My own apartments, to which Lady Margaret conducted me, were on +the southern side of the house—a rather stuffy bedroom with +walls covered by a kind of pleated chintz, and a boudoir with a +stone balcony that had a flight of steps going down to a terrace of +the garden, which overlooked a glen and had a far view of the +sea.</p> +<p>On the opposite side of the landing outside (which was not +immediately off the great staircase though open to the view of it) +there was a similar suite of rooms which I thought might be my +husband's, but I was told they were kept for a guest.</p> +<p>Being left alone I had taken off my outer things and was +standing on my balcony, listening to the dull hum of the water in +the glen, the rustle of the trees above it, the surge of the sea on +the rocks below, the creaking of a rusty weathercock and the +striking of a court-yard clock, when I also heard the toot and +throb of another motor-car, and as soon as it came up I saw that it +contained Aunt Bridget in the half-moon bonnet and Betsy Beauty, +who was looking more than ever like a country belle.</p> +<p>When I went down to the drawing-room Lady Margaret was pouring +out tea for them, and at sight of me Aunt Bridget cried,</p> +<p>"Sakes alive, here she is herself!"</p> +<p>"But how pale and pinched and thin!" said Betsy Beauty.</p> +<p>"Nonsense, girl, that's only natural," said my Aunt Bridget, +with something like a wink; and then she went on to say that she +had just been telling her ladyship that if I felt lonely and a +little helpless on first coming home Betsy would be pleased to +visit me.</p> +<p>Before I could reply my husband came in, followed shortly by +Alma, who was presented as before, as "Mary's old school-fellow"; +and then, while Betsy talked to Alma and my husband to his +kinswoman, Aunt Bridget, in an undertone, addressed herself to +me.</p> +<p>"You're that way, aren't you? . . . No? Goodness me, girl, your +father <i>will</i> be disappointed!"</p> +<p>Just then a third motor-car came throbbing up to the house, and +Betsy who was standing by the window cried:</p> +<p>"It's Uncle Daniel with Mr. Curphy and Nessy."</p> +<p>"Nessy, of course," said Aunt Bridget grumpily, and then she +told me in a confidential whisper that she was a much-injured woman +in regard to "that ungrateful step-daughter," who was making her +understand the words of Scripture about the pang that was sharper +than a serpent's tooth.</p> +<p>As the new-comers entered I saw that Nessy had developed an old +maid's idea of smartness, and that my father's lawyer was more than +ever like an over-fatted fish; but my father himself (except that +his hair was whiter) was the same man still, with the same heavy +step, the same loud voice and the same tempestuous gaiety.</p> +<p>"All here? Good! Glad to be home, I guess! Strong and well and +hearty, I suppose? . . . Yes, sir, yes! I'm middling myself, sir. +Middling, sir, middling!"</p> +<p>During these rugged salutations I saw that Alma, with the bad +manners of a certain type of society woman, looked on with a +slightly impertinent air of amused superiority, until she +encountered my father's masterful eyes, which nobody in the world +could withstand.</p> +<p>After a moment my father addressed himself to me.</p> +<p>"Well, gel," he said, taking me by the shoulders, as he did in +Rome, "you must have cut a dash in Egypt, I guess. Made the money +fly, didn't you? No matter! My gold was as good as anybody else's, +and I didn't grudge it. You'll clear me of that, anyway."</p> +<p>Then there was some general talk about our travels, about +affairs on the island (Mr. Curphy saying, with a laugh and a glance +in my direction, that things were going so well with my father that +if all his schemes matured he would have no need to wait for a +descendant to become the "uncrowned King of Ellan"), and finally +about Martin Conrad, whose great exploits had become known even in +his native country.</p> +<p>"Extraordinary! Extraordinary!" said my father. "I wouldn't have +believed it of him. I wouldn't really. Just a neighbour lad without +a penny at him. And now the world's trusting him with fifty +thousand pounds, they're telling me!"</p> +<p>"Well, many are called but few are chosen," said Mr. Curphy with +another laugh.</p> +<p>After that, and some broken conversation, Aunt Bridget expressed +a desire to see the house, as the evening was closing in and they +must soon be going back.</p> +<p>Lady Margaret thereupon took her, followed by the rest of us, +over the principal rooms of the Castle; and it was interesting to +see the awe with which she looked upon everything—her voice +dropping to a whisper in the dining-room. I remember, as if the +scene of carousing of the old roysterers had been a sort of +sanctuary.</p> +<p>My father, less impressed, saw nothing but a house in bad +repair, and turning to my husband, who had been obviously ill at +ease, he said:</p> +<p>"Go on like this much longer, son-in-law, and you'll be charging +two-pence a head to look at your ruins. Guess I must send my +architect over to see what he can do for you."</p> +<p>Then taking me aside he made his loud voice as low as he could +and said:</p> +<p>"What's this your Aunt Bridget tells me? Nine months married and +no sign yet? Tut, tut! That won't do, gel, that won't do."</p> +<p>I tried to tell him not to spend money on the Castle if he +intended to do so in expectation of an heir, but my heart was in my +mouth and what I really said I do not know. I only know that my +father looked at me for a moment as if perplexed, and then burst +into laughter.</p> +<p>"I see! I see!" he said. "It's a doctor you want. I must send +Conrad to put a sight on you. It'll be all right, gel, it'll be all +right! Your mother was like that when you were coming."</p> +<p>As we returned to the hall Betsy Beauty whispered that she was +surprised Mr. Eastcliff had married, but she heard from Madame that +we were to have a house-party soon, and she hoped I would not +forget her.</p> +<p>Then Aunt Bridget, who had been eyeing Alma darkly, asked me who +and what she was and where she came from, whereupon I (trying to +put the best face on things) explained that she was the daughter of +a rich New York banker. After that Aunt Bridget's countenance +cleared perceptibly and she said:</p> +<p>"Ah, yes, of course! I thought she had a quality toss with +her."</p> +<p>The two motor-cars had been drawn up to the door, and the two +parties had taken their seats in them when my father, looking about +him, said to my husband:</p> +<p>"Your garden is as rough as a thornbush, son-in-law. I must send +Tommy the Mate to smarten it up a bit. So long! So long!"</p> +<p>At the next moment they were gone, and I was looking longingly +after them. God knows my father's house had never been more than a +stepmother's home to me, but at that moment I yearned to return to +it and felt like a child who was being left behind at school.</p> +<p>What had I gained, by running away from London? Nothing at all. +Already I knew I had brought my hopeless passion with me.</p> +<p>And now I was alone.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Next day Lady Margaret came to my room to say good-bye, telling +me she had only stayed at Castle Raa to keep house and make ready +for me, and must now return to her own home, which was in +London.</p> +<p>I was sorry, for my heart had warmed to her, and when I stood at +the door and saw her drive off with my husband to catch the +afternoon steamer, I felt I had lost both sympathy and +protection.</p> +<p>Alma's feelings were less troubled, and as we turned back into +the house I could see that she was saying to herself:</p> +<p>"Thank goodness, <i>she's</i> gone away."</p> +<p>A day or two later Doctor Conrad came, according to my father's +instructions, and I was glad to see his close-cropped iron-grey +head coming up the stairs towards my room.</p> +<p>Naturally our first conversation was about Martin, who had +written to tell his parents of our meeting in London and to +announce his intended visit. It was all very exciting, and now his +mother was working morning and night at the old cottage, to prepare +for the arrival of her son. Such scrubbing and scouring! Such +taking up of carpets and laying them down again, as if the darling +old thing were expecting a prince!</p> +<p>"It ought to be Sunny Lodge indeed before she's done with it," +said the Doctor.</p> +<p>"I'm sure it will," I said. "It always was, and it always will +be."</p> +<p>"And how are we ourselves," said the doctor. "A little below +par, eh? Any sickness? No? Nausea? No? Headache and a feeling of +lassitude, then? No?"</p> +<p>After other questions and tests, the old doctor was looking +puzzled, when, not finding it in my heart to keep him in the dark +any longer, I told him there was nothing amiss with my health, but +I was unhappy and had been so since the time of my marriage.</p> +<p>"I see," he said. "It's your mind and not your body that is +sick?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"I'll speak to Father Dan," he said. "Good-bye! God bless +you!"</p> +<p>Less than half an hour after he had gone, Alma came to me in her +softest mode, saying the doctor had said I was suffering from +extreme nervous exhaustion and ought to be kept from worries and +anxieties of every kind.</p> +<p>"So if there's anything I can do while I'm here, dearest, . . . +such as looking after the house and the servants. . . . No, no, +don't deny me; it will be a pleasure, I assure you. . . . So we'll +say that's settled, shall we? . . . You dear, sweet darling +creature!"</p> +<p>I was too much out of heart to care what happened, but inside +two days I realised that Alma had taken possession of the house, +and was ordering and controlling everything.</p> +<p>Apparently this pleased such of the servants as had anything to +gain by it—the housekeeper in particular—for Alma was +no skinflint and she was making my husband's money flow like water, +but it was less agreeable to my maid, who said:</p> +<p>"This is a nice place to be sure, where the mistress takes no +interest in anything, and the guest walks over everybody. She'll +walk over the mistress herself before long—mark my word but +she will."</p> +<p>It would be about a week after our arrival at Castle Raa that +Price came to my room to say that a priest was asking for me, and +he was such a strange-looking thing that she was puzzled to know if +his face was that of a child, a woman or a dear old man.</p> +<p>I knew in a moment it must be Father Dan, so I went flying +downstairs and found him in the hall, wearing the same sack coat +(or so it seemed) as when I was a child and made cupboards of its +vertical pockets, carrying the same funny little bag which he had +taken to Rome and used for his surplice at funerals, and mopping +his forehead and flicking his boots with a red print handkerchief, +for the day was hot and the roads were dusty.</p> +<p>He was as glad to see me as I to see him, and when I asked if he +would have tea, he said Yes, for he had walked all the way from the +Presbytery, after fasting the day before; and when I asked if he +would not stay overnight he said Yes to that, too, "if it would not +be troublesome and inconvenient."</p> +<p>So I took his bag and gave it to a maid, telling her to take it +to the guest's room on my landing, and to bring tea to my boudoir +immediately.</p> +<p>But hardly had I taken him upstairs and we had got seated in my +private room, when the maid knocked at the door to say that the +housekeeper wished to speak with me, and on going out, and closing +the door behind me, I found her on the landing, a prim little +flinty person with quick eyes, thin lips and an upward lift of her +head.</p> +<p>"Sorry, my lady, but it won't be convenient for his reverence to +stay in the house to-night," she said.</p> +<p>"Why so?" I said.</p> +<p>"Because Madame has ordered all the rooms to be got ready for +the house-party, and this one," (pointing to the guest's room +opposite) "is prepared for Mr. and Mrs. Eastcliff, and we don't +know how soon they may arrive."</p> +<p>I felt myself flushing up to the eyes at the woman's impudence, +and it added to my anger that Alma herself was standing at the head +of the stairs, looking on and listening. So with a little spurt of +injured pride I turned severely on the one while really speaking to +the other, and said:</p> +<p>"Be good enough to make this room ready for his reverence +without one moment's delay, and please remember for the future, +that I am mistress in this house, and your duty is to obey me and +nobody else whatever."</p> +<p>As I said this and turned back to my boudoir, I saw that Alma's +deep eyes had a sullen look, and I felt that she meant to square +accounts with me some day; but what she did was done at once, for +going downstairs (as I afterwards heard from Price) she met my +husband in the hall, where, woman-like, she opened her battery upon +him at his weakest spot, saying:</p> +<p>"Oh, I didn't know your wife was priest-ridden."</p> +<p>"Priest-ridden?"</p> +<p>"Precisely," and then followed an explanation of what had +happened, with astonishing embellishments which made my husband +pale with fury.</p> +<p>Meantime I was alone with Father Dan in my room, and while I +poured out his tea and served him with bread and butter, he talked +first about Martin (as everybody seemed to do when speaking to me), +saying:</p> +<p>"He was always my golden-headed boy, and it's a mighty proud man +I am entirely to hear the good news of him."</p> +<p>More of the same kind there was, all music to my ears, and then +Father Dan came to closer quarters, saying Doctor Conrad had +dropped a hint that I was not very happy.</p> +<p>"Tell your old priest everything, my child, and if there is +anything he can do. . . ."</p> +<p>Without waiting for more words I sank to my knees at his feet, +and poured out all my troubles—telling him my marriage had +been a failure; that the sanctifying grace which he had foretold as +the result of the sacrament of holy wedlock had not come to pass; +that not only did I not love my husband, but my husband loved +another woman, who was living here with us in this very house.</p> +<p>Father Dan was dreadfully distressed. More than once while I was +speaking he crossed himself and said, "Lord and His Holy Mother +love us;" and when I came to an end he began to reproach himself +for everything, saying that he ought to have known that our lad +(meaning Martin) did not write those terrible letters without being +certain they were true, and that from the first day my husband came +to our parish the sun had been darkened by his shadow.</p> +<p>"But take care," he said. "I've told nobody about the compact we +made with your husband—nobody but our Blessed Lady +herself—and you mustn't think of that as a way out of your +marriage. No, nor of any other way, no matter what, which the +world, and the children of the world, may talk about."</p> +<p>"But I can't bear it, I can't bear it," I cried.</p> +<p>"Hush! Hush! Don't say that, my daughter. Think of it as one of +the misfortunes of life which we all have to suffer. How many poor +women have to bear the sickness and poverty, not to speak of the +drunkenness and death, of their husbands! Do they think they have a +right to run away from all that—to break the sacred vows of +their marriage on account of it? No, my child, no, and neither must +you. Some day it will all come right. You'll see it will. And +meantime by the memory of your mother—that blessed saint whom +the Lord has made one of his own. . . ."</p> +<p>"Then what can I do?"</p> +<p>"Pray, my child, pray for strength to bear your trials and to +resist all temptation. Say a rosary for the Blessed Virgin every +morning before breaking your fast. I'll say a rosary, too. You'll +see yet this is only God's love for you, and you'll welcome His +holy will."</p> +<p>While my dear father and friend was counselling me so I heard my +husband speaking in his loud, grating tones on the landing outside, +and before I could rise from my knees he had burst open the door +and entered the room.</p> +<p>His face was deadly white and he was like a man out of his right +mind.</p> +<p>"Mary," he said, looking down at me where I knelt with my hands +crossed on my bosom, "when did I give you permission to introduce a +priest into my house? Isn't it enough for a man to have a wife who +is a Catholic without having the church and its ministers shunted +into his home without his permission?"</p> +<p>I was so taken aback by this furious assault that at first I +could not speak, but Father Dan interposed to defend me, saying +with beautiful patience, that his visit had been quite unexpected +on my part, and that I had asked him to stay overnight only because +he was an old man, and had had a long walk from his parish.</p> +<p>"I'm much obliged to your reverence," said my husband, who was +quivering with fury, "but my wife is perfectly capable of answering +for herself without your assistance, and as for your parish you +would have done better to stay there instead of coming to meddle in +this one."</p> +<p>"Aren't you measuring me by your own yard, sir?" said Father +Dan, and at that straight thrust my husband broke into ungovernable +rage.</p> +<p>"Everybody knows what a Popish priest is," he said. "A +meddlesome busybody who pokes his nose into other men's secrets. +But priest or no priest, I'll have no man coming to my house to +make mischief between husband and wife."</p> +<p>"Are you sure," said Father Dan, "that some woman isn't in your +house already, making mischief between wife and husband?"</p> +<p>That thrust too went home. My husband looked at me with flashing +eyes and then said:</p> +<p>"As I thought! You've been sent for to help my wife to make a +great to-do of her imaginary grievances. You're to stay in the +house too, and before long we'll have you setting up as master here +and giving orders to my servants! But not if I know it! . . . Your +reverence, if you have any respect for your penitent, you'll please +be good enough to leave my wife to <i>my</i> protection."</p> +<p>I saw that Father Dan had to gulp down his gathering anger, but +he only said:</p> +<p>"Say no more, my lord. No true priest ever comes between a man +and the wife whom God has given him. It's his business to unite +people, not to put them apart. As for this dear child, I have loved +her since she was an infant in arms, and never so much as at the +present speaking, so I don't need to learn my duty from one who +appears to care no more for her than for the rind of a lemon. I'll +go, sir," said the old man, drawing himself up like a wounded lion, +"but it's not to your protection I leave her—it's to that of +God's blessed and holy love and will."</p> +<p>My husband had gone before the last words were spoken, but I +think they must have followed him as he went lunging down the +stairs.</p> +<p>During this humiliating scene a hot flush of shame had come to +my cheeks and I wanted to tell Father Dan not to let it grieve him, +but I could do nothing but stoop and kiss his hand.</p> +<p>Meantime two or three of the servants had gathered on the +landing at the sound of my husband's voice, and among them was the +flinty housekeeper holding the Father's little bag, and she gave it +back to him as he passed her.</p> +<p>Then, all being over, the woman came into my room, with an +expression of victorious mischief in her eyes and said:</p> +<p>"Your ladyship had better have listened to them as knows, you +see."</p> +<p>I was too benumbed by that cruel stroke to reply, but Price said +enough for both of us.</p> +<p>"If them as knows," she said, "don't get out of this room inside +two seconds they'll get their ugly faces slapped."</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>I thought I had reached the end of my power of endurance, and +that night, before going to bed, while my maid was taking down my +hair, and I was thinking of Martin and asking myself if I should +put up with my husband's brutalities any longer, I heard her +say:</p> +<p>"If I were a lady married to the wrong man, I'd have the right +one if I had to go through the divorce court for him."</p> +<p>Now that was so exactly the thought that was running riot in my +own tormented mind, that I flew at her like a wild cat, asking her +how she dared to say anything so abominably wicked, and telling her +to take her notice there and then.</p> +<p>But hardly had she left the room, when my heart was in my mouth +again, and I was trembling with fear lest she should take me at my +word and then the last of my friends would be gone.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Within the next few days the house-party arrived. There would be +twenty of them at least, not counting valets and ladies' maids, so +that large as Castle Raa was the house was full.</p> +<p>They were about equally divided as to sex and belonged chiefly +to my husband's class, but they included Mr. Eastcliff's beautiful +wife, Camilla, and Alma's mother, who, much to Alma's chagrin, had +insisted upon being invited.</p> +<p>My husband required me to receive them, and I did so, though I +was only their nominal hostess, and they knew it and treated me +accordingly.</p> +<p>I should be ashamed to speak of the petty slights they put upon +me, how they consulted Alma in my presence and otherwise wounded my +pride as a woman by showing me that I had lost my own place in my +husband's house.</p> +<p>I know there are people of the same class who are kind and +considerate, guileless and pure, the true nobility of their +country—women who are devoted to their homes and children, +and men who spend their wealth and strength for the public +good—but my husband's friends were not of that kind.</p> +<p>They were vain and proud, selfish, self-indulgent, thoroughly +insincere, utterly ill-mannered, shockingly ill-informed, +astonishingly ill-educated (capable of speaking several languages +but incapable of saying a sensible word in any of them), living and +flourishing in the world without religion, without morality, and +(if it is not a cant phrase to use) without God.</p> +<p>What their conduct was when out shooting, picnicking, driving, +riding, motoring, and yachting (for Mr. Eastcliff had arrived in +his yacht, which was lying at anchor in the port below the glen), I +do not know, for "doctor's orders" were Alma's excuse for not +asking me to accompany them.</p> +<p>But at night they played bridge (their most innocent amusement), +gambled and drank, banged the piano, danced "Grizzly Bears," sang +duets from the latest musical comedies, and then ransacked the +empty houses of their idle heads for other means of killing the one +enemy of their existence—Time.</p> +<p>Sometimes they would give entertainments in honour of their +dogs, when all the animals of all the guests (there seemed to be a +whole kennel of them) would be dressed up in coats of silk and +satin with pockets and pocket-handkerchiefs, and then led +downstairs to the drawing-room, where Alma's wheezy spaniel and my +husband's peevish terrier were supposed to receive them.</p> +<p>Sometimes they would give "freak dinners," when the guests +themselves would be dressed up, the men in women's clothes, the +women in men's, the male imitating the piping treble of the female +voices, and the female the over-vowelled slang of the male, until, +tiring of this foolishness, they would end up by flinging the food +at the pictures on the walls, the usual pellet being softened bread +and the favourite target the noses in the family portraits, which, +hit and covered with a sprawling mess, looked so ridiculous as to +provoke screams of laughter.</p> +<p>The talk at table was generally of horses and dogs, but +sometimes it was of love, courtship and marriage, including +conjugal fidelity, which was a favourite subject of ridicule, with +both the women and the men.</p> +<p>Thus my husband would begin by saying (he often said it in my +hearing) that once upon a time men took their wives as they took +their horses, on trial for a year and a day, and "really with some +women there was something to say for the old custom."</p> +<p>Then Mr. Vivian would remark that it was "a jolly good idea, by +Jove," and if he "ever married, by the Lord that's just what he +would do."</p> +<p>Then Mr. Eastcliff would say that it was a ridiculous +superstition that a woman should have her husband all to herself, +"as if he were a kind of toothbrush which she could not share with +anybody else," and somebody would add that she might as reasonably +want her dentist or her hairdresser to be kept for her own use +only.</p> +<p>After that the ladies, not to be left behind, would join in the +off-hand rattle, and one of them would give it as her opinion that +a wife might have an incorrigibly unfaithful husband, and yet be +well off.</p> +<p>"Ugh!" said Alma one night, shrugging her shoulders. "Think of a +poor woman being tied for life to an entirely faithful +husband!"</p> +<p>"I adore the kind of man who goes to the deuce for a +woman—Parnell, and Gambetta and Boulanger and that sort," +said a "smart" girl of three or four-and-twenty, whereupon Camilla +Eastcliff (she was a Russian) cried:</p> +<p>"That's vhy the co-respondents in your divorce courts are so +sharming. They're like the villayns in the plays—always so +dee-lightfully vicked."</p> +<p>Oh, the sickening horror of it all! Whether it was really moral +corruption or only affectation and pose, it seemed equally +shocking, and though I bore as much of it as I could with a +cheerful face, I escaped as often as possible to the clean +atmosphere of my own room.</p> +<p>But even there I was not always allowed to be alone, for Alma's +mother frequently followed me. She was a plump little person in a +profuse ornamentation of diamond rings and brooches, with little or +no education, and a reputation for saying risky things in +blundering French whereof the principal humour lay in the +uncertainty as to whether she knew their meaning or not.</p> +<p>Nevertheless she was the only good-hearted woman in the house, +and I really believe she thought she was doing a kind act in +keeping me company. But oh, how I suffered from her long accounts +of her former "visits" to my house, whereby I learned, without +wishing to, what her origin had been (the daughter of a London +postman); what position she had held in Castle Raa in her winsome +and reckless youth (one that need not be defined); how she had met +her husband in New York and he had married her to save the +reputation of his child; and finally how the American ladies of +society had refused to receive her, and she had vowed to be +revenged on them by marrying Alma to the highest title in Europe +that could be bought with money.</p> +<p>"I was just like your father, my dear. I never did no manner of +harm to those people. They used to think I thought myself better +blood nor they were, but I never thought no such thing, I assure +you. Only when they turned nasty after my marriage I made up my +mind—just as your father did—as Alma should marry a +bigger husband nor any of them, even if he wasn't worth a dime and +'adn't a 'air on 'is 'ead."</p> +<p>But even these revelations about herself were less humiliating +than her sympathy with me, which implied that I was not fitted to +be mistress of a noble house—how could it be expected of +me?—whereas Alma was just as if she had been born to it, and +therefore it was lucky for me that I had her there to show me how +to do things.</p> +<p>"Alma's gotten such <i>ton!</i> Such distangy manners!" she +would say.</p> +<p>The effect of all this was to make me feel, as I had never felt +before, the intolerable nature of the yoke I was living under. When +I looked into the future and saw nothing before me but years of +this ignoble bondage, I told myself that nothing—no sacrament +or contract, no law of church or state—could make me endure +it.</p> +<p>From day to day my maid came to me with insidious hints about +Alma and my husband. I found myself listening to them. I also found +myself refreshing my memory of the hideous scene in Paris, and +wondering why I had condoned the offence by staying an hour longer +under my husband's protection.</p> +<p>And then there was always another force at work within +me—my own secret passion. Though sometimes I felt myself to +be a wretched sinner and thought the burden I had to bear was +heaven's punishment for my guilty love, at other times my whole +soul rose in revolt, and I cried out not merely for separation from +my husband but for absolute sundering.</p> +<p>Twice during the painful period of the house-party I heard from +Martin. His first letter was full of accounts of the far-reaching +work of his expedition—the engaging of engineers, +electricians, geologists and masons, and the shipping of great +stores of wireless apparatus—for his spirits seemed to be +high, and life was full of good things for him.</p> +<p>His second letter told me that everything was finished, and he +was to visit the island the next week, going first to "the old +folks" and coming to me for a few days immediately before setting +sail.</p> +<p>That brought matters to a head, and compelled me to take +action.</p> +<p>It may have been weak of me, but not wanting a repetition of the +scene with Father Dan, (knowing well that Martin would not bear it +with the same patience) I sent the second letter to Alma, asking if +the arrangement would be agreeable. She returned it with the +endorsement (scribbled in pencil across the face), "Certainly; +anything to please <i>you</i>, dear."</p> +<p>I submitted even to that. Perhaps I was a poor-spirited thing, +wanting in proper pride, but I had a feeling that it was not worth +while to waste myself in little squibs of temper, because an +eruption was coming (I was sure of that) in which Martin would be +concerned on my side, and then everybody and everything would be +swept out of the path of my life for ever.</p> +<p>Martin came. In due course I read in the insular newspapers of +his arrival on the island—how the people had turned out in +crowds to cheer him at the pier, and how, on reaching our own +village the neighbours (I knew the names of all of them) had met +him at the railway station and taken him to his mother's house, and +then lighted fires on the mountains for his welcome home.</p> +<p>It cut me to the heart's core to think of Martin amid thrilling +scenes like those while I was here among degrading scenes like +these. My love for Martin was now like a wound and I resolved that, +come what might, before he reached Castle Raa I should liberate +myself from the thraldom of my false position.</p> +<p>Father Dan's counsels had faded away by this time. Though I had +prayed for strength to bear my burden there had been no result, and +one morning, standing before the figure of the Virgin in my +bedroom, I felt an impulse to blow out her lamp and never to light +it again.</p> +<p>The end of it all was that I determined to see the Bishop and my +father's advocate, Mr. Curphy, and perhaps my father himself, that +I might know one way or the other where I was, and what was to +become of me. But how to do this I could not see, having a houseful +of people who were nominally my guests.</p> +<p>Fortune—ill-fortune—favoured me. News came that my +father had suddenly fallen ill of some ailment that puzzled the +doctors, and making this my reason and excuse I spoke to my +husband, asking if I might go home for two or three days.</p> +<p>"Why not?" he said, in the tone of one who meant, "Who's keeping +you?"</p> +<p>Then in my weakness I spoke to Alma, who answered:</p> +<p>"Certainly, my sweet girl. We shall miss you <i>dreadfully</i>, +but it's your duty. And then you'll see that <i>dear</i> Mr. . . . +What d'ye callum?"</p> +<p>Finally, feeling myself a poor, pitiful hypocrite, I apologised +for my going away to the guests also, and they looked as if they +might say: "We'll survive it, perhaps."</p> +<p>The night before my departure my maid said:</p> +<p>"Perhaps your ladyship has forgotten that my time's up, but I'll +stay until you return if you want me to."</p> +<p>I asked her if she would like to stay with me altogether and she +said:</p> +<p>"Indeed I should, my lady. Any woman would like to stay with a +good mistress, if she <i>is</i> a little quick sometimes. And if +you don't want me to go to your father's I may be of some use to +you here before you come back again."</p> +<p>I saw that her mind was still running on divorce, but I did not +reprove her now, for mine was turning in the same direction.</p> +<p>Next morning most of the guests came to the hail door to see me +off, and they gave me a shower of indulgent smiles as the motor-car +moved away.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"FIFTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>FIFTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Before going to my father's house I went to the Bishop's. +Bishop's Court is at the other side of the island, and it was noon +before I drove under its tall elm trees, in which a vast concourse +of crows seemed to be holding a sort of general congress.</p> +<p>The Bishop was then at his luncheon, and after luncheon (so his +liveried servant told me) he usually took a siesta. I have always +thought it was unfortunate for my interview that it came between +his food and his sleep.</p> +<p>The little reception-room into which I was shown was +luxuriously, not to say gorgeously, appointed, with easy chairs and +sofas, a large portrait of the Pope, signed by the Holy Father +himself, and a number of pictures of great people of all +kinds—dukes, marquises, lords, counts—as well as +photographs of fashionable ladies in low dress inscribed in several +languages to "My dear Father in God the Lord Bishop of Ellan."</p> +<p>The Bishop came to me after a few minutes, smiling and +apparently at peace with all the world. Except that he wore a +biretta he was dressed—as in Rome—in his long black +soutane with its innumerable buttons, his silver-buckled shoes, his +heavy gold chain and jewelled cross.</p> +<p>He welcomed me in his smooth and suave manner, asking if he +could offer me a little refreshment; but, too full of my mission to +think of eating and drinking, I plunged immediately into the object +of my visit.</p> +<p>"Monsignor," I said, "I am in great trouble. It is about my +marriage."</p> +<p>The smile was smitten away from the Bishop's face by this +announcement.</p> +<p>"I am sorry," he said. "Nothing serious, I trust?"</p> +<p>I told him it was very serious, and straightway I began on the +spiritual part of my grievance—that my husband did not love +me, that he loved another woman, that the sacred sacrament of my +marriage. . . .</p> +<p>"Wait," said the Bishop, and he rose to close the window, for +the clamour of the crows was deafening—a trial must have been +going on in the trees. Returning to his seat he said:</p> +<p>"Dear lady, you must understand that there is one offence, and +only one, which in all Christian countries and civilised +communities is considered sufficient to constitute a real and +tangible grievance. Have you any evidence of that?"</p> +<p>I knew what he meant and I felt myself colouring to the roots of +my hair. But gulping down my shame I recounted the story of the +scene in Paris and gave a report of my maid's charges and +surmises.</p> +<p>"Humph!" said the Bishop, and I saw in a moment that he was +going to belittle my proofs.</p> +<p>"Little or no evidence of your own, apparently. Chiefly that of +your maid. And ladies' maids are notorious mischief-makers."</p> +<p>"But it's true," I said. "My husband will not deny it. He +cannot."</p> +<p>"So far as I am able to observe what passes in the world," said +the Bishop, "men in such circumstances always can and do deny +it."</p> +<p>I felt my hands growing moist under my gloves. I thought the +Bishop was trying to be blind to what he did not wish to see.</p> +<p>"But I'm right, I'm sure I'm right," I said.</p> +<p>"Well, assuming you <i>are</i> right, what is it, dear lady, +that you wish me to do?"</p> +<p>For some minutes I felt like a fool, but I stammered out at +length that I had come for his direction and to learn what relief +the Church could give me.</p> +<p>"H'm!" said the Bishop, and then crossing one leg over the +other, and fumbling the silver buckle of his shoe, he said:</p> +<p>"The Church, dear lady, does indeed provide alleviation in cases +of dire necessity. It provides the relief of +separation—always deploring the necessity and hoping for +ultimate reconciliation. But to sanction the separation of a wife +from her husband because—pardon me, I do not say this is your +case—she finds that he does not please her, or +because—again I do not say this is your case—she +fancies that somebody else pleases her better. . . ."</p> +<p>"Monsignor," I said, feeling hot and dizzy, "we need not discuss +separation. I am thinking of something much more serious."</p> +<p>Never shall I forget the expression of the Bishop's face. He +looked aghast.</p> +<p>"My good lady, surely you are not thinking of divorce?"</p> +<p>I think my head must have dropped as in silent assent, for in a +peremptory and condemnatory manner the Bishop took me to task, +asking if I did not know that the Catholic Church did not recognise +divorce under any circumstances, and if I had forgotten what the +Holy Father himself (pointing up to the portrait) had said to +me—that when I entered into the solemn contract of holy +matrimony I was to do so in the full consciousness that it could +not be broken but by death.</p> +<p>"The love in which husband and wife contract to hold each other +in holy wedlock is typified by the love of Christ for His Church, +and as the one can never be broken, neither can the other."</p> +<p>"But my husband does not love me," I said. "Neither do I love +him, and therefore the contract between us is broken already."</p> +<p>The Bishop was very severe with me for this, telling me that as +a good child of the Church, I must never, never say that again, for +though marriage was a contract it differed from all other contracts +whatsoever.</p> +<p>"When you married your husband, dear lady, you were bound to him +not by your own act alone, but by a mysterious power from which +neither of you can ever free yourself. The power that united you +was God, and whom God has joined together no man may put +asunder."</p> +<p>I felt my head drooping. The Bishop was saying what I had always +been taught, though in the torment of my trouble and the fierce +fire of my temptation I had forgotten it.</p> +<p>"The civil law <i>might</i> divorce you," continued the Bishop. +"I don't know—I can say nothing about that. But it would have +<i>no right</i> to do so because the law can have no right to undo +what God Himself has done."</p> +<p>Oh, it was cruel! I felt as if the future of my life were +darkening before me—as if the iron bars of a prison were +closing upon me, and fetters were being fixed on every limb.</p> +<p>"But even if the civil law <i>could</i> and <i>would</i> divorce +you," said the Bishop, "think of the injury you would be inflicting +on the Church. Yours was what is called a mixed marriage, and the +Church does not favour such marriages, but it consented in this +case, and why? Because it hoped to bring back an erring family in a +second generation to the fold of the faith. Yet what would you be +doing? Without waiting for a second generation you would he +defeating its purpose."</p> +<p>A cold chill seemed to creep to my heart at these words. Was it +the lost opportunity the Bishop was thinking of, instead of the +suffering woman with her bruised and bleeding soul?</p> +<p>I rose to go. The Bishop rose with me, and began to counsel +forgiveness.</p> +<p>"Even if you <i>have</i> suffered injury, dear lady," he +said—"I don't say you haven't—isn't it possible to +forgive? Remember, forgiveness is a divine virtue, enjoined on us +all, and especially on a woman towards the man she has married. +Only think! How many women have to practise it—every day, all +the world over!"</p> +<p>"Ah, well!" I said, and walked to the door.</p> +<p>The Bishop walked with me, urging me, as a good daughter of the +Church, to live at peace with my husband, whatever his faults, and +when my children came (as please God they would) to "instil into +them the true faith with all a mother's art, a mother's +tenderness," so that the object of my marriage might be fulfilled, +and a good Catholic become the heir to Castle Raa.</p> +<p>"So the Church can do nothing for me?" I said.</p> +<p>"Nothing but pray, dear lady," said the Bishop.</p> +<p>When I left him my heart was in fierce rebellion; and, since the +Church could do nothing, I determined to see if the law could do +anything, so I ordered my chauffeur to drive to the house of my +father's advocate at Holmtown.</p> +<p>The trial in the trees was over by this time, and a dead crow +tumbled from one of the tall elms as we passed out of the +grounds.</p> +<p>Holmtown is a little city on the face of our bleak west coast, +dominated by a broad stretch of sea, and having the sound of the +waves always rumbling over it. Mr. Curphy's house faced the shore +and his office was an upper room plainly furnished with a writing +desk, a deal table, laden with law books and foolscap papers, a +stiff arm-chair, covered with American leather, three or four +coloured engravings of judges in red and ermine, a photograph of +the lawyer himself in wig and gown, an illuminated certificate of +his membership of a legal society, and a number of lacquered tin +boxes, each inscribed with the name of a client—the largest +box bearing the name of "Daniel O'Neill."</p> +<p>My father's advocate received me with his usual bland smile, +gave me his clammy fat hand, put me to sit in the arm-chair, hoped +my unexpected visit did not presage worse news from the Big house, +and finally asked me what he could do.</p> +<p>I told my story over again, omitting my sentimental grievances +and coming quickly, and with less delicacy, to the grosser facts of +my husband's infidelity.</p> +<p>The lawyer listened with his head aside, his eyes looking out on +the sea and his white fingers combing his long brown beard, and +before I had finished I could see that he too, like the Bishop, had +determined to see nothing.</p> +<p>"You may be right," he began. . . .</p> +<p>"I <i>am</i> right!" I answered.</p> +<p>"But even if you <i>are</i>, I am bound to tell you that +adultery is not enough of itself as a ground for divorce."</p> +<p>"Not enough?"</p> +<p>"If you were a man it would be, but being a woman you must +establish cruelty as well."</p> +<p>"Cruelty? Isn't it all cruelty?" I asked.</p> +<p>"In the human sense, yes; in the legal sense, no," answered the +lawyer.</p> +<p>And then he proceeded to explain to me that in this country, +unlike some others, before a woman could obtain a divorce from her +husband she had to prove that he had not only been unfaithful to +her, but that he had used violence to her, struck her in the face +perhaps, threatened her or endangered her life or health.</p> +<p>"Your husband hasn't done that, has he? No? I thought not. After +all he's a gentleman. Therefore there is only one other ground on +which you could establish a right to divorce, namely desertion, and +your husband is not likely to run away. In fact, he couldn't. It +isn't to his interest. We've seen to all that—<i>here</i>," +and smiling again, the lawyer patted the top of the lacquered box +that bore my father's name.</p> +<p>I was dumbfounded. Even more degrading than the fetters whereby +the Church bound me to my marriage were the terms on which the law +would release me.</p> +<p>"But assuming that you <i>could</i> obtain a divorce," said the +lawyer, "what good would it do you? You would have to relinquish +your title."</p> +<p>"I care nothing about my title," I replied.</p> +<p>"And your position."</p> +<p>"I care nothing about that either."</p> +<p>"Come, come," said the lawyer, patting my arm as if I had been +an angry child on the verge of tears. "Don't let a fit of pique or +spleen break up a marriage that is so suitable from the points of +property and position. And then think of your good father. Why did +he spend all that money in setting a ruined house on its legs +again? That he might carry on his name in a noble family, and +through your children, and your children's children. . . ."</p> +<p>"Then the law can do nothing for me?" I said, feeling sick and +sore.</p> +<p>"Sorry, very sorry, but under present conditions, as far as I +can yet see, nothing," said the lawyer.</p> +<p>"Good-day, sir," I said, and before he could have known what I +was doing I had leapt up, left the room, and was hurrying +downstairs.</p> +<p>My heart was in still fiercer rebellion now. I would go home. I +would appeal to my father. Hard as he had always been with me he +was at least a man, not a cold abstraction, like the Church and the +law, without bowels of compassion or sense of human suffering.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTIETH_CHAPTER" id="SIXTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTIETH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Although I had sent word that I was coming home, there was no +one to welcome me when I arrived.</p> +<p>Aunt Bridget was out shopping, and Betsy Beauty (in the sulks +with me, as I afterwards heard, for not asking her to the +house-party) had run upstairs on hearing our horn, so I went direct +to my father's room.</p> +<p>Nessy MacLeod answered my knock, but instead of opening the door +to let me in, she slid out like a cat and closed it behind her. +Never had her ungainly figure, her irregular features, and her red +head seemed to me so repugnant. I saw at once that she was giving +herself the airs of housekeeper, and I noticed that she was wearing +the bunch of keys which used to dangle from Aunt Bridget's waist +when I was a child.</p> +<p>"Your father is ill," she said.</p> +<p>I told her I knew that, and it was one of the reasons I was +there.</p> +<p>"Seriously ill," she said, standing with her back to the door. +"The doctor says he is to be kept perfectly quiet."</p> +<p>Indignant at the effrontery of the woman who was trying to keep +me out of my father's room, I said:</p> +<p>"Let me pass, please."</p> +<p>"S'sh! He has a temperature, and I don't choose that anybody +shall disturb him to-day."</p> +<p>"Let me pass," I repeated, and I must have pitched my voice so +high that my father heard it.</p> +<p>"Is that Mary?" came from the other side of the door, whereupon +Nessy beat a retreat, and at the next moment I was in my father's +room.</p> +<p>His massive and powerful head was propped up with pillows in the +camp-bed which was all he ever slept on, and he was looking so ill +and changed in so short a time that I was shocked, as well as +ashamed at the selfishness of having thought only of myself all the +morning.</p> +<p>But he would listen to no sympathy, protesting there was little +or nothing the matter with him, that "Conrad was croaking about +cancer," but the doctor was a fool.</p> +<p>"What about yourself, though?" he said. "Great doings at the +Castle, they're telling me."</p> +<p>I thought this a favourable opportunity to speak about my own +affairs, so I began on my story again, and though I found it harder +to tell now that my listener was my father, I struggled on and on, +as well as I could for the emotion that was choking me.</p> +<p>I thought he would pity me. I expected him to be angry. Although +he was showing me some of the contemptuous tenderness which he had +always assumed towards my mother, yet I was his daughter, and I +felt sure that he would want to leap out of bed that he might take +my husband by the throat and shake him as a terrier shakes a rat. +But what happened was something quite different.</p> +<p>Hardly had I begun when he burst out laughing.</p> +<p>"God bless my soul," he cried, "you're never going to lose your +stomach over a thing like that?"</p> +<p>I thought he had not understood me, so I tried to speak +plainer.</p> +<p>"I see," he said. "Sweethearting some other woman, is he? Well, +what of it? He isn't the first husband who has done the like, and I +guess he won't be the last."</p> +<p>Still I thought I had not made myself clear, so I said my +husband had been untrue to me, that his infidelities under my own +roof had degraded me in my own eyes and everybody else's, that I +could not bear to live such a life any longer and consequently. . . +.</p> +<p>"Consequently," said my father, "you come to me to fight your +battles for you. No, no, fight them yourself, gel. No father-in-law +ought to interfere."</p> +<p>It was a man's point of view I suppose, but I was ready to cry +with vexation and disappointment, and though I conquered the +impulse to do that I could go no farther.</p> +<p>"Who's the woman?" he asked.</p> +<p>I told him it was one of our house-party.</p> +<p>"Then cut her out. I guess you're clever enough to do it, +whoever she is. You've got the looks too, and I don't grudge you +the money. Cut her out—that's the best advice I can give you. +Make your husband see you're the better woman of the two. Cut her +out, I'm saying, and don't come whining here like a cry-baby, who +runs to her grandmother's apron-strings at the first scratch she +gets outside."</p> +<p>He had been reaching forward, but he now fell back on his +pillows, saying:</p> +<p>"I see how it is, though. Women without children are always +vapouring about their husbands, as if married life ought to be a +garden of Eden. One woman, one man, and all the rest of the +balderdash. I sot your Aunt Bridget on you before, gel, and I'll +have to do it again I'm thinking. But go away now. If I'm to get +better I must have rest. Nessy!" (calling) "I've a mort o' things +to do and most everything is on my shoulders. Nessy! My medicine! +Nessy! Nessy! Where in the world has that girl gone to?"</p> +<p>"I'm here, Daniel," said Nessy MacLeod coming back to the room; +and as I went out and passed down the corridor, with a crushed and +broken spirit and the tears ready to gush from my eyes, I heard her +coaxing him in her submissive and insincere tones, while he blamed +and scolded her.</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards Aunt Bridget came to me in my mother's +room. Never in my life before had I been pleased to see her. She, +at least, would see my situation with a woman's eyes. But I was +doomed to another disappointment.</p> +<p>"Goodness me, girl," she cried, "what's this your father tells +me? One of your own guests, is it? That one with the big eyes I'll +go bail. Well, serve you right, I say, for bringing a woman like +that into the house with your husband—so smart and such a +quality toss with her. If you were lonely coming home why didn't +you ask your aunt or your first cousin? There would have been no +trouble with your husband then—not about me at all events. +But what are you thinking of doing?"</p> +<p>"Getting a divorce," I answered, firmly, for my heart was now +aflame.</p> +<p>If I had held a revolver in Aunt Bridget's face she could not +have looked more shocked.</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill, are you mad?" she cried. "Divorce indeed! No +woman of our family has ever disgraced herself like that. What will +your father say? What's to happen to Betsy Beauty? What are people +going to think about me?"</p> +<p>I answered that I had not made my marriage, and those who had +made it must take the consequences.</p> +<p>"What does that matter now? Hundreds of thousands of women have +married the wrong man of their own free will, but if every woman +who has made a rue-bargain were to try to get out of it your way +where would the world be, I wonder? Perhaps you think you could +marry somebody else, but you couldn't. What decent man wants to +marry a divorced woman even if she <i>is</i> the injured +party?"</p> +<p>"Then you think I ought to submit—tamely submit to such +infidelities?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Sakes alive," said Aunt Bridget, "what else can you do? Men are +polygamous animals, and we women have to make up our minds to it. +Goodness knows I had to when the old colonel used to go hanging +around those English barmaids at the 'Cock and Hen.' Be a little +blind, girl—that's what nine wives out of ten have to be +every day and every night and all the world over."</p> +<p>"Will that make my husband any better?" I asked.</p> +<p>"I don't say it will," said Aunt Bridget. "It will make +<i>you</i> better, though. What the eye doesn't see the heart +doesn't grieve for. That's something, isn't it?"</p> +<p>When I went to bed that night my whole soul was in revolt. The +Church, the law, society, parental power, all the conventions and +respectabilities seemed to be in a conspiracy to condone my +husband's offence and to make me his scapegoat, doomed to a life of +hypocrisy and therefore immorality and shame. I would die rather +than endure it. Yes, I would die that very day rather than return +to my husband's house and go through the same ordeal again.</p> +<p>But next morning when I thought of Martin, as I always did on +first awakening, I told myself that I would live and be a clean +woman in my own eyes <i>whatever the World might think of +me</i>.</p> +<p>Martin was now my only refuge, so I would tell him everything. +It would be hard to do that, but no matter, I would crush down my +modesty and tell him everything. And then, whatever he told me to +do I should do it.</p> +<p>I knew quite well what my resolution meant, what it implied and +involved, but still I thought, "<i>Whatever he tells me to do I +will do it</i>."</p> +<p>I remembered what the Countess in Rome had said about a life of +"complete emancipation" as an escape from unhappy marriage, and +even yet I thought "<i>Whatever he tells me to do I will do +it</i>."</p> +<p>After coming to that conclusion I felt more at ease and got up +to dress.</p> +<p>It was a beautiful morning, and I looked down into the orchard, +where the apples were reddening under the sunshine and the +gooseberries were ripening under their hanging boughs, when in the +quiet summer air I heard a footstep approaching.</p> +<p>An elderly woman in an old-fashioned quakerish bonnet was coming +up the drive. She carried a little bunch of red and white roses, +and her face, which was very sweet and simple, wore the pathetic +expression of a child in trouble.</p> +<p>It was Martin's mother. She was coming to see me, and at the +first sight of her something told me that my brave resolution was +about to be broken, and I was going to be shaken to the depths of +my being.</p> +<p>I heard the bell of the front door ringing. After a moment a +maid came up and said:</p> +<p>"Mrs. Doctor Conrad has called to see your ladyship."</p> +<p>"Bring her here," I answered.</p> +<p>My heart was in my mouth already.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When Martin's mother came into the room she looked nervous and +almost frightened, as if she had charged herself with a mission +which she was afraid to fulfil. But I put her to sit in my mother's +easy chair and sat on the arm of it myself, and then she seemed +calmer and more comfortable.</p> +<p>In spite of the silver threads in the smooth hair under her poke +bonnet her dear face was still the face of a child, and never +before had it seemed to me so helpless and child-like.</p> +<p>After a moment we began to talk of Martin. I said it must be a +great happiness to her to have him back after his long and perilous +voyage; and she answered that it was, but his visit was so short, +only four days altogether, although the doctor and she had looked +forward to it so long.</p> +<p>"That's not Martin's fault, though," she said. "He's such a good +son. I really, really think no mother ever had such a good son. But +when children grow up they can't always be thinking of the old +people, can they? That's why I say to the doctor, 'Doctor,' I say, +'perhaps we were the same ourselves when we were young and first +loved each other.'"</p> +<p>Already I thought I saw vaguely what the dear soul had come to +tell me, but I only said I supposed Martin was still with them.</p> +<p>She told me no, he had gone to King George's. That was his old +school, and being prize-giving day the masters had asked him to the +sports and to the dinner that was to be given that night before the +breaking-up for the holidays.</p> +<p>"The boys will give him a cheer, I know they will," she +said.</p> +<p>I said of course he would be back to-morrow, but again she said +no; he had gone for good, and they had said good-bye to him. When +he left King George's he was to go on to Castle Raa. Didn't I know +that? He had said he would telegraph to me. But being from home +perhaps I had not yet received his message. Oh yes, he was going on +to the Castle to-morrow night and would stay there until it was +time to leave the island.</p> +<p>"I'm so glad," I said, hardly knowing with what fervour I had +said it, until I saw the same expression of fear come back to the +sweet old face.</p> +<p>"Martin will be glad, too," she said, "and that's why +I've come to see you."</p> +<p>"That?"</p> +<p>"You won't be cross with me, will you? But Martin is so fond of +you. . . . He always has been fond of you, ever since he was a boy +. . . but this time. . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes?"</p> +<p>"This time I thought . . . I really, really thought he was too +fond of you."</p> +<p>I had to hold my breast to keep down the cry of joy that was +rising to my throat, but the dear soul saw nothing.</p> +<p>"Not that he said so—not to say said so, but it's a mother +to see things, isn't it? And he was talking and talking so much +about Mary O'Neill that I was frightened—really +frightened."</p> +<p>"Frightened?"</p> +<p>"He's so tender-hearted, you see. And then you . . . you're such +a wonderful woman grown. Tommy the Mate says there hasn't been the +like of you on this island since they laid your mother under the +sod. It's truth enough, too—gospel truth. And +Martin—Martin says there isn't your equal, no, not in London +itself neither. So . . . so," she said, trembling and stammering, +"I was thinking . . . I was thinking he was only flesh and blood +like the rest of us, poor boy, and if he got to be <i>too</i> fond +of you . . . now that you're married and have a husband, you know. +. . ."</p> +<p>The trembling and stammering stopped her for a moment.</p> +<p>"They're saying you are not very happy in your marriage neither. +Times and times I've heard people saying he isn't kind to you, and +they married you against your will. . . . So I was telling myself +if that's so, and Martin and you came together now, and you +encouraged him, and let him go on and anything came of it . . . any +trouble or disgrace or the like of that . . . it would be such a +terrible cruel shocking thing for the boy . . . just when +everybody's talking about him and speaking so well too."</p> +<p>It was out at last. Her poor broken-hearted story was told. +Being a married woman, unhappily married, too, I was a danger to +her beloved son, and she had come to me in her sweet, unmindful, +motherly selfishness to ask me to protect him <i>against +myself</i>.</p> +<p>"Whiles and whiles I've been thinking of it," she said. "'What +will I do?' I've been asking myself, and sometimes I've been +thinking I would speak to Martin. I didn't dare do it, though. But +when I heard last night that you had come home to see your father, +I said: 'Doctor, I'll go over and speak to herself.' 'You'll never +do that, Christian Ann,' said the doctor. 'Yes, I will,' I said. +'I'll speak to the young mistress herself. She may be a great lady +now, but haven't I nursed her on my knee? She'll never do anything +to harm my boy, if I ask her not to. No indeed she won't. Not Mary +O'Neill. I'll never believe it of her. Never in this world.'"</p> +<p>The sweet old face was beaming but it was wet with tears, too, +and while trying to get out her pocket-handkerchief, she was +fumbling with the flowers which she was still holding and passing +from hand to hand.</p> +<p>"Let me take the roses," I said as well as I could, for I could +scarcely say anything.</p> +<p>"I brought them for you," she said, and then she laughed, a +little confusedly, at her own forgetfulness.</p> +<p>"To be sure they're nothing to the green-house ones you'll have +at the Castle, but I thought you'd like them for all that. They're +from the tree outside the window of your own little room. We call +it your room still—the one you slept in when you came in your +little velvet frock and pinnie, singing carols to my door. 'Mary +O'Neill's room,' Martin called it then, and it's been the same to +us ever since."</p> +<p>This touched me so deeply that, before I knew what I was doing, +I was putting my arm about her waist and asking her to tell me what +she wished me to do and I would do it.</p> +<p>"Will you, though?" she said, and then one by one she propounded +the artless little schemes she had concocted to cure Martin of what +she conceived to be his love for me.</p> +<p>Her first thought was that I might make excuse of my father's +illness to remain where I was until the time came for Martin to +leave the island; but she repented of this almost immediately, +remembering that Martin was set on seeing me, ('I <i>must</i> see +her,' he had said) and if he did not see me he would be so +downhearted.</p> +<p>Then she thought I might praise up my husband to Martin, saying +what a fine man he was to be sure, and how good he had been to me, +and what a proud woman I was to be married to him; but she was +ashamed of that almost as soon as she had said it, for it might not +be true, and Martin might see I was pretending.</p> +<p>Finally, she suggested that in order to create a coolness +between Martin and myself I might try not to be so nice to him, +speaking short to him sometimes, and even harsh and angry; but no, +that would be too cruel, especially from me, after all these years, +just when he was going so far away, too, and only the Lord and the +blessed saints knew what was to become of him.</p> +<p>It was Martin, Martin, always Martin. Still in her sweet +motherly selfishness she could think of nobody else. Fondly as she +loved me, it never occurred to her for a moment that if I did what +she wished and sent Martin away from me, I too would suffer. But a +harder heart than mine would have melted at the sight of her +perplexity and distress, and when with a helpless look she +said:</p> +<p>"I don't know what you are to do—I really, really don't," +I comforted her (needing comfort so much myself), and told her I +would find a way of my own to do what she desired.</p> +<p>"Will you, though?" she said.</p> +<p>"Indeed I will."</p> +<p>"And you won't send him away sore-hearted, either?"</p> +<p>"Indeed I won't."</p> +<p>"I knew you would say that. May the Lord and His holy Mother +bless you!"</p> +<p>She was weeping tender, copious, blessed tears by this time, but +there were smiles behind them.</p> +<p>"Not that there's another woman in the world I would rather give +him to if things were as they used to be. But they're different +now, are they not?" she asked.</p> +<p>"Yes, they're different now," I answered.</p> +<p>"But are you sure you're not cross with me for coming?"</p> +<p>"Oh, no, no," I said, and it was all I <i>could</i> say for my +voice was failing me.</p> +<p>She gave a sigh of inexpressible relief and then rose to go.</p> +<p>"I must be going now. The doctor is digging in the garden and he +hasn't had his breakfast. But I put the pot on the <i>slouree</i> +to boil and it will be ready for the porridge."</p> +<p>She got as far as the door and then turned and said:</p> +<p>"I wish I had a photo of you—a right one, just as you are +at this very minute. I'd hang it in your own room, and times and +times in the day I'd be running upstairs to look at it. But it's +all as one. I've got a photo of you here," (touching her breast) +"and sometimes I can see it as plain as plain."</p> +<p>I could not speak after that, but I kissed her as she was going +out, and she said:</p> +<p>"That's nice, now! Good-bye, <i>my chree!</i> You'll not be +going home until to-morrow, it's like, so perhaps I'll be putting +another sight on you. Good-bye!"</p> +<p>I went to the window to watch her as she walked down the drive. +She was wiping her eyes, but her head was up and I thought her step +was light, and I was sure her face was shining.</p> +<p>God bless her! The dear sweet woman! Such women as she is, and +my mother was—so humble and loving, so guileless and pure, +never saying an unkind word or thinking an unkind thought—are +the flowers of the world that make the earth smell sweet.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>When she was gone and I remembered the promise I had made to her +I asked myself what was to become of me. If I could neither divorce +my husband under any circumstances without breaking a sacrament of +the Church, nor love Martin and be loved by him without breaking +the heart of his mother, where was I?</p> +<p>I intended to go home the following morning; I was to meet +Martin the following night. What was I to say? What was I to +do?</p> +<p>All day long these questions haunted me and I could find no +answers. But towards evening I took my troubles where I had often +taken them—to Father Dan.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The door of the Presbytery was opened by Father Dan's Irish +housekeeper, a good old soul whose attitude to her master was that +of a "moithered" mother to a wilful child.</p> +<p>All the way up the narrow staircase to his room, she grumbled +about his reverence. Unless he was sickening for the scarlet fever +she didn't know in her seven sinses what was a-matter with him +these days. He was as white as a ghost, and as thin as a shadder, +and no wonder neither, for he didn't eat enough to keep body and +soul together.</p> +<p>Yesterday itself she had cooked him a chicken as good as I could +get at the Big House; "done to a turn, too, with a nice bit of +Irish bacon on top, and a bowl of praties biled in their jackets +and a basin of beautiful new buttermilk;" but no, never a taste nor +a sup did he take of it.</p> +<p>"It's just timpting Providence his reverence is, and it'll be +glory to God if you'll tell him so."</p> +<p>"What's that you're saying about his reverence, Mrs. Cassidy?" +cried Father Dan from the upper landing.</p> +<p>"I'm saying you're destroying yourself with your fasting and +praying and your midnight calls at mountain cabins, and never a +ha'porth of anything in your stomach to do it on."</p> +<p>"Whisht then, Mrs. Cassidy, it's tay-time, isn't it? So just +step back to your kitchen and put on your kittle, and bring up two +of your best china cups and saucers, and a nice piece of buttered +toast, not forgetting a thimbleful of something neat, and then it's +the mighty proud woman ye'll be entoirely to be waiting for once on +the first lady in the island. . . . Come in, my daughter, come +in."</p> +<p>He was laughing as he let loose his Irish tongue, but I could +see that his housekeeper had not been wrong and that he looked worn +and troubled.</p> +<p>As soon as he had taken me into his cosy study and put me to sit +in the big chair before the peat and wood fire, I would have begun +on my errand, but not a word would he hear until the tea had come +up and I had taken a cup of it.</p> +<p>Then stirring the peats for light as well as warmth, (for the +room was dark with its lining of books, and the evening was closing +in) he said:</p> +<p>"Now what is it? Something serious—I can see that +much."</p> +<p>"It <i>is</i> serious, Father Dan."</p> +<p>"Tell me then," he said, and as well as I could I told him my +story.</p> +<p>I told him that since I had seen him last, during that violent +scene at Castle Raa, my relations with my husband had become still +more painful; I told him that, seeing I could not endure any longer +the degradation of the life I was living, I had thought about +divorce; I told him that going first to the Bishop and afterwards +to my father's advocate I had learned that neither the Church nor +the law, for their different reasons, could grant me the relief I +required; and finally, in a faint voice (almost afraid to hear +myself speak it), I told him my solemn and sacred secret—that +whatever happened I could not continue to live where I was now +living because I loved somebody else than my husband.</p> +<p>While I was speaking Father Dan was shuffling his feet and +plucking at his shabby cassock, and as soon as I had finished he +flashed out on me with an anger I had never seen in his face or +heard in his voice before.</p> +<p>"I know who it is," he said. "It's Martin Conrad."</p> +<p>I was so startled by this that I was beginning to ask how he +knew, when he cried:</p> +<p>"Never mind how I know. Perhaps you think an old priest has no +eyes for anything but his breviary, eh? It's young Martin, isn't +it?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"The wretch, the rascal, the scoundrel! If he ever dares to come +to this house again, I'll slam the door in his face."</p> +<p>I knew he loved Martin almost as much as I did, so I paid no +heed to the names he was calling him, but I tried to say that I +alone had been to blame, and that Martin had done nothing.</p> +<p>"Don't tell me he has done nothing," cried Father Dan. "I know +what he has done He has told you he loves you, hasn't he?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"He has been colloguing with you, then, and getting you to say +things?"</p> +<p>"Never."</p> +<p>"Pitying and sympathising with you, anyway, in your relations +with your husband?"</p> +<p>"Not for one moment."</p> +<p>"He had better not! Big man as he is in England now, I'll warm +his jacket for him if he comes here making mischief with a child of +mine. But thank the Lord and the holy saints he's going away soon, +so you'll see no more of him."</p> +<p>"But he is coming to Castle Raa," I said, "and I am to see him +to-morrow night."</p> +<p>"That too! The young scoundrel!"</p> +<p>I explained that my husband had invited him, being prompted to +do so by the other woman.</p> +<p>"Worse and worse!" cried Father Dan. "Don't you see that they're +laying a trap for you, and like two young fools you're walking +directly into it. But no matter! You mustn't go."</p> +<p>I told him that I should be compelled to do so, for Martin was +coming on my account only, and I could neither tell him the truth +nor make an excuse that would not be a falsehood.</p> +<p>"Well, well, perhaps you're right there. It's not the best way +to meet temptation to be always running away from it. That's Irish, +but it's true enough, though. You must conquer this temptation, my +child; you must fight it and overcome it."</p> +<p>"But I've tried and tried and I cannot," I said.</p> +<p>And then I told him the story of my struggle—how love had +been no happiness to me but only a cruel warfare, how I had +suffered and prayed and gone to mass and confession, yet all to no +purpose, for my affection for Martin was like a blazing fire which +nothing could put out.</p> +<p>Father Dan's hands and lips were trembling while I spoke and I +could see that he was shuddering with pity for me, so I went on to +say that if God had put this pure and holy love into my heart could +it be wrong—</p> +<p>"Stop a minute," cried Father Dan. "Who says God put it there? +And who informed you it was pure and holy? Let us see where we are. +Come, now. You say the Bishop told you that you could never be +divorced under any circumstances?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Yet you wish to leave your husband?"</p> +<p>"How can I help it? The life I have been living is too +horrible."</p> +<p>"Never mind that now. You wish to leave your husband, don't +you?"</p> +<p>"I . . . I must."</p> +<p>"And you want to go to this . . . this young . . . in short, you +want to go to Martin Conrad? That's the plain truth, isn't it? +Don't deny it. Very well, let us call things by their proper names. +What is the fact? You are asking me—me, your spiritual +Father—to allow you to live a life of open adultery. That's +what it comes to. You know it is, and God and His holy Mother have +mercy on your soul!"</p> +<p>I was so startled and shocked by his fierce assault, and by the +cruel climax it had come to, that I flung up my hands to my face +and kept them there, for I felt as if my brain had been stunned and +my heart was bursting.</p> +<p>How long I sat like this, with my hidden face to the fire, I do +not know; but after a long silence in which I heard nothing but my +own heaving breath, I became aware that Father Dan had drawn one of +my hands down to his knee and was smoothing it with his own.</p> +<p>"Don't be angry with your old priest for telling you the truth," +he said. "It's hard to bear; I know it's hard; but it's as hard for +him as for you, my child. Think—only think what he is trying +to save you from. If you do what you wish to do, you will put +yourself out of communion. If you put yourself out of communion, +you will cease to be a Catholic. What will become of you then, my +daughter? What will be left to replace the consolations of the +Church—in sorrow, in suffering, in the hour of death? Have +you never thought of that?"</p> +<p>I never had. It was thrilling through and through me.</p> +<p>"You say you cannot live any longer with your husband because he +has broken the vow he made to you at your marriage. But think how +many many thousands of poor women all the world over are doing it +every day—living with adulterous husbands for the sake of +their homes and children. And not for the sake of their homes and +children only, but for the sake of their souls and their religion. +Blessed, blessed martyrs, though we know nothing about them, +holding society and the Church and the human family together."</p> +<p>I was trembling all over. I felt as if Father Dan were trying to +take away from me the only sweet and precious thing in my life that +was left.</p> +<p>"Then you think you cannot live without the one you love, +because all your heart is full of him. But think of the holy women, +the holy saints, who have gone through the same +temptation—fighting against it with all the strength of their +souls until the very wounds of our blessed Lord have been marked on +their bodies."</p> +<p>He was creeping closer to my side. His voice was quivering at my +ear. I was struggling hard, and still trembling all over.</p> +<p>"Hold fast by the Church, my child. It is your only refuge. +Remember that God made your marriage and you cannot break it +without forsaking your faith. Can anything be good that is bought +at such a price? Nothing in this world! When you meet to-morrow +night—you two children—tell him that. Tell him I told +you to say so. . . . I love you both. Don't break your old priest's +heart. He's in trouble enough for you already. Don't let him think +that he must lose you altogether. And then remember your mother, +too—that saint in heaven who suffered so long and was +patient. . . . Everything will depend upon you, my child. In +matters of this kind the woman is the stronger vessel. Be strong +for him also. Renounce your guilty love, my daughter—"</p> +<p>"But I cannot, I cannot," I said. "I love him, and I cannot give +him up!"</p> +<p>"Let us ask God to help you," said Father Dan, and still holding +my hand he drew me down to my knees and knelt beside me. The room +was dark by this time, and only the sullen glow from the peat fire +was on our faces.</p> +<p>Then in a low voice, so low that it was like his throbbing +whisper before the altar, when he raised the Sacred host, Father +Dan prayed for me (calling me his dear child whom God had committed +to his care) that I might keep my marriage vow and be saved from +the temptation to break it.</p> +<p>His beautiful prayer or his throbbing voice, or both together, +had a great effect upon me, and when I rose to my feet, I felt +stronger. Although Martin was as dear to me as ever, I thought I +saw my way at last. If he loved me as I loved him, I had to be +brave for both of us. I had to oppose to the carnal instinct of +love the spiritual impulse of renunciation. Yes, yes, that was what +I had to do.</p> +<p>Father Dan saw me to the door.</p> +<p>"Give my love to my boy," he said, "and don't forget what I told +you to tell him."</p> +<p>"I'll tell him," I replied, for though I knew my heart was +bleeding I felt calm and more courageous.</p> +<p>It was milking time and the cows were lowing in the byre when I +crossed the fields and the farm-yard on my way back to my father's +house.</p> +<p>Early next morning I left it for Castle Raa.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Although it was mid-day before I reached the Castle, the gate to +the park had not been opened, the drive was deserted and even the +great door to the house itself was closed.</p> +<p>And when, in answer to my ringing, one of the maids came after a +certain delay, wearing neither apron nor cap, I found the hall +empty and no sign of life in the house, except a shrill chorus of +laughter which came from the servants' quarters.</p> +<p>"What's the meaning of this?" I asked, but before the girl could +reply, Price who had come down to take my wraps said:</p> +<p>"I'll tell your ladyship presently."</p> +<p>As we were going upstairs she told me that the entire +house-party had that morning gone off on a cruise in Mr. +Eastcliff's yacht, that they would be away several days, and that +Madame had left a letter for me which was supposed to explain +everything.</p> +<p>I found it on the mantelpiece in my boudoir under an open +telegram which had been stuck into the edge of the bevelled glass. +The telegram, which was addressed to me, was from Martin.</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p><i>"Expect to arrive to-morrow evening. Staying until Wednesday +afternoon. If not convenient wire Principal's House, King George's +College."</i></p> +</div> +<p>"To-morrow'?"</p> +<p>"That means to-day," said Price. "The telegram came yesterday. +Madame opened it and she told me to say—"</p> +<p>"Let me read her letter first," I said.</p> +<p>The letter ran as follows:</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p><i>"My Dearest Mary</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>You will be astonished to find the house empty and all your +racketty guests gone. Let me explain, and if you are angry about +what has happened you must lay all the blame on me</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Well, you see, my dear, it was arranged nearly a month ago +that before we left your delightful house we should make a little +cruise round your charming island. But we had not expected that +this would come off so soon, when suddenly and unexpectedly that +silly Mr. Eastcliff, who has no more brains than a spring chicken, +remembered that he had promised to visit a friend who has taken a +shoot in Skye. Result—we had to make the cruise immediately +or not at all, and yet behold! our hostess was away on an urgent +call of sickness, and what in the world were we to do without +her</i>?</p> +<p>"<i>Everybody was in a quandary—that wise Mr. Vivian +saying it would be 'jolly bad form by Jove' to go without you, +while Mr. Eastcliffs 'deelightfully vicked' little Camilla declared +it would be 'vilaynous,' and your husband vowed that his Margaret +Mary could not possibly be left behind</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>It was then that a certain friend of yours took the liberty +of remembering that you did not like the sea, and that even if you +had been here and had consented to go with us it would have been +only out of the sweetness of your heart, which I've always known to +be the tenderest and most unselfish in the world</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>This seemed to satisfy the whole house and everybody was at +ease, when lo! down on us like a thunderbolt came the telegram from +Mr. Conrad. Thinking it might require to be repeated, I took the +liberty of opening it, and then we were in a plight, I assure +you</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>What on earth was he to think of our leaving the house when +he was on the point of arriving? And, above all, how were we to +support the disappointment of missing him—some of us, the +women especially, and myself in particular, being just crazy to see +him again</i>?</p> +<p>"<i>This nearly broke down our plans altogether, but once more I +came to the rescue by remembering that Mr. Conrad was not coming to +see us but you, and that the very kindest thing we could do for a +serious person of his kind would be to take our racketty presence +out of the way</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>That contented everybody except my mother, who—would +you believe it?—had gotten some prudish notions into her head +about the impropriety of leaving you alone, and declared her +intention of staying behind to keep you in countenance! We soon +laughed her out of that, though, and now, to relieve you of her +company, we are carrying her away with us—which will be lots +of fun, for she's as fond of water as a cat and will fancy she is +seasick all the time</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Good-bye, dearest! We're just off. I envy you. You happy, +happy girl! I am sure you will have such a good time. What a man! +As natural as nature! I see, by the insular paper that your +islanders adore him</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Hope you found your father better. Another wonderful man! +Such an original type, too! Good-bye, my dearest dear</i>, +ALMA.</p> +<p>"<i>P.S. Have missed you so much, darling! Castle Raa wasn't the +same place without you—I assure you it wasn't</i>."</p> +</div> +<p>While I was turning this letter over in my hand, wondering what +the beautiful fiend had meant by it, my maid, who was standing by, +was visibly burning with a desire to know its contents and give me +the benefit of her own interpretation.</p> +<p>I told her in general what Alma had said and she burst into +little screams of indignation.</p> +<p>"Well, the huzzy! The wicked huzzy! That's all she is, my lady, +begging your pardon, and there's no other name for her. Arranged a +month ago, indeed! It was never thought of until last night after +Mr. Conrad's telegram came."</p> +<p>"Then what does it mean?"</p> +<p>"I can tell your ladyship what it means, if you'll promise not +to fly out at me again. It means that Madame wants to stand in your +shoes, and wouldn't mind going through the divorce court to do so. +And seeing that you can't be tempted to divorce your husband +because you are a Catholic, she thinks your husband, who isn't, +might be tempted to divorce you. So she's setting a trap for you, +and she expects you to fall into it while she's away, and if you +do. . . ."</p> +<p>"Impossible!"</p> +<p>"Oh, trust <i>me</i>, your ladyship. I haven't been keeping my +ears closed while your ladyship has been away, and if that +chatterbox of a maid of hers hadn't been such a fool I suppose she +would have been left behind to watch. But there's somebody else in +the house who thinks she has a grievance against you, and if +listening at keyholes will do anything . . . Hush!"</p> +<p>Price stopped suddenly with her finger to her lip, and then +going on tiptoe to the door she opened it with a jerk, when the +little housekeeper was to be seen rising to an upright position +while pretending that she had slipped.</p> +<p>"I only came to ask if her ladyship had lunched?" she said.</p> +<p>I answered that I had not, and then told her (so as to give her +no further excuse for hanging about me) that in future she was to +take her orders from Price—an announcement which caused my +maid to stand several inches taller in her shoes, and sent the +housekeeper hopping downstairs with her beak in the air like an +injured cockatoo.</p> +<p>All the afternoon I was in a state of the utmost agitation, +sometimes wondering what Martin would think of the bad manners of +my husband, who after inviting him had gone away just as he was +about to arrive; sometimes asking myself, with a quiver of shame, +if he would imagine that this was a scheme of my own contriving; +but oftenest remembering my resolution of renunciation and thinking +of the much fiercer fight that was before me now that I had to +receive and part with him alone.</p> +<p>More than once I had half a mind to telegraph to Martin putting +him off, and though I told myself that to do so would not be +renunciation but merely flight from temptation, I always knew at +the bottom of my heart that I really wanted him to come.</p> +<p>Nevertheless I vowed to my very soul that I should be +strong—strong in every word and look—and if Alma was +daring me I should defy her, and she would see that I should +neither yield nor run away.</p> +<p>Thus I entrenched myself at last in a sort of bright strong +faith in my power to resist temptation. But I must leave it to +those who know better than I the way to read a woman's heart to say +how it came to pass that towards five o'clock, when I heard the +sound of wheels and going on to my balcony saw a jaunting-car at +the front entrance, and then opening my door heard Martin's great +voice in the hall, I flew downstairs—literally flew—in +my eagerness to welcome him.</p> +<p>There he was in his brown Harris tweeds and soft slouch hat with +such an atmosphere of health and sweep of winds about him as almost +took away my breath.</p> +<p>"Helloa!" he cried, and I am sure his eyes brightened at the +sight of me for they were like the sea when the sun shines on +it.</p> +<p>"You're better, aren't you?" he said. "No need to ask that, +though—the colour in your face is wonderful."</p> +<p>In spite of my resolution, and the attempt I made to show him +only a kind of glad seriousness, I could not help it if I blushed. +Also I could not help it if, while going upstairs and telling him +what had happened to the house-party, I said he was doomed to the +disappointment of having nobody except myself for company, and +then, woman-like, waited eagerly for what he would say.</p> +<p>"So they're all gone except yourself, are they?" he said.</p> +<p>"I'm afraid they are," I answered.</p> +<p>"Well, if it had been the other way about, and you had gone and +they had stayed, by the stars of God, I <i>should</i> have been +disappointed. But things being as they are, we'll muddle through, +shan't we?"</p> +<p>Not all the vows in the world could prevent me from finding that +answer delightful, and when, on entering my boudoir, he said:</p> +<p>"Sorry to miss Madame though. I wanted a word with that lady +before I went down to the Antarctic," I could not resist the +mischievous impulse to show him Alma's letter.</p> +<p>While he read it his bright face darkened (for all the world +like a jeweller's window when the shutter comes down on it), and +when he had finished it he said once more:</p> +<p>"I hate that woman! She's like a snake. I'd like to put my foot +on it."</p> +<p>And then—</p> +<p>"She may run away as much as she likes, but I <i>will</i> yet, +you go bail, I will."</p> +<p>He was covered with dust and wanted to wash, so I rang for a +maid, who told me that Mr. and Mrs. Eastcliff's rooms had been +prepared for Mr. Conrad. This announcement (though I tried to seem +unmoved) overwhelmed me with confusion, seeing that the rooms in +question almost communicated with my own. But Martin only laughed +and said:</p> +<p>"Stunning! We'll live in this wing of the house and leave the +rest of the old barracks to the cats, should we?"</p> +<p>I was tingling with joy, but all the same I knew that a grim +battle was before me.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>By the time he returned from his room I had tea served in my +boudoir, and while we sat facing the open door to the balcony he +told me about his visit to his old school; how at the dinner on the +previous night the Principal had proposed his health, and after the +lads had sung "Forty Years On" he had told them yarns about his +late expedition until they made the long hiss of indrawn breath +which is peculiar to boys when they are excited; how they had +followed him to his bedroom as if he had been the Pied Piper of +Hamelin and questioned him and clambered over him until driven off +by the house-master; and how, finally, before he was out of bed +this morning the smallest scholar in the junior house, a tiny +little cherub with the face of his mother, had come knocking at his +door to ask if he wanted a cabin boy.</p> +<p>Martin laughed as if he had been a boy himself (which he always +was and always will be) while telling me these stories, and I +laughed too, though with a certain tremor, for I was constantly +remembering my resolution and feeling afraid to be too happy.</p> +<p>After tea we went out on to the balcony, and leaned side by side +over the crumbling stone balustrade to look at the lovely +landscape—loveliest when the sun is setting on it—with +the flower-garden below and the headland beyond, covered with +heather and gorse and with a winding white path lying over it like +the lash of a whip until it dipped down to the sea.</p> +<p>"It's a beautiful old world, though, isn't it?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"Isn't it?" I answered, and we looked into each other's eyes and +smiled.</p> +<p>Then we heard the light <i>shsh</i> of a garden hose, and +looking down saw an old man watering the geraniums.</p> +<p>"Sakes alive! It's Tommy the Mate," cried Martin, and leaving me +on the balcony he went leaping down the stone stairway to greet his +old comrade.</p> +<p>"God bless me!" said Tommy. "Let me have a right look at ye. +Yes, yes, it's himself, for sure."</p> +<p>A little gale of tender memories floated up to me from my +childhood at seeing those two together again, with Martin now +standing head and shoulders above the old man's Glengarry cap.</p> +<p>"You've been over the highways of the sea, farther than Franklin +himself, they're telling me," said Tommy, and when Martin, laughing +merrily, admitted that he had been farther south at all events, the +old sailor said:</p> +<p>"Well, well! Think of that now! But wasn't I always telling the +omadhauns what you'd be doing some day?"</p> +<p>Then with a "glime" of his "starboard eye" in my direction he +said:</p> +<p>"You haven't got a woman yet though? . . . No, I thought not. +You're like myself, boy—there's not many of them sorts +<i>in</i> for you."</p> +<p>After that, and a more undisguised look my way, the old man +talked about me, still calling me the "lil misthress" and saying +they were putting a power of gold on my fingers, but he would be +burning candles to the miracles of God to see the colour of it in +my cheeks too.</p> +<p>"She's a plant that doesn't take kindly to a hot-house same as +this," (indicating the house) "and she'll not be thriving until +somebody's bedding her out, I'm thinking."</p> +<p>It was Saturday, and after dinner Martin proposed that we should +walk to the head of the cliff to see Blackwater by night, which was +a wonderful spectacle, people said, at the height of the season, so +I put a silk wrap over my head and we set out together.</p> +<p>There was no moon and few stars were visible, but it was one of +those luminous nights in summer which never forget the day. +Therefore we walked without difficulty along the white winding path +with its nutty odour of the heather and gorse until we came near +the edge of the cliff, and then suddenly the town burst upon our +view, with its promenades, theatres, and dancing palaces ablaze +with electric light, which was reflected with almost equal +brilliance in the smooth water of the bay.</p> +<p>We were five miles from Blackwater, but listening hard we +thought we could hear, through the boom of the sea on the dark +cliffs below us, the thin sounds of the bands that were playing in +the open-air pavilions, and looking steadfastly we thought we could +see, in the black patches under the white light, the movement of +the thousands of persons who were promenading along "the +front."</p> +<p>This led Martin to talk of my father, saying as we walked back, +with the dark outlines of the sleeping mountains confronting us, +what a marvellous man he had been to transform in twenty years the +little fishing and trading port into a great resort for hundreds of +thousands of pleasure-seekers.</p> +<p>"But is he any better or happier for the wealth it has brought +him, and for the connections he has bought with it? Is anybody any +better?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"I know one who isn't," I answered.</p> +<p>I had not meant to say that. It had slipped out unawares, and in +my confusion at the self-revelation which it seemed to make, I +tripped in the darkness and would have fallen if Martin had not +caught me up.</p> +<p>In doing this he had to put his arms about me and to hold me +until I was steady on my feet, and having done so he took my hand +and drew it through his arm and in this way we walked the rest of +the way back.</p> +<p>It would be impossible and perhaps foolish to say what that +incident meant to me. I felt a thrill of joy, a quivering flood of +delight which, with all the raptures of my spiritual love, had +never come to me before.</p> +<p>Every woman who loves her husband must know what it is, but to +me it was a great revelation. It was just as if some new passion +had sprung into life in me at a single moment. And it had—the +mighty passion that lies at the root of our being, the overwhelming +instinct of sex which, taking no account of religion and +resolutions, sweeps everything before it like a flood.</p> +<p>I think Martin must have felt it too, for all at once he ceased +to speak, and I was trembling so much with this new feeling of +tenderness that I could not utter a word. So I heard nothing as we +walked on but the crackle of our footsteps on the gravel path and +the measured boom of the sea which we were leaving behind +us—nothing but that and the quick beating in my own +breast.</p> +<p>When we came to the garden the frowning face of the old house +was in front of us, and it was all in darkness, save for the light +in my room which came out on to the balcony. Everything was quiet. +The air was breathless. There was not a rustle in the trees.</p> +<p>We took two or three turns on the lawn in front of my windows, +saying nothing but feeling terribly, fearfully happy. After a few +moments (or they seemed few) a cuckoo clock on my desk struck +eleven, and we went up the stone stairway into my boudoir and +parted for the night.</p> +<p>Even then we did not speak, but Martin took my hand and lifted +my fingers to his lips, and the quivering delight I had been +feeling ever since I slipped on the headland rushed through me +again.</p> +<p>At the next moment I was in my room. I did not turn on the +light. I undressed in the darkness and when my maid came I was in +bed. She wanted to tell me about a scene with the housekeeper in +the kitchen, but I said:</p> +<p>"I don't want to talk to-night, Price."</p> +<p>I did not know what was happening to me. I only knew, for the +first time that night, that above everything else I was a woman, +and that my renunciation, if it was ever to come to pass, would be +a still more tragic thing than I had expected.</p> +<p>My grim battle had begun.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When I awoke in the morning I took myself severely to task. Was +this how I was fulfilling the promise I had made to Martin's +mother, or preparing to carry out the counsel of Father Dan?</p> +<p>"I must be more careful," I told myself. "I must keep a stronger +hold of myself."</p> +<p>The church bells began to ring, and I determined to go to mass. +I wanted to go alone and much as I grudged every minute of Martin's +company which I lost, I was almost glad when, on going into the +boudoir with my missal in my hand, I found him at a table covered +with papers and heard him say:</p> +<p>"Helloa! See these letters and telegrams? Sunday as it is I've +got to answer them."</p> +<p>Our church was a little chapel-of-ease on the edge of my +husband's estate, opened, after centuries of neglect, by the bad +Lord Raa, in his regenerate days, for the benefit of the people of +his own village. It was very sweet to see their homely faces as +they reverently bowed and rose, and even to hear their creachy +voices when they joined in the singing of the Gloria.</p> +<p>Following the gospel there was a sermon on the words "Lead us +not into temptation but deliver us from evil." The preacher was a +young curate, the brother of my husband's coachman; and it occurred +to me that he could know very little of temptation for himself, but +the instruction he gave us was according to the doctrine of our +Church, as I had received it from the Reverend Mother and the +Cardinals who used to hold retreats at the convent.</p> +<p>"Beware of the temptations of the flesh, my children," said the +priest. "The Evil One is very subtle, and not only in our moments +of pride and prosperity, but also in our hours of sorrow and +affliction, he is for ever waiting and watching to betray us to our +downfall and damnation."</p> +<p>In the rustling that followed the sermon a poor woman who sat +next to me, with a print handkerchief over her head, whispered in +my ear that she was sorry she had not brought her husband, for he +had given way to drink, poor fellow, since the island had had such +good times and wages had been so high.</p> +<p>But the message came closer home to me. Remembering the emotions +of the night before, I prayed fervently to be strengthened against +all temptation and preserved from all sin. And when the mass was +resumed I recalled some of the good words with which I had been +taught to assist at the Holy Sacrifice—praying at the +<i>Credo</i> that as I had become a child in the bosom of the +Church I might live and die in it.</p> +<p>When the service was over I felt more at ease and I emptied my +purse, I remember, partly into the plate and partly to the poor +people at the church door.</p> +<p>It was in this spirit that I returned home in the broad sunshine +of noonday. But half way up the drive I met Martin walking briskly +down to meet me. He was bareheaded and in flannels; and I could not +help it if he looked to me so good, so strong, and so well able to +protect a woman against every danger, that the instructions I had +received in church, and the resolutions I had formed there, seemed +to run out of my heart as rapidly as the dry sand of the sea-shore +runs through one's fingers.</p> +<p>"Helloa!" he cried, as usual. "The way I've been wasting this +wonderful morning over letters and telegrams! But not another +minute will I give to anything under the stars of God but you."</p> +<p>If there was any woman in the world who could have resisted that +greeting I was not she, and though I was a little confused I was +very happy.</p> +<p>As we walked back to the house we talked of my father and his +sudden illness, then of his mother and my glimpse of her, and +finally of indifferent things, such as the weather, which had been +a long drought and might end in a deluge.</p> +<p>By a sort of mutual consent we never once spoke of the central +subject of our thoughts—my marriage and its fatal +consequences—but I noticed that Martin's voice was soft and +caressing, that he was walking close to my side, and that as often +as I looked up at him he was looking down at me and smiling.</p> +<p>It was the same after luncheon when we went out into the garden +and sat on a seat in the shrubbery almost immediately facing my +windows, and he spread a chart on a rustic table and pointing to a +red line on it said:</p> +<p>"Look, this is the course of our new cruise, please God."</p> +<p>He talked for a long time, about his captain and crew; the +scientific experts who had volunteered to accompany him, his +aeronautic outfit, his sledges and his skis; but whatever he talked +about—if it was only his dogs and the food he had found for +them—it was always in that soft, caressing voice which made +me feel as if (though he never said one word of love) he were +making love to me, and saying the sweetest things a man could say +to a woman.</p> +<p>After a time I found myself answering in the same tones, and +even when speaking on the most matter-of-fact subjects I felt as if +I were saying the sweetest things a woman could say to a man.</p> +<p>We sat a long time so, and every moment we were together seemed +to make our relation more perilous, until at length the sweet +seductive twilight of the shortening autumn day began to frighten +me, and making excuse of a headache I said I must go indoors.</p> +<p>He walked with me up the stone-stairway and into my boudoir, +until we got to the very door of my room, and then suddenly he took +up both my hands and kissed them passionately.</p> +<p>I felt the colour rushing to my cheeks and I had an almost +irresistible impulse to do something in return. But conquering it +with a great effort, I turned quickly into my bedroom, shut the +door, pulled down the blinds and then sat and covered my face and +asked myself, with many bitter pangs, if it could possibly be true +(as I had been taught to believe) that our nature was evil and our +senses were always tempting us to our destruction.</p> +<p>Several hours passed while I sat in the darkness with this +warfare going on between my love and my religion, and then Price +came to dress me for dinner, and she was full of cheerful +gossip.</p> +<p>"Men are <i>such</i> children," she said; "they can't help +giving themselves away, can they?"</p> +<p>It turned out that after I had left the lawn she had had some +conversation with Martin, and I could see that she was eager to +tell me what he had said about myself.</p> +<p>"The talk began about your health and altered looks, my lady. +'Don't you think your mistress is looking ill?' said he. 'A +little,' I said. 'But her body is not so ill as her heart, if you +ask me,' said I."</p> +<p>"You never said that, Price?"</p> +<p>"Well, I could not help saying it if I thought so, could I?"</p> +<p>"And what did he say?"</p> +<p>"He didn't say anything then, my lady, but when I said, 'You +see, sir, my lady is tied to a husband she doesn't love,' he said, +'How can she, poor thing? 'Worse than that,' I said, 'her husband +loves another woman.' 'The fool! Where does he keep his eyes?' said +he. 'Worse still,' said I, 'he flaunts his infidelities in her very +face.' 'The brute!' he said, and his face looked so fierce that you +would have thought he wanted to take his lordship by the throat and +choke him. 'Why doesn't she leave the man?' said he. 'That's what I +say, sir, but I think it's her religion,' I said. 'Then God help +her, for there's no remedy for that,' said he. And then seeing him +so down I said, 'But we women are always ruled by our hearts in the +long run.' 'Do you think so?' said he. 'I'm sure of it,' said I, +'only we must have somebody to help us,' I said. 'There's her +father,' said he. 'A father is of no use in a case like this,' I +said, 'especially such a one as my lady's is, according to all +reports. No,' said I, 'it must be somebody else—somebody who +cares enough for a woman to risk everything for her, and just take +her and make her do what's best for herself whether she likes it or +not. Now if somebody like that were to come to my lady, and get her +out of her trouble,' I said. . . . 'Somebody will,' said he. 'Make +your mind easy about that. Somebody will,' he said, and then he +went on walking to and fro."</p> +<p>Price told this story as if she thought she was bringing me the +gladdest of glad tidings; but the idea that Martin had come back +into my life to master me, to take possession of me, to claim me as +his own (just as he did when I was a child) and thereby compel me +to do what I had promised his mother and Father Dan not to +do—this was terrifying.</p> +<p>But there was a secret joy in it too, and every woman will know +what I mean if I say that my heart was beating high with the fierce +delight of belonging to somebody when I returned to the boudoir +where Martin was waiting to sit down to dinner.</p> +<p>Then came a great surprise.</p> +<p>Martin was standing with his back to the fire-place, and I saw +in a moment that the few hours which had intervened had changed him +as much as they had changed me.</p> +<p>"Helloa! Better, aren't we?" he cried, but he was now cold, +almost distant, and even his hearty voice seemed to have sunk to a +kind of nervous treble.</p> +<p>I could not at first understand this, but after a while I began +to see that we two had reached the point beyond which it was +impossible to go without encountering the most tremendous fact of +our lives—my marriage and all that was involved by it.</p> +<p>During dinner we spoke very little. He seemed intentionally not +to look at me. The warm glances of his sea-blue eyes, which all the +afternoon had been making the colour mount to my cheeks, had gone, +and it sent a cold chill to my heart to look across the table at +his clouded face. But sometimes when he thought my own face was +down I was conscious that his eyes were fixed on me with a +questioning, almost an imploring gaze. His nervousness communicated +itself to me. It was almost as if we had begun to be afraid of each +other and were hovering on the brink of fatal revelations.</p> +<p>When dinner was over, the table cleared and the servants gone, I +could bear the strain no longer, so making excuse of a letter I had +to write to the Reverend Mother I sat down at my desk, whereupon +Martin lit a cigar and said he would stroll over the headland.</p> +<p>I heard his footsteps going down the stone stairway from the +balcony; I heard their soft thud on the grass of the lawn; I heard +their sharper crackle on the gravel of the white path, and then +they mingled with the surge and wash of the flowing tide and died +away in the distance.</p> +<p>I rose from the desk, and going over to the balcony door looked +out into the darkness. It was a beautiful, pathetic, heart-breaking +night. No moon, but a perfect canopy of stars in a deep blue sky. +The fragrance of unseen flowers—sweetbriar and rose as well +as ripening fruit—came up from the garden. There was no wind +either, not even the rustle of a leaf, and the last bird of evening +was silent. All the great orchestra of nature was still, save for +the light churning of the water running in the glen and the deep +organ song of the everlasting sea.</p> +<p>"What can I do?" I asked myself.</p> +<p>Now that Martin was gone I had begun to understand him. His +silence had betrayed his heart to me even more than his speech +could have done. Towering above him like a frowning mountain was +the fact that I was a married woman and he was trying to stand +erect in his honour as a man.</p> +<p>"He must be suffering too," I told myself.</p> +<p>That was a new thought to me and it cut me to the quick.</p> +<p>When it came to me first I wanted to run after him and throw +myself into his arms, and then I wanted to run away from him +altogether.</p> +<p>I felt as if I were on the brink of two madnesses—the +madness of breaking my marriage vows and the madness of breaking +the heart of the man who loved me.</p> +<p>"Oh, what can I do?" I asked myself again.</p> +<p>I wanted him to go; I wanted him to stay; I did not know what I +wanted. At length I remembered that in ordinary course he would be +going in two days more, and I said to myself:</p> +<p>"Surely I can hold out that long."</p> +<p>But when I put this thought to my breast, thinking it would +comfort me, I found that it burnt like hot iron.</p> +<p>Only two days, and then he would be gone, lost to me perhaps for +ever. Did my renunciation require that? It was terrible!</p> +<p>There was a piano in the room, and to strengthen and console +myself in my trouble I sat down to it and played and sang. I sang +"Ave Maria Stella."</p> +<p>I was singing to myself, so I know I began softly—so +softly that my voice must have been a whisper scarcely audible +outside the room—</p> +<p>"<i>Hail thou star of ocean,<br /> +Portal of the sky</i>."</p> +<p>But my heart was full and when I came to the verses which always +moved me most—</p> +<p>"<i>Virgin of all virgins,<br /> +To thy shelter take us</i>"—</p> +<p>my voice, without my knowing it, may have swelled out into the +breathless night until it reached Martin, where he walked on the +dark headland, and sounded to him like a cry that called him +back.</p> +<p>I cannot say. I only know that when with a thickening throat I +had come to an end, and my forehead had fallen on to the key-board, +and there was no other sound in the air but the far-off surging of +the sea. I heard somebody calling me in a soft and tremulous +whisper,</p> +<p>"Mary!"</p> +<p>It was he. I went out to the balcony and there he was on the +lawn below. The light of the room was on him and never before had I +seen his strong face so full of agitation.</p> +<p>"Come down," he said. "I have something to say to you."</p> +<p>I could not resist him. He was my master. I had to obey.</p> +<p>When I reached the bottom of the stairway he took my hand, and I +did not know whether it was his hand or mine that was trembling. He +led me across the lawn to the seat in the shrubbery that almost +faced my windows. In the soft and soundless night I could hear his +footsteps on the turf and the rustle of my dress over the +grass.</p> +<p>We sat, and for a moment he did not speak. Then with a +passionate rush of words he said:</p> +<p>"Mary, I hadn't meant to say what I'm going to say now, but I +can't do anything else. You are in trouble, and I can't stand by +and see you so ill-used. I can't and I won't!"</p> +<p>I tried to answer him, but my throat was fluttering and I could +not speak.</p> +<p>"It's only a few days before I ought to sail, but they may be +enough in which to do something, and if they're not I'll postpone +the expedition or put it off, or send somebody in my place, for go +away I cannot and leave you like this."</p> +<p>I tried to say that he should not do that whatever happened to +me, but still I could not speak.</p> +<p>"Mary. I want to help you. But I can only do so if you give me +the <i>right</i> to do it. Nobody must tell me I'm a meddler, +butting in where I have no business. There are people enough about +you who would be only too ready to do that—people related to +you by blood and by law."</p> +<p>I knew what he was coming to, for his voice was quivering in my +ears like the string of a bow.</p> +<p>"There is only one sort of right, Mary, that is above the right +of blood, and you know what that is."</p> +<p>My eyes were growing so dim that I could hardly see the face +which was so close to mine.</p> +<p>"Mary," he said, "I have always cared for you. Surely you know +that. By the saints of God I swear there has never been any other +girl for me, and now there never will he. Perhaps I ought to have +told you this before, and I wanted to do so when I met you in Rome. +But it didn't seem fair, and I couldn't bring myself to do it."</p> +<p>His passionate voice was breaking; I thought my heart was +breaking also.</p> +<p>"All I could do I did, but it came to nothing; and now you are +here and you are unhappy, and though it is so late I want to help +you, to rescue you, to drag you out of this horrible situation +before I go away. Let me do it. Give me the right of one you care +enough for to allow him to speak on your behalf."</p> +<p>I knew what that meant. I knew that I was tottering on the very +edge of a precipice, and to save myself I tried to think of Father +Dan, of Martin's mother, of my own mother, and since I could not +speak I struggled to pray.</p> +<p>"Don't say you can't. If you do I shall go away a sorrowful man. +I shall go at once too—to-night or to-morrow morning at +latest, for my heart bleeds to look at you and I can't stay here +any longer to see you suffer. It is not torture to me—it's +hell!"</p> +<p>And then the irrepressible, overwhelming, inevitable moment +came. Martin laid hold of my right hand and said in his tremulous +voice:</p> +<p>"Mary . . . Mary . . . I . . . I love you!"</p> +<p>I could hear no more. I could not think or pray or resist any +longer. The bitter struggle was at an end. Before I knew what I was +doing I was dropping my head on to his breast and he with a cry of +joy was gathering me in his arms.</p> +<p>I was his. He had taken his own. Nothing counted in the presence +of our love. To be only we two together—that was everything. +The world and the world's laws, the Church and the Canons of the +Church were blotted out, forgotten, lost.</p> +<p>For some moments I hardly breathed. I was only conscious that +over my head Martin was saying something that seemed to come to me +with all the deep and wonderful whispers of his heart.</p> +<p>"Then it's true! It's true that you love me! Yes, it's true! +It's true! No one shall hurt you again. Never again! No, by the +Lord God!"</p> +<p>And then suddenly—as suddenly as the moment of +intoxication had come to me—I awoke from my delirium. Some +little thing awakened me. I hardly know what it was. Perhaps it was +only the striking of the cuckoo clock in my room.</p> +<p>"What are we doing?" I said.</p> +<p>Everything had rolled back on me—my marriage, Father Dan's +warning, my promise to Martin's mother.</p> +<p>"Where are we?" I said.</p> +<p>"Hush! Don't speak," said Martin. "Let us think of nothing +to-night—nothing except our love."</p> +<p>"Don't say that," I answered. "We are not free to love each +other," and then, trying to liberate myself from his encircling +arms I cried:</p> +<p>"God help me! God forgive me!"</p> +<p>"Wait!" said Martin, holding me a moment longer. "I know what +you feel, and I'm not the man to want a girl to wrong her +conscience. But there's one question I must ask you. If you +<i>were</i> free, could you love me then?"</p> +<p>"Don't ask me that. I must not answer it."</p> +<p>"You must and shall," said Martin. "Could you?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"That's enough for me—enough for to-night anyway. Have no +fear. All shall be well. Go to your room now."</p> +<p>He raised me to my feet and led me back to the foot of the +balcony, and there he kissed my hand and let me go.</p> +<p>"Good night!" he said softly.</p> +<p>"Good night!" I answered.</p> +<p>"God bless you, my pure sweet girl!"</p> +<p>At the next moment I was in my room, lying face down on my +bed—seeing no hope on any side, and sobbing my heart out for +what might have been but for the hard law of my religion and the +cruel tangle of my fate.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Next morning, Monday morning, while I was breakfasting in my +bedroom, Price came with a message from Martin to say that he was +going into the glen and wished to know if I would go with him.</p> +<p>I knew perfectly what that meant. He wished to tell me what +steps he intended to take towards my divorce, and my heart trembled +with the thought of the answer I had to give him—that divorce +for me, under any circumstances, was quite impossible.</p> +<p>Sorry as I was for myself I was still more sorry for Martin. I +felt like a judge who had to pronounce sentence upon +him—dooming his dearest hopes to painful and instant +death.</p> +<p>I could hear him on the lawn with Tommy the Mate, laughing like +a boy let loose from school, and when I went down to him he greeted +me with a cry of joy that was almost heart-breaking.</p> +<p>Our way to the glen was through a field of grass, where the dew +was thick, and, my boots being thin, Martin in his high spirits +wished to carry me across, and it was only with an effort that I +prevented him from doing so.</p> +<p>The glen itself when we reached it (it was called Glen Raa) was +almost cruelly beautiful that day, and remembering what I had to do +in it I thought I should never be able to get it out of my +sight—with its slumberous gloom like that of a vast +cathedral, its thick arch of overhanging boughs through which the +morning sunlight was streaming slantwards like the light through +the windows of a clerestory, its running water below, its rustling +leaves above, and the chirping of its birds on every side, making a +sound that was like the chanting of a choir in some far-off apse +and the rumbling of their voices in the roof.</p> +<p>Two or three times, as we walked down the glen towards a port +(Port Raa) which lay at the seaward end of it. Martin rallied me on +the settled gravity of my face and then I had to smile, though how +I did so I do not know, for every other minute my heart was in my +mouth, and never more so than when, to make me laugh, he rattled +away in the language of his boyhood, saying:</p> +<p>"Isn't this stunning? Splendiferous, eh?"</p> +<p>When we came out at the mouth of the port, where a line of +little stunted oaks leaned landward as with the memory of many a +winter's storm, Martin said:</p> +<p>"Let us sit down here."</p> +<p>We sat on the sloping bank, with the insects ticking in the +grass, the bees humming in the air, the sea fowl screaming in the +sky, the broad sea in front, and the little bay below, where the +tide, which was going out, had left behind it a sharp reef of black +rocks covered with sea-weed.</p> +<p>A pleasure-steamer passed at that moment with its flags flying, +its awnings spread, its decks crowded with excursionists, and a +brass hand playing one of Sousa's marches, and as soon as it had +gone, Martin said:</p> +<p>"I've been thinking about our affair, Mary, how to go to work +and all that, and of course the first thing we've got to do is to +get a divorce."</p> +<p>I made no answer, and I tried not to look at him by fixing my +eyes upon the sea.</p> +<p>"You have evidence enough, you know, and if you haven't there's +Price—she has plenty. So, since you've given me the right to +speak for you, dear, I'm going to speak to your father first"</p> +<p>I must have made some half-articulate response, for not +understanding me he said:</p> +<p>"Oh, I know he'll be a hard nut to crack. He won't want to hear +what I've got to say, but he has got to hear it. And after all +you're his daughter, and if he has any bowels of compassion . . +."</p> +<p>Again I must have made some effort to speak, for he said:</p> +<p>"Yes, he's ill, but he has only to set Curphy to work and the +lawyer will do the rest."</p> +<p>I could not allow him to go any further, so I blurted out +somehow that I had seen my father already.</p> +<p>"On this subject?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"And what did he say?"</p> +<p>I told him as well as I could what my father had said, being +ashamed to repeat it.</p> +<p>"That was only bluff, though," said Martin. "The real truth is +that you would cease to be Lady Raa and that would be a blow to his +pride. Then there would no longer be any possibility of +establishing a family and that would disturb his plans. No matter! +We can set Curphy to work ourselves."</p> +<p>"But I have seen Mr. Curphy also," I said.</p> +<p>"And what did <i>he</i> say?"</p> +<p>I told him what the lawyer had said and he was aghast.</p> +<p>"Good heavens! What an iniquity! In England too! But never mind! +There are other countries where this relic of the barbaric ages +doesn't exist. We'll go there. We must get you a divorce +somehow."</p> +<p>My time had come. I could keep back the truth no longer.</p> +<p>"But Martin," I said, "divorce is impossible for me—quite +impossible."</p> +<p>And then I told him that I had been to see the Bishop also, and +he had said what I had known before, though in the pain of my +temptation I had forgotten it, that the Catholic Church did not +countenance divorce under any circumstances, because God made +marriages and therefore no man could dissolve them.</p> +<p>Martin listened intently, and in his eagerness to catch every +word he raised himself to a kneeling position by my side, so that +he was looking into my face.</p> +<p>"But Mary, my dear Mary," he said, "you don't mean to say you +will allow such considerations to influence you?"</p> +<p>"I am a Catholic—what else can I do?" I said.</p> +<p>"But think—my dear, dear girl, think how unreasonable, how +untrue, how preposterous it all is in a case like yours? God made +your marriage? Yours? God married you to that notorious profligate? +Can you believe it?"</p> +<p>His eyes were flaming. I dared not look at them.</p> +<p>"Then think again. They say there's no divorce in the Catholic +Church, do they? But what are they talking about? Morally speaking +you are a divorced woman already. Anybody with an ounce of brains +can see that. When you were married to this man he made a contract +with you, and he has broken the terms of it, hasn't he? Then +where's the contract now? It doesn't any longer exist. Your husband +has destroyed it."</p> +<p>"But isn't marriage different?" I asked.</p> +<p>And then I tried to tell him what the Bishop had said of the +contract of marriage being unlike any other contract because God +Himself had become a party to it.</p> +<p>"What?" he cried. "God become a party to a marriage like yours? +My dear girl, only think! Think of what your marriage has +been—the pride and vanity and self-seeking that conceived it, +the compulsion that was put upon you to carry it through, and then +the shame and the suffering and the wickedness and the sin of it! +Was God a party to the making of a marriage like that?"</p> +<p>In his agitation he rose, walked two or three paces in front and +came back to me.</p> +<p>"Then think what it means if your marriage may not be dissolved. +It means that you must go on living with this man whose life is so +degrading. Year in, year out, as long as your life lasts you must +let him humiliate and corrupt you with his company, his companions +and his example, until you are dragged down, down, down to the +filth he lives in himself, and your very soul is contaminated. Is +that what the Church asks of you?"</p> +<p>I answered no, and tried to tell him what the Bishop had told me +about separation, but he interrupted me with a shout.</p> +<p>"Separation? Did he say that? If the Church has no right to +divorce you what right has it to separate you? Oh, I see what it +will say—hope of reconciliation. But if you were separated +from your husband would you ever go back to him? Never in this +world. Then what would your separation be? Only divorce under +another name."</p> +<p>I was utterly shaken. Perhaps I wanted to believe what Martin +was saying; perhaps I did not know enough to answer him, but I +could not help it if I thought Martin's clear mind was making dust +and ashes of everything that Father Dan and the Bishop had said to +me.</p> +<p>"Then what can I do?" I asked.</p> +<p>I thought his face quivered at that question. He got up again, +and stood before me for a moment without speaking. Then he said, +with an obvious effort—</p> +<p>"If your Church will not allow you to divorce your husband, and +if you and I cannot marry without that, then . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes?"</p> +<p>"I didn't mean to propose it . . . God knows I didn't, but when +a woman . . . when a woman has been forced into a loveless +marriage, and it is crushing the very soul out of her, and the iron +law of her Church will not permit her to escape from it, what crime +does she commit if she . . ."</p> +<p>"Well?" I asked, though I saw what he was going to say.</p> +<p>"Mary," he said, breathing, hard and fast, "you must come to +me."</p> +<p>I made a sudden cry, though I tried not to.</p> +<p>"Oh, I know," he said. "It's not what we could wish. But we'll +be open about it. We'll face it out. Why shouldn't we? I shall +anyway. And if your father and the Bishop say anything to me I'll +tell them what I think of the abominable marriage they forced you +into. As for you, dear, I know you'll have to bear something. All +the conventional canting hypocrisies! Every man who has bought his +wife, and every woman who has sold herself into +concubinage—there are thousands and thousands of them all the +world over, and they'll try . . . perhaps they'll try . . . but let +them try. If they want to trample the life out of you they'll have +to walk over me first—yes, by God they will!"</p> +<p>"But Martin . . ."</p> +<p>"Well?"</p> +<p>"Do you mean that I . . . I am . . . to . . . to live with you +without marriage?"</p> +<p>"It's the only thing possible, isn't it?" he said. And then he +tried to show me that love was everything, and if people loved each +other nothing else mattered—religious ceremonies were +nothing, the morality of society was nothing, the world and its +back-biting was nothing.</p> +<p>The great moment had come for me at last, and though I felt torn +between love and pity I had to face it.</p> +<p>"Martin, I . . . I can't do it," I said.</p> +<p>He looked steadfastly into my face for a moment, but I dare not +look back, for I knew he was suffering.</p> +<p>"You think it would be wrong?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"A sin?"</p> +<p>I tried to say "Yes" again, but my reply died in my throat.</p> +<p>There was another moment of silence and then, in a faltering +voice that nearly broke me down, he said:</p> +<p>"In that case there is nothing more to say. . . . There isn't, +is there?"</p> +<p>I made an effort to speak, but my voice would not come.</p> +<p>"I thought . . . as there was no other way of escape from this +terrible marriage . . . but if you think . . ."</p> +<p>He stopped, and then coming closer he said:</p> +<p>"I suppose you know what this means for you, Mary—that +after all the degradation you have gone through you are shutting +the door to a worthier, purer life, and that . . ."</p> +<p>I could bear no more. My heart was yearning for him, yet I was +compelled to speak.</p> +<p>"But would it be a purer life, Martin, if it began in sin? No, +no, it wouldn't, it couldn't. Oh, you can't think how hard it is to +deny myself the happiness you offer me. It's harder than all the +miseries my husband has inflicted upon me. But it wouldn't be +happiness, because our sin would stand between us. That would +always be there, Martin—every day, every night, as long as +ever we lived. . . . We should never know one really happy hour. +I'm sure we should not. I should be unhappy myself and I should +make you unhappy. Oh, I daren't! I daren't! Don't ask me, I +beg—I beseech you."</p> +<p>I burst into tears after this, and there was a long silence +between us. Then Martin touched my arm and said with a gentleness +that nearly broke my heart:</p> +<p>"Don't cry, Mary. I give in. I find I have no will but yours, +dear. If <i>you</i> can bear the present condition of things, I +ought to be able to. Let us go back to the house."</p> +<p>He raised me to my feet and we turned our faces homeward. All +the brightness of the day had gone for both of us by this time. The +tide was now far out. Its moaning was only a distant murmur. The +shore was a stretch of jagged black rocks covered with +sea-weed.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Notwithstanding Martin's tenderness I had a vague fear that he +had only pretended to submit to my will, and before the day was +over I had proof of it.</p> +<p>During dinner we spoke very little, and after it was over we +went out to the balcony to sit on a big oak seat which stood +there.</p> +<p>It was another soft and soundless night, without stars, very +dark, and with an empty echoing air, which seemed to say that +thunder was not far off, for the churning of the nightjar vibrated +from the glen, and the distant roar of the tide, now rising, was +like the rumble of drums at a soldier's funeral.</p> +<p>Just as we sat down the pleasure-steamer we had seen in the +morning re-crossed our breadth of sea on its way back to +Blackwater; and lit up on deck and in all its port-holes, it looked +like a floating <i>café chantant</i> full of happy people, +for they were singing in chorus a rugged song which Martin and I +had known all our lives—</p> +<p><i>Ramsey town, Ramsey town, smiling by the sea,<br /> +Here's a health to my true love, wheresoe'er she be</i>.</p> +<p>When the steamer had passed into darkness, Martin said:</p> +<p>"I don't want to hurt you again, Mary, but before I go there's +something I want to know. . . . If you cannot divorce your husband, +and if . . . if you cannot come to me what . . . what is left to +us?"</p> +<p>I tried to tell him there was only one thing left to us, and (as +much for myself as for him) I did my best to picture the spiritual +heights and beauties of renunciation.</p> +<p>"Does that mean that we are to . . . to part?" he said. "You +going your way and I going mine . . . never to meet again?"</p> +<p>That cut me to the quick, so I said—it was all I could +trust myself to say—that the utmost that was expected of us +was that we should govern our affections—control and conquer +them.</p> +<p>"Do you mean that we are to stamp them out altogether?" he +said.</p> +<p>That cut me to the quick too, and I felt like a torn bird that +is struggling in the lime, but I contrived to say that if our love +was guilty love it was our duty to destroy it.</p> +<p>"Is that possible?" he said.</p> +<p>"We must ask God to help us," I answered, and then, while his +head was down and I was looking out into the darkness, I tried to +say that though he was suffering now he would soon get over this +disappointment.</p> +<p>"Do you <i>wish</i> me to get over it?" he asked.</p> +<p>This confused me terribly, for in spite of all I was saying I +knew at the bottom of my heart that in the sense he intended I did +not and could not wish it.</p> +<p>"We have known and cared for each other all our lives, +Mary—isn't that so? It seems as if there never was a time +when we didn't know and care for each other. Are we to pray to God, +as you say, that a time may come when we shall feel as if we had +never known and cared for each other at all?"</p> +<p>My throat was fluttering—I could not answer him.</p> +<p>"<i>I</i> can't," he said. "I never shall—never as long as +I live. No prayers will ever help me to forget you."</p> +<p>I could not speak. I dared not look at him. After a moment he +said in a thicker voice:</p> +<p>"And you . . . will you be able to forget <i>me</i>? By praying +to God will you be able to wipe me out of your mind?"</p> +<p>I felt as if something were strangling me.</p> +<p>"A woman lives in her heart, doesn't she?" he said. "Love is +everything to her . . . everything except her religion. Will it be +possible—this renunciation . . . will it be possible for you +either?"</p> +<p>I felt as if all the blood in my body were running away from +me.</p> +<p>"It will not. You know it will not. You will never be able to +renounce your love. Neither of us will he able to renounce it. It +isn't possible. It isn't human. . . . Well, what then? If we +continue to love each other—you here and I down +there—we shall be just as guilty in the eyes of the Church, +shan't we?"</p> +<p>I did not answer him, and after a moment he came closer to me on +the seat and said almost in a whisper:</p> +<p>"Then think again, Mary. Only give one glance to the horrible +life that is before you when I am gone. You have been married a +year . . . only a year . . . and you have suffered terribly. But +there is worse to come. Your husband's coarse infidelity has been +shocking, but there will be something more shocking than his +infidelity—his affection. Have you never thought of +<i>that</i>?"</p> +<p>I started and shuddered, feeling as if somebody must have told +him the most intimate secret of my life. Coming still closer he +said:</p> +<p>"Forgive me, dear. I'm bound to speak plainly now. If I didn't I +should never forgive myself in the future . . . Listen! Your +husband will get over his fancy for this . . . this woman. He'll +throw her off, as he has thrown off women of the same kind before. +What will happen then? He'll remember that you belong to him . . . +that he has rights in you . . . that you are his wife and he is +your husband . . . that the infernal law which denies you the +position of an equal human being gives him a right—a legal +right—to compel your obedience. Have you never thought of +<i>that</i>?"</p> +<p>For one moment we looked into each other's eyes; then he took +hold of my hand and, speaking very rapidly, said:</p> +<p>"That's the life that is before you when I am gone—to live +with this man whom you loathe . . . year after year, as long as +life lasts . . . occupying the same house, the same room, the same +. . ."</p> +<p>I uttered an involuntary cry and he stopped.</p> +<p>"Martin," I said, "there is something you don't know."</p> +<p>And then, I told him—it was forced out of me—my +modesty went down in the fierce battle with a higher pain, and I do +not know whether it was my pride or my shame or my love that +compelled me to tell him, but I <i>did</i> tell him—God knows +how—that I could not run the risk he referred to because I +was not in that sense my husband's wife and never had been.</p> +<p>The light was behind me, and my face was in the darkness; but +still I covered it with my hands while I stammered out the story of +my marriage day and the day after, and of the compact I had entered +into with my husband that only when and if I came to love him +should he claim my submission as a wife.</p> +<p>While I was speaking I knew that Martin's eyes were fixed on me, +for I could feel his breath on the back of my hands, but before I +had finished he leapt up and cried excitedly:</p> +<p>"And that compact has been kept?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Then it's all right! Don't be afraid. You shall be free. Come +in and let me tell you how! Come in, come in!"</p> +<p>He took me back into the boudoir. I had no power to resist him. +His face was as pale as death, but his eyes were shining. He made +me sit down and then sat on the table in front of me.</p> +<p>"Listen!" he said. "When I bought my ship from the Lieutenant we +signed a deed, a contract, as a witness before all men that he +would give me his ship and I would give him some money. But if +after all he hadn't given me his ship what would our deed have +been? Only so much waste paper."</p> +<p>It was the same with my marriage. If it had been an honest +contract, the marriage service would have been a witness before God +that we meant to live together as man and wife. But I never had, +therefore what was the marriage service? Only an empty +ceremony!</p> +<p>"That's the plain sense of the matter, isn't it?" he cried. "I +defy any priest in the world to prove the contrary."</p> +<p>"Well?"</p> +<p>"Well, don't you see what it comes to? You are +free—morally free at all events. You can come to me. You +must, too. I daren't leave you in this house any longer. I shall +take you to London and fix you up there, and then, when I tome back +from the Antarctic . . ."</p> +<p>He was glowing with joy, but a cold hand suddenly seized me, for +I had remembered all the terrors of excommunication as Father Dan +had described them.</p> +<p>"But Martin," I said, "would the Church accept that?"</p> +<p>"What matter whether it would or wouldn't? Our consciences would +be clear. There would be no sin, and what you were saying this +morning would not apply."</p> +<p>"But if I left my husband I couldn't marry you, could I?"</p> +<p>"Perhaps not."</p> +<p>"Then the Church would say that I was a sinful woman living a +sinful life, wouldn't it?"</p> +<p>"But you wouldn't be."</p> +<p>"All the same the Church would say so, and if it did I should be +cut out of communion, and if I were cut out of communion I should +be cast out of the Church, and if I were cast out of the Church . . +. what would become of me then?"</p> +<p>"But, my dear, dear girl," said Martin, "don't you see that this +is not the same thing at all? It is only a case of a ceremony. And +why should a mere ceremony—even if we cannot do away with +it—darken a woman's life for ever?"</p> +<p>My heart was yearning for love, but my soul was crying out for +salvation; and not being able to answer him for myself, I told him +what Father Dan had said I was to say.</p> +<p>"Father Dan is a saint and I love him," he said. "But what can +he know—what can any priest know of a situation like this? +The law of man has tied you to this brute, but the law of God has +given you to me. Why should a marriage service stand between +us?"</p> +<p>"But it does," I said. "And we can't alter it. No, no, I dare +not break the law of the Church. I am a weak, wretched girl, but I +cannot give up my religion."</p> +<p>After that Martin did not speak for a moment. Then he said:</p> +<p>"You mean that, Mary?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>And then my heart accused me so terribly of the crime of +resisting him that I took his hand and held his fingers in a tight +lock while I told him—what I had never meant to +tell—how long and how deeply I had loved him, but +nevertheless I dared not face the thought of living and dying +without the consolations of the Church.</p> +<p>"I dare not! I dare not!" I said. "I should be a broken-hearted +woman if I did, and you don't want that, do you?"</p> +<p>He listened in silence, though the irregular lines in his face +showed the disordered state of his soul, and when I had finished a +wild look came into his eyes and he said:</p> +<p>"I am disappointed in you, Mary. I thought you were brave and +fearless, and that when I showed you a way out of your miserable +entanglement you would take it in spite of everything."</p> +<p>His voice was growing thick again. I could scarcely bear to +listen to it.</p> +<p>"Do you suppose I wanted to take up the position I proposed to +you? Not I. No decent man ever does. But I love you so dearly that +I was willing to make that sacrifice and count it as nothing if +only I could rescue you from the misery of your abominable +marriage."</p> +<p>Then he broke into a kind of fierce laughter, and said:</p> +<p>"It seems I wasn't wanted, though. You say in effect that my +love is sinful and criminal, and that it will imperil your soul. So +I'm only making mischief here and the sooner I get away the better +for everybody."</p> +<p>He threw off my hand, stepped to the door to the balcony, and +looking out into the darkness said, between choking laughter and +sobs:</p> +<p>"Ellan, you are no place for me. I can't bear the sight of you +any longer. I used to think you were the dearest spot on earth, +because you were the home of her who would follow me to the ends of +the earth if I wanted her, but I was wrong. She loves me less than +a wretched ceremony, and would sacrifice my happiness to a +miserable bit of parchment."</p> +<p>My heart was clamouring loud. Never had I loved him so much as +now. I had to struggle with myself not to throw myself into his +arms.</p> +<p>"No matter!" he said. "I should be a poor-spirited fool to stay +where I'm not wanted. I must get back to my work. The sooner the +better, too. I thought I should be counting the days down there +until I could come home again. But why should I? And why should I +care what happens to me? It's all as one now."</p> +<p>He stepped back from the balcony with a resolute expression on +his gloomy face, and I thought for a moment (half hoping and half +fearing it) that he was going to lay hold of me and tell me I must +do what he wished because I belonged to him.</p> +<p>But he only looked at me for a moment in silence, and then burst +into a flood of tears, and turned and ran out of the house.</p> +<p>Let who will say his tears were unmanly. To me they were the +bitter cry of a great heart, and I wanted to follow him and say, +"Take me. Do what you like with me. I am yours."</p> +<p>I did not do so. I sat a long time where he had left me and then +I went into my room and locked the door.</p> +<p>I did not cry. Unjust and cruel as his reproaches had been, I +began to have a strange wild joy in them. I knew that he would not +have insulted me like that if he had not loved me to the very verge +of madness itself.</p> +<p>Hours passed. Price came tapping at my door to ask if she should +lock up the house—meaning the balcony. I answered "No, go to +bed."</p> +<p>I heard the deadened thud of Martin's footsteps on the lawn +passing to and fro. Sometimes they paused under my window and then +I had a feeling, amounting to certainty, that he was listening to +hear if I was sobbing, and that if I had been he would have broken +down my bedroom door to get to me.</p> +<p>At length I heard him come up the stone stairway, shut and bolt +the balcony door, and walk heavily across the corridor to his own +room.</p> +<p>The day was then dawning. It was four o'clock.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I awoke on Wednesday morning in a kind of spiritual and physical +fever. Every conflicting emotion which a woman can experience in +the cruel battle between her religion and her love seemed to flood +body and soul—joy, pain, pride, shame, fear, rapture—so +that I determined (not without cause) to make excuse of a headache +to stay in bed.</p> +<p>Although it was the last day of Martin's visit, and I charged +myself with the discourtesy of neglecting him, as well as the folly +of losing the few remaining hours of his company, I thought I could +not without danger meet him again.</p> +<p>I was afraid of him, but I was still more afraid of myself.</p> +<p>Recalling my last sight of his face as he ran out of the house, +and knowing well the desire of my own heart, I felt that if I spent +another day in his company it would be impossible to say what might +happen.</p> +<p>As a result of this riot of emotions I resolved to remain all +day in my room, and towards evening to send out a letter bidding +him good-bye and good-luck. It would be a cold end to a long +friendship and my heart was almost frozen at the thought of it, but +it was all I dared do and I saw no help for it.</p> +<p>But how little did I know what was written in the Book of Fate +for me!</p> +<p>First came Price on pretence of bathing my forehead, and she +bombarded me with accounts of Martin's anxiety. When he had heard +that I was ill he had turned as white as if sixteen ounces of blood +had been taken out of him. It nearly broke me up to hear that, but +Price, who was artful, only laughed and said:</p> +<p>"Men <i>are</i> such funny things, bless them! To think of that +fine young man, who is big enough to fell an ox and brave enough to +face a lion, being scared to death because a little lady has a +headache."</p> +<p>All morning she was in and out of my room with similar stories, +and towards noon she brought me a bunch of roses wet with the dew, +saying that Tommy the Mate had sent them.</p> +<p>"Are you sure it was Tommy the Mate?" I asked, whereupon the sly +thing, who was only waiting to tell the truth, though she pretended +that I was forcing it out of her, admitted that the flowers were +from Martin, and that he had told her not to say so.</p> +<p>"What's he doing now?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Writing a letter," said Price, "and judging by the times he has +torn it up and started again and wiped his forehead, it must be a +tough job, I can tell you."</p> +<p>I thought I knew whom the letter was meant for, and before +luncheon it came up to me.</p> +<p>It was the first love letter I had ever had from Martin, and it +melted me like wax over a candle. I have it still, and though +Martin is such a great man now, I am tempted to copy it out just as +it was written with all its appearance of irreverence (none, I am +sure, was intended), and even its bad spelling, for without that it +would not be Martin—my boy who could never learn his +lessons.</p> +<p>"<i>Dear Mary,—I am destroyed to here how ill you are, and +when I think it's all my fault I am ready to kick myself</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Don't worry about what I was saying last night. I was mad to +think what might happen to you while I should be down there, but +I've been thinking it over since and I've come to the conclusion +that if their is anything to God He can be trusted to look after +you without any help from me, so when we meet again before I go +away we'll never say another word on the subject—that's a +promice</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>I can't go until your better though, so I'm just sending the +jaunting car into town with a telegram to London telling them to +postpone the expedision on account of illness, and if they think +it's mine it won't matter because it's something worse</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>But if you are realy a bit better, as your maid says, you +might come to the window and wave your hand to me, and I shall be +as happy as a sand-boy</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Yours</i>,</p> +<p>"<i>Mart</i>."</p> +<p>To this letter (forgetting my former fears) I returned an +immediate verbal reply, saying I was getting better rapidly and +hoped to be up to dinner, so he must not send that telegram to +London on any account, seeing that nobody knew what was going to +happen and everything was in the hands of God.</p> +<p>Price took my message with a knowing smile at the corner of her +mouth, and a few minutes afterwards I heard Martin laughing with +Tommy the Mate at the other end of the lawn.</p> +<p>I don't know why I took so much pains with my dress that night. +I did not expect to see Martin again. I was sending him away from +me. Yet never before had I dressed myself with so much care. I put +on the soft white satin gown which was made for me in Cairo, a +string of pearls over my hair, and another (a tight one) about my +neck.</p> +<p>Martin was waiting for me in the boudoir, and to my surprise he +had dressed too, but, except that he wore a soft silk shirt, I did +not know what he was wearing, or whether he looked handsome or not, +because it was Martin and that was all that mattered to me.</p> +<p>I am sure my footstep was light as I entered the room, for I was +shod in white satin slippers, but Martin heard it, and I saw his +eyes fluttering as he looked at me, and said something sweet about +a silvery fir tree with its little dark head against the sky.</p> +<p>"It's to be a truce, isn't it?" he asked.</p> +<p>"Yes, a truce," I answered, which meant that as this was to be +our last evening together all painful subjects were to be put +aside.</p> +<p>Before we sat down to eat he took me out on to the balcony to +look at the sea, for though there was no rain flashes of sheet +lightning with low rumbling of distant thunder lit up the water for +a moment with visions of heavenly beauty, and then were devoured by +the grim and greedy darkness.</p> +<p>During dinner we kept faith with each other. In order to avoid +the one subject that was uppermost in both our minds, we played at +being children, and pretended it was the day we sailed to St. +Mary's Rock.</p> +<p>Thinking back to that time, and all the incidents which he had +thought so heroic and I so tragic, we dropped into the vernacular, +and I called him "boy" and he called me "bogh millish," and at +every racy word that came up from the forgotten cells of our brains +we shrieked with laughter.</p> +<p>When Martin spoke of his skipper I asked "Is he a stunner?" When +he mentioned one of his scientific experts I inquired "Is he any +good?" And after he had told me that he hoped to take possession of +some island in the name of the English crown, and raise the Union +Jack on it, I said: "Do or die, we allus does that when we're out +asploring."</p> +<p>How we laughed! He laughed because I laughed, and I laughed +because he was laughing. I had some delicious moments of femininity +too (such as no woman can resist), until it struck me suddenly that +in all this make-believe we were making love to each other again. +That frightened me for a time, but I told myself that everything +was safe as long as we could carry on the game.</p> +<p>It was not always easy to do so, though, for some of our +laughter had tears behind it, and some of our memories had an +unexpected sting, because things had a meaning for us now which +they never had before, and we were compelled to realise what life +had done for us.</p> +<p>Thus I found my throat throbbing when I recalled the loss of our +boat, leaving us alone together on that cruel rock with the rising +tide threatening to submerge us, and I nearly choked when I +repeated my last despairing cry: "I'm not a stunner! . . . and +you'll have to give me up . . . and leave me here, and save +yourself."</p> +<p>It was like walking over a solfataro with the thin hot earth +ready to break up under our feet.</p> +<p>To escape from it I sat down at the piano and began to sing. I +dared not sing the music I loved best—the solemn music of the +convent—so I sang some of the nonsense songs I had heard in +the streets. At one moment I twisted round on the piano stool and +said:</p> +<p>"I'll bet you anything"—(I always caught Martin's tone in +Martin's company), "you can't remember the song I sang sitting in +the boat with William Rufus on my lap."</p> +<p>"I'll bet you anything I can," said Martin.</p> +<p>"Oh, no, you can't," I said.</p> +<p>"Have it as you like, bogh, but sing it for all," said Martin, +and then I sang—</p> +<p><i>"Oh, Sally's the gel for me,<br /> +Our Sally's the gel for me,<br /> +I'll marry the gel that I love best,<br /> +When I come back from sea."</i></p> +<p>But that arrow of memory had been sharpened on Time's grindstone +and it seemed to pierce through us, so Martin proposed that we +should try the rollicking chorus which the excursionists had sung +on the pleasure-steamer the night before.</p> +<p>He did not know a note of music and he had no more voice than a +corn-crake, but crushing up on to the music-stool by my side, he +banged away with his left hand while I played with my right, and we +sang together in a wild delightful discord—</p> +<p><i>"Ramsey town, Ramsey town, smiling by the sea,<br /> +Here's a health to my true love, wheresoe'er she be."</i></p> +<p>We laughed again when that was over, but I knew I could not keep +it up much longer, and every now and then I forgot that I was in my +boudoir and seemed to see that lonesome plateau, twelve thousand +feet above the icy barrier that guards the Pole, and Martin toiling +through blizzards over rolling waves of snow.</p> +<p>Towards midnight we went out on to the balcony to look at the +lightning for the last time. The thunder was shaking the cliffs and +rolling along them like cannon-balls, and Martin said:</p> +<p>"It sounds like the breaking of the ice down there."</p> +<p>When we returned to the room he told me he would have to be off +early in the morning, before I was out of bed, having something to +do in Blackwater, where "the boys were getting up a spree of some +sort."</p> +<p>In this way he rattled on for some minutes, obviously talking +himself down and trying to prevent me from thinking. But the grim +moment came at last, and it was like the empty gap of time when you +are waiting for the whirring of the clock that is to tell the end +of the old year and the beginning of the new.</p> +<p>My cuckoo clock struck twelve. Martin looked at me. I looked at +him. Our eyes fell. He took my hand. It was cold and moist. His own +was hot and trembling.</p> +<p>"So this is . . . the end," he said.</p> +<p>"Yes . . . the end," I answered.</p> +<p>"Well, we've had a jolly evening to finish up with, anyway," he +said. "I shall always remember it."</p> +<p>I tried to say he would soon have other evenings to think about +that would make him forget this one.</p> +<p>"Never in this world!" he answered.</p> +<p>I tried to wish him good luck, and great success, and a happy +return to fame and fortune. He looked at me with his great liquid +eyes and said:</p> +<p>"Aw, well, that's all as one now."</p> +<p>I tried to tell him it would always be a joy to me to remember +that he and I had been such great, great friends.</p> +<p>He looked at me again, and answered:</p> +<p>"That's all as one also."</p> +<p>I reproached myself for the pain I was causing him, and to keep +myself in countenance I began to talk of the beauty and nobility of +renunciation—each sacrificing for the other's sake all sinful +thoughts and desires.</p> +<p>"Yes, I'm doing what you wish," he said. "I can't deny you +anything."</p> +<p>That cut me deep, so I went on to say that if I had acted +otherwise I should always have had behind me the memory of the vows +I had broken, the sacrament I had violated, and the faith I had +abandoned.</p> +<p>"All the same we might have been very happy," he said, and then +my throat became so thick that I could not say any more.</p> +<p>After a few moments he said:</p> +<p>"It breaks my heart to leave you. But I suppose I must, though I +don't know what is going to happen."</p> +<p>"All that is in God's hands," I said.</p> +<p>"Yes," said Martin, "it's up to Him now."</p> +<p>It made my heart ache to look at his desolate face, so, +struggling hard with my voice, I tried to tell him he must not +despair.</p> +<p>"You are so young," I said. "Surely the future holds much +happiness for you."</p> +<p>And then, though I knew that the bare idea of another woman +taking the love I was turning away would have made the world a +blank for me, I actually said something about the purest joys of +love falling to his lot some day.</p> +<p>"No, by the Lord God," said Martin. "There'll be no other woman +for me. If I'm not to have you I'll wear the willow for you the +same as if you were dead."</p> +<p>There was a certain pain in that, but there was a thrill of +secret joy in it too.</p> +<p>He was still holding my hand. We held each other's hands a long +time. In spite of my affected resignation I could not let his hand +go. I felt as if I were a drowning woman and his hand were my only +safety. Nevertheless I said:</p> +<p>"We must say good-night and good-bye now."</p> +<p>"And if it is for ever?"</p> +<p>"Don't say that."</p> +<p>"But if it is?"</p> +<p>"Well, then . . . for ever."</p> +<p>"At least give me something to take away with me," he said.</p> +<p>"Better not," I answered, but even as I spoke I dropped the +handkerchief which I had been holding in my other hand and he +picked it up.</p> +<p>I knew that my tears, though I was trying to keep them back, +were trickling down my cheeks. I saw that his face was all broken +up as it had been the night before.</p> +<p>There was a moment of silence in which I was conscious of +nothing but the fierce beating of my pulse, and then he raised my +hand to his lips, dropped it gently and walked over to the +door.</p> +<p>But after he had opened it he turned and looked at me. I looked +at him, longing, craving, hungering for his love as for a flame at +which my heart could warm itself.</p> +<p>Then came a blinding moment. It seemed as if in an instant he +lost all control of himself, and his love came rushing upon him +like a mighty surging river.</p> +<p>Flinging the door back he returned to me with long strides, and +snatching me up in his great arms, he lifted me off my feet, +clasped me tightly to him, kissed me passionately on the mouth and +cried in a quivering, husky voice:</p> +<p>"You are my wife. I am your real husband. I am not leaving you +because you are married to this brute, but for the sake of your +soul. We love each other. We shall continue to love each other. No +matter where you are, or what they do with you, you are mine and +always will be."</p> +<p>My blood was boiling. The world was reeling round me. There was +a roaring in my brain. All my spiritual impulses had gone. I was a +woman, and it was the same to me as if the primordial man had taken +possession of me by sheer force. Yet I was not afraid of that. I +rejoiced in it. I wanted to give myself up to it.</p> +<p>But the next moment Martin had dropped me, and fled from the +room, clashing the door behind him.</p> +<p>I felt as if a part of myself had been torn from my breast and +had gone out with him.</p> +<p>The room seemed to become dark.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SIXTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>SIXTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>For a moment I stood where Martin had left me, throbbing through +and through like an open wound, telling myself that he had gone, +that I should never see him again, and that I had driven him away +from me.</p> +<p>Those passionate kisses had deprived me of the power of +consecutive thought. I could only feel. And the one thing I felt +above everything else was that the remedy I had proposed to myself +for my unhappy situation—renunciation—was impossible, +because Martin was a part of my own being and without him I could +not live.</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin! My love! My love!" cried the voice of my +heart.</p> +<p>In fear lest I had spoken the words aloud, and in terror of what +I might do under the power of them, I hurried into my bedroom and +locked and bolted the door.</p> +<p>But the heart knows nothing of locks and bolts, and a moment +afterwards my spirit was following Martin to his room. I was seeing +him as I had seen him last, with his face full of despair, and I +was accusing myself of the pain I had caused him.</p> +<p>I had conquered Martin, but I had conquered myself also. I had +compelled him to submit, but his submission had vanquished me.</p> +<p>Even if I had a right to impose renunciation on myself, what +right had I to impose it upon him, who did not desire it, did not +think it necessary, was not reconciled to it, and only accepted it +out of obedience to my will?</p> +<p>He loved me. No man ever loved a woman more dearly. He deserved +to be loved in return. He had done nothing to forfeit love. He was +bound by no ties. And yet I was driving him away from me. What +right had I to do so?</p> +<p>I began to see that I had acted throughout with the most +abominable selfishness. In his great love he had said little or +nothing about himself. But why had <i>I</i> not thought of him? In +the struggles of my religious conscience I had been thinking of +myself alone, but Martin had been suffering too, and I had never +once really thought of that? What <i>right</i> had I to make him +suffer?</p> +<p>After a while I began to prepare for bed, but it took me long to +undress, for I stopped every moment to think.</p> +<p>I thought of the long years Martin had been waiting for me and +while I was telling myself that he had kept pure for my sake, my +heart was beating so fast that I could hardly bear the strain of +it.</p> +<p>It cut me still deeper to think that even as there had been no +other woman for him in the past so there would be no other in the +future. Never as long as he lived! I was as sure of that as of the +breath I breathed, and when I remembered what he had said about +wearing the willow for me as if I were dead I was almost +distracted.</p> +<p>His despairing words kept ringing mercilessly in my +ears—"It's all as one now"; "How happy we might have been." I +wanted to go to him and tell him that though I was sending him away +still I loved him, and it was <i>because</i> I loved him that I was +sending him away.</p> +<p>I had made one step towards the door before I remembered that it +was too late to carry out my purpose. The opportunity had passed. +Martin had gone to his room. He might even be in bed by this +time.</p> +<p>But there are spiritual influences which control our bodies +independently of our will. I put on my dressing-gown (being partly +undressed) and went back to the boudoir. I hardly knew what impulse +impelled me to do so, and neither do I know why I went from the +boudoir to the balcony unless it was in hope of the melancholy joy +of standing once more where Martin and I had stood together a +little while ago.</p> +<p>I was alone now. The low thunder was still rolling along the +cliffs, but I hardly heard it. The white sheet lightning was still +pulsing in the sky and rising, as it seemed, out of the sea, but I +hardly saw it.</p> +<p>At one moment I caught a glimpse of a solitary fishing boat, +under its brown lugger sails, heading towards Blackwater; at the +next moment my eyes were dazzled as by a flashlight from some +unseen battleship.</p> +<p>Leaning over the balcony and gazing into the intermittent +darkness I pictured to myself the barren desolation of Martin's +life after he had left me. Loving me so much he might fall into +some excess, perhaps some vice, and if that happened what would be +the measure of my responsibility?</p> +<p>Losing me he might lose his faith in God. I had read of men +becoming spiritual castaways after they had lost their anchorage in +some great love, and I asked myself what should I do if Martin +became an infidel.</p> +<p>And when I told myself that I could only save Martin's soul by +sacrificing my own I was overwhelmed by a love so great that I +thought I could do even that.</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin! Forgive me, forgive me," I cried.</p> +<p>I felt so hot that I opened my dressing-gown to cool my bare +breast. After a while I began to shiver and then fearing I might +take cold I went back to the boudoir, and sat down.</p> +<p>I looked at my cuckoo clock. It was half-past twelve. Only half +an hour since Martin had left me! It seemed like hours and hours. +What of the years and years of my life that I had still to spend +without him?</p> +<p>The room was so terribly silent, yet it seemed to be full of our +dead laughter. The ghost of our happiness seemed to haunt it. I was +sure I could never live in it again.</p> +<p>I wondered what Martin would be doing now. Would he be in bed +and asleep, or sitting up like this, and thinking of me as I was +thinking of him?</p> +<p>At one moment I thought I heard his footsteps. I listened, but +the sound stopped. At another moment, covering my face with my +hands, I thought I saw him in his room, as plainly as if there were +no walls dividing us. He was holding out his hands to me, and his +face had the yearning, loving, despairing expression which it had +worn when he looked back at me from the door.</p> +<p>At yet another moment I thought I heard him calling me.</p> +<p>"Mary!"</p> +<p>I listened again, but again all was still, and when I told +myself that if in actual fact he had spoken my name it was perhaps +only to himself (as I was speaking his) my heart throbbed up to my +throat.</p> +<p>Once more I heard his voice.</p> +<p>"Mary!"</p> +<p>I could bear no more. Martin wanted me. I must go to him. Though +body and soul were torn asunder I must go.</p> +<p>Before I knew what I was doing I had opened the door and was +walking across the corridor in the direction of Martin's room.</p> +<p>The house was dark. Everybody had gone to bed. Light as my +footsteps were, the landing was creaking under me. I knew that the +floors of the grim old Castle sometimes made noises when nobody +walked on them, but none the less I felt afraid.</p> +<p>Half way to Martin's door I stopped. A ghostly hand seemed to be +laid on my shoulder and a ghostly voice seemed to say in my +ear:</p> +<p>"Wait! Reflect! If you do what you are thinking of doing what +will happen? You will become an outcast. The whole body of your own +sex will turn against you. You will be a bad woman."</p> +<p>I knew what it was. It was my conscience speaking to me in the +voice of my Church—my Church, the mighty, irresistible power +that was separating me from Martin. I was its child, born in its +bosom, but if I broke its laws it would roll over me like a +relentless Juggernaut.</p> +<p>It was not at first that I could understand why the Church +should set itself up against my Womanhood. My Womanhood was crying +out for life and love and liberty. But the Church, in its +inexorable, relentless voice, was saying, "Thou Shalt Not!"</p> +<p>After a moment of impenetrable darkness, within and without, I +thought I saw things more plainly. The Church was the soul of the +world. It stood for purity, which alone could hold the human family +together. If all women who had made unhappy marriages were to do as +I was thinking of doing (no matter under what temptation) the world +would fall to wreck and ruin.</p> +<p>Feeling crushed and ashamed, and oh, so little and weak, I +groped my way back to the boudoir and closed the door.</p> +<p>Then a strange thing happened—one of those little +accidents of life which seem to be thrown off by the mighty hand of +Fate. A shaft of light from my bedroom, crossing the end of my +writing-desk, showed me a copy of a little insular newspaper.</p> +<p>The paper, which must have come by the evening post, had +probably been opened by Martin, and for that reason only I took it +up and glanced at it.</p> +<p>The first thing that caught my eye was a short report headed +"Charity Performance."</p> +<p>It ran:</p> +<p>"<i>The English ladies and gentlemen from Castle Raa who are +cruising round the island in the handsome steam yacht, the</i> +Cleopatra, <i>gave a variety entertainment last night in aid of the +Catholic Mission at the Palace, Ravenstown</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>At the end of the performance the Lord Bishop, who was +present in person and watched every item of the programme with +obvious enjoyment, proposed a vote of thanks in his usual +felicitous terms, thanking Lord Raa for this further proof of his +great liberality of mind in helping a Catholic charity, and +particularly mentioning the beautiful and accomplished Madame Lier, +who had charmed all eyes and won all hearts by her serpentine +dances, and to whom the Church in Ellan would always be indebted +for the handsome sum which had been the result of her disinterested +efforts in promoting the entertainment</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>It is understood that the</i> Cleopatra <i>will leave +Ravenstown Harbour to-morrow morning on her way back to Port +Raa</i>."</p> +<p>That was the end of everything. It came upon me like a torrent +and swept all my scruples away.</p> +<p>Such was the purity of the Church—threatening <i>me</i> +with its censures for wishing to follow the purest dictates of my +heart, yet taking money from a woman like Alma, who was bribing it +to be blind to her misconduct and to cover her with its +good-will!</p> +<p>My husband too—his infidelities were flagrant and +notorious, yet the Church, through its minister, was flattering his +vanity and condoning his offences!</p> +<p>He was coming back to me, too—this adulterous husband, and +when he came the Church would require that I should keep "true +faith" with him, whatever his conduct, and deny myself the pure +love that was now awake within me.</p> +<p>But no, no, no! Never again! It would be a living death. +Accursed be the power that could doom a woman to a living +death!</p> +<p>Perhaps I was no longer sane—morally sane—and if so +God and the Church will forgive me. But seeing that neither the +Church nor the Law could liberate me from this bond which I did not +make, that both were shielding the evil man and tolerating the bad +woman, my whole soul rose in revolt.</p> +<p>I told myself now that to leave my husband and go to Martin +would be to escape from shame to honour.</p> +<p>I saw Martin's despairing face again as I had seen it at the +moment of our parting, and my brain rang with his passionate words. +"You are my wife. I am your real husband. We love each other. We +shall continue to love each other. No matter where you are, or what +they do with you, you are mine and always will be."</p> +<p>Something was crying out within me: "Love him! Tell him you love +him. Now, now! He is going away. To-morrow will be too late. Go to +him. This will be your true marriage. The other was only legalised +and sanctified prostitution."</p> +<p>I leapt up, and tearing the door open, I walked with strong +steps across the corridor towards Martin's room.</p> +<p>My hair was down, my arms were bare in the ample sleeves of my +dressing-gown, and my breast was as open as it had been on the +balcony, but I thought nothing of all that.</p> +<p>I did not knock at Martin's door. I took hold of the handle as +one who had a right. It turned of itself and the door opened.</p> +<p>My mind was in a whirl, black rings were circling round my eyes, +but I heard my trembling, quivering, throbbing voice, as if it had +been the voice of somebody else, saying:</p> +<p>"Martin, I am coming in."</p> +<p>Then my heart which had been beating violently seemed to stop. +My limbs gave way. I was about to fall.</p> +<p>At the next moment strong arms were around me. I had no fear. +But there was a roaring in my brain such as the ice makes when it +is breaking up.</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>Oh, you good women, who are happy in the love that guards you, +shields you, shelters you, wraps you round and keeps you pure and +true, tread lightly over the prostrate soul of your sister in her +hour of trial and fierce temptation.</p> +<p>And you blessed and holy saints who kneel before the Mother of +all Mothers, take the transgression of her guilty child to Him +who—long ago in the house of the self-righteous +Pharisee—said to the woman who was a sinner and yet loved +much—the woman who had washed His feet with her tears and +dried them with the hair of her head—"Thy sins are forgiven +thee."</p> +</div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="FIFTH_PART" id="FIFTH_PART"></a>FIFTH PART</h2> +<h3>I BECOME A MOTHER</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTIETH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTIETH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Next morning, at half-past eight, my Martin left me.</p> +<p>We were standing together in the boudoir between the table and +the fire, which was burning briskly, for the sultry weather had +gone in the night, and the autumn air was keen, though the early +sun was shining.</p> +<p>At the last moment he was unwilling to go, and it was as much as +I could do to persuade him. Perhaps it is one of the mysteries +which God alone can read that our positions seemed to have been +reversed since the day before.</p> +<p>He was confused, agitated, and full of self reproaches, while I +felt no fear and no remorse, but only an indescribable joy, as if a +new and gracious life had suddenly dawned on me.</p> +<p>"I don't feel that I can leave England now," he said.</p> +<p>"You can and you must," I answered, and then I spoke of his +expedition as a great work which it was impossible to put off.</p> +<p>"Somebody else must do it, then," he said.</p> +<p>"Nobody else can, or shall," I replied.</p> +<p>"But our lives are for ever joined together now, and everything +else must go by the board."</p> +<p>"Nothing shall go by the board for my sake, Martin. I refuse and +forbid it."</p> +<p>Everything had been arranged, everything settled, great sums of +money had been subscribed out of faith in him, and him only, and a +large company was ready and waiting to sail under his command. He +was the Man of Destiny, therefore nothing—nothing +whatever—must keep him back.</p> +<p>"Then if I must go, you must go too," he said. "I mean you must +go with me to London and wait there until I return."</p> +<p>"That is impossible," I answered.</p> +<p>The eyes of the world were on him now, and the heart of the +world was with him. If I did what he desired it would reflect +dishonour on his name, and he should not suffer for my sake under +any circumstances.</p> +<p>"But think what may happen to you while I am away," he said.</p> +<p>"Nothing will happen while you are away, Martin."</p> +<p>"But how can you be so sure of the future when God alone knows +what it is to be?"</p> +<p>"Then God will provide for it," I said, and with that last +answer he had to be satisfied.</p> +<p>"You must take a letter from me at all events," said Martin, and +sitting at my desk he began to write one.</p> +<p>It is amazing to me now when I come to think of it that I could +have been so confident of myself and so indifferent to +consequences. But I was thinking of one thing only—that +Martin must go on his great errand, finish his great work and win +his great reward, without making any sacrifice for me.</p> +<p>After a few minutes he rose from the desk and handed me his +letter.</p> +<p>"Here it is," he said. "If the worst comes to the worst you may +find it of some use some day."</p> +<p>I took it and doubled it and continued to hold it in my +hand.</p> +<p>"Aren't you going to look at it!" he said.</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"Not even to see whom it is written to?"</p> +<p>"That is unnecessary."</p> +<p>I thought I knew it was written to my husband or my father, and +it did not matter to me which, for I had determined not to use +it.</p> +<p>"It is open—won't you see what it says?"</p> +<p>"That is unnecessary also."</p> +<p>I thought I knew that Martin had tried to take everything upon +himself, and I was resolved that he should not do so.</p> +<p>He looked at me with that worshipful expression which seen in +the eyes of the man who loves her, makes a woman proud to be +alive.</p> +<p>"I feel as if I want to kiss the hem of your dress, Mary," he +said, and after that there was a moment of heavenly silence.</p> +<p>It was now half-past eight—the hour when the motor-car had +been ordered round to take him to the town—and though I felt +as if I could shed drops of my blood to keep back the finger of my +cuckoo clock I pointed it out and said it was time for him to +go.</p> +<p>I think our parting was the most beautiful moment of all my +life.</p> +<p>We were standing a little apart, for though I wanted to throw my +arms about his neck at that last instant I would not allow myself +to do so, because I knew that that would make it the harder for him +to go.</p> +<p>I could see, too, that he was trying not to make it harder for +me, so we stood in silence for a moment while my bosom heaved and +his breath came quick.</p> +<p>Then he took my right hand in both of his hands and said: "There +is a bond between us now which can never be broken."</p> +<p>"Never," I answered.</p> +<p>"Whatever happens to either of us we belong to each other for +ever."</p> +<p>"For ever and ever," I replied.</p> +<p>I felt his hands tighten at that, and after another moment of +silence, he said:</p> +<p>"I may be a long time away, Mary."</p> +<p>"I can wait."</p> +<p>"Down there a man has to meet many dangers."</p> +<p>"You will come back. Providence will take care of you."</p> +<p>"I think it will. I feel I shall. But if I don't. . . ."</p> +<p>I knew what he was trying to say. A shadow seemed to pass +between us. My throat grew thick, and for a moment I could not +speak. But then I heard myself say:</p> +<p>"Love is stronger than death; many waters cannot quench it."</p> +<p>His hands quivered, his whole body trembled, and I thought he +was going to clasp me to his breast as before, but he only drew +down my forehead with his hot hand and kissed it.</p> +<p>That was all, but a blinding mist seemed to pass before my eyes, +and when it cleared the door of the room was open and my Martin was +gone.</p> +<p>I stood where he had left me and listened.</p> +<p>I heard his strong step on the stone flags of the hall—he +was going out at the porch.</p> +<p>I heard the metallic clashing of the door of the +automobile—he was already in the car.</p> +<p>I heard the throb of the motor and ruckling of the gravel of the +path—he was moving away.</p> +<p>I heard the dying down of the engine and the soft roll of the +rubber wheels—I was alone.</p> +<p>For some moments after that the world seemed empty and void. But +the feeling passed, and when I recovered my strength I found +Martin's letter in my moist left hand.</p> +<p>Then I knelt before the fire, and putting the letter into the +flames I burnt it.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Within, two hours of Martin's departure I had regained complete +possession of myself and was feeling more happy than I had ever +felt before.</p> +<p>The tormenting compunctions of the past months were gone. It was +just as if I had obeyed some higher law of my being and had become +a freer and purer woman.</p> +<p>My heart leapt within me and to give free rein to the riot of my +joy I put on my hat and cloak to go into the glen.</p> +<p>Crossing the garden I came upon Tommy the Mate, who told me +there had been a terrific thunderstorm during the night, with +torrential rain, which had torn up all the foreign plants in his +flower-beds.</p> +<p>"It will do good, though," said the old man. "Clane out some of +their dirty ould drains, I'm thinkin'."</p> +<p>Then he spoke of Martin, whom he had seen off, saying he would +surely come back.</p> +<p>"'Deed he will though. A boy like yander wasn't born to lave his +bark in the ice and snow . . . Not if his anchor's at home, +anyway"—with a "glime" in my direction.</p> +<p>How the glen sang to me that morning! The great cathedral of +nature seemed to ring with music—the rustling of the leaves +overhead, the ticking of the insects underfoot, the bleating of the +sheep, the lowing of the cattle, the light chanting of the stream, +the deep organ-song of the sea, and then the swelling and soaring +Gloria in my own bosom, which shot up out of my heart like a lark +out of the grass in the morning.</p> +<p>I wanted to run, I wanted to shout, and when I came to the paths +where Martin and I had walked together I wanted—silly as it +sounds to say so—to go down on my knees and kiss the very +turf which his feet had trod.</p> +<p>I took lunch in the boudoir as before, but I did not feel as if +I were alone, for I had only to close my eyes and Martin, from the +other side of the table, seemed to be looking across at me. And +neither did I feel that the room was full of dead laughter, for our +living voices seemed to be ringing in it still.</p> +<p>After tea I read again my only love-letter, revelling in the +dear delightful errors in spelling which made it Martin's and +nobody else's, and then I observed for the first time what was said +about "the boys of Blackwater," and their intention of "getting up +a spree."</p> +<p>This suggested that perhaps Martin had not yet left the island +but was remaining for the evening steamer, in order to be present +at some sort of celebrations to be given in his honour.</p> +<p>So at seven o'clock—it was dark by that time—I was +down at the Quay, sitting in our covered automobile, which had been +drawn up in a sheltered and hidden part of the pier, almost +opposite the outgoing steamer.</p> +<p>Shall I ever forget the scene that followed?</p> +<p>First, came a band of music playing one of our native songs, +which was about a lamb that had been lost in the snow, and how the +Big Man of the Farm went out in search of it, and found it and +brought it home in his arms.</p> +<p>Then came a double row of young men carrying flags and +banners—fine, clean-limbed lads such as make a woman's heart +leap to look at them.</p> +<p>Then came Martin in a jaunting car with a cheering crowd +alongside of him, trying to look cheerful but finding it fearfully +hard to do so.</p> +<p>And then—and this touched me most of all—a double +line of girls in knitted woollen caps (such as men wear in frozen +regions) over their heads and down the sides of their comely +faces.</p> +<p>I was crying like a child at the sight of it all, but none the +less I was supremely happy.</p> +<p>When the procession reached the gangway Martin disappeared into +the steamer, and then the bandsmen ranged themselves in front of +it, and struck up another song:</p> +<p>"<i>Come back to Erin, mavourneen, mavourneen,<br /> +Come back, aroon, to the land of your birth</i>."</p> +<p>In another moment every voice in the crowd seemed to take up the +refrain.</p> +<p>That brought Martin on to the captain's bridge, where he stood +bareheaded, struggling to smile.</p> +<p>By this time the last of the ship's bells had rung, the funnels +were belching, and the captain's voice was calling on the piermen +to clear away.</p> +<p>At last the hawsers were thrown off and the steamer started, +but, with Martin still standing bareheaded on the bridge, the +people rushed to the end of the pier to see the last of him.</p> +<p>There they sang again, louder than ever, the girls' clear voices +above all the rest, as the ship sailed out into the dark sea.</p> +<p><i>"Come back to Erin, mavourneen, mavourneen,<br /> +Come back, aroon, to the land of your birth."</i></p> +<p>As well as I could, for the mist in my eyes was blinding me, I +watched the steamer until she slid behind the headland of the bay, +round, the revolving light that stands on the point of +it—stretching my neck through the window of the car, while +the fresh wind from the sea smote my hot face and the salt air +licked my parched lips. And then I fell back in my seat and cried +for sheer joy of the love that was shown to Martin.</p> +<p>The crowd was returning down the pier by this time, like a black +river running in the darkness and rumbling over rugged stones, and +I heard their voices as they passed the car.</p> +<p>One voice—a female voice—said:</p> +<p>"Well, what do you think of <i>our</i> Martin Conrad?"</p> +<p>And then another voice—a male voice—answered:</p> +<p>"By God he's a Man!"</p> +<p>Within a few minutes the pier was deserted, and the chauffeur +was saying:</p> +<p>"Home, my lady?"</p> +<p>"Home," I answered.</p> +<p>Seeing Martin off had been too much like watching the lifeboat +on a dark and stormy night, when the lights dip behind a monstrous +wave and for some breathless moments you fear they will never +rise.</p> +<p>But as we drove up the head I caught the lights of the steamer +again now far out at sea, and well I knew that as surely as my +Martin was there he was thinking of me and looking back towards the +house in which he had left me behind him.</p> +<p>When we reached the Castle I found to my surprise that every +window was ablaze.</p> +<p>The thrum of the automobile brought Price into the hall. She +told me that the yachting party had come back, and were now in +their bedrooms dressing for dinner.</p> +<p>As I went upstairs to my own apartments I heard trills of +laughter from behind several of the closed doors, mingled with the +muffled humming of various music-hall ditties.</p> +<p>And then suddenly a new spirit seemed to take possession of me, +and I knew that I had become another woman.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>My darling was right. For a long hour after leaving Blackwater I +continued to stand on the captain's bridge, looking back at the +lighted windows of the house above Port Raa, and asking myself the +question which for sixteen months thereafter was to haunt me day +and night—Why had I left her behind me?</p> +<p>In spite of all her importunities, all her sweet unselfish +thought of my own aims and interests, all her confidence in +herself, all her brave determination to share responsibility for +whatever the future might have in store for us—Why had I left +her behind me?</p> +<p>The woman God gave me was mine—why had I left her in the +house of a man who, notwithstanding his infidelities and +brutalities, had a right in the eyes of the law, the church, and +the world to call her his wife and to treat her accordingly?</p> +<p>Let me make no pretence of a penitence I did not feel. Never for +one moment did I reproach myself for what had happened. Never for +the shadow of a moment did I reproach her. She had given herself to +me of her queenly right and sovereign grace as every good woman in +the world must give herself to the man she loves if their union is +to be pure and true.</p> +<p>But why did I not see then, as I see now, that it is the law of +Nature—the cruel and at the same time the glorious law of +Nature—that the woman shall bear the burden, the woman shall +pay the price?</p> +<p>It is over now, and though many a time since my sweet girl has +said out of her stainless heart that everything has worked out for +the best, and suffering is God's salt for keeping our souls alive, +when I think of what she went through for me, while I was out of +all reach and sight, I know I shall never forgive myself for +leaving her behind—never, never never.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>As this will be the last time I shall have to speak of my +husband's guests, I wish to repeat that I am trying to describe +them without malice exactly as they were—selfish, cruel, +ill-mannered, and insincere.</p> +<p>The dinner-bell rang while I was dressing, and on going +downstairs a few minutes afterwards I found that there had been no +attempt to wait for me.</p> +<p>Already the whole party were assembled at the table, my husband +being at the foot of it, and Alma (incredible as it may seem) in +the place of the hostess at the head.</p> +<p>This in my altered mood, was more than I could bear, so, while +the company made some attempt to welcome me with rather crude +salutations, and old Mrs. Lier cried, "Come along here, my pore +dear, and tell me how you've gotten on while we've been away" +(indicating an empty seat by her side), I walked boldly up to Alma, +put my hand on the back of her chair and said, "If you please."</p> +<p>Alma looked surprised. But after a moment she carried off the +difficult situation by taking the seat which had been reserved for +me beside her mother, by congratulating me on my improved +appearance and herself on relief from the necessity of filling my +place and discharging my responsible duties.</p> +<p>My husband, with the rest of the company, had looked up at the +awkward incident, and I thought I saw by his curious grimace that +he supposed my father (of whom he was always in fear) had told me +to assert myself. But Alma, with surer instinct, was clearly +thinking of Martin, and almost immediately she began to speak of +him.</p> +<p>"So your great friend has just gone, dearest. The servants are +crazy about him. We've missed him again, you see. Too bad! I hope +you gave him our regrets and excuses—did you?"</p> +<p>The evil one must have taken hold of me by this time, for I +said:</p> +<p>"I certainly did not, Alma."</p> +<p>"Why not, my love?"</p> +<p>"Because we have a saying in our island that it's only the ass +that eats the cushag"—a bitter weed that grows in barren +places.</p> +<p>Alma joined in the general laughter which followed this rather +intemperate reply, and then led off the conversation On the +incidents of the cruise.</p> +<p>I gathered that, encouraged by her success in capturing the +Bishop by her entertainment, she had set herself to capture the +"aristocracy" of our island by inviting them to a dance on the +yacht, while it lay at anchor off Holmtown, and the humour of the +moment was to play battledore and shuttlecock with the grotesque +efforts of our great people (the same that had figured at my +wedding) to grovel before my husband and his guests.</p> +<p>"I say, Jimmy," cried Mr. Vivian in his shrill treble, "do you +remember the old gal in the gauze who—etc . . . ?"</p> +<p>"But do you remember," cried Mr. Eastcliff, "the High Bailiff or +Bum Bailiff with the bottle-nose who—etc . . . ?"</p> +<p>"Killing, wasn't it, Vivian?" said one of the ladies.</p> +<p>"Perfectly killing," said everybody.</p> +<p>This shocking exhibition of bad manners had not gone on very +long before I became aware that it was being improvised for my +benefit.</p> +<p>After Alma had admitted that the Bishop was a "great flirt" of +hers, and Mr. Vivian, amid shouts of laughter, had christened him +her "crush," she turned to me and said, with her smiling face +slightly drawn down on one side:</p> +<p>"Mary, my love, you will certainly agree that your islanders who +do not eat cushags, poor dears, are the funniest people alive as +guests."</p> +<p>"Not funnier," I answered, "than the people who laugh at them as +hosts."</p> +<p>It was not easy to laugh at that, so to cover Alma's confusion +the men turned the talk to their usual topic, horses and dogs, and +I heard a great deal about "laying on the hounds," which culminated +in a rather vulgar story of how a beater who "wasn't nippy on his +pins" had been "peppered from behind," whereupon he had "bellowed +like a bull" until "soothed down by a sov."</p> +<p>I cannot say how long the talk would have continued in this +manner if old Mrs. Lier, addressing herself to me, had not struck a +serious subject.</p> +<p>It was about Alma's dog, which was dead. The poor wheezy, +spaniel had died in the course of the cruise, though what the cause +of its death was nobody knew, unless it had been fretting for its +mistress during the period of quarantine which the absurd +regulations of government had required on our return from +abroad.</p> +<p>The dog having died at sea, I presumed it had been buried there, +but no, that seemed to shock the company as an unfeeling +supposition. The ship's carpenter had made a coffin for it—a +beautiful one of mahogany with a plate-glass inset at the head, and +a gilt-lettered inscription below, giving the dog's name, Prue, and +its age, three.</p> +<p>In this condition it had been brought ashore, and was now lying +in a kind of state in Alma's dressing-room. But to-morrow it was to +be buried in the grounds, probably in the glen, to which the +company, all dressed in black, were to follow in procession as at a +human funeral.</p> +<p>I was choking with anger and horror at the recital of these +incredible arrangements, and at the close of it I said in a clear, +emphatic voice:</p> +<p>"I must ask you to be good enough not to do that, please."</p> +<p>"Why not, my dear?" said Alma.</p> +<p>"Because I do not wish and cannot permit it," I answered.</p> +<p>There was an awkward pause after this unexpected pronouncement, +and when the conversation was resumed my quick ears (which have not +always added to my happiness) caught the half-smothered words:</p> +<p>"Getting a bit sidey, isn't she?"</p> +<p>Nevertheless, when I rose to leave the dining-room, Alma wound +her arm round my waist, called me her "dear little nun," and +carried me off to the hall.</p> +<p>There we sat about the big open fire, and after a while the talk +became as free, as it often is among fashionable ladies of a +certain class.</p> +<p>Mr. Eastcliff's Camilla told a slightly indelicate anecdote of a +"dresser" she had had at the theatre, and then another young woman +(the same who "adored the men who went to the deuce for a woman") +repeated the terms of an advertisement she had seen in a Church +newspaper: "A parlour-maid wants a situation in a family where a +footman is kept."</p> +<p>The laughter which followed this story was loud enough, but it +was redoubled when Alma's mother, from the depths of an arm-chair, +said, with her usual solemnity, that she "didn't see nothing to +laugh at" in that, and "the pore girl hadn't no such thought as +they had."</p> +<p>Again I was choking with indignation, and in order to assert +myself once for all I said:</p> +<p>"Ladies, I will ask you to discontinue this kind of +conversation. I don't like it."</p> +<p>At last the climax came.</p> +<p>About ten days after Martin left me I received a telegram, which +had been put ashore at Southampton, saying, "Good-bye! God bless +you!" and next day there came a newspaper containing an account of +his last night at Tilbury.</p> +<p>He had given a dinner to a number of his friends, including his +old commander and his wife, several other explorers who happened to +be in London, a Cabinet Minister, and the proprietor of the journal +which had promoted his expedition.</p> +<p>They had dined in the saloon of the "Scotia" (how vividly I +remembered it!), finishing up the evening with a dance on deck in +the moonlight; and when the time came to break up, Martin had made +one of his sentimental little speeches (all heart and not too much +grammar), in which he said that in starting out for another siege +of the South Pole he "couldn't help thinking, with a bit of a pain +under the third button of his double-breasted waistcoat, of the +dear ones they were leaving behind, and of the unknown regions +whither they were tending where dancing would be forgotten."</p> +<p>I need not say how this moved me, being where I was, in that +uncongenial company; but by some mischance I left the paper which +contained it on the table in the drawing-room, and on going +downstairs after breakfast next morning I found Alma stretched out +in a rocking-chair before the fire in the hail, smoking a cigarette +and reading the report aloud in a mock heroic tone to a number of +the men, including my husband, whose fat body (he was growing +corpulent) was shaking with laughter.</p> +<p>It was as much as I could do to control an impulse to jump down +and flare out at them, but, being lightly shod, I was standing +quietly in their midst before they were aware of my presence.</p> +<p>"Ah," said Alma, with the sweetest and most insincere of her +smiles, "we were just enjoying the beautiful account of your +friend's last night in England."</p> +<p>"So I see," I said, and, boiling with anger underneath, I +quietly took the paper out of her hand between the tips of my thumb +and first finger (as if the contamination of her touch had made it +unclean) and carried it to the fire and burnt it.</p> +<p>This seemed to be the end of all things. The tall Mr. Eastcliff +went over to the open door and said:</p> +<p>"Deuced fine day for a motor drive, isn't it?"</p> +<p>That gentleman had hitherto shown no alacrity in establishing +the truth of Alma's excuse for the cruise on the ground of his +visit to "his friend who had taken a shoot in Skye;" but now he +found himself too deeply interested in the Inverness Meeting to +remain longer, while the rest of the party became so absorbed in +the Perth and Ayr races, salmon-fishing on the Tay, and +stag-shooting in the deer-forests of Invercauld, that within a week +thereafter I had said good-bye to all of them.</p> +<p>All save Alma.</p> +<p>I was returning from the hall after the departure of a group of +my guests when Alma followed me to my room and said:</p> +<p>"My dear, sweet girl, I want you to do me the greatest +kindness."</p> +<p>She had to take her mother to New York shortly; but as "that +dear old dunce" was the worst of all possible sailors, it would be +necessary to wait for the largest of all possible steamers, and as +the largest steamers sailed from Liverpool, and Ellan was so near +to that port, perhaps I would not mind . . . just for a week or two +longer. . . .</p> +<p>What <i>could</i> I say? What I did say was what I had said +before, with equal weakness and indiscretion, but less than equal +danger. A word, half a word, and almost before it was spoken, +Alma's arms were about my neck and she was calling me her "dearest, +sweetest, kindest friend in the world."</p> +<p>My maid Price was present at this interview, and hardly had Alma +left the boudoir when she was twitching at my arm and whispering in +my ear:</p> +<p>"My lady, my lady, don't you see what the woman wants? She's +watching you."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My husband was the next to go.</p> +<p>He made excuse of his Parliamentary duties. He might be three or +four weeks away, but meantime Alma would be with me, and in any +case I was not the sort of person to feel lonely.</p> +<p>Never having heard before of any devotion to his duty as a peer, +I asked if that was all that was taking him to London.</p> +<p>"Perhaps not all," he answered, and then, with a twang of voice +and a twitch of feature, he said:</p> +<p>"I'm getting sick of this God-forsaken place, and then . . . to +tell you the truth, your own behaviour is beginning to raw me."</p> +<p>With my husband's departure my triumphal course seemed to come +to a close. Left alone with Alma, I became as weak and irresolute +as before and began to brood upon Price's warning.</p> +<p>My maid had found a fierce delight in my efforts to assert +myself as mistress in my husband's house, but now (taking her +former advantage) she was for ever harping upon my foolishness in +allowing Alma to remain in it.</p> +<p>"She's deceiving you, my lady," said Price. "<i>Her</i> waiting +for a steamer indeed! Not a bit of her. If your ladyship will not +fly out at me again and pack me off bag and baggage, I'll tell you +what's she's waiting for."</p> +<p>"What?"</p> +<p>"She's waiting for . . . she thinks . . . she fancies . . . +well, to tell you the honest truth, my lady, the bad-minded thing +suspects that something is going to happen to your ladyship, and +she's just waiting for the chance of telling his lordship."</p> +<p>I began to feel ill. A dim, vague, uneasy presentiment of coming +trouble took frequent possession of my mind.</p> +<p>I tried to suppress it. I struggled to strangle it as an ugly +monster created by the nervous strain I had been going through, and +for a time I succeeded in doing so. I had told Martin that nothing +would happen during his absence, and I compelled myself to believe +that nothing would or could.</p> +<p>Weeks passed; the weather changed; the golden hue of autumn gave +place to a chilly greyness; the sky became sad with winterly +clouds; the land became soggy with frequent rains; the trees showed +their bare black boughs; the withered leaves drifted along the +roads before blustering winds that came up from the sea; the +evenings grew long and the mornings dreary; but still Alma, with +her mother, remained at Castle Raa.</p> +<p>I began to be afraid of her. Something of the half-hypnotic +spell which she had exercised over me when I was a child asserted +itself again, but now it seemed to me to be always evil and +sometimes almost demoniacal.</p> +<p>I had a feeling that she was watching me day and night. +Occasionally, when she thought I was looking down, I caught the +vivid gaze of her coal-black eyes looking across at me through her +long sable-coloured eyelashes.</p> +<p>Her conversation was as sweet and suave as ever, but I found +myself creeping away from her and even shrinking from her +touch.</p> +<p>More than once I remembered what Martin in his blunt way had +said of her: "I hate that woman; she's like a snake; I want to put +my foot on it."</p> +<p>The feeling that I was alone in this great gaunt house with a +woman who was waiting and watching to do me a mischief, that she +might step into my shoes, was preying upon my health and +spirits.</p> +<p>Sometimes I had sensations of faintness and exhaustion for which +I could not account. Looking into my glass in the morning, I saw +that my nose was becoming pinched, my cheeks thin, and my whole +face not merely pale, but grey.</p> +<p>Alma saw these changes in my appearance, and in the over-sweet +tones of her succulent voice she constantly offered me her +sympathy. I always declined it, protesting that I was perfectly +well, but none the less I shrank within myself and became more and +more unhappy.</p> +<p>So fierce a strain could not last very long, and the climax came +about three weeks after my husband had left for London.</p> +<p>I was rising from breakfast with Alma and her mother when I was +suddenly seized with giddiness, and, after staggering for a moment, +I fainted right away.</p> +<p>On recovering consciousness I found myself stretched out on the +floor with Alma and her mother leaning over me.</p> +<p>Never to the last hour of my life shall I forget the look in +Alma's eyes as I opened my own. With her upper lip sucked in and +her lower one slightly set forward she was giving her mother a +quick side-glance of evil triumph.</p> +<p>I was overwhelmed with confusion. I thought I might have been +speaking as I was coming to, mentioning a name perhaps, out of that +dim and sacred chamber of the unconscious soul into which God alone +should see. I noticed, too, that my bodice had been unhooked at the +back so as to leave it loose over my bosom.</p> +<p>As soon as Alma saw that my eyes were open, she put her arm +under my head and began to pour out a flood of honeyed words into +my ears.</p> +<p>"My dear, sweet darling," she said, "you scared us to death. We +must send for a doctor immediately—your own doctor, you +know."</p> +<p>I tried to say there was no necessity, but she would not +listen.</p> +<p>"Such a seizure may be of no consequence, my love. I trust it +isn't. But on the other hand, it may be a serious matter, and it is +my duty, dearest, my duty to your husband, to discover the cause of +it."</p> +<p>I knew quite well what Alma was thinking of, yet I could not say +more without strengthening her suspicions, so I asked for Price, +who helped me up to my room, where I sat on the edge of the bed +while she gave me brandy and other restoratives.</p> +<p>That was the beginning of the end. I needed no doctor to say +what had befallen me. It was something more stupendous for me than +the removal of mountains or the stopping of the everlasting coming +and going of the sea.</p> +<p>The greatest of the mysteries of womanhood, the most sacred, the +most divine, the mighty mystery of a new life had come to me as it +comes to other women. Yet how had it come? Like a lowering +thunderstorm.</p> +<p>That golden hour of her sex, which ought to be the sweetest and +most joyful in a woman's life—the hour when she goes with a +proud and swelling heart to the one she loves, the one who loves +her, and with her arms about his neck and her face hidden in his +breast whispers her great new secret, and he clasps her more fondly +than ever to his heart, because another and closer union has bound +them together—that golden hour had come to me, and there was +none to share it.</p> +<p>O God! O God! How proudly I had been holding up my head! How I +had been trampling on the conventions of morality, the canons of +law, and even the sacraments of religion, thinking Nature, which +had made our hearts what they are, did not mean a woman to be +ashamed of her purest instincts!</p> +<p>And now Nature herself had risen up to condemn me, and before +long the whole world would be joining in her cry.</p> +<p>If Martin had been there at that moment I do not think I should +have cared what people might think or say of a woman in my +condition. But he was separated from me by this time by thousands +of miles of sea, and was going deeper and deeper every day into the +dark Antarctic night.</p> +<p>How weak I felt, how little, how helpless! Never for a moment +did I blame Martin. But I was alone with my responsibility, I was +still living in my husband's house, and—worst of +all—another woman knew my secret.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Early next day Doctor Conrad came to see me. I thought it +significant that he came in my father's big motor-car—a car +of great speed and power.</p> +<p>I was in my dressing-gown before the fire in the boudoir, and at +the first glance of his cheerful face under his iron-grey head I +knew what Alma had said in the letter which had summoned him.</p> +<p>In his soft voice he asked me a few questions, and though I +could have wished to conceal the truth I dared not. I noticed that +his face brightened at each of my replies, and at the end of them +he said:</p> +<p>"There is nothing to be alarmed at. We shall be better than ever +by-and-by."</p> +<p>Then in his sweet and delicate way (as if he were saying +something that would be very grateful) he told me what I knew +already, and I listened with my head down and my face towards the +fire.</p> +<p>He must have been disappointed at the sad way I received his +news, for he proceeded to talk of my general health; saying the +great thing in such a case as mine was to be cheerful, to keep a +good heart, and to look hopefully to the future.</p> +<p>"You must have pleasant surroundings and the society of +agreeable people—old friends, old schoolfellows, familiar and +happy faces."</p> +<p>I said "Yes" and "Yes," knowing only too well how impossible it +all was; and then his talk turned on general topics—my +father, whose condition made his face very grave, and then his +wife, Christian Ann, whose name caused his gentle old eyes to gleam +with sunshine.</p> +<p>She had charged him with a message to me.</p> +<p>"Tell her," she had said, "I shall never forget what she did for +me in the autumn, and whiles and whiles I'm thanking God for +her."</p> +<p>That cut me to the quick, but I was nearly torn to pieces by +what came next.</p> +<p>"Christian Ann told me to say too that Sunny Lodge is longing +for you. 'She's a great lady now,' said she, 'but maybe great +ladies have their troubles same as ourselves, poor things, and if +she ever wants to rest her sweet head in a poor woman's bed, Mary +O'Neill's little room is always waiting for her.'"</p> +<p>"God bless her!" I said—it was all I <i>could</i> +say—and then, to my great relief, he talked on other +subjects.</p> +<p>The one thing I was afraid of was that he might speak of Martin. +Heaven alone, which looks into the deep places of a woman's heart +in her hour of sorest trial, knows why I was in such dread that he +might do so, but sure I am that if he had mentioned Martin at that +moment I should have screamed.</p> +<p>When he rose to go he repeated his warnings.</p> +<p>"You'll remember what I said about being bright and +cheerful?"</p> +<p>"I'll try."</p> +<p>"And keeping happy and agreeable faces about you?"</p> +<p>"Ye-s."</p> +<p>Hardly had he left the room when Alma came sweeping into it, +full of I her warmest and insincerest congratulations.</p> +<p>"There!" she cried, with all the bitter honey of her tongue. +"Wasn't I right in sending for the doctor? Such news, too! Oh, +happy, happy you! But I must not keep you now, dearest. You'll be +just crazy to write to your husband and tell him all about it."</p> +<p>Alma's mother was the next to visit me. The comfortable old +soul, redolent of perfume and glittering with diamonds, began by +congratulating herself on her perspicacity.</p> +<p>"I knew it," she said. "When I saw as how you were so and so, I +said to Alma as I was sure you were that way. 'Impossible,' said +Alma, but it's us married women to know, isn't it?"</p> +<p>After that, and some homely counsel out of her own +experience—to take my breakfast in bed in future, avoiding +tea, &c.,—she told me how fortunate I was to have Alma in +the house at such a moment.</p> +<p>"The doctor says you're to be kept bright and cheerful, and +she's such a happy heart, is Alma. So crazy about you too! You +wouldn't believe it, but she's actually talking of staying with you +until the December sailing, at all events."</p> +<p>The prospect of having Alma two months longer, to probe my +secret soul as with a red-hot iron, seemed enough to destroy me, +but my martyrdom had only begun.</p> +<p>Next day, Aunt Bridget came, and the bright glitter of the +usually cold grey eyes behind her gold-rimmed spectacles told me at +a glance that her visit was not an unselfish one.</p> +<p>"There now," she said, "you've got to thank me for this. Didn't +I give you good advice when I told you to be a little blind? It's +the only way with husbands. When Conrad came home with the news I +said, 'Betsy, I must get away to the poor girl straight.' To be +sure I had enough on my hands already, but I couldn't leave you to +strangers, could I?"</p> +<p>Hearing no response to this question, Aunt Bridget went on to +say that what was coming would be a bond between me and my +husband.</p> +<p>"It always is. It was in my case, anyway. The old colonel didn't +behave very well after our marriage, and times and times I was +telling myself I had made a rue bargain; but when Betsy came I +thought, 'I might have done better, but I might have done worse, +and he's the father of my offspring, anyway.'"</p> +<p>Hearing no response to this either, Aunt Bridget went on to talk +of Alma and her mother. Was not this the woman I suspected with my +husband—the young one with the big eyes and "the quality toss +with her?" Then why did I have a person like that about the +house?</p> +<p>"If you need bright and cheerful company, what's amiss with your +aunt and your first cousin? Some people are selfish, but I thank +the saints I don't know what selfishness is. I'm willing to do for +you what I did for your poor mother, and <i>I</i> can't say more +than that, can I?"</p> +<p>I must have made some kind of response, for Aunt Bridget went on +to say it might be a sacrifice, but then she wouldn't be sorry to +leave the Big House either.</p> +<p>"I'm twenty years there, and now I'm to be a servant to my own +stepchild. Dear heart knows if I can bear it much longer. The way +that Nessy is carrying on with your father is something shocking. I +do believe she'll marry the man some day."</p> +<p>To escape from a painful topic I asked after my father's +health.</p> +<p>"Worse and worse, but Conrad's news was like laughing-gas to the +man. He would have come with me to-day, but the doctor wouldn't +hear of it. He'll come soon though, and meantime he's talking and +talking about a great entertainment."</p> +<p>"Entertainment?"</p> +<p>"To celebrate the forthcoming event, of course, though nobody is +to know that except ourselves, it seems. Just a house-warming in +honour of your coming home after your marriage—that's all +it's to be on the outside, anyway."</p> +<p>I made some cry of pain, and Aunt Bridget said:</p> +<p>"Oh, I know what you're going to say—why doesn't he wait? +I'll tell you why if you'll promise not to whisper a word to any +one. Your father is a sick man, my dear. Let him say what he likes +when Conrad talks about cancer, he knows Death's hand is over him. +And thinking it may fall before your time has come, he wants to +take time by the forelock and see a sort of fulfilment of the hope +of his life—and you know what that is."</p> +<p>It was terrible. The position in which I stood towards my father +was now so tragic that (wicked as it was) I prayed with all my +heart that I might never look upon his face again.</p> +<p>I was compelled to do so. Three days after Aunt Bridget's visit +my father came to see me. The day was fine and I was walking on the +lawn when his big car came rolling up the drive.</p> +<p>I was shocked to see the change in him. His face was ghastly +white, his lips were blue, his massive and powerful head seemed to +have sunk into his shoulders, and his limbs were so thin that his +clothes seemed to hang on them; but the stern mouth was there +still, and so was the masterful lift of the eyebrows.</p> +<p>Coming over to meet me with an uncertain step, he said:</p> +<p>"Old Conrad was for keeping me in bed, but I couldn't take rest +without putting a sight on you."</p> +<p>After that, and some plain speech out of the primitive man he +always was and will be (about it's being good for a woman to have +children because it saved her from "losing her stomach" over +imaginary grievances), he led me, with the same half-contemptuous +tenderness which he used to show to my mother, back to the house +and into the drawing-room.</p> +<p>Alma and her mother were there, the one writing at a desk, the +other knitting on the sofa, and they rose as my father entered, but +he waved them back to their places.</p> +<p>"Set down, ma'am. Take your seat, mother. I'm only here for a +minute to talk to my gel about her great reception."</p> +<p>"Reception?" said Alma.</p> +<p>"Hasn't she told you about it?" he said, and being answered that +I had not, he gave a rough outline of his project, whereupon Alma, +whose former attitude towards my father had changed to one of +flattery and subservience, lifted her hands and cried:</p> +<p>"How splendid! Such an inspiration! Only think, my love, you +were to be kept bright and cheerful, and what could be better for +that purpose?"</p> +<p>In the torment of my soul I urged one objection after +another—it would be expensive, we could not afford it.</p> +<p>"Who asks you to afford it? It's my affair, isn't it?" said my +father.</p> +<p>I was unwell, and therefore unable to undertake the hard work of +such an entertainment—but that was the worst of excuses, for +Alma jumped in with an offer of assistance.</p> +<p>"My dearest child," she said, "you know how happy I shall be to +help you. In fact, I'll do all the work and you shall have all the +glory."</p> +<p>"There you are, then," cried my father, slapping me on the +shoulder, and then, turning to Alma, he told her to set to work +without a day's delay.</p> +<p>"Let everything be done correct even if it costs me a bit of +money."</p> +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> +<p>"A rael big thing, ma'am, such as nobody has ever seen +before."</p> +<p>"Yes indeed, sir."</p> +<p>"Ask all the big people on the island—Nessy MacLeod shall +send you a list of them."</p> +<p>"I will, sir."</p> +<p>"That'll do for the present—I guess I must be going now, +or old Conrad will be agate of me. So long, gel, so long."</p> +<p>I was silenced, I was helpless, I was ashamed.</p> +<p>I did not know then, what now I know, that, besides the desire +of celebrating the forthcoming birth of an heir, my father had +another and still more secret object—that of throwing dust in +the eyes of his advocates, bankers, and insular councillors, who +(having expected him to make money for them by magic) were +beginning to whisper that all was not well with his financial +schemes.</p> +<p>I did not know then, what now I know, that my father was at that +moment the most tragic figure in Ellan except myself, and that, +shattered in health and shaken in fortune, he was indulging in this +wild extravagance equally to assert his solvency and to gratify his +lifelong passion under the very wing of Death.</p> +<p>But oh, my wild woe, my frantic prayers! It was almost as if +Satan himself were torturing me.</p> +<p>The one terror of the next few days was that my husband might +return home, for I knew that at the first moment of his arrival the +whole world of make-believe which my father and Alma were setting +up around me would tumble about my head like a pack of cards.</p> +<p>He did not come, but he wrote. After saying that his political +duties would keep him in London a little longer, he said:</p> +<p>"I hear that your father is getting you to give a great +reception in honour of our home-coming. But why <i>now</i>, instead +of three months ago? <i>Do you know the reason?</i>"</p> +<p>As I read these last words I felt an icy numbness creeping up +from my feet to my heart. My position was becoming intolerable. The +conviction was being forced upon me that I had no right in my +husband's house.</p> +<p>It made no difference that my husband's house was mine also, in +the sense that it could not exist without me—I had no right +to be there.</p> +<p>It made no difference that my marriage had been no +marriage—I had no right to be there.</p> +<p>It made no difference that the man I had married was an utterly +bad husband—I had no right to be there.</p> +<p>It made no difference that I was not really an adulterous +wife—I had no right to be there.</p> +<p>Meanwhile Price, my maid, but my only real friend in Castle Raa, +with the liberty I allowed her, was unconsciously increasing my +torture. Every night as she combed out my hair she gave me her +opinion of my attitude towards Alma, and one night she said:</p> +<p>"Didn't I tell you she was only watching you, my lady? The +nasty-minded thing is making mischief with his lordship. She's +writing to him every day. . . . How do I know? Oh, I don't keep my +eyes and my ears open downstairs for nothing. You'll have no peace +of your life, my lady, until you turn that woman out of the +house."</p> +<p>Then in a fit of despair, hardly knowing what I was doing, I +covered my face with my hands and said:</p> +<p>"I had better turn myself out instead, perhaps."</p> +<p>The combing of my hair suddenly stopped, and at the next moment +I heard Price saying in a voice which seemed to come from a long +way off:</p> +<p>"Goodness gracious me! Is it like that, my lady?"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Alma was as good as her word.</p> +<p>She did everything without consulting me—fixed the date of +the reception for a month after the day of my father's visit, and +sent out invitations to all "the insular gentry" included in the +lists which came from Nessy MacLeod in her stiff and formal +handwriting.</p> +<p>These lists came morning after morning, until the invitations +issued reached the grand total of five hundred.</p> +<p>As the rooms of the Castle were not large enough to accommodate +so many guests, Alma proposed to erect a temporary pavilion. My +father agreed, and within a week hundreds of workmen from +Blackwater were setting up a vast wooden structure, in the form of +the Colosseum, on the headlands beyond the garden where Martin and +I had walked together.</p> +<p>While the work went on my father's feverish pride seemed to +increase. I heard of messages to Alma saying that no money was to +be spared. The reception was to surpass in grandeur any fête +ever held in Ellan. Not knowing what high stakes my father was +playing for, I was frightened by this extravagance, and from that +cause alone I wished to escape from the sight of it.</p> +<p>I could not escape.</p> +<p>I felt sure that Alma hated me with an implacable hatred, and +that she was trying to drive me away, thinking that would be the +easiest means to gain her own ends. For this reason, among others, +the woman in me would not let me fly, so I remained and went +through a purgatory of suffering.</p> +<p>Price, too, who had reconciled herself to my revelation, was +always urging me to remain, saying:</p> +<p>"Why should you go, my lady? You are your husband's wife, aren't +you? Fight it out, I say. Ladies do so every day. Why shouldn't +you?"</p> +<p>Before long the whole island seemed to be astir about our +reception. Every day the insular newspapers devoted columns to the +event, giving elaborate accounts of what limitless wealth could +accomplish for a single night's entertainment. In these +descriptions there was much eulogy of my father as "the uncrowned +king of Ellan," as well as praise of Alma, who was "displaying such +daring originality," but little or no mention of myself.</p> +<p>Nevertheless everybody seemed to understand the inner meaning of +the forthcoming reception, and in the primitive candour of our +insular manners some of the visits I received were painfully +embarrassing.</p> +<p>One of the first to come was my father's advocate, Mr. Curphy, +who smiled his usual bland smile and combed his long beard while he +thanked me for acting on his advice not to allow a fit of pique to +break up a marriage which was so suitable from points of property +and position.</p> +<p>"How happy your father must be to see the fulfilment of his +hopes," he said. "Just when his health is failing him, too! How +good! How gratifying!"</p> +<p>The next to come was the Bishop, who, smooth and suave as ever, +congratulated me on putting aside all thoughts of divorce, so that +the object of my marriage might be fulfilled and a good Catholic +become the heir of Castle Raa.</p> +<p>More delicate, but also more distressing, was a letter from +Father Dan, saying he had been forbidden my husband's house and +therefore could not visit me, but having heard an angel's whisper +of the sweet joy that was coming to me, he prayed the Lord and His +Holy Mother to carry me safely through.</p> +<p>"I have said a rosary for you every day since you were here, my +dear child, that you might be saved from a great temptation. And +now I know you have been, and the sacrament of your holy marriage +has fulfilled its mission, as I always knew it would. So God bless +you, my daughter, and keep you pure and fit for eternal union with +that blessed saint, your mother, whom the Lord has made His +own."</p> +<p>More than ever after this letter I felt that I must fly from my +husband's house, but, thinking of Alma, my wounded pride, my +outraged vanity (as I say, the <i>woman</i> in me), would not let +me go.</p> +<p>Three weeks passed.</p> +<p>The pavilion had been built and was being hung with gaily +painted bannerets to give the effect of the Colosseum as seen at +sunset. A covered corridor connecting the theatre with the house +was being lined with immense hydrangeas and lit from the roof by +lamps that resembled stars.</p> +<p>A few days before the day fixed for the event Alma, who had been +too much occupied to see me every day in the boudoir to which I +confined myself, came up to give me my instructions.</p> +<p>The entertainment was to begin at ten o'clock. I was to be +dressed as Cleopatra and to receive my guests in the drawing-room. +At the sound of a fanfare of trumpets I was to go into the theatre +preceded by a line of pages, and accompanied by my husband. After +we had taken our places in a private box a great ballet, brought +specially from a London music-hall, was to give a performance +lasting until midnight. Then there was to be a cotillon, led by +Alma herself with my husband, and after supper the dancing was to +be resumed and kept up until sunrise, when a basketful of +butterflies and doves (sent from the South of France) were to be +liberated from cages, and to rise in a multicoloured cloud through +the sunlit space.</p> +<p>I was sick and ashamed when I thought of this vain and gaudy +scene and the object which I supposed it was intended to serve.</p> +<p>The end of it all was that I wrote to my father, concealing the +real cause of my suffering, but telling him he could not possibly +be aware of what was being done in his name and with his money, and +begging him to put an end to the entertainment altogether.</p> +<p>The only answer I received was a visit from Nessy MacLeod. I can +see her still as she came into my room, the tall gaunt figure with +red hair and irregular features.</p> +<p>"Cousin Mary," she said, seating herself stiffly on the only +stiff-backed chair, and speaking in an impassive tone, "your letter +has been received, but your father has not seen it, his health +being such as makes it highly undesirable that he should be +disturbed by unnecessary worries."</p> +<p>I answered with some warmth that my letter had not been +unnecessary, but urgent and important, and if she persisted in +withholding it from my father I should deliver it myself.</p> +<p>"Cousin Mary," said Nessy, "I know perfectly what your letter +is, having opened and read it, and while I am as little as yourself +in sympathy with what is going on here, I happen to know that your +father has set his heart on this entertainment, and therefore I do +not choose that it shall be put off."</p> +<p>I replied hotly that in opening my letter to my father she had +taken an unwarrantable liberty, and then (losing myself a little) I +asked her by what right did she, who had entered my father's house +as a dependent, dare to keep his daughter's letter from him.</p> +<p>"Cousin Mary," said Nessy, in the same impassive tone, "you were +always self-willed, selfish, and most insulting as a child, and I +am sorry to see that neither marriage nor education at a convent +has chastened your ungovernable temper. But I have told you that I +do not choose that you shall injure your father's health by +disturbing his plans, and you shall certainly not do so."</p> +<p>"Then take care," I answered, "that in protecting my father's +health you do not destroy it altogether."</p> +<p>In spite of her cold and savourless nature, she understood my +meaning, for after a moment of silence she said:</p> +<p>"Cousin Mary, you may do exactly as you please. Your conduct in +the future, whatever it may be, will be no affair of mine, and I +shall not consider that I am in any way responsible for it."</p> +<p>At last I began to receive anonymous letters. They came from +various parts of Ellan and appeared to be in different +handwritings. Some of them advised me to fly from the island, and +others enclosed a list of steamers' sailings.</p> +<p>Only a woman who has been the victim of this species of cowardly +torture can have any idea of the shame of it, and again and again I +asked myself if I ought not to escape from my husband's house +before he returned.</p> +<p>But Price seemed to find a secret joy in the anonymous letters, +saying she believed she knew the source of them: and one evening +towards the end, she came running into my room with a shawl over +her head, a look of triumph in her face, and an unopened letter in +her hand.</p> +<p>"There!" she said. "It's all up with Madame now. You've got the +game in your own hands, my lady, and can send them all +packing."</p> +<p>The letter was addressed to my husband in London. Price had +seized the arm of Alma's maid in the act of posting it, and under +threat of the law (not to speak of instant personal chastisement) +the girl had confessed that both this letter and others had been +written by our housekeeper under the inspiration of her +mistress.</p> +<p>Without any compunction Price broke the seal of the intercepted +letter and read it aloud to me. It was a shocking thing, accusing +me with Martin, and taunting my husband with the falseness of the +forthcoming entertainment.</p> +<p>Feeling too degraded to speak, I took the letter in silence out +of my maid's hands, and while I was in the act of locking it away +in a drawer Alma came up with a telegram from my husband, saying he +was leaving London by the early train the following morning and +would arrive at Blackwater at half-past three in the afternoon.</p> +<p>"Dear old Jimmy!" she said, "what a surprise you have in store +for him! But of course you've told him already, haven't you? . . . +No? Ah, I see, you've been saving it all up to tell him face to +face. Oh, happy, happy you!"</p> +<p>It was too late to leave now. The hour of my trial had come. +There was no possibility of escape. It was just as if Satan had +been holding me in the net of my sin, so that I could not fly +away.</p> +<p>At three o'clock next day (which was the day before the day +fixed for the reception) I heard the motor-car going off to meet my +husband at Blackwater. At four o'clock I heard it return. A few +minutes afterwards I heard my husband's voice in the hall. I +thought he would come up to me directly, but he did not do so, and +I did not attempt to go down. When, after a while, I asked what had +become of him, I was told that he was in the library with Alma, and +that they were alone.</p> +<p>Two hours passed.</p> +<p>To justify and fortify myself I thought how badly my husband had +behaved to me. I remembered that he had married me from the most +mercenary motives; that he had paid off his mistress with the money +that came through me; that he had killed by cruelty the efforts I +had made to love him; that he had humiliated me by gross +infidelities committed on my honeymoon. I recalled the scenes in +Rome, the scenes in Paris, and the insults I had received under my +own roof.</p> +<p>It was all in vain. Whether God means it that the woman's fault +in breaking her marriage vows (whatever her sufferings and excuse) +shall be greater than that of the man I do not know. I only know +that I was trembling like a prisoner before her judge when, being +dressed for dinner and waiting for the sound of the bell, I heard +my husband's footsteps approach my door.</p> +<p>I was standing by the fire at that moment, and I held on to the +mantelpiece as my husband came into the room.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>He was very pale. The look of hardness, almost of brutality, +which pierced his manner at normal moments had deepened, and I +could see at a glance that he was nervous. His monocle dropped of +itself from his slow grey eyes, and the white fat fingers which +replaced it trembled.</p> +<p>Without shaking hands or offering any other sort of salutation +he plunged immediately into the matter that was uppermost in his +mind.</p> +<p>"I am still at a loss to account for this affair of your +father's," he said. "Of course I know what it is supposed to +be—a reception in honour of our home-coming. That explanation +may or may not be sufficient for these stupid islanders, but it's +rather too thin for me. Can you tell me what your father means by +it?"</p> +<p>I knew he knew what my father meant, so I said, trembling like a +sheep that walks up to a barking dog:</p> +<p>"Hadn't you better ask that question of my father himself?"</p> +<p>"Perhaps I should if he were here, but he isn't, so I ask you. +Your father is a strange man. There's no knowing what crude things +he will not do to gratify his primitive instincts. But he does not +spend five or ten thousand pounds for nothing. He isn't a fool +exactly."</p> +<p>"Thank you," I said. I could not help it. It was forced out of +me.</p> +<p>My husband flinched and looked at me. Then the bully in him, +which always lay underneath, came uppermost.</p> +<p>"Look here, Mary," he said. "I came for an explanation and I +intend to have one. Your father may give this affair what gloss he +pleases, but you must know as well as I do what rumour and report +are saying, so we might as well speak plainly. Is it the fact that +the doctor has made certain statements about your own condition, +and that your father is giving this entertainment because . . . +well, because he is expecting an heir?"</p> +<p>To my husband's astonishment I answered:</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"So you admit it? Then perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me +how that condition came about?"</p> +<p>Knowing he needed no explanation, I made no answer.</p> +<p>"Can't you speak?" he said.</p> +<p>But still I remained silent.</p> +<p>"You know what our relations have been since our marriage, so I +ask you again how does that condition come about?"</p> +<p>I was now trembling more than ever, but a kind of forced courage +came to me and I said:</p> +<p>"Why do you ask? You seem to know already."</p> +<p>"I know what anonymous letters have told me, if that's what you +mean. But I'm your husband and have a right to know from +<i>you</i>. How does your condition come about, I ask you?"</p> +<p>I cannot say what impulse moved me at that moment unless it was +the desire to make a clean breast and an end of everything, but, +stepping to my desk, I took out of a drawer the letter which Price +had intercepted and threw it on the table.</p> +<p>He took it up and read it, with the air of one to whom the +contents were not news, and then asked how I came by it.</p> +<p>"It was taken out of the hands of a woman who was in the act of +posting it," I said. "She confessed that it was one of a number of +such letters which had been inspired, if not written, by your +friend Alma."</p> +<p>"My friend Alma!"</p> +<p>"Yes, your friend Alma."</p> +<p>His face assumed a frightful expression and he said:</p> +<p>"So that's how it is to be, is it? In spite of the admission you +have just made you wish to imply that this" (holding out the +letter) "is a trumped-up affair, and that Alma is at the bottom of +it. You're going to brazen it out, are you, and shelter your +condition under your position as a married woman?"</p> +<p>I was so taken by surprise by this infamous suggestion that I +could not speak to deny it, and my husband went on to say:</p> +<p>"But it doesn't matter a rush to me who is at the bottom of the +accusation contained in this letter. There's only one thing of any +consequence—is it true?"</p> +<p>My head was reeling, my eyes were dim, my palms were moist, I +felt as if I were throwing myself over a precipice but I +answered:</p> +<p>"It is perfectly true."</p> +<p>I think that was the last thing he expected. After a moment he +said:</p> +<p>"Then you have broken your marriage vows—is that it?"</p> +<p>"Yes, if you call it so."</p> +<p>"Call it so? Call it so? Good heavens, what do <i>you</i> call +it?"</p> +<p>I did not reply, and after another moment he said:</p> +<p>"But perhaps you wish me to understand that this man whom I was +so foolish as to invite to my house abused my hospitality and +betrayed my wife. Is that what you mean?"</p> +<p>"No," I said. "He observed the laws of hospitality much better +than you did, and if I am betrayed I betrayed myself."</p> +<p>I shall never forget the look with which my husband received +this confession. He drew himself up with the air of an injured man +and said:</p> +<p>"What? You mean that you yourself . . . deliberately . . . Good +God!"</p> +<p>He stopped for a moment and then said with a rush:</p> +<p>"I suppose you've not forgotten what happened at the time of our +marriage . . . your resistance and the ridiculous compact I +submitted to? Why did I submit? Because I thought your innocence, +your convent-bred ideas, and your ignorance of the first conditions +of matrimony. . . . But I've been fooled, for you now tell me . . . +after all my complacency . . . that you have deliberately. . . . In +the name of God do you know what you are? There's only one name for +a woman who does what you've done. Do you want me to tell you what +that name is?"</p> +<p>I was quivering with shame, but my mind, which was going at +lightning speed, was thinking of London, of Cairo, of Rome, and of +Paris.</p> +<p>"Why don't you speak?" he cried, lifting his voice in his rage. +"Don't you understand what a letter like this is calling you?"</p> +<p>My heart choked. But the thought that came to me—that, bad +as his own life had been, he considered he had a right to treat me +in this way because he was a man and I was a woman—brought +strength out of my weakness, so that when he went on to curse my +Church and my religion, saying this was all that had come of "the +mummery of my masses," I fired up for a moment and said:</p> +<p>"You can spare yourself these blasphemies. If I have done wrong, +it is I, and not my Church, that is to blame for it."</p> +<p>"<i>If</i> you have done wrong!" he cried. "Damn it, have you +lost all sense of a woman's duty to her husband? While you have +been married to me and I have been fool enough not to claim you as +a wife because I thought you were only fit company for the saints +and angels, you have been prostituting yourself to this blusterer, +this . . ."</p> +<p>"That is a lie," I said, stepping up to him in the middle of the +floor. "It's true that I am married to you, but <i>he</i> is my +real husband and you . . . you are nothing to me at all."</p> +<p>My husband stood for a moment with his mouth agape. Then he +began to laugh—loudly, derisively, mockingly.</p> +<p>"Nothing to you, am I? You don't mind bearing my name, though, +and when your time comes you'll expect it to cover your +disgrace."</p> +<p>His face had become shockingly distorted. He was quivering with +fury.</p> +<p>"That's not the worst, either," he cried. "It's not enough that +you should tell me to my face that somebody else is your real +husband, but you must shunt your spurious offspring into my house. +Isn't that what it all comes to . . . all this damnable fuss of +your father's . . . that you are going to palm off on me and my +name and family your own and this man's . . . bastard?"</p> +<p>And with the last word, in the drunkenness of his rage, he +lifted his arm and struck me with the back of his hand across the +cheek.</p> +<p>The physical shock was fearful, but the moral infamy was a +hundred-fold worse. I can truly say that not alone for myself did I +suffer. When my mind, still going at lightning speed, thought of +Martin, who loved me so tenderly, I felt crushed by my husband's +blow to the lowest depths of shame.</p> +<p>I must have screamed, though I did not know it, for at the next +moment Price was in the room and I saw that the housekeeper (drawn +perhaps, as before, by my husband's loud voice) was on the landing +outside the door. But even that did not serve to restrain him.</p> +<p>"No matter," he said. "After what has passed you may not enjoy +to-morrow's ceremony. But you shall go through it! By heaven, you +shall! And when it is over, I shall have something to say to your +father."</p> +<p>And with that he swung out of the room and went lunging down the +stairs.</p> +<p>I was still standing in the middle of the floor, with the blow +from my husband's hand tingling on my cheek, when Price, after +clashing the door in the face of the housekeeper, said, with her +black eyes ablaze:</p> +<p>"Well, if ever I wanted to be a man before to-day!"</p> +<p>News of the scene went like wildfire through the house, and +Alma's mother came to comfort me. In her crude and blundering way +she told me of a similar insult she had suffered at the hands of +the "bad Lord Raa," and how it had been the real reason of her +going to America.</p> +<p>"Us married ladies have much to put up with. But cheer up, +dearie. I guess you'll have gotten over it by to-morrow +morning."</p> +<p>When she was gone I sat down before the fire. I did not cry. I +felt as if I had reached a depth of suffering that was a thousand +fathoms too deep for tears. I do not think I wept again for many +months afterwards, and then it was a great joy, not a great grief, +that brought me a burst of blessed tears.</p> +<p>But I could hear my dear good Price crying behind me, and when I +said:</p> +<p>"Now you see for yourself that I cannot remain in this house any +longer," she answered, in a low voice:</p> +<p>"Yes, my lady."</p> +<p>"I must go at once—to-night if possible."</p> +<p>"You shall. Leave everything to me, my lady."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The bell rang, but of course I did not go down to dinner.</p> +<p>As soon as Price had gone off to make the necessary arrangements +I turned the key in the lock of my door, removed my evening gown, +and began to dress for my flight.</p> +<p>My brain was numb, but I did my best to confront the new +situation that was before me.</p> +<p>Hitherto I had been occupied with the problem of whether I +should or should not leave my husband's house; now I had to settle +the question of where I was to go to.</p> +<p>I dared not think of home, for (Nessy MacLeod and Aunt Bridget +apart) the house of my father was the last place I could fly to at +a moment when I was making dust and ashes of his lifelong +expectations.</p> +<p>Neither dared I think of Sunny Lodge, although I remembered, +with a tug of tenderness, Christian Ann's last message about Mary +O'Neill's little room that was always waiting for me—for I +thought of how I had broken my pledge to her.</p> +<p>The only place I could think of was that which Martin had +mentioned when he wished to carry me away—London. In the +mighty world of London I might hide myself from observation and +wait until Martin returned from his expedition.</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, London," I told myself in my breathless excitement, +little knowing what London meant.</p> +<p>I began to select the clothes I was to carry with me and to wear +on my journey. They must be plain, for I had to escape from a house +in which unfriendly eyes would be watching me. They must be +durable, for during my time of waiting I expected to be poor.</p> +<p>I hunted out some of the quaker-like costumes which had been +made for me before my marriage; and when I had put them on I saw +that they made a certain deduction from my appearance, but that did +not matter to me now—the only eyes I wished to look well in +being down in the Antarctic seas.</p> +<p>Then I tried to think of practical matters—how I was to +live in London and how, in particular, I was to meet the situation +that was before me. Surely never did a more helpless innocent +confront such a serious problem. I was a woman, and for more than a +year I had been a wife, but I had no more experience of the hard +facts of material existence than a child.</p> +<p>I thought first of the bank-book which my father had sent me +with authority to draw on his account. But it was then nine +o'clock, the banks were closed for the day, and I knew enough of +the world to see that if I attempted to cash a cheque in the +morning my whereabouts would he traced. That must never happen, I +must hide myself from everybody; therefore my bank-book was +useless.</p> +<p>"Quite useless," I thought, throwing it aside like so much waste +paper.</p> +<p>I thought next of my jewels. But there I encountered a similar +difficulty. The jewels which were really mine, having been bought +by myself, had been gambled away by my husband at Monte Carlo. What +remained were the family jewels which had come to me as Lady Raa; +but that was a name I was never more to bear, a person I was never +more to think about, so I could not permit myself to take anything +that belonged to her.</p> +<p>The only thing left to me was my money. I had always kept a good +deal of it about me, although the only use I had had for it was to +put it in the plate at church, and to scatter it with foolish +prodigality to the boys who tossed somersaults behind the carriage +in the road.</p> +<p>Now I found it all over my room—in my purse, in various +drawers, and on the toilet-tray under my dressing-glass. Gathered +together it counted up to twenty-eight pounds. I owed four pounds +to Price, and having set them aside, I saw that I had twenty-four +pounds left in notes, gold, and silver.</p> +<p>Being in the literal and unconventional sense utterly ignorant +of the value of sixpence, I thought this a great sum, amply +sufficient for all my needs, or at least until I secured +employment—for I had from the first some vague idea of +earning my own living.</p> +<p>"Martin would like that," I told myself, lifting my head with a +thrill of pride.</p> +<p>Then I began to gather up the treasures which were inexpressibly +more dear to me than all my other possessions.</p> +<p>One of them was a little miniature of my mother which Father Dan +had given me for a wedding-present when (as I know now) he would +rather have parted with his heart's blood.</p> +<p>Another was a pearl rosary which the Reverend Mother had dropped +over my arm the last time she kissed me on the forehead; and the +last was my Martin's misspelt love-letter, which was more precious +to me than rubies.</p> +<p>Not for worlds, I thought, would I leave these behind me, or +ever part with them under any circumstances.</p> +<p>Several times while I was busy with such preparations, growing +more and more nervous every moment, Price came on tip-toe and +tapped softly at my door.</p> +<p>Once it was to bring me some food and to tell me, with many +winks (for the good soul herself was trembling with excitement), +that everything was "as right as ninepence." I should get away +without difficulty in a couple of hours, and until to-morrow +morning nobody would be a penny the wiser.</p> +<p>Fortunately it was Thursday, when a combined passenger and cargo +steamer sailed to Liverpool. Of course the motor-car would not be +available to take me to the pier, but Tommy the Mate, who had a +stiff cart in which he took his surplus products to market, would +be waiting for me at eleven o'clock by the gate to the high +road.</p> +<p>The people downstairs, meaning my husband and Alma and her +mother, were going off to the pavilion (where hundreds of +decorators were to work late and the orchestra and ballet were to +have a rehearsal), and they had been heard to say that they would +not be back until "way round about midnight."</p> +<p>"But the servants?" I asked.</p> +<p>"They're going too, bless them," said Price. "So eat your dinner +in peace, my lady, and don't worry about a thing until I come back +to fetch you."</p> +<p>Another hour passed. I was in a fever of apprehension. I felt +like a prisoner who was about to escape from a dungeon.</p> +<p>A shrill wind was coming up from the sea and whistling about the +house. I could hear the hammering of the workmen in the pavilion as +well as the music of the orchestra practising their scores.</p> +<p>A few minutes before eleven Price returned, carrying one of the +smaller of the travelling-trunks I had taken to Cairo. I noticed +that it bore no name and no initials.</p> +<p>"It's all right," she said. "They've gone off, every mother's +son and daughter of them—all except the housekeeper, and I've +caught her out, the cat!"</p> +<p>That lynx-eyed person had begun to suspect. She had seen Tommy +harnessing his horse and had not been satisfied with his +explanation—that he was taking tomatoes to Blackwater to be +sent off by the Liverpool steamer.</p> +<p>So to watch events, without seeming to watch them, the +housekeeper (when the other servants had gone off to the rehearsal) +had stolen upstairs to her room in the West tower overlooking the +back courtyard.</p> +<p>But Price had been more than a match for her. Creeping up +behind, she had locked the door of the top landing, and now the +"little cat" might scream her head off through the window, and +(over the noises of the wind and the workmen) it would be only like +"tom" shrieking on the tiles.</p> +<p>"We must be quick, though," said Price, tumbling into my +travelling-trunk as many of my clothes as it would hold.</p> +<p>When it was full and locked and corded she said:</p> +<p>"Wait," and stepped out on the landing to listen.</p> +<p>After a moment she returned saying:</p> +<p>"Not a sound! Now for it, my lady."</p> +<p>And then, tying her handkerchief over her head to keep down her +hair in the wind, she picked up the trunk in her arms and crept out +of the room on tiptoe.</p> +<p>The moment had come to go, yet, eager as I had been all evening +to escape from my husband's house, I could scarcely tear myself +away, for I was feeling a little of that regret which comes to us +all when we are doing something for the last time.</p> +<p>Passing through the boudoir this feeling took complete +possession of me. Only a few hours before it had been the scene of +my deepest degradation, but many a time before it had been the +place of my greatest happiness.</p> +<p><i>"You are my wife. I am your real husband. No matter where you +are or what they do with you, you are mine and always will +be."</i></p> +<p>Half-closing the door, I took a last look round—at the +piano, the desk, the table, the fireplace, all the simple things +associated with my dearest memories. So strong was the yearning of +my own soul that I felt as if the soul of Martin were in the room +with me at that moment.</p> +<p>I believe it was.</p> +<p>"Quick, my lady, or you'll lose your steamer," whispered Price, +and then we crossed the landing (which was creaking again) and +crept noiselessly down a back staircase. We were near the bottom +when I was startled by a loud knocking, which seemed to come from a +distant part of the house. My heart temporarily stopped its +beating, but Price only laughed and whispered:</p> +<p>"There she is! We've fairly caught her out, the cat."</p> +<p>At the next moment Price opened an outer door, and after we had +passed through she closed and locked it behind us.</p> +<p>We were then in the courtyard behind the house, stumbling in the +blinding darkness over cobble-stones.</p> +<p>"Keep close to me, my lady," said Price.</p> +<p>After a few moments we reached the drive. I think I was more +nervous than I had ever been before. I heard the withered leaves +behind me rustling along the ground before the wind from the sea, +and thought they were the footsteps of people pursuing us. I heard +the hammering of the workmen and the music of the orchestra, and +thought they were voices screaming to us to come back.</p> +<p>Price, who was forging ahead, carried the trunk in her arms as +if it had been a child, but every few minutes she waited for me to +come up to her, and encouraged me when I stumbled in the +darkness.</p> +<p>"Only a little further, my lady," she said, and I did my best to +struggle on.</p> +<p>We reached the gate to the high road at last. Tommy the Mate was +there with his stiff cart, and Price, who was breathless after her +great exertion, tumbled my trunk over the tail-board.</p> +<p>The time had come to part from her, and, remembering how +faithful and true she had been to me, I hardly knew what to say. I +told her I had left her wages in an envelope on the dressing-table, +and then I stammered something about being too poor to make her a +present to remember me by.</p> +<p>"It doesn't need a present to help me to remember a good +mistress, my lady," she said.</p> +<p>"God bless you for being so good to me," I answered, and then I +kissed her.</p> +<p>"I'll remember you by that, though," she said, and she began to +cry.</p> +<p>I climbed over the wheel of the stiff cart and seated myself on +my trunk, and then Tommy, who had been sitting on the front-board +with his feet on the outer shaft, whipped up his horse and we +started away.</p> +<p>During the next half-hour the springless cart bobbed along the +dark road at its slow monotonous pace. Tommy never once looked +round or spoke except to his horse, but I understood my old friend +perfectly.</p> +<p>I was in a fever of anxiety lest I should be overtaken and +carried back. Again and again I looked behind. At one moment, when +a big motor-car, with its two great white eyes, came rolling up +after us, my stormy heart stood still. But it was not my husband's +car, and in a little while its red tail-light disappeared in the +darkness ahead.</p> +<p>We reached Blackwater in time for the midnight steamer and drew +up at the landward end of the pier. It was cold; the salt wind from +the sea was very chill. Men who looked like commercial travellers +were hurrying along with their coat-collars turned up, and porters +with heavy trunks on their shoulders were striving to keep pace +with them.</p> +<p>I gave my own trunk to a porter who came up to the cart, and +then turned to Tommy to say good-bye. The old man had got down from +the shaft and was smoothing his smoking horse, and snuffling as if +he had caught a cold.</p> +<p>"Good-bye, Tommy," I said—and then something more which I +do not wish to write down.</p> +<p>"Good-bye, lil missie," he answered (that cut me deep), "I never +believed ould Tom Dug would live to see ye laving home like this . +. . But wait! Only wait till himself is after coming back, and I'll +go bail it'll be the divil sit up for some of them."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>It was very dark. No more than three or four lamps on the pier +were burning, but nevertheless I was afraid that the pier-master +would recognise me.</p> +<p>I thought he did so as I approached the gangway to the saloon, +for he said:</p> +<p>"Private cabin on main deck aft."</p> +<p>Nervous as I was, I had just enough presence of mind to say +"Steerage, please," which threw him off the scent entirely, so that +he cried, in quite a different voice:</p> +<p>"Steerage passengers forward."</p> +<p>I found my way to the steerage end of the steamer; and in order +to escape observation from the few persons on the pier I went down +to the steerage cabin, which was a little triangular place in the +bow, with an open stove in the middle of the floor and a bleary +oil-lamp swinging from a rafter overhead.</p> +<p>The porter found me there, and in my foolish ignorance of the +value of money I gave him half a crown for his trouble. He first +looked at the coin, then tested it between his teeth, then spat on +it, and finally went off chuckling.</p> +<p>The first and second bells rang. I grudged every moment of delay +before the steamer sailed, for I still felt like a prisoner who was +running away and might even yet be brought back.</p> +<p>Seating myself in the darkest corner of the cabin, I waited and +watched. There were only two other steerage passengers and they +were women. Judging by their conversation I concluded that they +were cooks from lodging-houses on "the front," returning after a +long season to their homes in Liverpool. Both were very tired, and +they were spreading their blankets on the bare bunks so as to +settle themselves for the night.</p> +<p>At last the third bell rang. I heard the engine whistle, the +funnel belch out its smoke, the hawsers being thrown off, the +gangways being taken in, and then, looking through the porthole, I +saw the grey pier gliding behind us.</p> +<p>After a few moments, with a feeling of safety and a sense of +danger passed, I went up on deck. But oh, how little I knew what +bitter pain I was putting myself to!</p> +<p>We were just then swinging round the lighthouse which stands on +the south-east headland of the bay, and the flash of its revolving +light in my face as I reached the top of the cabin stairs brought +back the memory of the joyous and tumultuous scenes of Martin's +last departure.</p> +<p>That, coupled and contrasted with the circumstances of my own +flight, stealthily, shamefully, and in the dead of night, gave me a +pang that was almost more than I could bear.</p> +<p>But my cup was not yet full. A few minutes afterwards we sailed +in the dark past the two headlands of Port Raa, and, looking up, I +saw the lights in the windows of my husband's house, and the glow +over the glass roof of the pavilion.</p> +<p>What would happen there to-morrow morning when it was discovered +that I was gone? What would happen to-morrow night when my father +arrived, ignorant of my flight, as I felt sure the malice of my +husband would keep him?</p> +<p>Little as I knew then of my father's real motives in giving that +bizarre and rather vulgar entertainment, I thought I saw and heard +everything that would occur.</p> +<p>I saw the dazzling spectacle, I saw the five hundred guests, I +saw Alma and my husband, and above all I saw my father, the old man +stricken with mortal maladies, the wounded lion whom the shadow of +death itself could not subdue, degraded to the dust in his hour of +pride by the act of his own child.</p> +<p>I heard his shouts of rage, his cries of fury, his imprecations +on me as one who should never touch a farthing of his fortune. And +then I heard the whispering of his "friends," who were telling the +"true story" of my disappearance, the tale of my "treacheries" to +my husband—just as if Satan had willed it that the only +result of the foolish fête on which my father had wasted his +wealth like water should be the publication of my shame.</p> +<p>But the bitterest part of my experience was still to come. In a +few minutes we sailed past the headlands of Port Raa, the lights of +my husband's house shot out of view like meteors on a murky night, +and the steamer turned her head to the open sea.</p> +<p>I was standing by a rope which crossed the bow and holding on to +it to save myself from falling, for, being alone with Nature at +last, I was seeing my flight for the first time in full light.</p> +<p>I was telling myself that as surely as my flight became known +Martin's name would be linked with mine, and the honour that was +dearer to me than, my own would be buried in disgrace.</p> +<p>O God! O God! Why should Nature be so hard and cruel to a woman? +Why should it be permitted that, having done no worse than obey the +purest impulses of my heart, the iron law of my sex should rise up +to condemn both me and the one who was dearer to my soul than life +itself?</p> +<p>I hardly know how long I stood there, holding on to that rope. +There was no sound now except the tread of a sailor in his heavy +boots, an inarticulate call from the bridge, an answering shout +from the wheel, the rattling of the wind in the rigging, the +throbbing of the engine in the bowels of the ship, and the +monotonous wash of the waves against her side.</p> +<p>Oh, how little I felt, how weak, how helpless!</p> +<p>I looked up towards the sky, but there seemed to be no sky, no +moon, and no stars, only a vaporous blackness that came down and +closed about me.</p> +<p>I looked out to the sea, but there seemed to be no sea, only a +hissing splash of green spray where the steamer's forward light +fell on the water which her bow was pitching up, and beyond that +nothing but a threatening and thundering void.</p> +<p>I did not weep, but I felt as other women had felt before me, as +other women have felt since, as women must always feel after they +have sinned against the world and the world's law, that there was +nothing before me but the blackness of night.</p> +<p>"Out of the depths I cry unto thee, O Lord. Lord, hear my +cry."</p> +<p>But all at once a blessed thought came to me. We were travelling +eastward, and dark as the night was now, in a few hours the day +would dawn, the sun would shine in our faces and the sky would +smile over our heads!</p> +<p>It would be like that with me. Martin would come back. I was +only going to meet him. It was dark midnight with me now, but I was +sailing into the sunrise!</p> +<p>Perhaps I was like a child, but I think that comforted me.</p> +<p>At all events I went down to the little triangular cabin with a +cheerful heart, forgetting that I was a runaway, a homeless +wanderer, an outcast, with nothing before me but the wilderness of +London where I should be friendless and alone.</p> +<p>The fire had gone out by this time, the oil-lamp was swinging to +the motion of the ship, the timbers were creaking, and the +Liverpool women were asleep.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"SEVENTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>SEVENTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At eight o'clock next morning I was in the train leaving +Liverpool for London.</p> +<p>I had selected a second-class compartment labelled "For Ladies," +and my only travelling companion was a tall fair woman, in a +seal-skin coat and a very large black hat. She had filled the +carriage with the warm odour of eau-de-Cologne and the racks on +both sides with her luggage, which chiefly consisted of ladies' hat +boxes of various shapes and sizes.</p> +<p>Hardly had we started when I realised that she was a very +loquacious and expansive person.</p> +<p>Was I going all the way? Yes? Did I live in Liverpool? No? In +London perhaps? No? Probably I lived in the country? Yes? That was +charming, the country being so lovely.</p> +<p>I saw in a moment that if my flight was to be carried out to any +purpose I should have to conceal my identity; but how to do so I +did not know, my conscience never before having had to accuse me of +deliberate untruth.</p> +<p>Accident helped me. My companion asked me what was my husband's +profession, and being now accustomed to think of Martin as my real +husband, I answered that he was a commander.</p> +<p>"You mean the commander of a ship?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Ah, yes, you've been staying in Liverpool to see him off on a +voyage. How sweet! Just what I should do myself if my husband were +a sailor."</p> +<p>Then followed a further battery of perplexing questions.</p> +<p>Had my husband gone on a long voyage? Yes? Where to? The South. +Did I mean India, Australia, New Zealand? Yes, and still +farther.</p> +<p>"Ah, I see," she said again. "He's probably the captain of a +tramp steamer, and will go from port to port as long as he can find +a cargo."</p> +<p>Hardly understanding what my companion meant by this, I half +agreed to it, and then followed a volley of more personal +inquiries.</p> +<p>I was young to be married, wasn't I? Probably I hadn't been +married very long, had I? And not having settled myself in a home +perhaps I was going up to London to wait for my husband? Yes? How +wise—town being so much more cheerful than the country.</p> +<p>"Any friends there?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"None whatever?"</p> +<p>"None whatever."</p> +<p>"But won't you be lonely by yourself in London?"</p> +<p>"A little lonely perhaps."</p> +<p>Being satisfied that she had found out everything about me, my +travelling companion (probably from the mere love of talking) told +me something about herself.</p> +<p>She was a fashionable milliner and had a shop in the West End of +London. Occasionally she made personal visits to the provinces to +take orders from the leading shopkeepers, but during the season she +found it more profitable to remain in town, where her connection +was large, among people who could pay the highest prices.</p> +<p>By this time we had reached Crewe, and as there was some delay +in getting into the station, my travelling companion put her head +out of the window to inquire the cause. She was told that a night +train from Scotland was in front of us, and we should have to be +coupled on to it before we could proceed to London.</p> +<p>This threw her into the wildest state of excitement.</p> +<p>"I see what it is," she said. "The shooting season is over and +the society people are coming down from the moors. I know lots and +lots of them. They are my best customers—the gentlemen at all +events."</p> +<p>"The gentlemen?"</p> +<p>"Why, yes," she said with a little laugh.</p> +<p>After some shunting our Liverpool carriages were coupled to the +Scotch train and run into the station, where a number of gentlemen +in knickerbockers and cloth caps were strolling about the +platform.</p> +<p>My companion seemed to know them all, and gave them their names, +generally their Christian names, and often their familiar ones.</p> +<p>Suddenly I had a shock. A tall man, whose figure I recognised, +passed close by our carriage, and I had only time to conceal myself +from observation behind the curtain of the window.</p> +<p>"Helloa!" cried my companion. "There's Teddy Eastcliff. He +married Camilla, the Russian dancer. They first met in my shop I +may tell you."</p> +<p>I was feeling hot and cold by turns, but a thick veil must have +hidden my confusion, for after we left Crewe my companion, becoming +still more confidential, talked for a long time about her +aristocratic customers, and I caught a glimpse of a life that was +on the verge of a kind of fashionable Bohemia.</p> +<p>More than once I recognised my husband's friends among the +number of her clients, and trembling lest my husband himself should +become a subject of discussion, I, made the excuse of a headache to +close my eyes and be silent.</p> +<p>My companion thereupon slept, very soundly and rather audibly, +from Rugby to Willesden, where, awakening with a start while the +tickets were being collected, she first powdered her face by her +fashion-glass and then interested herself afresh in my affairs.</p> +<p>"Did you say, my dear, that you have no friends in London?"</p> +<p>I repeated that I had none.</p> +<p>"Then you will go to an hotel, I suppose?"</p> +<p>I answered that I should have to look for something less +expensive.</p> +<p>"In that case," she said, "I think I know something that will +suit you exactly."</p> +<p>It was a quiet boarding establishment in +Bloomsbury—comfortable house, reasonable terms, and, above +all, perfectly respectable. In fact, it was kept by her own sister, +and if I liked she would take me along in her cab and drop me at +the door. Should she?</p> +<p>Looking back at that moment I cannot but wonder that after what +I had heard I did not fear discovery. But during the silence of the +last hour I had been feeling more than ever weak and helpless, so +that when my companion offered me a shelter in that great, noisy, +bewildering city in which I had intended to hide myself, but now +feared I might be submerged and lost, with a willing if not a +cheerful heart I accepted.</p> +<p>Half an hour afterwards our cab drew up in a street off Russell +Square at a rather grimy-looking house which stood at the corner of +another and smaller square that was shut off by an iron +railing.</p> +<p>The door was opened by a young waiter of sixteen or seventeen +years, who was wearing a greasy dress-suit and a soiled shirt +front.</p> +<p>My companion pushed into the hall, I followed her, and almost at +the same moment a still larger and perhaps grosser woman than my +friend, with the same features and complexion, came out of a room +to the left with, a serviette in her hand.</p> +<p>"Sophie!"</p> +<p>"Jane!" cried my companion, and pointing to me she said:</p> +<p>"I've brought you a new boarder."</p> +<p>Then followed a rapid account of where she had met me, who and +what I was, and why I had come up to London.</p> +<p>"I've promised you'll take her in and not charge her too much, +you know."</p> +<p>"Why, no, certainly not," said the sister.</p> +<p>At the next moment the boy waiter was bringing, my trunk into +the house on his shoulder and my travelling companion was bidding +me good-bye and saying she would look me up later.</p> +<p>When the door was closed I found the house full of the smell of +hot food, chiefly roast beef and green vegetables, and I could hear +the clink of knives and forks and the clatter of dishes in the room +the landlady had come from.</p> +<p>"You'd like to go up to your bedroom at once, wouldn't you?" she +said.</p> +<p>We went up two flights of stairs covered with rather dirty +druggeting, along a corridor that had a thin strip of linoleum, and +finally up a third flight that was bare to the boards, until we +came to a room which seemed to be at the top of the house and +situated in its remotest corner.</p> +<p>It was a very small apartment, hardly larger than the room over +the hall at home in which Aunt Bridget had made me sleep when I was +a child, and it was nearly as cold and cheerless.</p> +<p>The wall-paper, which had once been a flowery pink, was now pale +and patternless; the Venetian blind over the window (which looked +out on the smaller square) had lost one of its cords and hung at an +irregular angle; there was a mirror over the mantelpiece with the +silvering much mottled, and a leather-covered easy chair whereof +the spring was broken and the seat heavily indented.</p> +<p>"I dare say this will do for the present," said my landlady, and +though my heart was in my mouth I compelled myself to agree.</p> +<p>"My terms, including meals and all extras, will be a pound a +week," she added, and to that also, with a lump in my throat I +assented, whereupon my landlady left me, saying luncheon was on and +I could come downstairs when I was ready.</p> +<p>A talkative cockney chambermaid, with a good little face, +brought me a fat blue jug of hot water, and after I had washed and +combed I found my way down to the dining-room.</p> +<p>What I expected to find there I hardly know. What I did find was +a large chamber, as dingy as the rest of the house, and as much in +need of refreshing, with a long table down the middle, at which +some twenty persons sat eating, with the landlady presiding at the +top.</p> +<p>The company, who were of both sexes and chiefly elderly, seemed +to me at that first sight to be dressed in every variety of +out-of-date clothes, many of them rather shabby and some almost +grotesque.</p> +<p>Raising their faces from their plates they looked at me as I +entered, and I was so confused that I stood hesitating near the +door until the landlady called to me.</p> +<p>"Come up here," she said, and when I had done so, and taken the +seat by her side, which had evidently been reserved for me, she +whispered:</p> +<p>"I don't think my sister mentioned your name, my dear. What is +it?"</p> +<p>I had no time to deliberate.</p> +<p>"O'Neill," I whispered back, and thereupon my landlady, raising +her voice, and addressing the company as if they had been members +of her family, said:</p> +<p>"Mrs. O'Neill, my dears."</p> +<p>Then the ladies at the table inclined their heads at me and +smiled, while the men (especially those who were the most strangely +dressed) rose from their seats and bowed deeply.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTIETH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTIETH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTIETH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Of all houses in London this, I thought, was the least suitable +to me.</p> +<p>Looking down the table I told myself that it must be the very +home of idle gossip and the hot-bed of tittle-tattle.</p> +<p>I was wrong. Hardly had I been in the house a day when I +realised that my fellow-guests were the most reserved and +self-centred of all possible people.</p> +<p>One old gentleman who wore a heavy moustache, and had been a +colonel in the Indian army, was understood to be a student of +Biblical prophecy, having collected some thousands of texts which +established the identity of the British nation with the lost tribes +of Israel.</p> +<p>Another old gentleman, who wore a patriarchal beard and had +taken orders without securing a living, was believed to be writing +a history of the world and (after forty years of continuous labour) +to have reached the century before Christ.</p> +<p>An elderly lady with a benign expression was said to be a tragic +actress who was studying in secret for a season at the National +Theatre.</p> +<p>Such, and of such kind, were my house-mates; and I have since +been told that every great city has many such groups of people, the +great prophets, the great historians, the great authors, the great +actors whom the world does not know—the odds and ends of +humanity, thrown aside by the rushing river of life into the +gulley-ways that line its banks, the odd brothers, the odd sisters, +the odd uncles, the odd aunts, for whom there is no place in the +family, in society, or in the business of the world.</p> +<p>It was all very curious and pathetic, yet I think I should have +been safe, for a time at all events, in this little corner of +London into which chance had so strangely thrown me, but for one +unfortunate happening.</p> +<p>That was the arrival of the daily newspaper.</p> +<p>There was never more than a single copy. It came at eight in the +morning and was laid on the dining-room mantelpiece, from which (by +an unwritten law of the house) it was the duty as well as the +honour of the person who had first finished breakfast to take it up +and read the most startling part of the news to the rest of the +company.</p> +<p>Thus it occurred that on the third morning after my arrival I +was startled by the voice of the old colonel, who, standing back to +the fire, with the newspaper in his hand, cried:</p> +<p>"Mysterious Disappearance of a Peeress."</p> +<p>"Read it," said the old clergyman.</p> +<p>The tea-cup which I was raising to my mouth trembled in my hand, +and when I set it down it rattled against the saucer. I knew what +was coming, and it came.</p> +<p>The old colonel read:</p> +<p>"<i>A telegram from Blackwater announces the mysterious +disappearance of the young wife of Lord Raa, which appears to have +taken place late on Thursday night or in the early hours of Friday +morning</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>It will be remembered that the missing lady was married a +little more than a year ago, and her disappearance is the more +unaccountable from the fact that during the past month she has been +actively occupied in preparing for a fête in honour of her +return home after a long and happy honeymoon</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>The pavilion in which the fête was to have been held +had been erected on a headland between Castle Raa and a precipitous +declivity to the sea, and the only reasonable conjecture is that +the unhappy lady, going out on Thursday night to superintend the +final preparations, lost her way in the darkness and fell over the +cliffs</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>The fact that the hostess was missing was not generally +known in Ellan until the guests had begun to arrive for the +reception on Friday evening, when the large assembly broke up in +great confusion</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Naturally much sympathy is felt for the grief-stricken +husband</i>."</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>After the colonel had finished reading I had an almost +irresistible impulse to scream, feeling sure that the moment my +house-mates looked into my face they must see that I was the person +indicated.</p> +<p>They did not look, and after a chorus of exclamations ("Most +mysterious!" "What can have become of her?" "On the eve of her +fête too!") they began to discuss disappearances in general, +each illustrating his point by reference to the subject of his own +study.</p> +<p>"Perfectly extraordinary how people disappear nowadays," said +one.</p> +<p>"Extraordinary, sir?" said the old colonel, looking over his +spectacles, "why should it be extraordinary that one person should +disappear when whole nations—the ten tribes for example. . . +."</p> +<p>"But that's a different thing altogether," said the old +clergyman. "Now if you had quoted Biblical examples—Elisha or +perhaps Jonah. . . ."</p> +<p>After the discussion had gone on for several minutes in this way +I rose from the table on my trembling limbs and slipped out of the +room.</p> +<p>It would take long to tell of the feverish days that +followed—how newspaper correspondents were sent from London +to Ellan to inquire into the circumstances of my disappearance; how +the theory of accident gave place to the theory of suicide, and the +theory of suicide to the theory of flight; how a porter on the pier +at Blackwater said he had carried my trunk to the steamer that +sailed on Thursday midnight, thinking I was a maid from the great +house until I had given him half-a-crown (his proper fee being +threepence); how two female passengers had declared that a person +answering to my description had sailed with them to Liverpool; how +these clues had been followed up and had led to nothing; and how, +finally, the correspondents had concluded the whole incident of my +disappearance could not be more mysterious if I had been dropped +from mid-air into the middle of the Irish Sea.</p> +<p>But then came another development.</p> +<p>My father, who was reported to have received the news of my +departure in a way that suggested he had lost control of his senses +(raging and storming at my husband like a man demented), having +come to the conclusion that I, being in a physical condition +peculiar to women, had received a serious shock resulting in a loss +of memory, offered five hundred pounds reward for information that +would lead to my discovery, which was not only desirable to allay +the distress of my heart-broken family but urgently necessary to +settle important questions of title and inheritance.</p> +<p>With this offer of a reward came a description of my personal +appearance.</p> +<p><i>"Age 20, a little under medium height; slight; very black +hair; lustrous dark eyes; regular features; pale face; grave +expression; unusually sunny smile."</i></p> +<p>It would be impossible for me to say with what perturbation I +heard these reports read out by the old colonel and the old +clergyman. Even the nervous stirring of my spoon and the agitated +clatter of my knife and fork made me wonder that my house-mates did +not realise the truth, which must I thought, be plainly evident to +all eyes.</p> +<p>They never did, being so utterly immersed in their own theories. +But all the same I sometimes felt as if my fellow guests in that +dingy house in Bloomsbury were my judges and jury, and more than +once, in my great agitation, when the reports came near to the +truth, I wanted to cry. "Stop, stop, don't you see it is I?"</p> +<p>That I never did so was due to the fact that, not knowing what +legal powers my father might have to compel my return to Ellan, the +terror that sat on me like a nightmare was that of being made the +subject of a public quarrel between my father and my husband, +concerning the legitimacy of my unborn child, with the shame and +disgrace which that would bring not only upon me but upon +Martin.</p> +<p>I had some reason for this fear.</p> +<p>After my father's offer of a reward there came various spiteful +paragraphs (inspired, as I thought, by Alma and written by the +clumsier hand of my husband) saying it was reported in Ellan that, +if my disappearance was to be accounted for on the basis of flight, +the only "shock" I could have experienced must be a shock of +conscience, rumour having for some time associated my name with +that of a person who was not unknown in connection with Antarctic +exploration.</p> +<p>It was terrible.</p> +<p>Day by day the motive of my disappearance became the sole topic +of conversation in our boarding-house. I think the landlady must +have provided an evening as well as a morning paper, for at tea in +the drawing-room upstairs the most recent reports were always being +discussed.</p> +<p>After a while I realised that not only my house-mates but all +London was discussing my disappearance.</p> +<p>It was a rule of our boarding-house that during certain hours of +the day everybody should go out as if he had business to go to, and +having nothing else to do I used to walk up and down the streets. +In doing so I was compelled to pass certain newsvendors' stalls, +and I saw for several days that nearly every placard had something +about "the missing peeress."</p> +<p>When this occurred I would walk quickly along the thoroughfare +with a sense of being pursued and the feeling which a nervous woman +has when she is going down a dark corridor at night—that +noiseless footsteps are coming behind, and a hand may at any moment +be laid on her shoulder.</p> +<p>But nobody troubled me in the streets and the only person in our +boarding-house who seemed to suspect me was our landlady. She said +nothing, but when my lip was quivering while the old colonel read +that cruel word about Martin I caught her little grey eyes looking +aslant at me.</p> +<p>One afternoon, her sister, the milliner, came to see me +according to her promise, and though she, too, said nothing, I saw +that, while the old colonel and the old clergyman were disputing on +the hearthrug about some disappearance which occurred thousands of +years ago, she was looking fixedly at the fingers with which, in my +nervousness, I was ruckling up the discoloured chintz of my +chair.</p> +<p>Then in a moment—I don't know why—it flashed upon me +that my travelling companion was in correspondence with my +father.</p> +<p>That idea became so insistent towards dinner-time that I made +pretence of being ill (which was not very difficult) to retire to +my room, where the cockney chambermaid wrung handkerchiefs out of +vinegar and laid them on my forehead to relieve my +headache—though she increased it, poor thing, by talking +perpetually.</p> +<p>Next morning the landlady came up to say that if, as she assumed +from my name, I was Irish and a Catholic, I might like to receive a +visit from a Sister of Mercy who called at the house at intervals +to attend to the sick.</p> +<p>I thought I saw in a moment that this was a subterfuge, but +feeling that my identity was suspected I dared not give cause for +further suspicion, so I compelled myself to agree.</p> +<p>A few minutes later, having got up and dressed, I was standing +with my back to the window, feeling like one who would soon have to +face an attack, when a soft footstep came up my corridor and a +gentle hand knocked at my door.</p> +<p>"Come in," I cried, trembling like the last leaf at the end of a +swinging bough.</p> +<p>And then an astonishing thing happened.</p> +<p>A young woman stepped quietly into the room and closed the door +behind her. She was wearing the black and white habit of the Little +Sisters of the Poor, but I knew her long, pale, plain-featured face +in an instant.</p> +<p>A flood of shame, and at the same time a flood of joy swept over +me at the sight of her.</p> +<p>It was Mildred Bankes.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>"Mary," said Mildred, "speak low and tell me everything."</p> +<p>She sat in my chair, I knelt by her side, took one of her hands +in both of mine, and told her.</p> +<p>I told her that I had fled from my husband's house because I +could not bear to remain there any longer.</p> +<p>I told her that my father had married me against my will, in +spite of my protests, when I was a child, and did not know that I +had any right to resist him.</p> +<p>I told her that my father—God forgive me if I did him a +wrong—did not love me, that he had sacrificed my happiness to +his lust of power, and that if he were searching for me now it was +only because my absence disturbed his plans and hurt his pride.</p> +<p>I told her that my husband did not love me either, and that he +had married me from the basest motives, merely to pay his debts and +secure an income.</p> +<p>I told her, too, that not only did my husband not love me, but +he loved somebody else, that he had been cruel and brutal to me, +and therefore (for these and other reasons) I could not return to +him under any circumstances.</p> +<p>While I was speaking I felt Mildred's hand twitching between +mine, and when I had finished she said:</p> +<p>"But, my dear child, they told me your friends were +broken-hearted about you; that you had lost your memory and perhaps +your reason, and therefore it would be a good act to help them to +send you home."</p> +<p>"It's not true, it's not true," I said.</p> +<p>And then in a low voice, as if afraid of being overheard, she +told me how she came to be there—that the woman who had +travelled with me in the train from Liverpool, seeing my father's +offer of a reward, had written to him to say that she knew where I +was and only needed somebody to establish my identity; that my +father wished to come to London for this purpose, but had been +forbidden by his doctor; that our parish priest, Father Donovan, +had volunteered to come instead, but had been prohibited by his +Bishop; and finally that my father had written to his lawyers in +London, and Father Dan to her, knowing that she and I had been +together at the Sacred Heart in Rome, and that it was her work now +to look after lost ones and send them safely back to their +people.</p> +<p>"And now the lawyer and the doctors are downstairs," she said in +a whisper, "and they are only waiting for me to say who you are +that they may apply for an order to send you home."</p> +<p>This terrified me so much that I made a fervent appeal to +Mildred to save me.</p> +<p>"Oh, Mildred, save me, save me," I cried.</p> +<p>"But how can I? how can I?" she asked.</p> +<p>I saw what she meant, and thinking to touch her still more +deeply I told her the rest of my story.</p> +<p>I told her that if I had fled from my husband's house it was not +merely because he had been cruel and brutal to me, but because I, +too, loved somebody else—somebody who was far away but was +coming back, and there was nothing I could not bear for him in the +meantime, no pain or suffering or loneliness, and when he returned +he would protect me from every danger, and we should love each +other eternally.</p> +<p>If I had not been so wildly agitated I should have known that +this was the wrong way with Mildred, and it was not until I had +said it all in a rush of whispered words that I saw her eyes fixed +on me as if they were about to start from their sockets.</p> +<p>"But, my dear, dear child," she said, "this is worse and worse. +Your father and your husband may have done wrong, but you have done +wrong too. Don't you see you have?"</p> +<p>I did not tell her that I had thought of all that before, and +did not believe any longer that God would punish me for breaking a +bond I had been forced to make. But when she was about to rise, +saying that after all it would be a good thing to send me home +before I had time to join my life to his—whoever he +was—who had led me to forget my duty as a wife, I held her +trembling hands and whispered:</p> +<p>"Wait, Mildred. There is something I have not told you even +yet."</p> +<p>"What is it?" she asked, but already I could see that she knew +what I was going to say.</p> +<p>"Mildred," I said, "if I ran away from my husband it was not +merely because I loved somebody else, but because. . . ."</p> +<p>I could not say it. Do what I would I could not. But holy women +like Mildred, who spend their lives among the lost ones, have a way +of reading a woman's heart when it is in trouble, and Mildred read +mine.</p> +<p>"Do you mean that . . . that there are consequences . . . going +to be?" she whispered.</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Does your husband know?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"And your father?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>Mildred drew her hand away from me and crossed herself, saying +beneath her breath:</p> +<p>"Oh Mother of my God!"</p> +<p>I felt more humbled than I had ever been before, but after a +while I said:</p> +<p>"Now you see why I can never go back. And you will save me, will +you not?"</p> +<p>There was silence for some moments. Mildred had drawn back in +her chair as if an evil spirit had passed between us But at length +she said:</p> +<p>"It is not for me to judge you, Mary. But the gentlemen will +come up soon to know if you are the Mary O'Neill whom I knew at the +Sacred Heart, and what am I to say to them?"</p> +<p>"Say no," I cried. "Why shouldn't you? They'll never know +anything to the contrary. Nobody will know."</p> +<p>"Nobody?"</p> +<p>I knew what Mildred meant, and in my shame and confusion I tried +to excuse myself by telling her who the other woman was.</p> +<p>"It is Alma," I said.</p> +<p>"Alma? Alma Lier?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>And then I told her how Alma had come back into my life, how she +had tortured and tempted me, and was now trying to persuade my +husband, who was a Protestant, to divorce me that she might take my +place.</p> +<p>And then I spoke of Martin again—I could not help +it—saying that the shame which Alma would bring on him would +be a greater grief to me than anything else that could befall me in +this world.</p> +<p>"If you only knew who he is," I said, "and the honour he is held +in, you would know that I would rather die a thousand deaths than +that any disgrace should fall on him through me."</p> +<p>I could see that Mildred was deeply moved at this, and though I +did not intend to play upon her feelings, yet in the selfishness of +my great love I could not help doing so.</p> +<p>"You were the first of my girl friends, Mildred—the very +first. Don't you remember the morning after I arrived at school? +They had torn me away from my mother, and I was so little and +lonely, but you were so sweet and kind. You took me into church for +my first visitation, and then into the garden for my first +rosary—don't you remember it?"</p> +<p>Mildred had closed her eyes. Her face was becoming very +white.</p> +<p>"And then don't you remember the day the news came that my +mother was very ill, and I was to go home? You came to see me off +at the station, and don't you remember what you said when we were +sitting in the train? You said we might never meet again, because +our circumstances would be so different. You didn't think we should +meet like this, did you?"</p> +<p>Mildred's face was growing deadly white.</p> +<p>"My darling mother died. She was all I had in the world and I +was all she had, and when she was gone there was no place for me in +my father's house, so I was sent back to school. But the Reverend +Mother was very kind to me, and the end of it was that I wished to +become a nun. Yes indeed, and never so much as on the day you took +your vows."</p> +<p>Mildred's eyes were still closed, but her eyelids were +fluttering and she was breathing audibly.</p> +<p>"How well I remember it! The sweet summer morning and the +snow-white sunshine, and the white flowers and the white chapel of +the Little Sisters, and then you dressed as a bride in your white +gown and long white veil. I cried all through the ceremony. And if +my father had not come for me then, perhaps I should have been a +nun like you now."</p> +<p>Mildred's lips were moving. I was sure she was praying to our +Lady for strength to resist my pleading, yet that only made me +plead the harder.</p> +<p>"But God knows best what our hearts are made for," I said. "He +knows that mine was made for love. And though you may not think it +I know God knows that he who is away is my real husband—not +the one they married me to. You will not separate us, will you? All +our happiness—his and mine—is in your hands. You will +save us, will you not?"</p> +<p>Some time passed before Mildred spoke. It may have been only a +few moments, but to me it seemed like an eternity. I did not know +then that Mildred was reluctant to extinguish the last spark of +hope in me. At length she said:</p> +<p>"Mary, you don't know what you are asking me to do. When I took +my vows I promised to speak the truth under all circumstances, no +matter what the consequences, as surely as I should answer to God +at the great Day of Judgment. Yet you wish me to lie. How can I? +How can I? Remember my vows, my duty."</p> +<p>I think the next few minutes must have been the most evil of all +my life. When I saw, or thought I saw, that, though one word would +save me, one little word, Mildred intended to give me away to the +men downstairs, I leapt to my feet and burst out on her with the +bitterest reproaches.</p> +<p>"You religious women are always talking about your duty," I +cried. "You never think about love. Love is kind and merciful; but +no, duty, always duty! Love indeed! What do you cold creatures out +of the convent, with your crosses and rosaries, know about +love—real love—the blazing fire in a woman's heart when +she loves somebody so much that she would give her heart's blood +for him—yes, and her soul itself if need be."</p> +<p>What else I said I cannot remember, for I did not know what I +was doing until I found myself looking out of the window and +panting for breath.</p> +<p>Then I became aware that Mildred was making no reply to my +reproaches, and looking over my shoulder I saw that she was still +sitting in my chair with both her hands covering her face and the +tears trickling through her fingers on to the linen of her +habit.</p> +<p>That conquered me in a moment.</p> +<p>I was seized with such remorse that I wished to throw my arms +about her neck and kiss her. I dared not do that, now, but I knelt +by her side again and asked her to forgive me.</p> +<p>"Forgive me, sister," I said. "I see now that God has brought us +to this pass and there is no way out of it. You must do what you +think is right. I shall always know you couldn't have done +otherwise. <i>He</i> will know too. And if it must be that disgrace +is to fall on him through me . . . and that when he comes home he +will find. . . ."</p> +<p>But I could not bear to speak about that, so I dropped my head +on Mildred's lap.</p> +<p>During the silence that followed we heard the sound of footsteps +coming up the stairs.</p> +<p>"Listen! They're here," said Mildred. "Get up. Say nothing. +Leave everything to me."</p> +<p>I rose quickly and returned to the window. Mildred dried her +eyes, got up from the chair and stood with her back to the +fire-place.</p> +<p>There was a knock at my door. I do not know which of us answered +it, but my landlady came into the room, followed by three men in +tall silk hats.</p> +<p>"Excuse us, my dear," she said, in an insincere voice. "These +gentlemen are making an examination of the house, and they wish to +see your room. May they?"</p> +<p>I do not think I made any reply. I was holding my breath and +watching intently. The men made a pretence of glancing round, but I +could see they were looking at Mildred. Their looks seemed to say +as plainly as words could speak:</p> +<p>"Is it she?"</p> +<p>Mildred hesitated for a moment, there was a dreadful silence and +then—may the holy Virgin bless her!—she shook her +head.</p> +<p>I could bear no more. I turned back to the window. The men, who +had looked at each other with expressions of surprise, tried to +talk together in ordinary tones as if on common place subjects.</p> +<p>"So there's nothing to do here, apparently."</p> +<p>"Apparently not."</p> +<p>"Let's go, then. Good day, Sister. Sorry to have troubled +you."</p> +<p>I heard the door close behind them. I heard their low voices as +they passed along the corridor. I heard their slow footsteps as +they went down the stairs. And then, feeling as if my heart would +burst, I turned to throw myself at Sister Mildred's feet.</p> +<p>But Sister Mildred was on her knees, with her face buried in my +bed, praying fervently.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I did not know then, and it seems unnecessary to say now, why my +father gave up the search for me in London. He did so, and from the +day the milliner's clue failed him I moved about freely.</p> +<p>Then from the sense of being watched I passed into that of being +lost.</p> +<p>Sister Mildred was my only friend in London, but she was +practically cut off from me. The Little Sisters had fixed her up +(in the interests of her work among the lost ones) in a tiny flat +at the top of a lofty building near Piccadilly, where her lighted +window always reminded me of a lighthouse on the edge of a +dangerous reef. But in giving me her address she warned me not to +come to her except in case of urgent need partly because further +intercourse might discredit her denial, and partly because it would +not be good for me to be called "one of Sister Veronica's +girls"—that being Mildred's name as a nun.</p> +<p>Oh the awful loneliness of London!</p> +<p>Others just as friendless have wandered in the streets of the +big city. I knew I was not the first, and I am sure I have not been +the last to find London the most solitary place in the world. But I +really and truly think there was one day of the week when, from +causes peculiar to my situation, my loneliness must have been +deeper than that of the most friendless refugee.</p> +<p>Nearly every boarder in our boarding-house used to receive once +a week or once a month a letter containing a remittance from some +unknown source, with which he paid his landlady and discharged his +other obligations.</p> +<p>I had no such letter to receive, so to keep up the character I +had not made but allowed myself to maintain (of being a commander's +wife) I used to go out once a week under pretence of calling at a +shipping office to draw part of my husband's pay.</p> +<p>In my childish ignorance of the habits of business people I +selected Saturday afternoon for this purpose; and in my fear of +encountering my husband, or my husband's friends in the West End +streets, I chose the less conspicuous thoroughfares at the other +side of the river.</p> +<p>Oh, the wearisome walks I had on Saturday afternoons, wet or +dry, down the Seven Dials, across Trafalgar Square, along +Whitehall, round the eastern end of the Houses of Parliament, and +past Westminster Pier (dear to me from one poignant memory), and so +on and on into the monotonous and inconspicuous streets beyond.</p> +<p>Towards nightfall I would return, generally by the footway +across Hungerford Bridge, which is thereby associated with the most +painful moments of my life, for nowhere else did I feel quite so +helpless and so lonely.</p> +<p>The trains out of Charing Cross shrieking past me, the dark +river flowing beneath, the steamers whistling under the bridge, the +automobiles tooting along the Embankment, the clanging of the +electric cars, the arc lamps burning over the hotels and the open +flares blazing over the theatres—all the never-resting life +of London—and myself in the midst of the tumultuous solitude, +a friendless and homeless girl.</p> +<p>But God in His mercy saved me from all that—saved me too, +in ways in which it was only possible to save a woman.</p> +<p>The first way was through my vanity.</p> +<p>Glancing at myself in my mottled mirror one morning I was +shocked to see that what with my loneliness and my weary walks I +was losing my looks, for my cheeks were hollow, my nose was +pinched, my eyes were heavy with dark rings underneath them, and I +was plainer than Martin had ever seen me.</p> +<p>This frightened me.</p> +<p>It would be ridiculous to tell all the foolish things I did +after that to improve and preserve my appearance for Martin's sake, +because every girl whose sweetheart is away knows quite well, and +it is not important that anybody else should.</p> +<p>There was a florist's shop in Southampton Row, and I went there +every morning for a little flower which I wore in the breast of my +bodice, making believe to myself that Martin had given it to +me.</p> +<p>There was a jeweller's shop there too, and I sold my wedding +ring (having long felt as if it burnt my finger) and bought another +wedding ring with an inscription on the inside "<i>From Martin to +Mary</i>."</p> +<p>As a result of all this caressing of myself I saw after a while, +to my great joy, that my good looks were coming back; and it would +be silly to say what a thrill of delight I had when, going into the +drawing-room of our boarding-house one day, the old actress called +me "Beauty" instead of the name I had hitherto been known by.</p> +<p>The second way in which God saved me from my loneliness was +through my condition.</p> +<p>I did not yet know what angel was whispering to me out of the +physical phase I was passing through, when suddenly I became +possessed by a passion for children.</p> +<p>It was just as if a whole new world of humanity sprang into life +for me by magic. When I went out for my walks in the streets I +ceased to be conscious of the faces of men and women, and it seemed +as if London were peopled by children only.</p> +<p>I saw no more of the crowds going their different ways like ants +on an ant-hill, but I could not let a perambulator pass without +peering under the lace of the hood at the little cherub face whose +angel eyes looked up at me.</p> +<p>There was an asylum for children suffering from incurable +diseases in the smaller square beside our boarding-house, and every +morning after breakfast, no matter how cold the day might be, I +would open my window to hear the cheerful voices of the suffering +darlings singing their hymn:</p> +<p>"<i>There's a Friend for little children,<br /> +Above the bright blue sky</i>."</p> +<p>Thus six weeks passed, Christmas approached, and the sad old +city began to look glad and young and gay.</p> +<p>Since a certain night at Castle Raa I had had a vague feeling +that I had thrown myself out of the pale of the Church, therefore I +had never gone to service since I came to London, and had almost +forgotten that confession and the mass used to be sweet to me.</p> +<p>But going home one evening in the deepening London fog (for the +weather had begun to be frosty) I saw, through the open doors of a +Catholic church, a great many lights in a side chapel, and found +they were from a little illuminated model of the Nativity with the +Virgin and Child in the stable among the straw. A group of untidy +children were looking at it with bright beady eyes and chattering +under their breath, while a black-robed janitor was rattling his +keys to make them behave.</p> +<p>This brought back the memory of Rome and of Sister Angela. But +it also made me think of Martin, and remember his speech at the +public dinner, about saying the prayers for the day with his +comrades, that they might feel that they were not cut off from the +company of Christian men.</p> +<p>So telling myself he must be back by this time on that lonely +plateau that guards the Pole, I resolved (without thinking of the +difference of time) to go to mass on Christmas morning, in order to +be doing the same thing as Martin at the same moment.</p> +<p>With this in my mind I returned to our boarding-house and found +Christmas there too, for on looking into the drawing-room on my way +upstairs I saw the old actress, standing on a chair, hanging holly +which the old colonel with old-fashioned courtesy was handing up to +her.</p> +<p>They were cackling away like two old hens when they caught sight +of me, whereupon the old actress cried:</p> +<p>"Ah, here's Beauty!"</p> +<p>Then she asked me if I would like a ticket for a dress rehearsal +on Christmas Eve of a Christmas pantomime.</p> +<p>"The audience will be chiefly children out of the lanes and +alleys round about, but perhaps you won't mind that," she said.</p> +<p>I told her I should be overjoyed, and at two o'clock the +following afternoon I was in my seat at the corner of the +dress-circle of the great theatre, from which I could see both the +stage and the auditorium.</p> +<p>The vast place was packed with children from ceiling to floor, +and I could see the invisible hands of thousands of mothers who had +put the girls into clean pinafores and brushed and oiled the +tousled heads of the boys.</p> +<p>How their eager faces glistened! How sad they looked when the +wicked sisters left Cinderella alone in the kitchen! How bright +when the glittering fairy godmother came to visit her! How their +little dangling feet clapped together with joy when the pretty maid +went off to the ball behind six little ponies which pranced along +under the magical moonlight in the falling snow!</p> +<p>But the part of the performance which they liked best was their +own part when, in the interval, the band struck up one of the songs +they sang in their lanes and alleys:</p> +<p>"<i>Yew aw the enny, Oi em ther bee,<br /> +Oi'd like ter sip ther enny from those red lips yew see</i>."</p> +<p>That was so loaded with the memory of one of the happiest days +of my life (the day I went with Martin to see the <i>Scotia</i>) +that, in the yearning of the motherhood still unborn in me, I felt +as if I should like to gather the whole screaming houseful of happy +children to my breast.</p> +<p>But oh why, why, why, does not Providence warn us when we are on +the edge of tragic things?</p> +<p>The pantomime rehearsal being over I was hurrying home (for the +evening was cold, though I was so warm within) when I became aware +of a number of newsmen who were flying up from the direction of the +Strand, crying their papers at the top of their voice.</p> +<p>I did not usually listen to such people, but I was compelled to +do so now, for they were all around me.</p> +<p>"<i>Paper—third e'shen—loss of the Sco-sha</i>."</p> +<p>The cry fell on me like a thunderbolt. An indescribable terror +seized me. I felt paralysed and stood dead still. People were +buying copies of the papers, and at first I made a feeble effort to +do the same. But my voice was faint; the newsman did not hear me +and he went flying past.</p> +<p>"<i>Paper—third e'shen—reported loss of the +Sco-sha</i>."</p> +<p>After that I dared not ask for a paper. Literally I dared not. I +dared not know the truth. I dared not see the dreadful fact in +print.</p> +<p>So I began to hurry home. But as I passed through the streets, +stunned, stupefied, perspiring, feeling as if I were running away +from some malignant curse, the newsmen seemed to be pursuing me, +for they were darting out from every street.</p> +<p>"<i>Paper—third e'shen—loss of the Sco-sha</i>."</p> +<p>Faster and faster I hurried along. But the awful cry was always +ringing in my ears, behind, before, and on either side.</p> +<p>When I reached our boarding-house my limbs could scarcely +support me. I had hardly strength enough to pull the bell. And +before our young waiter had opened the door two news men, crossing +the square, were crying:</p> +<p>"<i>Paper—third edition—reported loss of the +'Scotia.'</i>"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>As I passed through the hall the old colonel and the old +clergyman were standing by the dining-room door. They were talking +excitedly, and while I was going upstairs, panting hard and holding +on by the handrail, I heard part of their conversation.</p> +<p>"Scotia was the name of the South Pole ship, wasn't it?"</p> +<p>"Certainly it was. We must send young John out for a paper."</p> +<p>Reaching my room I dropped into my chair. My faculties had so +failed me that for some minutes I was unable to think. Presently my +tired brain recalled the word "Reported" and to that my last hope +began to cling as a drowning sailor clings to a drifting spar.</p> +<p>After a while I heard some of our boarders talking on the floor +below. Opening my door and listening eagerly I heard one of them +say, in such a casual tone:</p> +<p>"Rather sad—this South Pole business, isn't it?"</p> +<p>"Yes, if it's true."</p> +<p>"Doesn't seem much doubt about that—unless there are two +ships of the same name, you know."</p> +<p>At that my heart leapt up. I had now two rafts to cling to. Just +then the gong sounded, and my anxiety compelled me to go down to +tea.</p> +<p>As I entered the drawing-room the old colonel was unfolding a +newspaper.</p> +<p>"Here we are," he was saying. "Reported loss of the +<i>Scotia</i>—Appalling Antarctic Calamity."</p> +<p>I tried to slide into the seat nearest to the door, but the old +actress made room for me on the sofa close to the tea-table.</p> +<p>"You enjoyed the rehearsal? Yes?" she whispered.</p> +<p>"Hush!" said our landlady, handing me a cup of tea, and then the +old colonel, standing back to the fire, began to read.</p> +<p>"<i>Telegrams from New Zealand report the picking up of large +fragments of a ship which were floating from the Antarctic seas. +Among them were the bulwarks, some portions of the deck cargo, and +the stern of a boat, bearing the name 'Scotia.'</i></p> +<p>"<i>Grave fears are entertained that these fragments belong to +the schooner of the South Pole expedition, which left Akaroa a few +weeks ago, and the character of some of the remnants (being vital +parts of a ship's structure) lead to the inference that the vessel +herself must have foundered</i>."</p> +<p>"Well, well," said the old clergyman, with his mouth full of +buttered toast.</p> +<p>The walls of the room seemed to be moving around me. I could +scarcely see; I could scarcely hear.</p> +<p>"<i>Naturally there can be no absolute certainty that the +'Scotia' may not be still afloat, or that the members of the +expedition may not have reached a place of safety, but the presence +of large pieces of ice attached to some of the fragments seem to +the best authorities to favour the theory that the unfortunate +vessel was struck by one of the huge icebergs which have lately +been floating up from the direction of the Admiralty Mountains, and +in that case her fate will probably remain one of the many +insoluble mysteries of the ocean</i>."</p> +<p>"Now that's what one might call the irony of fate," said the old +clergyman, "seeing that the object of the expedition . . ."</p> +<p>"Hush!"</p> +<p><i>"While the sympathy of the public will be extended to the +families of all the explorers who have apparently perished in a +brave effort to protect mankind from one of the worst dangers of +the great deep, the entire world will mourn the loss (as we fear it +may be) of the heroic young Commander, Doctor Martin Conrad, who +certainly belonged to the ever-diminishing race of dauntless and +intrepid souls who seem to be born will that sacred courage which +leads men to render up their lives at the lure of the Unknown and +the call of a great idea."</i></p> +<p>I felt as if I were drowning. At one moment there was the +shrieking of waves about my face; at the next the rolling of +billows over my head.</p> +<p><i>"Though it seems only too certain . . . this sacred courage +quenched . . . let us not think such lives as his are wasted . . . +only wasted lives . . . lives given up . . . inglorious ease . . . +pursuit of idle amusements. . . . Therefore let loved ones left +behind . . . take comfort . . . inspiring thought . . . if lost . . +. not died in vain . . . Never pleasure but Death . . . the lure +that draws true hearts. . . ."</i></p> +<p>I heard no more. The old colonel's voice, which had been beating +on my brain like a hammer, seemed to die away in the distance.</p> +<p>"How hard you are breathing. What is amiss?" said our +landlady.</p> +<p>I made no reply. Rising to my feet I became giddy and held on to +the table cloth to prevent myself from falling.</p> +<p>The landlady jumped up to protect her crockery and at the same +moment the old actress led me from the room. I excused myself on +the ground of faintness, and the heat of the house after my quick +walk home from the theatre.</p> +<p>Back in my bedroom my limbs gave way and I sank to the floor +with my head on the chair. There was no uncertainty for me now. It +was all over. The great love which had engrossed my life had +gone.</p> +<p>In the overwhelming shock of that moment I could not think of +the world's loss. I could not even think of Martin's. I could only +think of my own, and once more I felt as if something of myself had +been torn out of my breast.</p> +<p>"Why? Why?" I was crying in the depths of my heart—why, +when I was so utterly alone, so helpless and so friendless, had the +light by which I lived been quenched.</p> +<p>After a while the gong sounded for dinner. I got up and lay on +the bed. The young waiter brought up some dishes on a tray. I sent +them down again. Then time passed and again I heard voices on the +floor below.</p> +<p>"Rough on that young peeress if Conrad has gone down, eh?"</p> +<p>"What peeress?"</p> +<p>"Don't you remember—the one who ran away from that +reprobate Raa?"</p> +<p>"Ah, yes, certainly. I remember now."</p> +<p>"Of course, Conrad was the man pointed at, and perhaps if he had +lived to come back he might have stood up for the poor thing, but +now. . . ."</p> +<p>"Ah, well, that's the way, you see."</p> +<p>The long night passed.</p> +<p>Sometimes it seemed to go with feet of lead, sometimes with +galloping footsteps. I remember that the clocks outside seemed to +strike every few minutes, and then not to strike at all. At one +moment I heard the bells of a neighbouring church ringing merrily, +and by that I knew it was Christmas morning.</p> +<p>I did not sleep during the first hours of night, but somewhere +in the blank reaches of that short space between night and day +(like the slack-water between ebb and flow), which is the only time +when London rests, I fell into a troubled doze.</p> +<p>I wish I had not done so, for at the first moment of returning +consciousness I had that sense, so familiar to bereaved ones, of +memory rushing over me like a surging tide. I did not cry, but I +felt as if my heart were bleeding.</p> +<p>The morning dawned dark and foggy. In the thick air of my room +the window looked at me like a human eye scaled with cataract. It +was my first experience of a real London fog and I was glad of it. +If there had been one ray of sunshine that morning I think my heart +would have broken.</p> +<p>The cockney chambermaid came with her jug of hot water and +wished me "a merry Christmas." I did my best to answer her.</p> +<p>The young waiter came with my breakfast. I told him to set it +down, but I did not touch it.</p> +<p>Then the cockney chambermaid came back to make up my room and, +finding me still in bed, asked if I would like a fire. I answered +"Yes," and while she was lighting a handful between the two bars of +my little grate she talked of the news in the newspaper.</p> +<p>"It don't do to speak no harm of the dead, but as to them men as +'ad a collusion with a iceberg in the Australier sea, serve 'em +jolly well right I say. What was they a-doing down there, risking +their lives for nothing, when they ought to have been a-thinking of +their wives and children. My Tom wanted to go for a sailor, but I +wouldn't let him! Not me! 'If you're married to a sailor,' says I, +''alf your time you never knows whether you 'as a 'usband or +'asn't.' 'Talk sense,' says Tom. 'I <i>am</i> a-talking sense,' +says I, 'and then think of the kiddies,' I says."</p> +<p>After a while I got up and dressed and sat long hours before the +fire. I tried to think of others beside myself who must be +suffering from the same disaster—especially of Martin's +mother and the good old doctor. I pictured the sweet +kitchen-parlour in Sunny Lodge, with the bright silver bowls on the +high mantelpiece. There was no fire under the <i>slouree</i> now. +The light of that house was out, and two old people were sitting on +either side of a cold hearth.</p> +<p>I passed in review my maidenhood, my marriage, and my love, and +told myself that the darkest days of my loneliness in London had +hitherto been relieved by one bright hope. I had only to live on +and Martin would come back to me. But now I was utterly alone, I +was in the presence of nothingness. The sanctuary within me where +Martin had lived was only a cemetery of the soul.</p> +<p>"Why? Why? Why?" I cried again, but there was no answer.</p> +<p>Thus I passed my Christmas Day (for which I had formed such +different plans), and I hardly knew if it was for punishment or +warning that I was at last compelled to think of something besides +my own loss.</p> +<p>My unborn child!</p> +<p>No man on earth can know anything about that tragic prospect, +though millions of women must have had to face it. To have a child +coming that is doomed before its birth to be fatherless—there +is nothing in the world like that.</p> +<p>I think the bitterest part of my grief was that nobody could +ever know. If Martin had lived he would have leapt to acknowledge +his offspring in spite of all the laws and conventions of life. But +being dead he could not be charged with it. Therefore the name of +the father of my unborn child must never, never, never be +disclosed.</p> +<p>The thickening of the fog told me that the day was passing.</p> +<p>It passed. The houses on the opposite side of the square +vanished in a vaporous, yellow haze, and their lighted windows were +like rows of bloodshot eyes looking out of the blackness.</p> +<p>Except the young waiter and the chambermaid nobody visited me +until a little before dinner time. Then the old actress came up, +rather fantastically dressed (with a kind of laurel crown on her +head), to say that the boarders were going to have a dance and +wished me to join them. I excused myself on the ground of headache, +and she said:</p> +<p>"Young women often suffer from it. It's a pity, though! +Christmas night, too!"</p> +<p>Not long after she had gone, I heard, through the frequent +tooting of the taxis in the street, the sound of old-fashioned +waltzes being played on the piano, and then a dull thudding noise +on the floor below, mingled with laughter, which told me that the +old boarders were dancing.</p> +<p>I dare say my head was becoming light. I had eaten nothing for +nearly forty hours, and perhaps the great shock which chance had +given me had brought me near to the blank shadowland which is +death.</p> +<p>I remember that in some vague way there arose before me a desire +to die. It was not to be suicide—my religion saved me from +that—but death by exhaustion, by continuing to abstain from +food, having no desire for it.</p> +<p>Martin was gone—what was there to live for? Had I not +better die before my child came to life? And if I could go where +Martin was I should be with him eternally.</p> +<p>Still I did not weep, but—whether audibly or only in the +unconscious depths of my soul—more than once I cried to +Martin by name.</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin! I am coming to you!"</p> +<p>I was in this mood (sitting in my chair as I had done all day +and staring into the small slow fire which was slipping to the +bottom of the grate) when I heard a soft step in the corridor +outside. At the next moment my door was opened noiselessly, and +somebody stepped into the room.</p> +<p>It was Mildred, and she knelt by my side and said in a low +voice:</p> +<p>"You are in still deeper trouble, Mary—tell me."</p> +<p>I tried to pour out my heart to her as to a mother, but I could +not do so, and indeed there was no necessity. The thought that must +have rushed into my eyes was instantly reflected in hers.</p> +<p>"It is he, isn't it?" she whispered, and I could only bow my +head.</p> +<p>"I thought so from the first," she said. "And now you are +thinking of . . . of what is to come?"</p> +<p>Again I could only bow, but Mildred put her arms about me and +said:</p> +<p>"Don't lose heart, dear. Our Blessed Lady sent me to take care +of you. And I will—I will."</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>Surely Chance must be the damnedest conspirator against human +happiness, or my darling could never have been allowed to suffer so +much from the report that my ship was lost.</p> +<p>What actually happened is easily told.</p> +<p>Two days after we left Akaroa, N.Z., which was the last we saw +of the world before we set our faces towards the Unknown, we ran +into a heavy lumpy sea and made bad weather of it for forty-eight +hours.</p> +<p>Going at good speed, however, we proceeded south on meridian 179 +degrees E., latitude 68, when (just as we were sighting the +Admiralty Mountains, our first glimpse of the regions of the Pole) +we encountered a south-westerly gale, which, with our cumbersome +deck cargo, made the handling of the ship difficult.</p> +<p>Nevertheless the <i>Scotia</i> rode bravely for several hours +over the mountainous seas, though sometimes she rolled fifty +degrees from side to side.</p> +<p>Towards nightfall we shipped a good deal of water; the sea +smashed in part of our starboard bulwarks, destroyed the upper +deck, washed out the galley, carried off two of our life boats and +sent other large fragments of the vessel floating away to +leeward.</p> +<p>At last the pumps became choked, and the water found its way to +the engine-room. So to prevent further disaster we put out the +fires, and then started, all hands, to bale out with buckets.</p> +<p>It was a sight to see every man-jack at work on that job +(scientific staff included), and you would not have thought our +spirits were much damped, whatever our bodies may have been, if you +had been there when I cried, "Are we downhearted, shipmates?" and +heard the shout that came up from fifty men (some of them waist +deep in the water):</p> +<p>"No!"</p> +<p>We had a stiff tussle until after midnight, but we stuck hard, +and before we turned into our bunks, we had fought the sea and +beaten it.</p> +<p>Next morning broke fine and clear, with that fresh crisp air of +the Antarctic which is the same to the explorer as the sniff of +battle to the warhorse, and no sign of the storm except the sight +of some lead-white icebergs which had been torn from the islands +south-west of us.</p> +<p>Everybody was in high spirits at breakfast, and when one of the +company started "Sweethearts and Wives" all hands joined in the +chorus, and (voice or no voice) I had a bit of a go at it +myself.</p> +<p>It is not the most solemn music ever slung together, but perhaps +no anthem sung in a cathedral has ascended to heaven with a +heartier spirit of thanksgiving.</p> +<p>When I went up on deck again, though, I saw that enough of our +"wooden walls" had gone overboard to give "scarey people" the +impression (if things were ever picked up, as I knew they would be, +for the set of the current was to the north-east) that we had +foundered, and that made me think of my dear one.</p> +<p>We had no wireless aboard, and the ship would not be going back +to New Zealand until March, so I was helpless to correct the error; +but I determined that the very first message from the very first +station I set up on the Antarctic continent should be sent to her +to say that I was safe and everything going splendid.</p> +<p>What happened on Christmas day is a longer story.</p> +<p>On the eighteenth of December, having landed some of my deck +cargo and provisions, and sent up my ship to winter quarters, I was +on my way, with ponies, dogs, and sledges and a large company of +men, all in A1 condition, to the lower summit of Mount Erebus, for +I intended to set up my first electric-power-wave station +there—that being high enough, we thought, to permit of a +message reaching the plateau of the Polar zone and low enough +(allowing for the curvature of the earth) to cover the maximum +distance in a northerly direction.</p> +<p>It was a long reach, but we chose the rocky ridges and moraines, +trying to avoid the crevassed glaciers, and all went well until the +twentieth, when just as we were reaching the steeper gradients a +strong wind sprang up, blowing straight down the course before +us.</p> +<p>All day long we toiled against it, but the weather grew worse, +with gusts of sleet and snow, until the wind reached the force of a +hurricane and the temperature fell to 28 degrees below zero.</p> +<p>There was nothing to do but to wait for the blizzard to blow +itself out, so we plugged down our tents in the shelter of the +rocky side of a ravine that had an immense snow-field behind +it.</p> +<p>The first night was bad enough, for the canvas of one tent flew +into ribbons, and the poor chaps in it had to lie uncovered in +their half-frozen sleeping-bags until morning.</p> +<p>All through the twenty-first, twenty-second, and twenty-third +the storm continued, sweeping with terrific force down the ravine, +and whirling the snow in dense masses from the snow-field +overhead.</p> +<p>Christmas Eve was worse, with the temperature down to 38 degrees +below zero and the wind up to eighty miles an hour in gusts, and +during the greater part of Christmas Day we were all confined to +our sleeping-bags and half buried in the snow that had drifted in +on us.</p> +<p>As a consequence we had no religious service, and if anybody +said a De Profundis it was between his crackling lips under his +frozen beard. We had no Christmas dinner either, except a few +Plasmon biscuits and a nip of brandy and water, which were served +out by good old O'Sullivan who had come with me as doctor to the +expedition.</p> +<p>On St. Stephen's Day I made a round of the camp and found the +ponies suffering terribly and the dogs badly hit. The storm was +telling on the men too, for some of them were down with dysentery, +and the toes of one poor chap were black from frostbite.</p> +<p>I was fit enough myself, thank God, but suffering from want of +sleep or rather from a restless feeling which broken sleep brought +with it.</p> +<p>The real truth is that never since I sailed had I been able to +shake off the backward thought that I ought not to have left my +dear one behind me. In active work, like the gale, I could dismiss +the idea of her danger; but now that I had nothing to do but to lie +like a log in a sleeping-bag, I suffered terribly from my +recollection of her self-sacrifice and my fear of the consequences +that might come of it.</p> +<p>This was not so bad in the daytime, for even in the midst of the +whirling snow and roaring wind I had only to close my eyes, and I +could see her as she came up the road in the sunshine that Sunday +morning when she was returning from church in her drooping hat and +fluttering veil, or as she looked at me with her great "seeing +eyes" at the last moment of all when she compelled me to come +away.</p> +<p>But the night was the devil. No sooner did I drop off to sleep +than I awoke with a start at the sound of her voice calling me by +my name.</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin!"</p> +<p>It was always a voice of distress, and though I am no dreamer +and I think no crank, I could not get away from the idea that she +was crying to me to come back.</p> +<p>That was about the one thing in the world that was impossible to +me now, and yet I knew that getting assurance from somewhere that +my dear one was being cared for was the only way to set my mind at +rest for the job that was before me.</p> +<p>It may seem ridiculous that I should have thought of that, but +everybody who has ever been with Nature in her mighty solitudes, +aloof from the tides of life, knows that the soul of man is +susceptible down there to signs which would seem childish amid the +noise and bustle of the world.</p> +<p>It was like that with me.</p> +<p>I shared my tent with O'Sullivan, the chief of our scientific +staff, and Treacle, who thought it his duty to take care of me, +though the work was generally the other way about.</p> +<p>The old salt had been badly battered, and I had not liked the +way he had been mumbling about "mother," which is not a good sign +in a stalwart chap when his strength is getting low.</p> +<p>So while buttoning up the tent on the night after Christmas Day +I was a bit touched up to see old Treacle, who had lived the life +of a rip, fumbling at his breast and hauling something out with an +effort.</p> +<p>It was a wooden image of the Virgin (about the length of my +hand) daubed over with gilt and blue paint, and when he stuck it up +in front of his face as he lay in his sleeping-bag, I knew that he +expected to go out before morning, and wished <i>that</i> to be the +last thing his old eyes should rest on.</p> +<p>I am not much of a man for saints myself (having found that we +get out of tight places middling well without them), but perhaps +what Treacle did got down into some secret place of my soul, for I +felt calmer as I fell asleep, and when I awoke it was not from the +sound of my darling's voice, but from a sort of deafening +silence.</p> +<p>The roaring of the wind had ceased; the blizzard was over; the +lamp that hung from the staff of the tent had gone out; and there +was a sheet of light coming in from an aperture in the canvas.</p> +<p>It was the midnight sun of the Antarctic, and when I raised my +head I saw that it fell full on the little gilded image of the +Virgin. Anybody who has never been where I was then may laugh if he +likes and welcome, but that was enough for me. It was all right! +Somebody was looking after my dear one!</p> +<p>I shouted to my shipmates to get up and make ready, and at dawn, +when we started afresh on our journey, there may have been dark +clouds over our heads but the sun was shining inside of us.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Sister Mildred was right. Our Blessed Lady must have interceded +for me, because help came immediately.</p> +<p>I awoke on St. Stephen's morning with that thrilling emotion +which every mother knows to be the first real and certain +consciousness of motherhood.</p> +<p>It is not for me to describe the physical effects of that great +change. But the spiritual effect is another matter. It was like +that of a miracle. God in his great mercy, looking down on me in my +sorrow, had sent one of His ministering angels to comfort me.</p> +<p>It seemed to say:</p> +<p>"Don't be afraid. He who went away is not lost to you. Something +of himself is about to return."</p> +<p>I felt no longer that I was to be left alone in my prison-house +of London, because Martin's child was to bear me company—to +be a link between us, an everlasting bond, so that he and I should +be together to the end.</p> +<p>I tremble to say what interpretation I put upon all +this—how it seemed to be a justification of what I did on the +night before Martin left Ellan, as if God, knowing he would not +return, had prompted me, so that when my dark hour came I might +have this great hope for my comforter.</p> +<p>And oh how wonderful it was, how strange, how mysterious, how +joyful!</p> +<p>Every day and all day and always I was conscious of my unborn +child, as a fluttering bird held captive in the hand. The mystery +and the joy of the coming life soothed away my sorrow, and if I had +shed any tears they would have dried them.</p> +<p>And then the future!</p> +<p>I seemed to know from the first that it was to be a girl, and +already I could see her face and look into her sea-blue eyes. As +she grew up I would talk to her of her father—the brave +explorer, the man of destiny, who laid down his life in a great +work for the world. We should always be talking of him—we two +alone together, because he belonged to us and nobody else in the +world besides. Everything I have written here I should tell +her—at least the beautiful part of it, the part about our +love, which nothing in life, and not even death itself, could +quench.</p> +<p>Oh the joy of those days! It may seem strange that I should have +been so happy so soon after my bereavement, but I cannot help it if +it was so, and it <i>was</i> so.</p> +<p>Perhaps it was a sort of hysteria, due to the great change in my +physical condition. I do not know. I do not think I want to know. +But one thing is sure—that hope and prayer and the desire of +life awoke in me again, as by the touch of God's own hand, and I +became another and a happier woman.</p> +<p>Such was the condition in which Mildred found me when she +returned a few days later. Then she brought me down plump to +material matters. We had first to consider the questions of ways +and means, in order to find out how to face the future.</p> +<p>It was the beginning of January, my appointed time was in June, +and I had only some sixteen pounds of my money left, so it was +clear that I could not stay in the boarding-house much longer.</p> +<p>Happily Mildred knew of homes where women could live +inexpensively during their period of waiting. They were partly +philanthropic and therefore subject to certain regulations, which +my resolute determination (not to mention Martin's name, or permit +it to be mentioned) might make it difficult for me to observe, but +Mildred hoped to find one that would take me on her recommendation +without asking further question.</p> +<p>In this expectation we set out in search of a Maternity Home. +What a day of trial we had! I shall never forget it.</p> +<p>The first home we called at was a Catholic one in the +neighbourhood of our boarding-house.</p> +<p>It had the appearance of a convent, and that pleased me +exceedingly. After we had passed the broad street door, with its +large brass plate and small brass grille, we were shown into a +little waiting-room with tiled floor, distempered walls, and +coloured pictures of the saints.</p> +<p>The porteress told us the Mother was at prayers with the +inmates, but would come downstairs presently, and while we waited +we heard the dull hum of voices, the playing of an organ, and the +singing of the sweet music I knew so well.</p> +<p>Closing my eyes I felt myself back in Rome, and began to pray +that I might be permitted to remain there. But the desire was +damped when the Mother entered the room.</p> +<p>She was a stout woman, wearing heavy outdoor boots and carrying +her arms interlaced before her, with the hands hidden in the ample +sleeves of her habit, and her face was so white and expressionless, +that it might have been cast in plaster of Paris.</p> +<p>In a rather nervous voice Mildred explained our errand. +"Mother," she said, "I cannot tell you anything about this young +lady, and I have come to ask if you will take her on my +recommendation."</p> +<p>"My dear child," said the Mother, "that would be utterly against +our rule. Not to know who the young lady is, where she comes from, +why she is here, and whether she is married or single or a +widow—it is quite impossible."</p> +<p>Mildred, looking confused and ashamed, said:</p> +<p>"She can afford to pay a little."</p> +<p>"That makes no difference."</p> +<p>"But I thought that in exceptional cases . . ."</p> +<p>"There can be no exceptional cases, Sister. If the young lady is +married and can say that her husband consents, or single and can +give us assurance that her father or guardian agrees, or a widow +and can offer satisfactory references . . ."</p> +<p>Mildred looked across at me, but I shook my head.</p> +<p>"In that case there seems to be nothing more to say," said the +Mother, and rising without ceremony she walked with us to the +door.</p> +<p>Our next call was at the headquarters of a home which was +neither Catholic nor Protestant, but belonged, Mildred said, to a +kind of Universal Church, admitting inmates of all +denominations.</p> +<p>It was in a busy thoroughfare and had the appearance of a +business office. After Mildred had written her name and the object +of our visit on a slip of paper we were taken up in a lift to +another office with an open safe, where a man in a kind of uniform +(called a Commissioner) was signing letters and cheques.</p> +<p>The Commissioner was at first very courteous, especially to me, +and I had an uncomfortable feeling that he was mistaking me for +something quite other than I was until Mildred explained our +errand, and then his manner changed painfully.</p> +<p>"What you ask is against all our regulations," he said. "Secrecy +implies something to hide, and we neither hide anything nor permit +anything to be hidden. In fact our system requires that we should +not only help the woman, but punish the man by making him realise +his legal, moral, and religious liability for his wrong-doing. +Naturally we can only do this by help of the girl, and if she does +not tell us at the outset who and what the partner of her sin has +been and where he is to be found. . . ."</p> +<p>I was choking with shame and indignation, and rising to my feet +I said to Mildred:</p> +<p>"Let us go, please."</p> +<p>"Ah, yes, I know," said the Commissioner, with a superior smile, +"I have seen all this before. The girl nearly always tries to +shield the guilty man. But why should she? It may seem generous, +but it is really wicked. It is a direct means of increasing +immorality. The girl who protects the author of her downfall is +really promoting the ruin of another woman, and if. . . ."</p> +<p>Thinking of Martin I wanted to strike the smug Pharisee in the +face, and in order to conquer that unwomanly impulse I hurried out +of the office, and into the street, leaving poor Mildred to follow +me.</p> +<p>Our last call was at the home of a private society in a little +brick house that seemed to lean against the wall of a large +lying-in hospital in the West End of London.</p> +<p>At the moment of our arrival the Matron was presiding in the +drawing-room over a meeting of a Missionary League for the +Conversion of the Jews, so we were taken through a narrow lobby +into a little back-parlour which overlooked, through a glass +screen, a large apartment, wherein a number of young women, who had +the appearance of dressmakers, ladies' maids, and governesses, were +sewing tiny pieces of linen and flannel that were obviously +baby-clothes.</p> +<p>There were no carpets on the floors and the house had a slight +smell of carbolic. The tick-tick of sewing machines on the other +side of the screen mingled with the deadened sound of the clapping +of hands in the room overhead.</p> +<p>After a while there was rustle of dresses coming down the bare +stairs, followed by the opening and closing of the front door, and +then the Matron came into the parlour.</p> +<p>She was a very tall, flat-bosomed woman in a plain black dress, +and she seemed to take in our situation instantly. Without waiting +for Mildred's explanation she began to ask my name, my age, and +where I came from.</p> +<p>Mildred fenced these questions as well as she could, and then, +with even more nervousness than ever, made the same request as +before.</p> +<p>The Matron seemed aghast.</p> +<p>"Most certainly not," she said. "My committee would never dream +of such a thing. In the interests of the unfortunate girls who have +fallen from the path of virtue, as well as their still more +unfortunate offspring, we always make the most searching inquiries. +In fact, we keep a record of every detail of every case. Listen to +this," she added, and opening a large leather-bound hook like a +ledger, she began to read one of its entries:</p> +<p><i>"H.J., aged eighteen years, born of very respectable parents, +was led astray</i> [that was not the word] <i>in a lonely road very +late at night by a sailor who was never afterwards heard of. . . +."</i></p> +<p>But I could bear no more, and rising from my seat I fled from +the room and the house into the noisy street outside.</p> +<p>All day long my whole soul had been in revolt. It seemed to me +that, while God in His gracious mercy was giving me my child to +comfort and console me, to uplift and purify me, and make me a +better woman than I had been before, man, with his false and cruel +morality, with his machine-made philanthropy, was trying to use it +as a whip to punish not only me but Martin.</p> +<p>But that it should never do! Never as long as I lived! I would +die in the streets first!</p> +<p>Perhaps I was wrong, and did not understand myself, and +certainly Mildred did not understand me. When she rejoined me in +the street we turned our faces homeward and were half way back to +the boarding-house before we spoke again.</p> +<p>Then she said:</p> +<p>"I am afraid the other institutions will be the same. They'll +all want references."</p> +<p>I answered that they should never get them.</p> +<p>"But your money will be done soon, my child, and then what is to +become of you?"</p> +<p>"No matter!" I said, for I had already determined to face the +world myself without help from anybody.</p> +<p>There was a silence again until we reached the door of our +boarding-house, and then Mildred said:</p> +<p>"Mary, your father is a rich man, and however much you may have +displeased him he cannot wish you to be left to the mercy of the +world—especially when your time comes. Let me write to him. . +. ."</p> +<p>That terrified me, for I saw only one result—an open +quarrel between my father and my husband about the legitimacy of my +child, who would probably be taken away from me as soon as it was +born.</p> +<p>So taking Mildred by the arm, regardless of the observation of +passers-by, I begged and prayed and implored of her not to write to +my father.</p> +<p>She promised not to do so, and we parted on good terms; but I +was not satisfied, and the only result of our day's journeying was +that I became possessed of the idea that the whole world was +conspiring to rob me of my unborn child.</p> +<p>A few days later Mildred called again, and then she said:</p> +<p>"I had another letter from Father Donovan this morning, Mary. +Your poor priest is broken-hearted about you. He is sure you are in +London, and certain you are in distress, and says that with or +without his Bishop's consent he is coming up to London to look for +you, and will never go back until you are found."</p> +<p>I began to suspect Mildred. In the fever of my dread of losing +my child I convinced myself that with the best intentions in the +world, merely out of love for me and pity for my position, she +would give me up—perhaps in the very hour of my peril.</p> +<p>To make this impossible I determined to cut myself off from her +and everybody else, by leaving the boarding-house and taking +another and cheaper lodging far enough away.</p> +<p>I was encouraged in this course by the thought of my diminishing +resources, and though heaven knows I had not too many comforts +where I was. I reproached myself for spending so much on my own +needs when I ought to be economising for the coming of my +child.</p> +<p>The end of it all was that one morning early I went down to the +corner of Oxford Street where the motor-omnibuses seem to come and +go from all parts of London.</p> +<p>North, south, east, and west were all one to me, leading to +labyrinths of confused and interminable streets, and I knew as +little as a child which of them was best for my purpose. But chance +seems to play the greatest part in our lives, and at that moment it +was so with me.</p> +<p>I was standing on the edge of the pavement when a motor-bus +labelled "Bayswater Road" stopped immediately in front of me and I +stepped into it, not knowing in the least why I did so.</p> +<p>Late that evening, having found what I wanted, I returned in the +mingled mist and darkness to the boarding-house to pack up my +belongings. That was not difficult to do, and after settling my +account and sending young John for a cab I was making for the door +when the landlady came up to me.</p> +<p>"Will you not leave your new address, my dear, lest anybody +should call," she said.</p> +<p>"Nobody will call," I answered.</p> +<p>"But in case there should he letters?"</p> +<p>"There will be no letters," I said, and whispering to the driver +to drive up Oxford Street, I got into the cab.</p> +<p>It was then quite dark. The streets and shops were alight, and I +remembered that as I crossed the top of the Charing Cross Road I +looked down in the direction of the lofty building in which +Mildred's window would be shining like a lighthouse over +Piccadilly.</p> +<p>Poor dear ill-requited Mildred! She has long ago forgiven me. +She knows now that when I ran away from the only friend I had in +London it was because I could not help it.</p> +<p>She knows, too, that I was not thinking of myself, and that in +diving still deeper into the dungeon of the great city, in hiding +and burying myself away in it, I was asking nothing of God but that +He would let me live the rest of my life—no matter how poor +and lonely—with the child that He was sending to be a living +link between my lost one and me.</p> +<p>In the light of what happened afterwards, that was all so +strange, and oh, so wonderful and miraculous!</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My new quarters were in the poorer district which stands at the +back of Bayswater.</p> +<p>The street was a cul-de-sac (of some ten small houses on either +side) which was blocked up at the further end by the high wall of a +factory for the "humanization" of milk, and opened out of a busy +thoroughfare of interior shops like a gully-way off a noisy +coast.</p> +<p>My home in this street was in number one, and I had been +attracted to it by a printed card in the semi-circular fan-light +over the front door, saying: "A ROOM TO LET FURNISHED."</p> +<p>My room, which was of fair size, was on the first floor and had +two windows to the street, with yellow holland blinds and white +muslin curtains.</p> +<p>The furniture consisted of a large bed, a horse-hair sofa, three +cane-bottomed chairs, a chest of drawers (which stood between the +windows), and a mirror over the mantelpiece, which had pink paper, +cut into fanciful patterns, over the gilt frame, to keep off the +flies.</p> +<p>The floor was covered with linoleum, but there were two strips +of carpet, one before the fire and the other by the bed: the walls +were papered with a bright red paper representing peonies in bloom; +and there were three pictures—a portrait of a great Welsh +preacher with a bardic name ("Dyfed"), an engraving entitled "Feed +my Sheep" (showing Jesus carrying a lamb), and a memorial card of +some member of the family of the house, in the form of a tomb with +a weeping angel on either side.</p> +<p>I paid five shilling a week for my room, and, as this included +the use of kettle, cooking utensils, and crockery, I found to my +great delight at the end of the first week that providing for +myself (tea, bread and butter, and eggs being my principal food) I +had only spent ten shillings altogether, which, according to my +present needs, left me enough for my time of waiting and several +weeks beyond.</p> +<p>Every morning I went out with a little hand-bag to buy my +provisions in the front street; and every afternoon I took a walk +in the better part of Bayswater and even into the Park (Hyde Park), +which was not far off, but never near Piccadilly, or so far east as +Bloomsbury, lest I should meet Sister Mildred or be recognized by +the old boarders.</p> +<p>I had no key to my lodgings, but when I returned home I knocked +at the front door (which was at the top of a short flight of steps +from the pavement) and then a string was pulled in the +cellar-kitchen in which the family of my landlady lived, whereupon +the bolt was shot back and the door opened of itself.</p> +<p>Finding it necessary to account for myself here as at the +boarding-house, I had adhered to my former name, but said I was the +widow of a commander lately lost, at sea, which was as near to the +truth as I dared venture.</p> +<p>I had also made no disguise of the fact that I was expecting a +child, a circumstance which secured me much sympathy from the +kind-hearted souls who were now my neighbours.</p> +<p>They were all womanly women, generally the wives of men working +in the milk factory, and therefore the life of our street was very +regular.</p> +<p>At five in the morning you heard the halting step of the old +"knocker up," who went up and down the street tapping at the +bedroom windows with a long pole like a fishing-rod. A little +before six you heard the clashing of many front doors and the +echoing footsteps of the men going to their work. At half-past +seven you heard the whoop of the milkman and the rattling of his +cans. At half-past eight you heard the little feet of the children, +like the pattering of rain, going off to the Board School round the +corner. And a little after four in the afternoon you heard the wild +cries of the juvenile community let loose from lessons, the boys +trundling iron hoops and the girls skipping to a measured tune over +a rope stretched from parapet to parapet.</p> +<p>After that, our street hummed like a bee-hive, with the women, +washed and combed, standing knitting at their open doors or +exchanging confidences across the areas until darkness fell and +each of the mothers called her children into bed, as an old hen in +the farmyard clucks up her chickens.</p> +<p>These good creatures were very kind to me. Having satisfied +themselves from observation of my habits that I was "respectable," +they called me "our lady"; and I could not help hearing that I was +"a nice young thing," though it was a little against me that I did +not go to church or chapel, and had confessed to being a +Catholic—for several of our families (including that of my +landlady) were members of the Welsh Zion Chapel not far away.</p> +<p>Such was the life of the little human cage to which I had +confined myself, but I had an inner life that was all my own and +very sweet to me.</p> +<p>During the long hours of every day in which I was alone I +occupied myself in the making of clothes for my baby—buying +linen and flannel and worsted, and borrowing patterns from my Welsh +landlady.</p> +<p>This stimulated my tenderness towards the child that was to +come, for the heart of a young mother is almost infantile, and I +hardly know whether to laugh or cry when I think of the childish +things I did and thought and said to myself in those first days +when I was alone in my room in that back street in Bayswater.</p> +<p>Thus long before baby was born I had christened her. At first I +wished to call her Mary, not because I cared for that name myself, +but because Martin had said it was the most beautiful in the world. +In the end, however, I called her Isabel Mary (because Isabel was +my mother's name and she had been a far better woman than I was), +and as I finished my baby's garments one by one I used to put them +away in their drawer, saying to myself, "That's Isabel Mary's +binder," or "Isabel Mary's christening-robe" as the case might +be.</p> +<p>I dare say it was all very foolish. There are tears in my eyes +when I think of it now, but there were none then, for though there +were moments when, remembering Martin, I felt as if life were for +ever blank, I was almost happy in my poor surroundings, and if it +was a cage I had fixed myself in there was always a bird singing +inside of it—the bird that sang in my own bosom.</p> +<p>"When Isabel Mary comes everything will he all right," I used to +think.</p> +<p>This went on for many weeks and perhaps it might have gone on +until my time was full but for something which, occurring under my +eyes, made me tremble with the fear that the life I was living and +the hope I was cherishing were really very wrong and selfish.</p> +<p>Of my landlady, Mrs. Williams, I saw little. She was a rather +hard but no doubt heavily-laden woman, who had to "do" for a swarm +of children, besides two young men lodgers who lived in the kitchen +and slept in the room behind mine. Her husband was a quiet man (a +carter at the dairy) whom I never saw at all except on the +staircase at ten o'clock at night, when, after winding the tall +clock on the landing, he went upstairs to bed in his stocking +feet.</p> +<p>But the outstanding member of the family for me was a +shock-headed girl of fourteen called Emmerjane, which was a running +version of Emma Jane.</p> +<p>I understood that Emmerjane was the illegitimate daughter of +Mrs. Williams's dead sister, and that she had been born in +Carnarvon, which still shimmered in her memory in purple and +gold.</p> +<p>Emmerjane was the drudge of the family, and I first saw her in +the street at dusk, mothering a brood of her little cousins, taking +Hughie by one hand and Katie by the other and telling Gwennie to +lay hold of Davie lest he should be run over by the milk vans.</p> +<p>Afterwards she became my drudge also—washing my floor, +bringing up my coals, and cleaning my grate, for sixpence a week, +and giving me a great deal of information about my neighbours for +nothing.</p> +<p>Thus she told me, speaking broad cockney with a Welsh accent, +that the people opposite were named Wagstaffe and that the creaking +noise I heard was that of a mangle, which Mrs. Wagstaffe had to +keep because her husband was a drunkard, who stole her money and +came home "a-Saturday nights, when the public-houses turned out, +and beat her somethink shockin'," though she always forgave him the +next day and then the creaking went on as before.</p> +<p>But the greatest interest of this weird little woman, who had a +premature knowledge of things a child ought not to know, was in a +house half-way down the street on the other side, where steam was +always coming from the open door to the front kitchen.</p> +<p>The people who lived there were named Jones. Mrs. Jones "washed" +and had a bed-ridden old mother (with two shillings from the +Guardians) and a daughter named Maggie.</p> +<p>Maggie Jones, who was eighteen, and very pretty, used to work in +the dairy, but the foreman had "tiken advantage of her" and she had +just had a baby.</p> +<p>This foreman was named Owen Owens and he lived at the last +number on our side, where two unmarried sisters "kept house" for +him and sat in the "singing seat" at Zion.</p> +<p>Maggie thought it was the sisters' fault that Owen Owens did not +marry her, so she conceived a great scheme for "besting" them, and +this was the tragedy which, through Emmerjane's quick little eyes +and her cockney-Welsh tongue, came to me in instalments day by +day.</p> +<p>When her baby was a month old Maggie dressed it up "fine" and +took it to the photographers for its "card di visit." The +photographs were a long time coming, but when they came they were +"heavenly lovely" and Maggie "cried to look at them."</p> +<p>Then she put one in an envelope and addressed it to Owen Owens, +and though it had only to cross the street, she went out after dark +to a pillar-box a long way off lest anybody should see her posting +it.</p> +<p>Next day she said, "He'll have it now, for he always comes home +to dinner. He'll take it up to his bedroom, look you, and stand it +on the washstand, and if either of those sisters touch it he'll +give them what's what."</p> +<p>After that she waited anxiously for an acknowledgment, and every +time the postman passed down our street her pretty pale face would +be at the door, saying, "Anything for me to-day?" or "Are you +<i>sure</i> there's nothing for me, postman?"</p> +<p>At length a letter came, and Maggie Jones trembled so much that +she dared not open it, but at last she tripped up to her room to be +"all of herself," and then . . . then there was a "wild screech," +and when Emmerjane ran upstairs Maggie was stretched out on the +floor in a dead faint, clutching in her tight hand the photograph +which Owen Owens had returned with the words, written in his heavy +scrawl across the face—<i>Maggie Jones's bastard</i>.</p> +<p>It would be impossible to say how this incident affected me. I +felt as if a moral earthquake had opened under my feet.</p> +<p>What had I been doing? In looking forward to the child that was +to come to me I had been thinking only of my own comfort—my +own consolation.</p> +<p>But what about the child itself?</p> +<p>If my identity ever became known—and it might at any +moment, by the casual recognition of a person in the +street—how should the position of my child differ from that +of this poor girl?</p> +<p>A being born out of the pale of the law, as my husband would say +it must be, an outcast, a thing of shame, without a father to +recognise it, and with its mother's sin to lash its back for +ever!</p> +<p>When I thought of that, much as I had longed for the child that +was to be a living link between Martin and me, I asked myself if I +had any right to wish for it.</p> +<p>I felt I had no right, and that considering my helpless position +the only true motherly love was to pray that my baby might be +still-born.</p> +<p>But that was too hard. It was too terrible. It was like a second +bereavement. I could not and would not do it.</p> +<p>"Never, never, never!" I told myself.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Thinking matters out in the light of Maggie Jones's story, I +concluded that poverty was at the root of nearly everything. If I +could stave off poverty no real harm could come to my child.</p> +<p>I determined to do so. But there was only one way open to me at +present—and that was to retrench my expenses.</p> +<p>I did retrench them. Persuading myself that I had no real need +of this and that, I reduced my weekly outlay.</p> +<p>This gave me immense pleasure, and even when I saw, after a +while, that I was growing thin and pale, I felt no self-pity of any +sort, remembering that I had nobody to look well for now, and only +the sweet and glorious duty before me of providing for my +child.</p> +<p>I convinced myself, too, that my altered appearance was natural +to my condition, and that all I needed was fresh air and exercise, +therefore I determined to walk every day in the Park.</p> +<p>I did so once only.</p> +<p>It was one of those lovely mornings in early spring, when the +air and the sky of London, after the long fog and grime of winter, +seem to be washed by showers of sunshine.</p> +<p>I had entered by a gate to a broad avenue and was resting (for I +was rather tired) on a seat under a chestnut tree whose glistening +sheaths were swelling and breaking into leaf, when I saw a number +of ladies and gentlemen on horseback coming in my direction.</p> +<p>I recognised one of them instantly. It was Mr. Vivian, and a +beautiful girl was riding beside him. My heart stood still, for I +thought he would see me. But he was too much occupied with his +companion to do so.</p> +<p>"Yes, by Jove, it's killing, isn't it?" he said, in his shrill +voice, and with his monocle in his mole-like eye, he rode past me, +laughing.</p> +<p>After that I took my walks in the poorer streets behind +Bayswater, but there I was forced back on my old problem, for I +seemed to be always seeing the sufferings of children.</p> +<p>Thank God, children as a whole are happy. They seem to live in +their hearts alone, and I really and truly believe that if all the +doors of the rich houses of the West End of London were thrown open +to the poor children of the East End they would stay in their slums +and alleys.</p> +<p>But some of them suffer there for all that, especially the +unfortunate ones who enter the world without any legal right to be +here, and I seemed to be coming upon that kind everywhere.</p> +<p>One evening I saw a tiny boy of five sheltering from the rain +under a dripping and draughty railway arch, and crying as if his +little heart would break. I tried to comfort him and could not, but +when a rather shame-faced young woman came along, as if returning +from her work, he burst out on her and cried:</p> +<p>"Oh, muvver, she's been a-beating of me awrful."</p> +<p>"Never mind, Johnny," said the young woman, kneeling on the wet +pavement to dry the child's eyes. "Don't cry, that's a good +boy."</p> +<p>It needed no second sight to look into the heart of that +tragedy, and the effect of it upon me was to make me curtail my +expenditure still further.</p> +<p>Looking back on those days I cannot but wonder that I never +tried to find employment. But there was one delicate impediment +then—my condition, which was becoming visible, I thought, to +people in the street, and causing some of them, especially women, +to look round at me. When this became painful I discontinued my +walks altogether, and sent Emmerjane on my few errands.</p> +<p>Then my room became my world.</p> +<p>I do not think I ever saw a newspaper. And knowing nothing of +what was going on, beyond the surge and swell of the life of London +as it came to me when I opened my window. I had now, more than +ever, the sense of living in a dungeon on a rock in the middle of +the sea.</p> +<p>Having no exercise I ate less and less. But I found a certain +joy in that, for I was becoming a miser for my child's sake, and +the only pain I suffered was when I went to my drawer, as I did +every day, and looked at my rapidly diminishing store.</p> +<p>I knew that my Welsh landlady was beginning to call me +<i>close</i>, meaning mean; but that did not trouble me in the +least, because I told myself that every penny I saved out of my own +expenses was for my child, to keep her from poverty and all the +evils and injustices that followed in its train.</p> +<p>As my appointed time drew near my sleep was much broken; and +sometimes in the middle of the night, when I heard a solitary +footstep going down the street I would get up, draw aside one of my +blinds, and see a light burning in some bedroom window opposite, +and afterwards hear the muffled cry of the small new being who had +come as another immigrant into our chill little world.</p> +<p>But I made no arrangements for myself until my Welsh landlady +came up to my room one day and asked if I had settled with a +doctor. When I answered no, she held up her hands and cried:</p> +<p>"Good gracious! Just as I thought. Thee'st got to lose no time, +though."</p> +<p>Happily there was a doctor in our street nearly every day, and +if I wished it she would call him up to me. I agreed and the doctor +came next morning.</p> +<p>He was a tall, elderly man with cold eyes, compressed lips, and +a sour expression, and neither his manner nor his speech gave any +hint of a consciousness (which I am sure every true doctor must +have) that in coming to a woman in my condition he was entering one +of the sacred chambers of human life.</p> +<p>He asked me a few abrupt questions, told me when he would come +again, and then spoke about his fee.</p> +<p>"My fee is a guinea and I usually get it in advance," he said, +whereupon I went to my drawer, and took out a sovereign and a +shilling, not without a certain pang at seeing so much go in a +moment after I had been saving so long.</p> +<p>The doctor had dropped the money into his waistcoat pocket with +oh! such a casual air, and was turning to go, when my Welsh +landlady said:</p> +<p>"Her's not doing herself justice in the matter, of food, +doctor."</p> +<p>"Why, what do you eat?" asked the doctor, and as well as I +could, out of my dry and parched throat, I told him.</p> +<p>"Tut! tut! This will never do," he said. "It's your duty to your +child to have better food than that. Something light and nourishing +every day, such as poultry, fish, chicken broth, beef-tea, and +farinaceous foods generally."</p> +<p>I gasped. 'What was the doctor thinking about?</p> +<p>"Remember," he said, with his finger up, "the health of the +child is intimately dependent on the health of the mother. When the +mother is in a morbid state it affects the composition of the +blood, and does great harm to the health of the offspring, both +immediately and in after life. Don't forget now. Good day!"</p> +<p>That was a terrible shock to me. In my great ignorance and great +love I had been depriving myself for the sake of my child, and now +I learned that I had all the time been doing it a grave and perhaps +life-long injury!</p> +<p>Trying to make amends I sent out for some of the expensive foods +the doctor had ordered me, but when they were cooked I found to my +dismay that I had lost the power of digesting them.</p> +<p>My pain at this discovery was not lessened next day when my +Welsh landlady brought up a nurse whom I had asked her to engage +for me.</p> +<p>The woman was a human dumpling with a discordant voice, and her +first interest, like that of the doctor, seemed to centre in her +fee.</p> +<p>She told me that her usual terms were a guinea for the +fortnight, but when she saw my face fall (for I could not help +thinking how little I had left) she said:</p> +<p>"Some ladies don't need a fortnight, though. Mrs. Wagstaffe, for +instance, she never has no more than five days, and on the sixth +she's back at her mangle. So if five will do, ma'am, perhaps ten +and six won't hurt you."</p> +<p>I agreed, and the nurse was rolling her ample person out of my +room when my Welsh landlady said:</p> +<p>"But her's not eating enough to keep a linnet, look you."</p> +<p>And then my nurse, who was what the doctor calls a croaker, +began on a long series of stories of ladies who, having "let +themselves down" had died, either at childbirth or soon +afterwards.</p> +<p>"It's <i>after</i> a lady feels it if she has to nurse her +baby," said the nurse, "and I couldn't be responsible neither for +you nor the child if you don't do yourself justice."</p> +<p>This was a still more terrible possibility—the possibility +that I might die and leave my child behind me. The thought haunted +me all that day and the following night, but the climax came next +morning, when Emmerjane, while black-leading my grate, gave me the +last news of Maggie Jones.</p> +<p>Maggie's mother had been "a-naggin' of her to get work," asking +if she had not enough mouths to feed "without her bringin' +another."</p> +<p>Maggie had at first been afraid to look for employment, thinking +everybody knew of her trouble. But after her mother had put the +young minister from Zion on to her to tell her to be "obejent" she +had gone out every day, whether the weather was good or bad or +"mejum."</p> +<p>This had gone on for three months (during which Maggie used to +stay out late because she was afraid to meet her mother's face) +until one wet night, less than a week ago, she had come home +drenched to the skin, taken to her bed, "sickened for somethink" +and died.</p> +<p>Three days after Emmerjane told me this story a great solemnity +fell on our street.</p> +<p>It was Saturday, when the children do not go to school, but, +playing no games, they gathered in whispering groups round the +house with the drawn blinds, while their mothers stood bareheaded +at the doors with their arms under their aprons and their hidden +hands over their mouths.</p> +<p>I tried not to know what was going on, but looking out at the +last moment I saw Maggie Jones's mother, dressed in black, coming +down her steps, with her eyes very red and her hard face (which was +seamed with labour) all wet and broken up.</p> +<p>The "young minister" followed (a beardless boy who could have +known nothing of the tragedy of a woman's life), and stepping into +the midst of the group of the congregation from Zion, who had +gathered there with their warm Welsh hearts full of pity for the +dead girl, he gave out a Welsh hymn, and they sang it in the London +street, just as they had been used to do at the cottage doors in +the midst of their native mountains:</p> +<p>"<i>Bydd myrdd o ryfeddodau<br /> +Ar doriad boreu wawr</i>."</p> +<p>I could look no longer, so I turned back into my room, but at +the next moment I heard the rumble of wheels and knew that Maggie +Jones was on her way to her last mother of all—the Earth.</p> +<p>During the rest of that day I could think of nothing but +Maggie's child, and what was to become of it, and next morning when +Emmerjane came up she told me that the "young minister" was +"a-gettin' it into the 'ouse."</p> +<p>I think that was the last straw of my burden, for my mind came +back with a swift rebound from Maggie Jones's child to my own.</p> +<p>The thought of leaving my baby behind now terrified and appalled +me. It brought me no comfort to think that though I was poor my +father was rich, for I knew that if he ever came to know of my +child's existence he would hate it and cast it off, as the central +cause of the downfall of his plans.</p> +<p>Yet Martin's child alone, and at the mercy of the world! It +could not and must not be!</p> +<p>Then came a fearful thought. I fought against it. I said many +"Hail Marys" to protect myself from it. But I could not put it +away.</p> +<p>Perhaps my physical condition was partly to blame. Others must +judge of that. It is only for me to say, in all truth and +sincerity, what I felt and thought when I stood (as every woman who +is to be a mother must) at the door of that dark chamber which is +Life's greatest mystery.</p> +<p>I thought of how Martin had been taken from me, as Fate (perhaps +for some good purpose still unrevealed) had led me to believe.</p> +<p>I thought of how I had comforted myself with the hope of the +child that was coming to be a link between us.</p> +<p>I thought of the sweet hours I had spent in making my baby's +clothes; in choosing her name; in whispering it to myself, yes, and +to God, too, every night and every morning.</p> +<p>I thought of how day by day I had trimmed the little lamp I kept +burning in the sanctuary within my breast where my baby and I lived +together.</p> +<p>I thought of how this had taken the sting out of death and +victory out of the grave. And after that I told myself that, +however sweet and beautiful, <i>all this had been selfishness and I +must put it away</i>.</p> +<p>Then I thought of the child itself, who—conceived in sin +as my Church would say, disinherited by the law, outlawed by +society, inheriting my physical weaknesses, having lost one of its +parents and being liable to lose the other—was now in danger +of being left to the mercies of the world, banned from its birth, +penniless and without a protector, to become a drudge and an +outcast or even a thief, a gambler, or a harlot.</p> +<p>This was what I thought and felt.</p> +<p>And when at last I knew that I had come to the end of my +appointed time I knelt down in my sad room, and if ever I prayed a +fervent prayer, if ever my soul went up to God in passionate +supplication, it was that the child I had longed for and looked +forward to as a living link with my lost one <i>might be born +dead</i>.</p> +<p>"Oh God, whatever happens to me, let my baby be born +dead—I pray, I beseech Thee."</p> +<p>Perhaps it was a wicked prayer. God knows. He will be just.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>It was Saturday, the seventh of June. The summer had been a cold +one thus far; the night was chill and heavy rain was beating +against the window-pane.</p> +<p>There was a warm fire in my room for the first time for several +months; the single gas jet on the window side of the mantelpiece +had been turned low, and the nurse, in list slippers, was taking my +little flannel and linen garments out of the chest of drawers and +laying them on the flat steel fender.</p> +<p>I think I must have had intervals of insensibility, for the +moments of consciousness came and went with me, like the diving and +rising of a sea-bird in the midst of swelling waves.</p> +<p>At one such moment I became aware that the doctor and my Welsh +landlady, as well as my nurse, were in the room, and that they were +waiting for the crisis and fearing for my life.</p> +<p>I heard them talking in low voices which made a drumming noise +in my ears, like that which the sea makes when it is rolling into a +cave.</p> +<p>"She's let herself down so low, pore thing, that I don't know in +the world what's to happen to her."</p> +<p>"As God is my witness, look you, I never saw anybody live on so +little."</p> +<p>"I'm not afraid of the mother. I'm more afraid of the child, if +you ask me."</p> +<p>Then the drumming noise would die out, and I would only hear +something within myself saying:</p> +<p>"Oh God, oh God, that my child may be born dead."</p> +<p>At another moment I heard, above the rattle of the rain, the +creaking of the mangle in the cellar-kitchen on the other side of +the street.</p> +<p>At still another moment I heard the sound of quarrelling in the +house opposite. A woman was screaming, children were shrieking, and +a man was swearing in a thick hoarse voice.</p> +<p>I knew what had happened—it was midnight, the +"public-houses had turned out," and Mr. Wagstaffe had came home +drunk.</p> +<p>The night passed heavily. I heard myself (as I had done before) +calling on Martin in a voice of wild entreaty:</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin!"</p> +<p>Then remembering that he was gone I began again to pray. I heard +myself praying to the Blessed Virgin:</p> +<p>"Oh, Mother of my God, let my child . . ."</p> +<p>But a voice which seemed to come from far away interrupted +me.</p> +<p>"Hush, bâch, hush! It will make it harder for thee."</p> +<p>At length peace came. It seemed to me that I was running out of +a tempestuous sea, with its unlimited loneliness and cruel depth, +into a quiet harbour.</p> +<p>There was a heavenly calm, in which I could hear the doctor and +the nurse and my Welsh landlady talking together in cheerful +whispers.</p> +<p>I knew that everything was over, and with the memory of the +storm I had passed through still in my heart and brain. I said:</p> +<p>"Is it dead?"</p> +<p>"Dead?" cried the nurse in a voice several octaves higher than +usual. "Dear heart no, but alive and well. A beautiful little +girl!"</p> +<p>"Yes, your baby is all right, ma'am," said the doctor, and then +my Welsh landlady cried:</p> +<p>"Why did'st think it would be dead, bach? As I am a Christian +woman thee'st got the beautifullest baby that ever breathed."</p> +<p>I could bear no more. The dark thoughts of the days before were +over me still, and with a groan I turned to the wall. Then +everything was wiped out as by an angel's wing, and I fell into a +deep sleep.</p> +<p>When I awoke my dark thoughts were vanishing away like a bad +dream in the morning. The rain had ceased, the gas had been put +out, and I could see by the glow on the peonies of the wall-paper +that the sun was shining with a soft red light through the holland +blinds of my windows.</p> +<p>I heard the sparrows chirping on the sills outside; I heard the +milkman rattling his cans; I heard the bells of a neighbouring +church ringing for early communion.</p> +<p>I closed my eyes and held my breath and listened to the sounds +in my own room. I heard the kettle singing over the fire; I heard +somebody humming softly, and beating a foot on the floor in time to +the tune and then I heard a low voice (it was Emmerjane's) saying +from somewhere near my bed:</p> +<p>"I dunno but what she's awake. Her breathing ain't a-goin' +now."</p> +<p>Then I turned and saw the nurse sitting before the fire with +something on her lap. I knew what it was. It was my child, and it +was asleep. In spite of my dark thoughts my heart yearned for +it.</p> +<p>And then came the great miracle.</p> +<p>My child awoke and began to cry. It was a faint cry, oh! so thin +and weak, but it went thundering and thundering through me. There +was a moment of awful struggle, and then a mighty torrent of love +swept over me.</p> +<p>It was Motherhood.</p> +<p>My child! Mine! Flesh of my flesh! Oh God! Oh God!</p> +<p>All my desire for my baby's death to save it from the pains of +life was gone, and my heart, starved so long, throbbed with +tenderness. I raised myself in bed, in spite of my nurse's protest, +and cried to her to give me my baby.</p> +<p>"Give her to me. Give her to me."</p> +<p>"By-and-by, by-and-by," said the nurse.</p> +<p>"Now, now! I can wait no longer."</p> +<p>"But you must take some food first. Emmerjane, give her that +glass of milk and water."</p> +<p>I drank the milk just to satisfy them, and then held out my arms +for my child.</p> +<p>"Give her to me—quick, quick!"</p> +<p>"Here she is then, the jewel!"</p> +<p>Oh! the joy of that moment when I first took my baby in my arms, +and looked into her face, and saw my own features and the sea-blue +eyes of Martin! Oh the rapture of my first eager kiss!</p> +<p>I suppose I must have been rough with my little cherub in the +fervour of my love, for she began to cry again.</p> +<p>"There! there!" said the nurse. "Be good now, or I must take +baby away."</p> +<p>But heaven had taught me another lesson, and instantly, +instinctively, I put my baby to my breast. Instantly and +instinctively, too, my baby turned to it with its little mouth open +and its little fingers feeling for the place.</p> +<p>"Oh God! My God! Oh Mother of my God!"</p> +<p>And then in that happiness that is beyond all earthly +bliss—the happiness of a mother when she first clasps her +baby to her breast—I began to cry.</p> +<p>I had not cried for months—not since that night in Ellan +which I did not wish to remember any more—but now my tears +gushed out and ran down my face like rain.</p> +<p>I cried on Martin once more—I could not help it. And +looking down at the closed eyes of my child my soul gushed out in +gratitude to God, who had sent me this for all I had suffered.</p> +<p>"Hush, hush! You will do yourself a mischief and it will be bad +for the milk," said the nurse.</p> +<p>After that I tried to control myself. But I found a fierce and +feverish delight in suckling my child. It seemed as if every drop +my baby drew gave me a spiritual as well as a physical +joy—cooling my blood and my brain and wiping out all my +troubles.</p> +<p>Oh mystery of mysteries! Oh miracle of miracles!</p> +<p>My baby was at my breast and my sufferings were at an end.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>That was a long, long day of happiness.</p> +<p>It was both very long and very short, for it passed like a +dream.</p> +<p>What wonderful happenings were crowded into it!</p> +<p>First the nurse, from the dizzy heights of her greater +experience and superior knowledge, indulged my infantile anxieties +by allowing me to look on while baby was being bathed, and rewarded +me for "being good" by many praises of my baby's beauty.</p> +<p>"I've nursed a-many in my time," she said, "but I don't mind +saying as I've never had a bonnier babby on my knee. Look at her +legs now, so white and plump and dimpled. Have you <i>ever</i> seen +anythink so putty?"</p> +<p>I confessed that I never had, and when nurse showed me how to +fix the binder, and put on the barrow-coat without disturbing baby +while asleep, I thought her a wonderful woman.</p> +<p>Emmerjane, who had with difficulty been kept out of the room +last night and was now rushing breathlessly up and down stairs, +wished to hold baby for a moment, and at length out of the +magnificence of my generosity I allowed her to do so, only warning +her, as she loved her life, to hold tight and not let baby +fall.</p> +<p>"How'd you mean?" said the premature little mother. "<i>Me</i> +let her fall? Not much!"</p> +<p>Every hour, according to the doctor's orders, I gave baby the +breast. I do not know which was my greatest joy—to feast my +eyes on her while she sucked and to see her little head fall back +with her little mouth open when she had had enough, or to watch her +when she stretched herself and hiccoughed, and then grasped my +thumb with her little tight fingers.</p> +<p>Oh, the wild, inexpressible delight of it!</p> +<p>Every hour had its surprise. Every few minutes had their cause +of wonder.</p> +<p>It rather hurt me when baby cried, and I dare say my own foolish +lip would drop at such moments, but when I saw that there were no +tears in her eyes, and she was only calling for her food, I pleaded +with nurse to let me give her the breast again.</p> +<p>The sun shone all day long, and though the holland window blinds +were kept down to subdue the light, for my sake and perhaps for +baby's, I thought my room looked perfectly beautiful. It might be +poor and shabby, but flights of angels could not have made it more +heavenly than it was in my eyes then.</p> +<p>In the afternoon nurse told me I must take some sleep myself, +but I would not sleep until baby slept, so she had to give me my +cherub again, and I sat up and rocked her and for a while I +sang—as softly as I could—a little lullaby.</p> +<p>It was a lullaby I had learned at Nemi from the Italian women in +embroidered outside stays, who so love their children; and though I +knew quite well that it had been written for the Mother of all +Mothers, who, after she had been turned away from every door, had +been forced to take refuge in a stable in Bethlehem, I was in such +an ecstasy of spiritual happiness that I thought it no irreverence +to change it a little and to sing it in my London lodging to my +human child.</p> +<p>"<i>Sleep, little baby, I love thee, I love thee,<br /> +Sleep, little Queen, I am bending above thee</i>."</p> +<p>I dare say my voice was sweet that day—a mother's voice is +always sweet—for when Emmerjane, who had been out of the +room, came back to it with a look of awed solemnity, she said:</p> +<p>"Well, I never did! I thought as 'ow there was a' angel a-come +into this room."</p> +<p>"So there is, and here she is," I said, beaming down on my +sleeping child.</p> +<p>But the long, short, blissful day came to an end at last, and +when night fell and I dropped asleep, there were two names of my +dear ones on my lips, and if one of them was the name of him who +(as I thought) was in heaven, the other was the name of her who was +now lying in my arms.</p> +<p>I may have been poor, but I felt like a queen with all the +riches of life in my little room.</p> +<p>I may have sinned against the world and the Church, but I felt +as if God had justified me by His own triumphant law.</p> +<p>The whole feminine soul in me seemed to swell and throb, and +with my baby at my breast I wanted no more of earth or heaven.</p> +<p>I was still bleeding from the bruises of Fate, but I felt healed +of all my wounds, loaded with benefits, crowned with rewards.</p> +<p>Four days passed like this, varied by visits from the doctor and +my Welsh landlady. Then my nurse began to talk of leaving me.</p> +<p>I did not care. In my ignorance of my condition, and the greed +of my motherly love, I was not sorry she was going so soon. Indeed, +I was beginning to be jealous of her, and was looking forward to +having my baby all to myself.</p> +<p>But nurse, as I remember, was a little ashamed and tried to +excuse herself.</p> +<p>"If I hadn't promised to nurse another lady, I wouldn't leave +you, money or no money," she said. "But the girl" (meaning +Emmerjane) "is always here, and if she isn't like a nurse she's +'andy."</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, I shall be all right," I answered.</p> +<p>On the fifth day my nurse left me, and shocking as that fact +seems to me now, I thought little of it then.</p> +<p>I was entirely happy. I had nothing in the world except my baby, +and my baby had nothing in the world except me. I was still in the +dungeon that had seemed so dreadful to me before—the great +dungeon of London to one who is poor and friendless.</p> +<p>But no matter! I was no longer alone, for there was one more +inmate in my prison-house—my child.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SIXTH_PART" id="SIXTH_PART"></a>SIXTH PART</h2> +<h3>I AM LOST</h3> +<div class="center"><i>"Is it nothing to you, ye that pass by . . . +?"</i></div> +<h2>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</h2> +<p>I hate to butt in where I may not be wanted, but if the +remainder of my darling's story is to be understood I must say what +was happening in the meantime to me.</p> +<p>God knows there was never a day on which I did not think of my +dear one at home, wondering what was happening to her, and whether +a certain dark fact which always lay at the back of my mind as a +possibility was actually coming to pass.</p> +<p>But she would be brave—I know that quite well—and I +saw plainly that, if I had to get through the stiff job that was +before me, I must put my shadowy fears away and think only of the +dangers I was sure about.</p> +<p>The first of these was that she might suppose our ship was lost, +so as soon as we had set up on old Erebus the wooden lattice towers +which contained our long-distance electric apparatus, I tried to +send her that first message from the Antarctic which was to say we +had not been shipwrecked.</p> +<p>It was a thrilling moment. Exactly at the stroke of midnight on +January 21, while the midnight sun was shining with its dull sullen +glow, the whole of our company having gathered round, the wireless +man prepared to despatch my message.</p> +<p>As we were not sure of our machinery I had drawn up the words to +suit any place into which they might fall if they missed their +intended destination:</p> +<p>"South Pole Expedition safe. All well. Send greetings to dear +ones at home."</p> +<p>For some forty seconds the sparks crackled out their snappy +signals into the crisp night air, and then the settled calm +returned, and we stood in breathless silence like beings on the +edge of a world waiting for the answer to come as from another +planet.</p> +<p>It came. After a few minutes we heard from our magnetic detector +the faint sound of the S signals, and then we broke into a great +cheer. It was not much, but it was enough; and while our scientific +staff were congratulating themselves that electric-wave telegraphy +was not inhibited by long distance, or by the earth's curvature +over an arc of a great circle, I was thinking of my dear +one—that one way or another my message would reach her and +she would be relieved.</p> +<p>Then in splendid health and spirits—dogs, ponies, and men +all A1—we started on our journey, making a bee-line for the +Pole.</p> +<p>Owing to the heavy weights we had to transport our progress was +slow, much slower than we had expected; and though the going was +fair and we kept a steady pace, travelling a good deal by night, it +was not until the end of March that we reached Mount Darwin, which +I had fixed on for the second of our electric power stations.</p> +<p>By this time winter was approaching, the nights were beginning +to be dark and cold, and the altitude (8000 ft.) was telling on +some of us.</p> +<p>Nevertheless our second installation got finished about the last +week in April, and again we gathered round (not quite such a hearty +company as before) while the wireless man spoke to the operator we +had left on Erebus.</p> +<p>Again the electrical radiations went crackling into space, and +again we gave a cheer when the answer came back—all well and +instruments in perfect order.</p> +<p>Then, late as it was, we began on the last stage of our journey, +which we knew would be a hard one. Three hundred geographical miles +in front; temperature down to minus 40°; the sun several weeks +gone, and nothing before us but thickening twilight, cold winds, +snow, the rare aurora and the frequent moon.</p> +<p>But the worst fact was that our spirits were low, and do what I +would to keep a good heart and cheer up the splendid fellows who +had come with me, I could not help feeling the deepening effect of +that sunless gloom.</p> +<p>In spite of this, I broke camp on April 25, and started straight +as a die for the South.</p> +<p>It was a stiff fight over the upper glacier in latitude 85, with +its razor-shaped ice, full of snow-covered crevasses, and three +days out two of our best men fell into one of the worst of +them.</p> +<p>I saw the accident from a dozen yards away, and running up I lay +on my stomach and shouted down, but it was a black bottomless gulf +and not a sound or a sign came back to me.</p> +<p>This cast a still deeper gloom on our company, who could not be +cheered up, though I kept telling them we should be on the great +plateau soon, please God, and then we should have a clear road to +the Pole.</p> +<p>We were not much better on top though, for the surface was much +broken up, and in that brewing place of the winds there seemed to +be nothing but surging seas of cumulus cloud and rolling waves of +snow.</p> +<p>The Polar march was telling on us badly. We were doing no more +than seven miles at a stretch. So to help my shipmates to keep up +their spirits (and perhaps to give a bit of a "heise" to my own) I +had to sing all day long—though my darling is right that I +have no more voice than a corn-crake.</p> +<p>Sometimes I sang "Ramsey Town," because it did not want much +music, but generally "Sally's the gel for me," because it had a +rattling chorus. The men all joined in (scientific experts +included), and if the angels took any heed of us, I think it must +have touched them up to look down on our little company of puny men +singing away as we trudged through that snowy wilderness which +makes a man feel so small.</p> +<p>But man can only do his best, and as Father Dan (God bless his +old heart!) used to say, the angels can do no more. We were making +middling hard work of it in the 88th parallel, with a temperature +as low as 50 degrees of frost, when a shrieking, blinding blizzard +came sweeping down on us from the south.</p> +<p>I thought it might blow itself out, but it didn't, so we struck +camp in a broad half-circle, building igloos (snow huts) with their +backs (like rain-beaten cattle) to the storm.</p> +<p>There we lay nine days—and it is not worth while now to +say how much some of our men suffered from frozen fingers, and more +from falling spirits.</p> +<p>Sometimes I heard them saying (in voices that were intended to +be loud enough for me to hear) it would have been better to have +built winter quarters on the north of Darwin and settle there until +the return of summer. And at other times I heard them counting the +distance to the Pole—a hundred geographical miles, making +twenty days' march at this season, with the heavy weights we had to +carry, and the dwindling of our dogs and ponies, for we had killed +a lot of them for food.</p> +<p>But I would not give in, for I felt that to go back without +finishing my job would break my heart; and one day when old Treacle +said, "No use, guv'nor, let's give it best," I flew at him like a +hunted tiger.</p> +<p>All the same I was more than a bit down myself, for there were +days when death was very near, and one night it really broke me up +to hear a big strapping chap saying to the man who shared his +two-man sack, "I shouldn't care a whiff if it wasn't for the wife +and the kiddies."</p> +<p>God knows I had my own anchor at home, and sometimes it had a +devil of a tug at me. I fought myself hard, though, and at last in +my desire to go on and my yearning to go back to my dear one, I +made an awful proposal, such as a man does not much like to think +of after a crisis is over.</p> +<p>"Shipmates," I said, "it isn't exactly my fault that we are here +in the middle of winter, but here we are, and we must make the best +of it. I am going forward, and those who want to go with me can go. +But those who don't want to go can stay; and so that no one may +have it on his conscience that he has kept his comrades back, +whether by weakness or by will, I have told the doctor to serve out +a dose of something to every man, that he may end it whenever he +wants to."</p> +<p>To my surprise that awful proposal was joyfully received; and +never so long as I live shall I forget the sight o' O'Sullivan +going round the broad circle of my shipmates in the blue gloom of +that noonday twilight and handing something to every one of them, +while nobody spoke, and Death seemed to look us in the face.</p> +<p>And now I come to the incident for which I have told this +story.</p> +<p>I could not get a wink of sleep that night for thinking of the +brave fellows I had doomed to death by their own hands (for that +was what it came to), because their souls were starving and they +were thinking of home.</p> +<p>My soul was starving too, and whether it was the altitude (now +11,000 ft.) that was getting into my head, and giving me that +draught in the brain which only travellers in frozen regions know, +or the Power higher than Nature which speaks to a man in great +solitudes when life is low, I cannot say, but as God is my witness, +I was hearing again the voices of my dear ones so far away.</p> +<p>Sometimes they were the voices of my old people in Ellan, but +more frequently, and most importunately, it was Mary's voice, +calling me by my name, and crying to me for help as if she were in +the shadow of some threatening danger.</p> +<p>"Martin! Martin! Martin!"</p> +<p>When this idea took clear possession of me—it was about +three a.m. and the hurricane was yowling like a wounded +dog—the answering thought came quick. I must go back. No +matter at what cost or sacrifice—I must go back.</p> +<p>It was in vain I reflected that the trouble which threatened my +darling (whatever it was, and I thought I knew) might be all over +before I reached her side—I must go back.</p> +<p>And even when I reminded myself that I was within twenty days' +march of that last point of my journey which was to be the crown +and completion of it all, I also remembered that my dear one was +calling me, and I had no choice but to obey.</p> +<p>Next morning, in the first light of the dim Antarctic glow, I +crept out of my snow hut to look south with powerful glasses in +order to make sure that there was no reason why I should change my +mind.</p> +<p>There was none. Although the snow had ceased the blizzard was +blowing a hundred miles an hour in cutting gusts, so with a +bleeding heart (and yet a hot one) I told Treacle to call rip our +company, and when they stood round me in the shelter of my hut I +said:</p> +<p>"Shipmates, I have been thinking things over during the night, +and I see them differently now. Nature is stronger than man, and +the nature that is inside of us sometimes hits us harder than that +which is without. I think it is that way with us here, and I +believe there isn't a man of you who wouldn't go forward with me if +he had nobody to think of except himself. . . . Well, perhaps +<i>I</i> have somebody to think of, too, so we'll stick together, +shipmates, and whatever regrets there may be, or disappointments, +or heart-breakings, we'll . . . we'll go back home."</p> +<p>I think it says something for the mettle my men were made of +that there was never a cheer after I said that, for they could see +what it cost me to say it. But by God, there was a shout when I +added:</p> +<p>"We've drawn a blank this time, boys, but we'll draw a winner +yet, and I ask you to swear that you'll come back with me next +year, please God, to finish the work we've begun."</p> +<p>Then we gripped hands in that desolate place, and took our +solemn oath, and God knows we meant to keep it.</p> +<p>It did not take long to strike camp, I can tell you. The men +were bustling about like boys and we had nothing to think of now +but the packing of the food and the harnessing of the dogs and +ponies, for we were leaving everything else behind us.</p> +<p>At the last moment before we turned northward I planted the +Union Jack on the highest hummock of snow, and when we were a +hundred yards off I looked back through the gloom and saw it +blowing stiffly in the wind.</p> +<p>I don't think I need tell how deeply that sight cut me, but if +life has another such moment coming for me all I have to say is +that I hope I may die before I live to see it—which is Irish, +but most damnably true.</p> +<p>That was twelve o'clock noon on the eighth day of June and +anybody may make what he likes of what I say, but as nearly as I +can calculate the difference of time between London and where we +were in the 88th latitude it was the very hour of my dear one's +peril.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EIGHTY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"EIGHTY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>EIGHTY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Two weeks passed and if I suffered from getting up too soon I +was never conscious of it.</p> +<p>Once or twice, perhaps, in the early days I felt a certain +dizziness and had to hold on for a moment to the iron rail of my +bedstead, but I was too much occupied with the tender joys of +motherhood to think much about myself.</p> +<p>Bathing, dressing, undressing, and feeding my baby were a +perpetual delight to me.</p> +<p>What a joy it all was!</p> +<p>There must he something almost animal, even voluptuous, in +mothers' love, for there was nothing I liked so much as having baby +naked on my knee and devouring its sweet body all over with +kisses—putting its little fat hands and even its little fat +feet into my mouth.</p> +<p>There must be something almost infantile, too, for sometimes +after I had talked to my darling with a flood of joyous chatter I +would even find myself scolding her a little, and threatening what +I would do if she did not "behave."</p> +<p>Oh, mysterious laws of motherhood! Only God can fathom the +depths of them.</p> +<p>It was just as if sixteen years of my life had rolled back, and +I was again a child in my mother's room playing with my dolls under +the table. Only there was something so wonderful now in the sweet +eyes that looked up at me, that at certain moments I would fall +into a long reverie and my heart would be full of adoration.</p> +<p>What lengths I went to!</p> +<p>It was the height of the London season when baby came; and +sometimes at night, looking through my window, I saw the tail-end +of the long queue of carriages and electric broughams which +stretched to the end of the street I lived in, from the great +houses fronting the Park where balls and receptions were being held +until the early hours of morning. But I never envied the society +ladies they were waiting for. On the contrary I pitied them, +remembering they were childless women for the most part and +thinking their pleasures were hollow as death compared with +mine.</p> +<p>I pitied the rich mothers too—the mothers who banish their +babies to nurseries to be cared for by servants, and I thought how +much more blessed was the condition of poor mothers like myself who +kept all that sweetness to themselves.</p> +<p>How happy I was! No woman coming into a fortune was ever so +happy. I sang all day long. Sometimes it was the sacred music of +the convent in which each note, with its own glory of sound, wraps +one's heart round as with a rainbow, but more frequently it was +"Ramsey Town" or "Sally's the gel for me," which were only noisy +nonsense but dear to me by such delicious memories.</p> +<p>My neighbours would come to their doors to listen, and when I +had stopped I would hear them say:</p> +<p>"Our lady is a 'appy 'cart, isn't she?"</p> +<p>I suppose it was because I was so happy that my looks returned +to me, though I did not know it was so until one morning, after +standing a moment at the window, I heard somebody say:</p> +<p>"Our lady seems to be prettier than ever now her baby has +come."</p> +<p>I should not have been a woman if I could have resisted that, so +I ran to the glass to see if it was true, and it was.</p> +<p>The ugly lines that used to be in my cheeks had gone, my hair +had regained its blue-black lustre, and my eyes had suddenly become +bright like a darkened room when the shutters are opened and the +sunshine streams into it.</p> +<p>But the coming of baby did better for me than that. It brought +me back to God, before whom I now felt so humble and so glad, +because he had transformed the world for me.</p> +<p>Every Catholic will know why I could not ask for the benediction +of the Church after childbirth; but he will also know why I was in +a fever of anxiety to have my baby baptized at the earliest +possible moment. It was not that I feared her death (I never +thought of that in those days), but because I lived in dread of the +dangers which had darkened my thoughts before she was born.</p> +<p>So when baby was nearly a fortnight old I wrote to the Rector of +a neighbouring Catholic Church asking when I might bring her to be +baptized, and he sent me a printed reply, giving the day and hour, +and enclosing a card to be filled up with her name and all other +particulars.</p> +<p>What a day of joy and rapture was that of my baby's baptism! I +was up with the sun on the morning appointed to take her to church +and spent hours and hours in dressing her.</p> +<p>How lovely she looked when I had finished! I thought she was the +sweetest thing in the world, sweeter than a rosebud under its +sparkling web of dew when the rising sun is glistening on it.</p> +<p>After I had put on all the pretty clothes I had prepared for her +before she was born—the christening robe and the pelisse and +the knitted bonnet with its pink ribbons and the light woollen +veil—I lifted her up to the glass to look at herself, being +such a child myself and so wildly, foolishly happy.</p> +<p>"That old Rector won't see anything equal to her <i>this</i> +summer morning anyway," I thought.</p> +<p>And then the journey to church!</p> +<p>I have heard that unmarried mothers, going out for the first +time after their confinement, feel ashamed and confused, as if +every passer-by must know their shameful secret. I was a kind of +unmarried mother myself, God help me, but I had no such feeling. +Indeed I felt proud and gay, and when I sailed out with my baby in +my arms I thought all the people in our street were looking at me, +and I am sure I wanted to say "Good morning" to everybody I met on +my way.</p> +<p>The church was not in a joyous quarter. It stood on the edge of +a poor and very populous district, with a flaunting public-house +immediately opposite. When I got to it I found a number of other +mothers (all working women), with their babies and the godfathers +and godmothers they had provided for them, waiting at the door.</p> +<p>At this sight I felt very stupid, for I had been thinking so +much about other things (some of them vain enough perhaps) that I +had forgotten the necessity for sponsors; and I do not know what I +should have done at that last moment if the sacristan had not come +to my relief—finding me two old people who, for a fee of a +shilling each, were willing to stand godmother and godfather to my +darling.</p> +<p>Then the priest came out of the church in his white surplice and +stole, and we all gathered in the porch for the preliminary part of +the sacrament.</p> +<p>What an experience it was! Never since my marriage had I been in +a state of such spiritual exaltation.</p> +<p>The sacristan, showing me some preference, had put me in the +middle of the row, immediately in front of the priest, so what +happened to the other children I do not know, having eyes and ears +for nothing but the baptism of my own baby.</p> +<p>There were some mistakes, but they did not trouble me, although +one was a little important.</p> +<p>When the priest said, "What name give you this child?" I handed +the Rector's card to the sacristan, and whispered "Isabel Mary" to +the godmother, but the next thing I heard was:</p> +<p>"Mary Isabel, what dost thou ask of the Church of God?"</p> +<p>But what did it matter? Nothing mattered except one +thing—that my darling should be saved by the power of the +Holy Sacrament from the dark terrors which threatened her.</p> +<p>Oh, it is a fearful and awful thing, the baptism of a child, if +you really and truly believe in it. And I did—from the bottom +of my heart and soul I believed in it and trusted it.</p> +<p>In my sacred joy I must have cried nearly all the time, for I +had taken baby's bonnet off, I remember, and holding it to my mouth +I found after a while that I was wetting it with my tears.</p> +<p>When the exorcisms were over, the priest laid the end of his +stole over baby's shoulder and led her (as our prayer books say) +into the church, and we all followed to the baptistery, where I +knelt immediately in front of the font, with the old godmother +before me, the other mothers on either side, and a group of +whispering children behind.</p> +<p>The church was empty, save for two charwomen who were sweeping +the floor of the nave somewhere up by the dark and silent altar; +and when the sacristan closed the outer door there was a solemn +hush, which was broken only by the priest's voice and the +godparents' muttered responses.</p> +<p>"Mary Isabel, dost thou renounce Satan?"</p> +<p>"I do renounce him."</p> +<p>"And all his works?"</p> +<p>"I do renounce them."</p> +<p>"And all his pomps?"</p> +<p>"I do renounce them."</p> +<p>The actual baptism was like a prayer to me. I am sure my whole +soul went out to it. And though I may have been a sinful woman +unworthy to be churched, I know, and God knows, that no chaste and +holy nun ever prayed with a purer heart than I did then, kneeling +there with my baby's bonnet to my mouth.</p> +<p>"Mary Isabel, I baptize thee in the name of the Father + and of +the Son + and of the Holy Ghost.+"</p> +<p>Except that baby cried a little when the water was poured on her +head (as she had cried when the salt was put on her tongue), I knew +no more after that until I saw the candle in the godfather's hand +(which signified that my child had been made a Child of Light) and +heard the priest say:</p> +<p>"Go in peace and the Lord be with thee."</p> +<p>Then I awoke as from a trance. There was a shuffling of feet. +The priest was going away. The solemn rite was at an end.</p> +<p>I rose from my knees, put a little money in the plate which the +sacristan held out to me, gave a shilling to each of the two old +sponsors, took baby back into my arms, and sat down in a pew to put +on her bonnet and veil.</p> +<p>The spiritual exaltation which had sustained me lasted until I +reached the street where the other mothers and their friends were +laughing and joking, in voices that had to be pitched high over the +rattle of the traffic, about going to the house opposite to "wet +the baby's head."</p> +<p>But I think something of the celestial light of the sacrament +must have been on my face still when I reached home, for I remember +that as I knocked at the door, and waited for the rope from the +kitchen to open it, I heard one of my neighbours say:</p> +<p>"Our lady has taken a new lease of life, hasn't she?"</p> +<p>I thought I had—a great new lease of physical and +spiritual life.</p> +<p>But how little did I know what Fate had in store for me!</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETIETH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETIETH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETIETH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I was taking off baby's outdoor things when my Welsh landlady +came up to ask how I had got on, and after I had told her she +said:</p> +<p>And now thee'st got to get the jewel registered."</p> +<p>"Registered?"</p> +<p>"Within three weeks. It's the law, look you."</p> +<p>That was the first thing that frightened me. I had filled up +truthfully enough the card which the Rector had sent me, because I +knew that the register of my Church must be as sacred as its +confessional.</p> +<p>But a public declaration of my baby's birth and parentage seemed +to be quite another matter—charged with all the dangers to +me, to Martin, and above all to my child, which had overshadowed my +life before she was born.</p> +<p>More than once I felt tempted to lie, to make a false +declaration, to say that Martin had been my husband and Isabel was +my legitimate child.</p> +<p>But at length I resolved to speak the truth, the plain truth, +telling myself that God's law was above man's law, and I had no +right to be ashamed.</p> +<p>In this mood I set off for the Registry Office. It was a long +way from where I lived, and carrying baby in my arms I was tired +when I got there.</p> +<p>I found it to be a kind of private house, with an open vestibule +and a black-and-white enamelled plate on the door-post, saying +"Registry of Births and Deaths."</p> +<p>In the front parlour (which reminded me of Mr. Curphy's office +in Holmtown) there was a counter by the door and a large table +covered with papers in the space within.</p> +<p>Two men sat at this table, an old one and a young one, and I +remember that I thought the old one must have been reading aloud +from a newspaper which he held open in his hand, for as I entered +the young one was saying:</p> +<p>"Extraordinary! Perfectly extraordinary! And everybody thought +they were lost, too!"</p> +<p>In the space between the door and the counter two women were +waiting. Both were poor and obviously agitated. One had a baby in +her arms, and when it whimpered for its food she unbuttoned her +dress and fed it openly. The other woman, whose eyes were red as if +she had been crying, wore a coloured straw hat over which, in a +pitiful effort to assume black, she had stretched a pennyworth of +cheap crêpe.</p> +<p>In his own good time the young man got up to attend to them. He +was a very ordinary young clerk in a check suit, looking frankly +bored by the dull routine of his daily labour, and palpably +unconscious of the fact that every day and hour of his life he was +standing on the verge of the stormiest places of the soul.</p> +<p>Opening one of two registers which lay on the counter (the +Register of Births) he turned first to the woman with the child. +Her baby, a boy, was illegitimate, and in her nervousness she +stumbled and stammered, and he corrected her sharply.</p> +<p>Then opening the other register (the Register of Deaths) he +attended to the woman in the crêpe. She had lost her little +girl, two years old, and produced a doctor's certificate. While she +gave the particulars she held a soiled handkerchief to her mouth as +if to suppress a sob, but the young clerk's composure remained +undisturbed.</p> +<p>I do not know if it was the agitation of the two poor women that +made me nervous, but when they were gone and my turn had come, I +was hot and trembling.</p> +<p>The young clerk, however, who was now looking at me for the +first time, had suddenly become respectful. With a bow and a smile +he asked me if I wished to register my child, and when I answered +yes he asked me to be good enough to step up to the counter.</p> +<p>"And what is your baby's name, please?" he asked.</p> +<p>I told him. He dipped his pen in his metal ink-pot, shook some +drops back, made various imaginary flourishes over his book and +wrote:</p> +<p>"Mary Isabel."</p> +<p>"And now," he said, with another smile, "the full name, +profession, and place of residence of the father."</p> +<p>I hesitated for a moment, and then, making a call on my +resolution, I said:</p> +<p>"Martin Conrad, seaman, deceased."</p> +<p>The young clerk looked up quickly.</p> +<p>"Did you say Martin Conrad, ma'am?" he asked, and as well as I +could for a click in my throat I answered:</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>He paused as if thinking; then with the same flourish as before +he wrote that name also, and after he had done so, he twisted his +face about to the old man, who was sitting behind him, and said, in +a voice that was not meant to reach me:</p> +<p>"Extraordinary coincidence, isn't it?"</p> +<p>"Extraordinary!" said the old man, who had lowered his newspaper +and was looking across at me over the rims of his spectacles.</p> +<p>"And now," said the young clerk, "your own name and your maiden +name if you please."</p> +<p>"Mary O'Neill."</p> +<p>The young clerk looked up at me again. I was holding baby on my +left arm and I could see that his eye caught my wedding ring.</p> +<p>"Mary Conrad, maiden name O'Neill, I presume?" he said.</p> +<p>I hesitated once more. The old temptation was surging back upon +me. But making a great pull on my determination to tell the truth +(or what I believed to be the truth) I answered:</p> +<p>"No, Mary O'Neill simply."</p> +<p>"Ah!" said the young clerk, and I thought his manner changed +instantly.</p> +<p>There was silence for some minutes while the young clerk filled +up his form and made the copy I was to carry away.</p> +<p>I heard the scratching of the young clerk's pen, the crinkling +of the old man's newspaper, the hollow ticking of a round clock on +the wall, the dull hum of the traffic in the streets, and the +thud-thud-thudding in my own bosom.</p> +<p>Then the entry was read out to me and I was asked to sign +it.</p> +<p>"Sign here, please," said the young clerk in quite a different +tone, pointing to a vacant line at the bottom of the hook, and I +signed with a trembling hand and a feeling of only partial +consciousness.</p> +<p>I hardly know what happened after that until I was standing in +the open vestibule, settling baby on my arm afresh for my return +journey, and telling myself that I had laid a stigma upon my child +which would remain with her as long as she lived.</p> +<p>It was a long, long way back, I remember, and when I reached +home (having looked neither to the right nor left, nor at anything +or anybody, though I felt as if everybody had been looking at me) I +had a sense of dimness of sight and of aching in the eyeballs.</p> +<p>I did not sing very much that day, and I thought baby was rather +restless.</p> +<p>Towards nightfall I had a startling experience.</p> +<p>I was preparing Isabel for bed, when I saw a red flush, like a +rash, down the left side of her face.</p> +<p>At first I thought it would pass away, but when it did not I +called my Welsh landlady upstairs to look at it.</p> +<p>"Do you see something like a stain on baby's face?" I asked, and +then waited breathlessly for her answer.</p> +<p>"No . . . Yes . . . Well," she said, "now that thee'st saying so +. . . perhaps it's a birthmark."</p> +<p>"A birthmark?"</p> +<p>"Did'st strike thy face against anything when baby was +coming?"</p> +<p>I made some kind of reply, I hardly know what, but the truth, or +what I thought to be the truth, flashed on me in a moment.</p> +<p>Remembering my last night at Castle Raa, and the violent scene +which had occurred there, I told myself that the flush on baby's +face was the mark of my husband's hand which, making no impression +upon me, had been passed on to my child, and would remain with her +to the end of her life, as the brand of her mother's shame and the +sign of what had been called her bastardy.</p> +<p>How I suffered at the sight of it! How time after time that +night I leaned over my sleeping child to see if the mark had passed +away! How again and again I knelt by her side to pray that if sin +of mine had to be punished the punishment might fall on me and not +on my innocent babe!</p> +<p>At last I remembered baby's baptism and told myself that if it +meant anything it meant that the sin in which my child had been +born, the sin of those who had gone before her (if sin it was), had +been cast out of her soul with the evil spirits which had inspired +them.</p> +<p>"<i>This sign of the Holy Cross + which we make upon her +forehead do thou, accursed devil, never dare to violate</i>."</p> +<p>God's law had washed my darling white! What could man's +law—his proud but puny morality—do to injure her? It +could do nothing!</p> +<p>That comforted me. When I looked at baby again the flush had +gone and I went to bed quite happy.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-FIRST CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I think it must have been the morning of the next day when the +nurse who had attended me in my confinement came to see how I was +going along.</p> +<p>I told her of the dimness of my sight and the aching of my +eyeballs, whereupon she held up her hands and cried:</p> +<p>"There now! What did I tell you? Didn't I say it is <i>after</i> +a lady feels it?"</p> +<p>The moral of her prediction was that, being in a delicate state +of health, and having "let myself low" before baby was born, it was +my duty to wean her immediately.</p> +<p>I could not do it.</p> +<p>Although the nurse's advice was supported by my Welsh landlady +(with various prognostications of consumption and rickets), I could +not at first deny myself the wild joy of nursing my baby.</p> +<p>But a severer monitor soon came to say that I must. I found that +my money was now reduced to little more than two pounds, and that I +was confronted by the necessity (which I had so long put off) of +looking for employment.</p> +<p>I could not look for employment until I had found a nurse for my +child, and I could not find a nurse until my baby could do without +me, so when Isabel was three weeks old I began to wean her.</p> +<p>At first I contented myself with the hours of night, keeping a +feeding-bottle in bed, with the cow's milk warmed to the heat of my +own body. But when baby cried for the breast during the day I could +not find it in my heart to deny her.</p> +<p>That made the time of weaning somewhat longer than it should +have been, but I compromised with my conscience by reducing still +further my meagre expenses.</p> +<p>Must I tell how I did so?</p> +<p>Although it was the month of July there was a snap of cold +weather such as sometimes comes in the middle of our English +summer, and yet I gave up having a fire in my room, and for the +cooking of my food I bought a small spirit stove which cost me a +shilling.</p> +<p>This tempted me to conduct which has since had consequences, and +I am half ashamed and half afraid to speak of it. My baby linen +being little I had to wash it frequently, and having no fire I . . +. dried it on my own body.</p> +<p>Oh, I see now it was reckless foolishness, almost wilful +madness, but I thought nothing of it then. I was poor and perhaps I +was proud, and I could not afford a fire. And then a mother's love +is as deep as the sea, and there was nothing in the wide world I +would not have done to keep my darling a little longer beside +me.</p> +<p>Baby being weaned at last I had next to think of a nurse, and +that was a still more painful ordeal. To give my child to another +woman, who was to be the same as a second mother to her, was almost +more than I could bear to think about.</p> +<p>I <i>had</i> to think of it. But I could only do so by telling +myself that, when I put baby out to nurse, I might arrange to see +her every morning and evening and as often as my employment +permitted.</p> +<p>This idea partly reconciled me to my sacrifice, and I was in +the act of drawing up a newspaper advertisement in these terms when +my landlady came to say that the nurse knew of somebody who would +suit me exactly.</p> +<p>Nurse called the same evening and told me a long story about her +friend.</p> +<p>She was a Mrs. Oliver, and she lived at Ilford, which was at the +other end of London and quite on the edge of the country. The poor +woman, who was not too happily married, had lost a child of her own +lately, and was now very lonely, being devoted to children.</p> +<p>This pleased me extremely, especially (God forgive me!), the +fact that Mrs. Oliver was a bereaved mother and lived on the edge +of the country.</p> +<p>Already in my mind's eye I saw her sitting on sunny days under a +tree (perhaps in an orchard) with Isabel in her arms, rocking her +gently and singing to her softly, and almost forgetting that she +was not her own baby whom she had lost . . . though that was a +two-edged sword which cut me both ways, being a sort of wild joy +with tears lurking behind it.</p> +<p>So I took a note of Mrs. Oliver's address (10 Lennard's Row, +Lennard's Green, Ilford) and wrote to her the same night, asking +her terms and stating my own conditions.</p> +<p>A reply came the following day. It was a badly-written and +misspelt letter, which showed me that Mrs. Oliver must be a working +woman (perhaps the wife of a gardener or farm-labourer, I thought), +though that did not trouble me in the least, knowing by this time +how poor people loved their children.</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p><i>"The terms is fore shillins a weke," she wrote, "but i am +that lonelie sins my own littel one lef me i wood tike your swete +darling for nothin if I cud afford it and you can cum to see her as +offen as you pleas</i>."</p> +</div> +<p>In my ignorance and simplicity this captured me completely, so I +replied at once saying I would take baby to Ilford the next +day.</p> +<p>I did all this in a rush, but when it came to the last moment I +could scarcely part with my letter, and I remember that I passed +three pillar-boxes in the front street before I could bring myself +to post it.</p> +<p>I suppose my eyes must have been red when I returned home, for +my Welsh landlady (whom I had taken into my confidence about my +means) took me to task for crying, telling me that I ought to thank +God for what had happened, which was like a message from heaven, +look you, and a dispensation of Providence.</p> +<p>I tried to see things in that light, though it was difficult to +do so, for the darker my prospects grew the more radiant shone the +light of the little angel by whose life I lived, and the harder it +seemed to live without her.</p> +<p>"But it isn't like losing my child altogether, is it?" I +said.</p> +<p>"'Deed no, and 'twill he better for both of you," said my +landlady.</p> +<p>"Although Ilford is a long way off I can go there every day, +can't I'!"</p> +<p>"'Deed thee can, if thee'st not minding a journey of nine miles +or more."</p> +<p>"And if I can get a good situation and earn a little money I may +be able to have baby back and hire somebody to nurse her, and so +keep her all to myself."</p> +<p>"And why shouldn't thee?" said my Welsh landlady. "Thee reading +print like the young minister and writing letters like a +copybook!"</p> +<p>So in the fierce bravery of motherly love I dried my eyes and +forced back my sobs, and began to pack up my baby's clothes, and to +persuade myself that I was still quite happy.</p> +<p>My purse was very low by this time. After paying my rent and +some other expenses I had only one pound and a few shillings +left.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-SECOND CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At half past seven next morning I was ready to start on my +journey.</p> +<p>I took a hasty glance at myself in the glass before going out, +and I thought my eyes were too much like the sky at +daybreak—all joyful beams with a veil of mist in front of +them.</p> +<p>But I made myself believe that never since baby was born had I +been so happy. I was sure I was doing the best for her. I was also +sure I was doing the best for myself, for what could be so sweet to +a mother as providing for her child?</p> +<p>My Welsh landlady had told me it was nine miles to Ilford, and I +had gathered that I could ride all the way in successive omnibuses +for less than a shilling. But shillings were scarce with me then, +so I determined to walk all the way.</p> +<p>Emmerjane, by her own urgent entreaty, carried baby as far as +the corner of the Bayswater Road, and there the premature little +woman left me, after nearly smothering baby with kisses.</p> +<p>"Keep straight as a' arrow and you can't lose your wye," she +said.</p> +<p>It was one of those beautiful mornings in late July when the air +is fresh and the sun is soft, and the summer, even in London, has +not yet had time to grow tired and dusty.</p> +<p>I felt as light as the air itself. I had put baby's +feeding-bottle in my pocket and hung her surplus linen in a parcel +about my wrist, so I had nothing to carry in my arms except baby +herself, and at first I did not feel her weight.</p> +<p>There were not many people in the West-End streets at that early +hour, yet a few were riding in the Park, and when I came to the +large houses in Lancaster Gate I saw that though the sun was +shining on the windows most of the blinds were down.</p> +<p>I must have been walking slowly, for it was half past eight when +I reached the Marble Arch. There I encountered the first cross-tide +of traffic, but somebody, seeing baby, took me by the arm and led +me safely over.</p> +<p>The great "Mediterranean of Oxford Street" was by this time +running at full tide. People were pouring out of the Tube and +Underground stations and clambering on to the motor-buses. But in +the rush nobody hustled or jostled me. A woman with a child in her +arms was like a queen—everybody made way for her.</p> +<p>Once or twice I stopped to look at the shops. Some of the +dressmakers' windows were full of beautiful costumes. I did not +covet any of them. I remembered the costly ones I had bought in +Cairo and how little happiness they had brought me. And then I felt +as if the wealth of the world were in my arms.</p> +<p>Nevertheless the whole feminine soul in me awoke when I came +upon a shop for the sale of babies' clothes. Already I foresaw a +time when baby, dressed in pretty things like these, would be +running about Lennard's Green and plucking up the flowers in Mrs. +Oliver's garden.</p> +<p>The great street was very long and I thought it would never end. +But I think I must have been still fresh and happy while we passed +through the foreign quarter of Soho, for I remember that, when two +young Italian waiters, standing at the door of their café, +asked each other in their own language which of us (baby or I) was +"the bambino," I turned to them and smiled.</p> +<p>Before I came to Chancery Lane, however, baby began to cry for +her food, and I was glad to slip down a narrow alley into Lincoln's +Inn Fields and sit on a seat in the garden while I gave her the +bottle. It was then ten o'clock, the sun was high and the day was +becoming hot.</p> +<p>The languid stillness of the garden after the noise and stir of +the streets tempted me to stay longer than I had intended, and when +I resumed my journey I thought the rest must have done me good, but +before I reached the Holborn Viaduct fatigue was beginning to gain +on me.</p> +<p>I saw that I must be approaching some great hospital, for +hospital nurses were now passing me constantly, and one of them, +who was going my way, stepped up and asked me to allow her to carry +baby. She looked so sweet and motherly that I let her do so, and as +we walked along we talked.</p> +<p>She asked me if I was going far, and I said no, only to the +other end of London, the edge of the country, to Ilford.</p> +<p>"Ilford!" she cried. "Why, that's miles and miles away. You'll +have to 'bus it to Aldgate, then change for Bow, and then tram it +through Stratford Market."</p> +<p>I told her I preferred to walk, being such a good walker, and +she gave me a searching look, but said no more on that subject.</p> +<p>Then she asked me how old baby was and whether I was nursing her +myself, and I answered that baby was six weeks and I had been +forced to wean her, being supposed to be delicate, and besides . . +.</p> +<p>"Ah, perhaps you are putting her out to nurse," she said, and I +answered yes, and that was the reason I was going to Ilford.</p> +<p>"I see," she said, with another searching look, and then it +flashed upon me that she had formed her own conclusions about what +had befallen me.</p> +<p>When we came to a great building in a side street on the left, +with ambulance vans passing in and out of a wide gateway, she said +she was sorry she could not carry baby any further, because she was +due in the hospital, where the house-doctor would be waiting for +her.</p> +<p>"But I hope baby's nurse will be a good one. They're not always +that, you know."</p> +<p>I was not quite so happy when the hospital nurse left me. The +parcel on my wrist was feeling heavier than before, and my feet +were beginning to drag. But I tried to keep a good heart as I faced +the crowded thoroughfares—Newgate with its cruel old prison, +the edge of St. Paul's, and the corner of St. Martin's-le-Grand, +and so on into Cheapside.</p> +<p>Cheapside itself was almost impassable. Merchants, brokers, +clerks, and city men generally in tall silk hats were hurrying and +sometimes running along the pavement, making me think of the river +by my father's house, whose myriad little waves seemed to my fancy +as a child to be always struggling to find out which could get to +Murphy's Mouth the first and so drown itself in the sea.</p> +<p>People were still very kind to me, though, and if anybody +brushed me in passing he raised his hat; and if any one pushed me +accidentally he stopped to say he was sorry.</p> +<p>Of course baby was the talisman that protected me from harm; and +what I should have done without her when I got to the Mansion house +I do not know, for that seemed to be the central heart of all the +London traffic, with its motor-buses and taxi-cabs going in +different directions and its tremendous tides of human life flowing +every way.</p> +<p>But just as I was standing, dazed and deafened on the edge of a +triangle of streets, looking up at a great building that was like a +rock on the edge of a noisy sea, and bore on its face the startling +inscription, "The Earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof," a +big policeman, seeing me with baby in my arms, held up his hand to +the drivers and shouted to the pedestrians ("Stand a-one side, +please"), and then led me safely across, as if the Red Sea had +parted to let us pass.</p> +<p>It was then twelve o'clock and baby was once more crying for her +food, so I looked for a place in which I might rest while I gave +her the bottle again.</p> +<p>Suddenly I came upon what I wanted. It seemed to be a garden, +but it was a graveyard—one of the graveyards of the old +London churches, enclosed by high buildings now, and overlooked by +office windows.</p> +<p>Such a restful place, so green, so calm, so beautiful! Lying +there in the midst of the tumultuous London traffic, it reminded me +of one of the little islands in the middle of our Ellan glens, on +which the fuchsia and wild rose grow while the river rolls and +boils about it.</p> +<p>I had just sat down on a seat that had been built about a +gnarled and blackened old tree, and was giving baby her food, when +I saw that a young girl was sitting beside me.</p> +<p>She was about nineteen years of age, and was eating scones out +of a confectioner's bag, while she read a paper-covered novel. +Presently she looked at baby with her little eyes, which were like +a pair of shiny boot buttons, and said:</p> +<p>"That your child?"</p> +<p>I answered her, and then she asked:</p> +<p>"Do you like children?"</p> +<p>I answered her again, and asked her if she did not like them +also.</p> +<p>"Can't say I'm particularly gone on them," she said, whereupon I +replied that that was probably because she had not yet had much +experience.</p> +<p>"Oh, haven't I? Perhaps I haven't," she said, and then with a +hard little laugh, she added "Mother's had nine though."</p> +<p>I asked if she was a shop assistant, and with a toss of her head +she told me she was a typist.</p> +<p>"Better screw and your evenings off," she said, and then she +returned to the subject of children.</p> +<p>One of her chums in the office who used to go out with her every +night to the music-halls got into trouble a year or two ago. As a +consequence she had to marry. And what was the result? Never had +her nose out of the wash-tub now!</p> +<p>The story was crude enough, yet it touched me closely.</p> +<p>"But couldn't she have put her baby out to nurse and get another +situation somewhere?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Matter o' luck," said the girl. "Some can. Some can't. That's +their look out. Firms don't like it. If they find you've got a +child they gen'r'lly chuck you."</p> +<p>In spite of myself I was a little down when I started on my +journey again. I thought the parcel was cutting my wrist and I felt +my feet growing heavier at every step.</p> +<p>Was Maggie Jones's story the universal one?</p> +<p>If a child were born beyond the legal limits, was it a thing to +hide away and be ashamed of?</p> +<p>And could it be possible that man's law was stronger than God's +law after all?</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-THIRD CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I had walked so slowly and stopped so often that it was two +o'clock in the afternoon when I passed through Aldgate.</p> +<p>I was then faint for want of food, so I looked out for a +tea-shop or restaurant.</p> +<p>I passed several such places before I found the modest house I +wanted. Then I stepped into it rather nervously and took the seat +nearest the door.</p> +<p>It was an oblong room with red plush seats along the walls +behind a line of marble-topped tables. The customers were all men, +chiefly clerks and warehousemen, I thought, and the attendants were +girls in black frocks and white aprons.</p> +<p>There seemed to be a constant fire of free-and-easy flirtation +going on between them. At one table a man in a cloth cap was saying +to the girl who had served him:</p> +<p>"What's the damage, dearie?"</p> +<p>"One roast, one veg, two breads—'levenpence, and no +liberties, mister."</p> +<p>"Sunday off, Em'ly?" said a youth in a red tie at another table, +and being told it was, he said:</p> +<p>"Then what do you say to 'oppin' up to 'Endon and 'aving a day +in a boat?"</p> +<p>I had to wait some time before anybody came to attend to me, but +at length a girl from the other end of the room, who had taken no +part in these amatory exchanges, stepped up and asked what I +wanted.</p> +<p>I ordered a glass of cold milk and a scone for myself and a pint +of hot milk to replenish baby's bottle.</p> +<p>The girl served me immediately, and after rinsing and refilling +the feeding-bottle she stood near while the baby used it.</p> +<p>She had quiet eyes and that indefinable expression of yearning +tenderness which we sometimes see in the eyes of a dear old maid +who has missed her motherhood.</p> +<p>The shop had been clearing rapidly; and as soon as the men were +gone, and while the other girls were sitting in corners to read +penny novelettes, my waitress leaned over and asked me if I did not +wish to go into the private room to attend to baby.</p> +<p>A moment afterwards I followed her into a small apartment at the +end of the shop, and there a curious thing occurred.</p> +<p>She closed the door behind us and asked me in an eager whisper +to allow her to see to baby.</p> +<p>I tried to excuse myself, but she whispered:</p> +<p>"Hush! I have a baby of my own, though they know nothing about +it here, so you can safely trust me."</p> +<p>I did so, and it was beautiful to see the joy she had in doing +what was wanted, saying all sorts of sweet and gentle things to my +baby (though I knew they were meant for her own), as if the starved +mother-heart in her were stealing a moment of maternal +tenderness.</p> +<p>"There!" she said, "She'll be comfortable now, bless her!"</p> +<p>I asked about her own child, and, coming close and speaking in a +whisper, she told me all about it.</p> +<p>It was a girl and it would be a year old at Christmas. At first +she had put it out to nurse in town, where she could see it every +evening, but the foster-mother had neglected it, and the inspector +had complained, so she had been compelled to take it away. Now it +was in a Home in the country, ten miles from Liverpool Street, and +it was as bonny as a peach and as happy as the day is long.</p> +<p>"See," she whispered, taking a card from her breast, after a +furtive glance towards the door. "I sent two shillings to have her +photograph taken and the Matron has just sent it."</p> +<p>It was the picture of a beautiful baby girl, and I found it easy +to praise her.</p> +<p>"I suppose you see her constantly, don't you?" I said.</p> +<p>The girl's face dropped.</p> +<p>"Only on visiting days, once a month, and not always that," she +answered.</p> +<p>"But how can you live without seeing her oftener?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Matter o' means," she said sadly. "I pay five shillings a week +for her board, and the train is one-and-eight return, so I have to +be careful, you see, and if I lost my place what would happen to +baby?"</p> +<p>I was very low and tired and down when I resumed my walk. But +when I thought for a moment of taking omnibuses for the rest of my +journey I remembered the waitress's story and told myself that the +little I had belonged to my child, and so I struggled on.</p> +<p>But what a weary march it was during the next two hours! I was +in the East End now, and remembering the splendour of the West, I +could scarcely believe I was still in London.</p> +<p>Long, mean, monotonous streets, running off to right and left, +miles on miles of them without form or feature, or any trace of +nature except the blue strips of sky overhead.</p> +<p>Such multitudes of people, often badly dressed and generally +with set and anxious faces, hasting to and fro, hustling, elbowing, +jostling each other along, as if driven by some invisible power +that was swinging an unseen scourge.</p> +<p>No gracious courtesy here! A woman with a child in her arms was +no longer a queen. Children were cheap, and sometimes it was as +much as I could do to save myself from being pushed off the +pavement.</p> +<p>The air seemed to smell of nothing but ale and coarse tobacco. +And then the noise! The ceaseless clatter of carts, the clang of +electric cars, the piercing shrieks of the Underground Railway +coming at intervals out of the bowels of the earth like explosions +out of a volcano, and, above all, the raucous, rasping, +high-pitched voices of the people, often foul-mouthed, sometimes +profane, too frequently obscene.</p> +<p>A cold, grey, joyless, outcast city, cut off from the rest of +London by an invisible barrier more formidable than a wall; a city +in which the inhabitants seemed to live cold, grey, joyless lives, +all the same that they joked and laughed; a city under perpetual +siege, the siege of Poverty, in the constant throes of civil war, +the War of Want, the daily and hourly fight for food.</p> +<p>If there were other parts of the East End (and I am sure there +must be) where people live simple, natural, human lives, I did not +see them that day, for my course was down the principal +thoroughfares only.</p> +<p>Those thoroughfares, telescoping each other, one after another, +seemed as if they would never come to an end.</p> +<p>How tired I was! Even baby was no longer light, and the parcel +on my wrist had become as heavy as lead.</p> +<p>Towards four o'clock I came to a broad parapet which had strips +of garden enclosed by railings and iron seats in front of them. +Utterly exhausted, my arms aching and my legs limp, I sank into one +of these seats, feeling that I could walk no farther.</p> +<p>But after a while I felt better, and then I became aware that +another woman was sitting beside me.</p> +<p>When I looked at her first I thought I had never in my life seen +anything so repulsive. She was asleep, and having that +expressionless look which sleep gives, I found it impossible to +know whether she was young or old. She was not merely coarse, she +was gross. The womanhood in her seemed to be effaced, and I thought +she was utterly brutalised and degraded.</p> +<p>Presently baby, who had also been asleep, awoke and cried, and +then the woman opened her eyes and looked at the child, while I +hushed her to sleep again.</p> +<p>There must be something in a baby's face that has a miraculous +effect on every woman (as if these sweet angels, fresh from God, +make us all young and all beautiful), and it was even so at that +moment.</p> +<p>Never shall I forget the transfiguration in the woman's face +when she looked into the face of my baby. The expression of +brutality and degradation disappeared, and through the bleared eyes +and over the coarsened features there came the light of an almost +celestial smile.</p> +<p>After a while the woman spoke to me. She spoke in a husky voice +which seemed to be compounded of the effects of rum and raw night +air.</p> +<p>"That your'n," she said.</p> +<p>I answered her.</p> +<p>"Boy or gel?"</p> +<p>I told her.</p> +<p>"'Ow old?"</p> +<p>I told her that too.</p> +<p>The woman was silent for a moment, and then, with a thickening +of the husky voice, she said:</p> +<p>"S'pose you'll say I'm a bleedin' liar, but I 'ad a kid as putty +as that onct—puttier. It was a boy. The nobbiest little +b—— as you ever come acrost. Your'n is putty, but it +ain't in it with my Billie, not by a long chalk."</p> +<p>I asked her what had become of her child.</p> +<p>"Lawst 'im," she said. "Used to give sixpence a week to the +woman what 'ad 'alf the 'ouse with me to look after 'im while I was +workin' at the fact'ry. But what did the bleedin' b—— +do? Blimey, if she didn't let 'im get run over by the dray from the +brewery."</p> +<p>"Killed?" I said, clutching at baby.</p> +<p>The woman nodded without speaking.</p> +<p>I asked her how old her child had been.</p> +<p>"More'n four," she said. "Just old enough to run a arrand. It +was crool. Hit me out, I can tell you. That kid was all I had. +Apple o' my eye, in a manner of speakin'. When it was gone there +wasn't much encouragement, was there? The Favver from the Mission +came jawin' as 'ow Jesus 'ad taken 'im to 'Imself. Rot! When they +put 'im down in old Bow I didn't care no more for nothin'. Monse +and monse I walked about night and day, and the bleedin' coppers +was allus on to me. They got their own way at last. I took the +pneumonier and was laid up at the London. And when I got out I +didn't go back to the fact'ry neither."</p> +<p>"What did you do?" I asked.</p> +<p>The woman laughed—bitterly, terribly.</p> +<p>"Do? Don't you <i>know</i>?"</p> +<p>I shook my head. The woman looked hard at me, and then at the +child.</p> +<p>"Look here—are you a good gel?" she said.</p> +<p>Hardly knowing what she meant I answered that I hoped so</p> +<p>"'Ope? Don't you know <i>that</i> neither?"</p> +<p>Then I caught her meaning, and answered faintly:</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>She looked searchingly into my eyes and said:</p> +<p>"I b'lieve you. Some gels is. S'elp me Gawd I don't know how +they done it, though."</p> +<p>I was shuddering and trembling, for I was catching glimpses, as +if by broken lights from hell, of the life behind—the wrecked +hope, the shattered faith, the human being hunted like a beast and +at last turned into one.</p> +<p>Just at that moment baby awoke and cried again. The woman looked +at her with the same look as before—not so much a smile as a +sort of haggard radiance.</p> +<p>Then leaning over me she blew puffs of alcoholic breath into +baby's face, and stretching out a coarse fat finger she tickled her +under the chin.</p> +<p>Baby ceased to cry and began to smile. Seeing this the woman's +eyes sparkled like sunshine.</p> +<p>"See that," she cried. "S'elp me Jesus, I b'lieve I could 'ave +been good meself if I'd on'y 'ad somethink like this to keer +for."</p> +<p>I am not ashamed to say that more than once there had been tears +in my eyes while the woman spoke, though her blasphemies had +corrupted the air like the gases that rise from a dust-heap. But +when she touched my child I shuddered as if something out of the +'lowest depths had tainted her.</p> +<p>Then a strange thing happened.</p> +<p>I had risen to go, although my limbs could scarcely support me, +and was folding my little angel closely in my arms, when the woman +rose too and said:</p> +<p>"You wouldn't let me carry your kiddie a bit, would you?"</p> +<p>I tried to excuse myself, saying something, I know not what The +woman looked at me again, and after a moment she said:</p> +<p>"S'pose not. On'y I thought it might make me think as 'ow I was +carryin' Billie."</p> +<p>That swept down everything.</p> +<p>The one remaining window of the woman's soul was open and I +dared not close it.</p> +<p>I looked down at my child—so pure, so sweet, so stainless; +I looked up at the woman—so foul, so gross, so degraded.</p> +<p>There was a moment of awful struggle and then . . . the woman +and I were walking side by side.</p> +<p>And the harlot was carrying my baby down the street.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-FOURTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At five o'clock I was once more alone.</p> +<p>I was then standing (with baby in my own arms now) under the +statue which is at the back of Bow Church.</p> +<p>I thought I could walk no farther, and although every penny I +had in my pocket belonged to Isabel (being all that yet stood +between her and want) I must borrow a little of it if she was to +reach Mrs. Oliver's that night.</p> +<p>I waited for the first tram that was going in my direction, and +when it came up I signalled to it, but it did not stop—it was +full.</p> +<p>I waited for a second tram, but that was still more crowded.</p> +<p>I reproached myself for having come so far. I told myself how +ill-advised I had been in seeking for a nurse for my child at the +farthest end of the city. I reminded myself that I could not hope +to visit her every day if my employment was to be in the West, as I +had always thought it would be. I asked myself if in all this vast +London, with its myriads of homes, there had been no house nearer +that could have sheltered my child.</p> +<p>Against all this I had to set something, or I think my very +heart would have died there and then. I set the thought of Ilford, +on the edge of the country, with its green fields and its flowers. +I set the thought of Mrs. Oliver, who would love my child as +tenderly as if she were her own little lost one.</p> +<p>I dare say it was all very weak and childish, but it is just +when we are done and down, and do not know what we are doing, that +Providence seems to be directing us, and it was so with me at that +moment.</p> +<p>The trams being full I had concluded that Fate had set itself +against my spending any of Isabel's money, and had made up my mind +to make a fierce fight over the last stage of my journey, when I +saw that a little ahead of where I was standing the road divided +into two branches at an acute angle, one branch going to the right +and the other to the left.</p> +<p>Not all Emmerjane's instructions about keeping "as straight as +a' arrow" sufficed to show me which of the two roads to take and I +looked about for somebody to tell me.</p> +<p>It was then that I became aware of a shabby old four-wheeled cab +which stood in the triangular space in front of the statue, and of +the driver (an old man, in a long coachman's coat, much worn and +discoloured, and a dilapidated tall hat, very shiny in patches) +looking at me while he took the nose-bag off his horse—a bony +old thing with its head hanging down.</p> +<p>I stepped up to him and asked my way, and he pointed it out to +me—to the right, over the bridge and through Stratford +Market.</p> +<p>I asked how far it was to Ilford.</p> +<p>"Better nor two mile <i>I</i> call it," he answered.</p> +<p>After that, being so tired in brain as well as body, I asked a +foolish question—how long it would take me to get there.</p> +<p>The old driver looked at me again, and said:</p> +<p>"'Bout a 'our and a 'alf I should say by the looks of +you—and you carryin' the biby."</p> +<p>I dare say my face dropped sadly as I turned away, feeling very +tired, yet determined to struggle through. But hardly had I walked +twenty paces when I heard the cab coming up behind and the old +driver crying:</p> +<p>"'Old on, missie."</p> +<p>I stopped, and to my surprise he drew up by my side, got down +from his box, opened the door of his cab and said:</p> +<p>"Ger in."</p> +<p>I told him I could not afford to ride.</p> +<p>"Ger in," he said again more loudly, and as if angry with +himself for having to say it.</p> +<p>Again I made some demur, and then the old man said, speaking +fiercely through his grizzly beard:</p> +<p>"Look 'ere, missie. I 'ave a gel o' my own lost somewheres, and +I wouldn't be ans'rable to my ole woman if I let you walk with a +face like that."</p> +<p>I don't know what I said to him. I only know that my tears +gushed out and that at the next moment I was sitting in the +cab.</p> +<p>What happened then I do not remember, except that the dull +rumble of the wheels told me we were passing over a bridge, and +that I saw through the mist before my eyes a sluggish river, a +muddy canal, and patches of marshy fields.</p> +<p>I think my weariness and perhaps my emotion, added to the heavy +monotonous trotting of the old horse, must have put me to sleep, +for after a while I was conscious of a great deal of noise, and of +the old driver twisting about and shouting in a cheerful voice +through the open window at the back of his seat:</p> +<p>"Stratford Market."</p> +<p>After a while we came to a broad road, full of good houses, and +then the old driver cried "Ilford," and asked what part of it I +wished to go to.</p> +<p>I reached forward and told him, "10 Lennard's Row, Lennard's +Green," and then sat back with a lighter heart.</p> +<p>But after another little while I saw a great many funeral cars +passing us, with the hearses empty, as if returning from a +cemetery. This made me think of the woman and her story, and I +found myself unconsciously clasping my baby closer.</p> +<p>The cortèges became so numerous at last that to shut out +painful sights I closed my eyes and tried to think of pleasanter +things.</p> +<p>I thought, above all, of Mrs. Oliver's house, as I had always +seen it in my mind's eye—not a pretentious place at all, only +a little humble cottage but very sweet and clean, covered with +creepers and perhaps with roses.</p> +<p>I was still occupied with these visions when I felt the cab turn +sharply to the left. Then opening my eyes I saw that we were +running down a kind of alley-way, with a row of very mean little +two-storey houses on the one side, and on the other, a kind of +waste ground strewn with broken bottles, broken iron pans, broken +earthenware and other refuse, interspersed with tufts of long +scraggy grass, which looked the more wretched because the sinking +sun was glistening over it.</p> +<p>Suddenly the cab slowed down and stopped. Then the old man +jumped from his box and opening his cab door, said:</p> +<p>"Here you are, missie. This is your destingnation."</p> +<p>There must have been a moment of semi-consciousness in which I +got out of the cab, for when I came to full possession of myself I +was standing on a narrow pavement in front of a closed door which +bore the number 10.</p> +<p>At first I was stunned. Then my heart was in my mouth and it was +as much as I could do not to burst out crying. Finally I wanted to +fly, and I turned back to the cab, but it had gone and was already +passing round the corner.</p> +<p>It was six o'clock. I was very tired. I was nine miles from +Bayswater. I could not possibly carry baby back. What <i>could</i> +I do?</p> +<p>Then, my brain being unable to think, a mystic feeling (born +perhaps of my life in the convent) came over me—a feeling +that all that had happened on my long journey, all I had seen and +everything that had been said to me, had been intended to prepare +me for (and perhaps to save me from) the dangers that were to +come.</p> +<p>I think that gave me a certain courage, for with what strength +of body and spirit I had left (though my heart was in my mouth +still) I stepped across the pavement and knocked at the door.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>My great-hearted, heroic little woman!</p> +<p>All this time I, in my vain belief that our expedition was of +some consequence to the world, was trying to comfort myself with +the thought that my darling must have heard of my safety.</p> +<p>But how could I imagine that she had hidden herself away in a +mass of humanity—which appears to be the most impenetrable +depths into which a human being can disappear?</p> +<p>How could I dream that, to the exclusion of all such interests +as mine, she was occupied day and night, night and day, with the +joys and sorrows, the raptures and fears of the mighty passion of +Motherhood, which seems to be the only thing in life that is really +great and eternal?</p> +<p>Above all, how could I believe that in London itself, in the +heart of the civilised and religious world, she was going through +trials which make mine, in the grim darkness of the Polar night, +seem trivial and easy?</p> +<p>It is all over now, and though, thank God, I did not know at the +time what was happening to my dear one at home, it is some comfort +to me to remember that I was acting exactly as if I did.</p> +<p>From the day we turned hack I heard my darling's voice no more. +But I had a still more perplexing and tormenting experience, and +that was a dream about her, in which she was walking on a crevassed +glacier towards a precipice which she could not see because the +brilliant rays of the aurora were in her eyes.</p> +<p>Anybody may make what he likes of that on grounds of natural +law, and certainly it was not surprising that my dreams should +speak to me in pictures drawn from the perils of my daily life, but +only one thing matters now—that these experiences of my +sleeping hours increased my eagerness to get back to my dear +one.</p> +<p>My comrades were no impediment to that, I can tell you. With +their faces turned homewards, and the wind at their backs, they +were showing tremendous staying power, although we had thirty and +forty below zero pretty constantly, with rough going all the time, +for the snow had been ruckled up by the blizzard to almost +impassable heaps and hummocks.</p> +<p>On reaching our second installation at Mount Darwin I sent a +message to the men at the foot of Mount Erebus, telling them to get +into communication (through Macquarie Island) with the captain of +our ship in New Zealand, asking him to return for us as soon as the +ice conditions would permit; and this was the last of our jobs +(except packing our instruments tight and warm) before we started +down the "long white gateway" for our quarters at the Cape.</p> +<p>With all the heart in the world, though, our going had to be +slow. It was the middle of the Antarctic winter, when absolute +night reigned for weeks and we had nothing to alleviate the +darkness but the light of the scudding moon, and sometimes the +glory of the aurora as it encircled the region of the unrisen +sun.</p> +<p>Nevertheless my comrades sang their way home through the sullen +gloom. Sometimes I wakened the echoes of those desolate old hills +myself with a stave of "Sally's the gel," although I was suffering +a good deal from my darker thoughts of what the damnable +hypocrisies of life might be doing with my darling, and my desire +to take my share of her trouble whatever it might be.</p> +<p>The sun returned the second week in August. Nobody can know what +relief that brought us except those who have lived for months +without it. To see the divine and wonderful thing rise up like a +god over those lone white regions is to know what a puny thing man +is in the scheme of the world.</p> +<p>I think all of us felt like that at sight of the sun, though +some (myself among the rest) were thinking more of it as a kind of +message from friends at home. But old Treacle, I remember, who had +stood looking at it in awed solemnity, said:</p> +<p>"Well, I'm d——!"</p> +<p>After that we got on famously until we reached Winter Quarters, +where we found everybody well and everything in order, but received +one piece of alarming intelligence—that the attempt to get +into wireless communication with our ship had failed, with the +result that we should have to wait for her until the time +originally appointed for her return.</p> +<p>That did not seem to matter much to my shipmates, who, being +snugly housed from blinding blizzards, settled down to amuse +themselves with sing-songs and story-tellings and readings.</p> +<p>But, do what I would, to me the delay was dreadful, and every +day, in the fever of my anxiety to get away as soon as the ice +permitted, I climbed the slopes of old Erebus with O'Sullivan, to +look through powerful glasses for what the good chap called the +"open wather."</p> +<p>Thank God, our wooden house was large enough to admit of my +having a cabin to myself, for I should have been ashamed of my +comrades hearing the cries that sometimes burst from me in the +night.</p> +<p>It is hard for civilised men at home, accustomed to hold +themselves under control, to realise how a man's mind can run away +from him when he is thousands of miles separated from his dear +ones, and has a kind of spiritual certainty that evil is befalling +them.</p> +<p>I don't think I am a bigger fool than most men in that way, but +I shiver even yet at the memory of all the torment I went through +during those days of waiting, for my whole life seemed to revolve +before me and I accused myself of a thousand offences which I had +thought dead and buried and forgotten.</p> +<p>Some of these were trivial in themselves, such as hot and +intemperate words spoken in childhood to my good old people at +home, disobedience or ingratitude shown to them, with all the usual +actions of a naughty boy, who ought to have been spanked and never +was.</p> +<p>But the worst of them concerned my darling, and came with the +thought of my responsibility for the situation in which I felt sure +she found herself.</p> +<p>A thousand times I took myself to task for that, thinking what I +ought and ought not to have done, and then giving myself every bad +name and my conduct every damning epithet.</p> +<p>Up and down my cabin I would walk with hands buried in my +pockets, revolving these thoughts and working myself up, against my +will, to a fever of regret and self-accusation.</p> +<p>Talk about Purgatory—the Purgatory of dear old Father Dan! +That was to come after death—mine came before, and by the +holy saints, I had enough of it.</p> +<p>Two months passed like this; and when the water of the Sound was +open and our ship did not appear, mine was not the only heart that +was eating itself out, for the spirits of my shipmates had also +begun to sink.</p> +<p>In the early part of the Antarctic spring there had been a +fearful hurricane lasting three days on the sea, with a shrieking, +roaring chorus of fiends outside, and the conviction now forced +itself on my men that our ship must have gone down in the +storm.</p> +<p>Of course I fought this notion hard, for my last hopes were +based on not believing it. But when after the lapse of weeks I +could hold out no longer, and we were confronted by the possibility +of being held there another year (for how were our friends to know +before the ice formed again that it was necessary to send relief?), +I faced the situation firmly—measuring out our food and +putting the men on shortened rations, twenty-eight ounces each and +a thimbleful of brandy.</p> +<p>By the Lord God it is a fearful thing to stand face to face with +slow death. Some of my shipmates could scarcely bear it. The utter +solitude, the sight of the same faces and the sound of the same +voices, with the prospect of nothing else, seemed to drive most of +them nearly mad.</p> +<p>There was no sing-songing among them now, and what speaking I +overheard was generally about the great dinners they had eaten, or +about their dreams, which were usually of green fields and +flower-beds and primroses and daisies—daisies, by heaven, in +a world that was like a waste!</p> +<p>As for me I did my best to play the game of never giving up. It +was a middling hard game, God knows, and after weeks of waiting a +sense of helplessness settled down on me such as I had never known +before.</p> +<p>I am not what is called a religious man, but when I thought of +my darling's danger (for such I was sure it was) and how I was cut +off from her by thousands of miles of impassable sea, there came an +overwhelming longing to go with my troubles to somebody stronger +than myself.</p> +<p>I found it hard to do that at first, for a feeling of shame came +over me, and I thought:</p> +<p>"You coward, you forgot all about God when things were going +well with you, but now that they are tumbling down, and death seems +certain, you whine and want to go where you never dreamt of going +in your days of ease and strength."</p> +<p>I got over that, though—there's nothing except death a man +doesn't get over down there—and a dark night came when (the +ice breaking from the cliffs of the Cape with a sound that made me +think of my last evening at Castle Raa) I found myself folding my +hands and praying to the God of my childhood, not for myself but +for my dear one, that He before whom the strongest of humanity were +nothing at all, would take her into His Fatherly keeping.</p> +<p>"Help her! Help her! <i>I</i> can do no more."</p> +<p>It was just when I was down to that extremity that it pleased +Providence to come to my relief. The very next morning I was +awakened out of my broken sleep by the sound of a gun, followed by +such a yell from Treacle as was enough to make you think the +sea-serpent had got hold of his old buttocks.</p> +<p>"The ship! The ship! Commander! Commander! The ship! The +ship!"</p> +<p>And, looking out of my little window I saw him, with six or +seven other members of our company, half naked, just as they had +leapt out of their bunks, running like savages to the edge of the +sea, where the "Scotia," with all flags flying (God bless and +preserve her!), was steaming slowly up through a grinding pack of +broken ice.</p> +<p>What a day that was! What shouting! What hand-shaking! For +O'Sullivan it was Donnybrook Fair with the tail of his coat left +out, and for Treacle it was Whitechapel Road with "What cheer, old +cock?" and an unquenchable desire to stand treat all round.</p> +<p>But what I chiefly remember is that the moment I awoke, and +before the idea that we were saved and about to go home had been +fully grasped by my hazy brain, the thought flashed to my mind:</p> +<p>"Now you'll hear of <i>her!</i>"</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-FIFTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The door of No. 10 was opened by a rather uncomely woman of +perhaps thirty years of age, with a weak face and watery eyes.</p> +<p>This was Mrs. Oliver, and it occurred to me even at that first +sight that she had the frightened and evasive look of a wife who +lives under the intimidation of a tyrannical husband.</p> +<p>She welcomed me, however, with a warmth that partly dispelled my +depression and I followed her into the kitchen.</p> +<p>It was the only room on the ground floor of her house (except a +scullery) and it seemed sweet and clean and comfortable, having a +table in the middle of the floor, a sofa under the window, a +rocking-chair on one side of the fireplace, a swinging baby's cot +on the other side, and nothing about it that was not homelike and +reassuring, except two large photographs over the mantelpiece of +men stripped to the waist and sparring.</p> +<p>"We've been looking for you all day, ma'am, and had nearly give +you up," she said.</p> +<p>Then she took baby out of my arms, removed her bonnet and +pelisse, lifted her barrow-coat to examine her limbs, asked her +age, kissed her on the arms, the neck and the legs, and praised her +without measure.</p> +<p>"And what's her name, ma'am?"</p> +<p>"Mary Isabel, but I wish her to be called Isabel."</p> +<p>"Isabel! A beautiful name too! Fit for a angel, ma'am. And she +<i>is</i> a little angel, bless her! Such rosy cheeks! Such a ducky +little mouth! Such blue eyes—blue as the bluebells in the +cemet'ry. She's as pretty as a waxwork, she really is, and any +woman in the world might be proud to nurse her."</p> +<p>A young mother is such a weakling that praise of her child +(however crude) acts like a charm on her, and in spite of myself I +was beginning to feel more at ease, when Mrs. Oliver's husband came +downstairs.</p> +<p>He was a short, thick-set man of about thirty-five, with a +square chin, a very thick neck and a close-cropped red bullet head, +and he was in his stocking feet and shirt-sleeves as if he had been +dressing to go out for the evening.</p> +<p>I remember that it flashed upon me—I don't know +why—that he had seen me from the window of the room upstairs, +driving up in the old man's four-wheeler, and had drawn from that +innocent circumstance certain deductions about my character and my +capacity to pay.</p> +<p>I must have been right, for as soon as our introduction was over +and I had interrupted Mrs. Oliver's praises of my baby's beauty by +speaking about material matters, saying the terms were to be four +shillings, the man, who had seated himself on the sofa to put on +his boots said, in a voice that was like a shot out of a +blunderbus:</p> +<p>"Five."</p> +<p>"How'd you mean, Ted?" said Mrs. Oliver, timidly. "Didn't we say +four?"</p> +<p>"Five," said the man again, with a still louder volume of +voice.</p> +<p>I could see that the poor woman was trembling, but assuming the +sweet air of persons who live in a constant state of fear, she +said:</p> +<p>"Oh yes. It <i>was</i> five, now I remember."</p> +<p>I reminded her that her letter had said four, but she insisted +that I must be mistaken, and when I told her I had the letter with +me and she could see it if she wished, she said:</p> +<p>"Then it must have been a slip of the pen in a manner of +speaking, ma'am. We allus talked of five. Didn't we, Ted?"</p> +<p>"Certainly," said her husband, who was still busy with his +boots.</p> +<p>I saw what was going on, and I felt hot and angry, but there +seemed to be nothing to do except submit.</p> +<p>"Very well, we'll say five then," I said.</p> +<p>"Paid in advance," said the man, and when I answered that that +would suit me very well, he added:</p> +<p>"A month in advance, you know."</p> +<p>By this time I felt myself trembling with indignation, as well +as quivering with fear, for while I looked upon all the money I +possessed as belonging to baby, to part with almost the whole of it +in one moment would reduce me to utter helplessness, so I said, +turning to Mrs. Oliver:</p> +<p>"Is that usual?"</p> +<p>It did not escape me that the unhappy woman was constantly +studying her husband's face, and when he glanced up at her with a +meaning look she answered, hurriedly:</p> +<p>"Oh yes, ma'am, quite usual. All the women in the Row has it. +Number five, she has twins and gets a month in hand with both of +them. But we'll take four weeks and I can't say no fairer than +that, can I?"</p> +<p>"But why?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Well, you see, ma'am, you're . . . you're a stranger to us, and +if baby was left on our hands . . . Not as we think you'd leave her +chargeable as the saying is, but if you were ever ill, and got a +bit back with your payments . . . we being only pore people. . . +."</p> +<p>While the poor woman was floundering on in this way my blood was +boiling and I was beginning to ask her if she supposed for one +moment that I meant to desert my child, when the man, who had +finished the lacing of his boots, rose to his feet, and said:</p> +<p>"You don't want yer baiby to be give over to the Guardians for +the sake of a week or two, do you?"</p> +<p>That settled everything. I took out my purse and with a +trembling hand laid my last precious sovereign on the table.</p> +<p>A moment or two after this Mr. Oliver, who had put on his coat +and a cloth cap, made for the door.</p> +<p>"Evenin', ma'am," he said, and with what grace I could muster I +bade him good-bye.</p> +<p>"You aren't a-going to the 'Sun' to-night, are you, Ted?" asked +Mrs. Oliver.</p> +<p>"Club," said the man, and the door clashed behind him.</p> +<p>I breathed more freely when he was gone, and his wife (from +whose face the look of fear vanished instantly) was like another +woman.</p> +<p>"Goodness gracious," she cried, with a kind of haggard hilarity, +"where's my head? Me never offering you a cup of tea, and you +looking so white after your journey."</p> +<p>I took baby back into my arms while she put on the kettle, set a +black tea-pot on the hob to warm, laid a piece of tablecloth and a +thick cup and saucer on the end of the table, and then knelt on the +fender to toast a little bread, talking meantime (half +apologetically and half proudly) about her husband.</p> +<p>He was a bricklayer by trade, and sometimes worked at the +cemetery which I could see at the other side of the road (behind +the long railings and the tall trees), but was more generally +engaged as a sort of fighting lieutenant to a Labour leader whose +business it was to get up strikes. Before they were married he had +been the "Light Weight Champion of Whitechapel," and those were +photos of his fights which I could see over the mantelpiece, but +"he never did no knocking of people about now," being "quiet and +matrimonual."</p> +<p>In spite of myself my heart warmed to the woman. I wonder it did +not occur to me there and then that, living in constant dread of +her tyrannical husband, she would always be guilty of the +dissimulation I had seen an example of already and that the effect +of it would be reflected upon my child.</p> +<p>It did not. I only told myself that she was clearly fond of +children and would be a kind nurse to my baby. It even pleased me, +in my foolish motherly selfishness, that she was a plain-featured +person, whom baby could never come to love as she would, I was +sure, love me.</p> +<p>I felt better after I had taken tea, and as it was then seven +o'clock, and the sun was setting horizontally through the cypresses +of the cemetery, I knew it was time to go.</p> +<p>I could not do that, though, without undressing baby and singing +her to sleep. And even then I sat for a while with an aching heart, +and Isabel on my knee, thinking of how I should have to go to bed +that night, for the first time, without her.</p> +<p>Mrs. Oliver, in the meantime, examining the surplus linen which +I had brought in my parcel, was bursting into whispered cries of +delight over it, and, being told I had made the clothes myself, was +saying:</p> +<p>"What a wonderful seamstress you might be if you liked, +ma'am."</p> +<p>At length the time came to leave baby, and no woman knows the +pain of that experience who has not gone through it.</p> +<p>Though I really believed my darling would be loved and cared +for, and knew she would never miss me, or yet know that I was gone +(there was a pang even in that thought, and in every other kind of +comforting), I could not help it, that, as I was putting my cherub +into her cot, my tears rained down on her little face and awakened +her, so that I had to kneel by her side and rock her to sleep +again.</p> +<p>"You'll be good to my child, won't you, Mrs. Oliver?" I +said.</p> +<p>"'Deed I will, ma'am," the woman replied.</p> +<p>"You'll bath her every day, will you not?"</p> +<p>"Night and morning. I allus does, ma'am."</p> +<p>"And rinse out her bottle and see that she has nice new milk +fresh from the cow?"</p> +<p>"Sure as sure, ma'am. But don't you fret no more about the +child, ma'am. I've been a mother myself, ma'am, and I'll be as good +to your little angel as if she was my own come back to me."</p> +<p>"God bless you," I said in a burst of anguish, and after +remaining a moment longer on my knees by the cot (speaking with all +my heart and soul, though neither to nurse nor to baby) I rose to +my feet, dashed the tears from my eyes, and ran out of the +house.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-SIXTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I knew that my eyes were not fit to be seen in the streets, so I +dropped my dark veil and hurried along, being conscious of nothing +for some time except the clang of electric cars and the bustle of +passers-by, to whom my poor little sorrow was nothing at all.</p> +<p>But I had not gone far—I think I had not, though my senses +were confused and vague—before I began to feel ashamed, to +take myself to task, and to ask what I had to cry about.</p> +<p>If I had parted from my baby it was for her own good, and if I +had paid away my last sovereign I had provided for her for a month, +I had nothing to think of now except myself and how to get +work.</p> +<p>I never doubted that I should get work, or that I should get it +immediately, the only open question being what work and where.</p> +<p>Hitherto I had thought that, being quick with my pen, I might +perhaps become secretary to somebody; but now, remembering the +typist's story ("firms don't like it"), and wishing to run no risks +in respect of my child, I put that expectation away and began to +soar to higher things.</p> +<p>How vain they were! Remembering some kind words the Reverend +Mother had said about me at the convent (where I had taken more +prizes than Alma, though I had never mentioned it before) I told +myself that I, too, was an educated woman. I knew Italian, French +and German, and having heard that some women could make a living by +translating books for publishers I thought I might do the same.</p> +<p>Nay, I could even write books myself. I was sure I +could—one book at all events, about friendless girls who have +to face the world for themselves, and all good women would read it +(some good men also), because they would see that it must be +true.</p> +<p>Oh, how vain were my thoughts! Yet in another sense they were +not all vanity, for I was not thinking of fame, or what people +would say about what I should write, but only what I should get for +it.</p> +<p>I should get money, not a great deal perhaps, yet enough for +baby and me, that we might have that cottage in the country, +covered with creepers and roses, where Isabel would run about the +grass by and by, and pluck the flowers in the garden.</p> +<p>"So what have <i>you</i> got to cry about, you ridiculous +thing," I thought while I hurried along, with a high step now, as +if my soul had been in my feet.</p> +<p>But a mother's visions of the future are like a mirage (always +gleaming with the fairy palaces which her child is to inhabit some +day), and I am not the first to find her shadows fade away.</p> +<p>I must have been walking for some time, feeling no weariness at +all, when I came to the bridge by Bow Church. There I had intended +to take a tram, but not being tired I went on farther, thinking +every stage I could walk would be so much money to the good.</p> +<p>I was deep in the Mile End Road, when a chilling thought came to +me. It was the thought of the distance that would divide me from my +child, making my visits to her difficult, and putting it out of my +power to reach her quickly (perhaps even to know in time) if, as +happened to children, she became suddenly and dangerously ill.</p> +<p>I remembered the long line of telescoping thoroughfares I had +passed through earlier in the day (with their big hospitals, their +big breweries, their big tabernacles, their workmen's +lodging-houses, their Cinema picture palaces, their Jewish +theatres, and their numberless public houses); and then the barrier +of squalid space which would divide me from baby, if I obtained +employment in the West End, seemed to be immeasurably greater and +more frightening than the space that had divided me from Martin +when he was at the other end of the world.</p> +<p>Not all the allurements of my dream were sufficient to reconcile +me to such a dangerous separation.</p> +<p>"It's impossible," I thought. "Quite impossible."</p> +<p>Insensibly my rapid footsteps slackened. When I reached that +part of the Mile End Road in which the Jewish tailors live, and +found myself listening to a foreign language which I afterwards +knew to be Yiddish, and looking at men with curls at each side of +their sallow faces, slithering along as if they were wearing +eastern slippers without heels, I stopped, without knowing why, at +the corner of a street where an Italian organ-man was playing while +a number of bright-eyed Jewish children danced.</p> +<p>I was still looking on, hardly thinking of what I saw, when my +eyes fell on an advertisement, pasted on the window of a +sausage-and-ham shop at the corner. In large written characters it +ran:</p> +<p><i>Seamstress Wanted. Good Wages.<br /> +Apply No. —— Washington Street</i>.</p> +<p>How little are the things on which our destiny seems to hang! In +a moment I was remembering what Mrs. Oliver had said about my being +a good seamstress; and, almost before I knew what I was about, I +was hurrying up the side street and knocking with my knuckles at an +open door.</p> +<p>A rather fat and elderly Jewess, covered with rings and gold +chains, and wearing a manifest black wig, came from a room at one +side of the lobby. I explained my errand, and after she had looked +me over in a sort of surprise, as if I had not been the kind of +person she expected, she said, in a nasal and guttural voice:</p> +<p>"Vait! My daughter, she speaks very vell Ainglish."</p> +<p>Then turning her head over her shoulder, she pitched her voice +several octaves higher and cried, "Miriam," whereupon there came +tripping downstairs a Jewish girl of about eighteen, with large +black eyes, thick black hair, and such a dear good face.</p> +<p>I repeated my application, and after the girl had interpreted my +request to her mother, I was asked into the lobby, and put through +a kind of catechism.</p> +<p>Was I a seamstress? No, but I wished to become one. Had I aiver +vorked on vaistcoats? I hadn't, but I could do anything with my +needle.</p> +<p>Perhaps the urgency of my appeal, and more probably the pressure +of her own need, weighed with the Jewess, for after reflection, and +an eager whisper from her daughter (who was looking at me with +kindling eyes), she said,</p> +<p>"Very vell, ve'll see what she can do."</p> +<p>I was then taken into a close and stuffy room where a number of +girls (all Jewish as I could see) were working on sections of +waistcoats which, lying about on every side, looked like patterns +for legs of mutton. One girl was basting, another was pressing, and +a third was sewing button-holes with a fine silk twist round bars +of gimp.</p> +<p>This last was the work which was required of me, and I was told +to look and see if I could do it. I watched the girl for a moment +and then said:</p> +<p>"Let me try."</p> +<p>Needle and twist and one of the half vests were then given to +me, and after ten minutes I had worked my first button-hole and +handed it back.</p> +<p>The daughter praised it warmly, but the mother said:</p> +<p>"Very fair, but a leedle slow."</p> +<p>"Let me try again," I said, and my trembling fingers were so +eager to please that my next button-hole was not only better but +more quickly made.</p> +<p>"Beautiful!" said the daughter. "And mamma, only think, she's +quicker than Leah, already. I timed them."</p> +<p>"I muz call your vader, dough," said the Jewess, and she +disappeared through the doorway.</p> +<p>While I stood talking to the younger Jewess, who had, I could +see, formed as quick an attachment for me as I for her, I heard +another nasal and guttural voice (a man's) coming towards us from +the hall.</p> +<p>"Is she von of our people?"</p> +<p>"Nein! She's a Skihoah"—meaning, as I afterwards learned, +a non-Jewish girl.</p> +<p>Then a tall, thin Jew entered the room behind the elderly +Jewess. I had never before and have never since seen such a +patriarchal figure. With his long grey beard and solemn face he +might have stood for Moses in one of the pictures that used to hang +on the walls of the convent—except for his velvet skull-cap +and the black alpaca apron, which was speckled over with fluffy +bits of thread and scraps of cloth and silk.</p> +<p>He looked at me for a moment with his keen eyes, and after his +wife had shown him my work, and he had taken a pinch of snuff and +blown his nose on a coloured handkerchief with the sound of a +trumpet, he put me through another catechism.</p> +<p>I was trembling lest he should make intimate inquiries, but +beyond asking my name, and whether I was a Christian, he did not +concern himself with personal questions.</p> +<p>"Vat vages do you vant?" he asked.</p> +<p>I told him I should be pleased to take whatever was paid to +other girls doing work of the same kind.</p> +<p>"Ach no! Dese girls are full-timers. You are only a greener +[meaning a beginner] so you vill not expect anything like so +much."</p> +<p>At that his daughter repeated her assurance that I was quicker +than the girl she had called Leah; but the Jew, with an air of +parental majesty, told her to be silent, and then said that as I +was an "improver" he could only take me "on piece," naming the +price (a very small one) per half-dozen buttons and buttonholes, +with the condition that I found my own twist and did the work in my +own home.</p> +<p>Seeing that I should be no match for the Jew at a bargain, and +being so eager to get to work at any price, I closed with his +offer, and then he left the room, after telling me to come back the +next day.</p> +<p>"And vhere do you lif, my dear?" said the Jewess.</p> +<p>I told her Bayswater, making some excuse for being in the East +End, and getting as near to the truth as I dare venture, but +feeling instinctively, after my sight of the master of the house, +that I dared say nothing about my child.</p> +<p>She told me I must live nearer to my work, and I said that was +exactly what I wished to do—asking if she knew where I could +find a room.</p> +<p>Fortunately the Jewess herself had two rooms vacant at that +moment, and we went upstairs to look at them.</p> +<p>Both were at the top of the house, and one of them I could have +for two shillings a week, but it was dark and cheerless, being at +the back and looking into the space over the yards in which the +tenants dried their washing on lines stretched from pulleys.</p> +<p>The other, which would cost a shilling a week more, was a lean +slit of a room, very sparsely furnished, but it was to the front, +and looked down into the varied life of the street, so I took it +instantly and asked when I could move in.</p> +<p>"Ven you like," said the Jewess. "Everyding is ready."</p> +<p>So, early next morning I bade farewell to my good Welsh landlady +(who looked grave when I told her what I was going to do) and to +Emmerjane (who cried when I kissed her smudgy face) and, taking +possession of my new home, began work immediately in my first and +only employment.</p> +<p>Perhaps it was a deep decline after the splendours of my dreams, +but I did not allow myself to think about that. I was near to +Ilford and I could go to see Isabel every day.</p> +<p>Isabel! Isabel! Isabel! Everything was Isabel, for now that +Martin was gone my hopes and my fears, my love and my life, +revolved on one axis only—my child.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-SEVENTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My employer was a Polish Jew, named Israel Abramovitch.</p> +<p>He had come to England at the time of the religious persecution +in the Holy Cities of Russia, set himself up in his trade as a +tailor in a garret in Whitechapel, hired a "Singer," worked with +"green" labour for "slop" warehouses, and become in less than +twenty years the richest foreign Jew in the East End of London, +doing some of the "best bespoke" work for the large shops in the +West and having the reputation (as I afterwards found) of being the +greatest of Jewish "sweaters."</p> +<p>In spite of this, however, he was in his own way a deeply +religious man. Strict, severe, almost superstitious in obeying the +Levitical laws and in practising the sad and rather gloomy +symbolism of his faith. A famous Talmudist, a pillar of the +synagogue, one of the two wardens of the Chevra in Brick Lane, and +consequently a great upholder of moral rectitude.</p> +<p>His house seemed to be a solid mass of human beings, chiefly +Jewish girls, who worked all day, and sometimes (when regulations +could be evaded or double gangs engaged) all night, for the Jew +drove everybody at high speed, not excepting his wife, who cooked +the food and pressed the clothes at the same time.</p> +<p>In this hive of industry I needed no spur to make me work.</p> +<p>Every morning Mrs. Abramovitch brought up a thick pile of vests +to my room, and every evening she took them down again, after +counting my earnings with almost preternatural rapidity and paying +me, day by day, with unfailing promptitude.</p> +<p>At the end of my first week I found I had made ten shillings. I +was delighted, but after I had paid for my room and my food there +was not enough for baby's board, so the second week I worked later +in the evenings, and earned fourteen shillings. This was still +insufficient, therefore I determined to take something from the +other end of the day.</p> +<p>"Morning will be better," I thought, remembering the painful +noises at night, especially about midnight, when people were being +thrown out of a public-house higher up the street, where there was +a placard in the window saying the ale sold there could be +guaranteed to "make anybody drunk for fourpence."</p> +<p>Unfortunately (being a little weak) I was always heavy in the +mornings, but by great luck my room faced the east, so I conceived +the idea of moving my bed up to the window and drawing my blinds to +the top so that the earliest light might fall on my face and waken +me.</p> +<p>This device succeeded splendidly, and for many weeks of the late +summer and early autumn I was up before the sun, as soon as the +dawn had broadened and while the leaden London daylight was +filtering through the smoke of yesterday.</p> +<p>By this means I increased my earnings to sixteen shillings, and, +as my fingers learned to fly over their work, to seventeen and even +eighteen.</p> +<p>That was my maximum, and though it left a narrow margin for +other needs it enabled me at the end of a month to pay another +pound for baby's board and to put away a little towards her +"shortening," which Mrs. Oliver was always saying must be soon.</p> +<p>I had to stick close to maintain this average, and I grudged +even the time occupied in buying and eating my food, though that +was not a long process in the Mile End Road, which is full of shops +where things can be bought ready cooked. After the first week I did +not even need to go out for them, for they were brought round to my +room every morning, thus enabling me to live without leaving my +work.</p> +<p>It was a stiff life, perhaps, but let nobody think I looked upon +myself as a slave. Though I worked so hard I felt no self-pity. The +thought that I was working for my child sweetened all my labours. +It was such a joy to think that baby depended upon me for +everything she wanted.</p> +<p>Being so happy in those days I sang a great deal, though +naturally not in the middle of the day, when our house was going +like a mill-wheel, but in the early mornings before the electric +trams began to clang, or the hawkers with their barrows to shout, +and when there was no sound even in the East End except that +ceaseless tramp, tramp, tramp in the front street which always made +me think of the children of Israel in Egypt drawing burdens for +Pharaoh.</p> +<p>Throwing open my window I sang all sorts of things, but, being +such a child myself and so fond of make-believe, I loved best to +sing my lullaby, and so pretend that baby was with me in my room, +lying asleep behind me in my bed.</p> +<p>"<i>Sleep, little baby, I love thee, I love thee,<br /> +Sleep, little Queen, I am bending above thee</i>."</p> +<p>I never knew that I had any other audience than a lark in a cage +on the other side of the street (perhaps I was in a cage myself, +though I did not think of that then) which always started singing +when I sang, except the washerwomen from a Women's Shelter going +off at four to their work at the West End, and two old widows +opposite who sewed Bibles and stitched cassocks, which being (so +Miriam told me) the worst-paid of all sweated labour compelled them +to be up as early as myself.</p> +<p>It was not a very hopeful environment, yet for some time, in my +little top room, I was really happy.</p> +<p>I saw baby every day. Between six and nine every night, I broke +off work to go to Ilford, saying nothing about my errand to +anybody, and leaving the family of the Jew to think it was my time +for recreation.</p> +<p>Generally I "trammed" it from Bow Church, because I was so eager +to get to my journey's end, but usually I returned on foot, for +though the distance was great I thought I slept better for the +walk.</p> +<p>What joyful evenings those were!</p> +<p>Perhaps I was not altogether satisfied about the Olivers, but +that did not matter very much. On closer acquaintance I found my +baby's nurse to be a "heedless" and "feckless" woman; and though I +told myself that all allowances must be made for her in having a +bad husband, I knew in my secret heart that I was deceiving myself, +and that I ought to listen to the voices that were saying "Your +child is being neglected."</p> +<p>Sometimes it seemed to me that baby had not been +bathed—but that only gave me an excuse for bathing her +myself.</p> +<p>Sometimes I thought her clothes were not as clean as they might +be—but that only gave me the joy of washing them.</p> +<p>Sometimes I was sure that her feeding-bottle had not been rinsed +and her milk was not quite fresh—but that only gave me the +pleasure of scalding the one and boiling the other.</p> +<p>More than once it flashed upon me that I was paying Mrs. Oliver +to do all this—but then what a deep delight it was to be +mothering my own baby!</p> +<p>Thus weeks and months passed—it is only now I know how +many, for in those days Time itself had nothing in it for me except +my child—and every new day brought the new joy of watching my +baby's development.</p> +<p>Oh, how wonderful it all was! To see her little mind and soul +coming out of the Unknown! Out of the silence and darkness of the +womb into the world of light and sound!</p> +<p>First her sense of sight, with her never-ending interest in her +dear little toes! Then her senses of touch and hearing, and the +gift of speech, beginning with a sort of crow, and ending in the +"ma-ma-ma" which the first time I heard it went prancing through +and through me and was more heavenly to my ears than the music of +the spheres!</p> +<p>What evenings of joy I had with her!</p> +<p>The best of them (God forgive me!) were the nights when the +bricklayer had got into some trouble by "knocking people about" at +the "Rising Sun" and his wife had to go off to rescue him from the +police.</p> +<p>Then, baby being "shortened," I would prop her up in her cot +while I sang "Sally" to her; or if that did not serve, and her +little lip continued to drop, I both sang and danced, spreading my +skirts and waltzing to the tune of "Clementina" while the kettle +hummed over the fire and the bricklayer's kitchen buzzed softly +like a hive of bees.</p> +<p>Oh dear! Oh dear! I may have been down in the depths, yet there +is no place so dark that it may not be brightened by a sunbeam, and +my sunbeam was my child.</p> +<p>And then Martin—baby was constantly making me think of +him. Devouring her with my eyes, I caught resemblances every +day—in her eyes, her voice, her smile, and, above all, in +that gurgling laugh that was like water bubbling out of a +bottle.</p> +<p>I used to talk to her about him, pouring all my sentimental +secrets into her ears, just as if she understood, telling her what +a great man her father had been and how he loved both of +us—<i>would</i> have done if he had lived longer.</p> +<p>I dare say it was very foolish. Yet I cannot think it was all +foolishness. Many and many a time since I have wondered if the holy +saints, who knew what had really happened to Martin, were +whispering all this in my ear as a means of keeping my love for him +as much alive as if he had been constantly by my side.</p> +<p>The climax came when Isabel was about five months old, for then +the feeling about baby and Martin reached another and higher +phase.</p> +<p>I hardly dare to speak of it, lest it should seem silly when it +was really so sacred and so exalted.</p> +<p>The idea I had had before baby was born, that she was being sent +to console me (to be a link between my lost one and me), developed +into the startling and rapturous thought that the very soul of +Martin had passed into my child.</p> +<p>"So Martin is not dead at all," I thought, "not really dead, +because he lives in baby."</p> +<p>It is impossible to say how this thought stirred me; how it +filled my heart with thankfulness; how I prayed that the little +body in which the soul of my Martin had come to dwell might grow +beautiful and strong and worthy of him; how I felt charged with +another and still greater responsibility to guard and protect her +with my life itself if need be.</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, my very life itself," I thought.</p> +<p>Perhaps this was a sort of delirium, born of my great love, my +hard work, and my failing strength. I did not know, I did not +care.</p> +<p>All that mattered to me then was one thing only—that +whereas hitherto I had thought Martin was so far gone from me that +not Time but only Eternity would bring us together, now I felt that +he was coming back and back to me—nearer and nearer and +nearer every day.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>My dear, noble little woman was right in more ways than she +knew.</p> +<p>At that very time I was in literal truth hurrying home to her as +fast as the fastest available vessel could carry me.</p> +<p>As soon as we had boarded the <i>Scotia</i> at the Cape and +greeted our old shipmates, we shouted for our letters.</p> +<p>There were some for all of us and heaps for me, so I scuttled +down to my cabin, where I sorted the envelopes like a pack of +cards, looking for the small delicate hand that used to write my +letters and speeches.</p> +<p>To my dismay it was not there, and realizing that fact I bundled +the letters into a locker and never looked at them again until we +were two days out—when I found they were chiefly +congratulations from my committee, the proprietor of my newspaper, +and the Royal Geographical Society, all welcome enough in their +way, but Dead Sea fruit to a man with an empty, heaving heart.</p> +<p>Going up on deck I found every face about me shining like the +aurora, for the men had had good news all round, one having come +into a fortune and another into the fatherhood of twins, and both +being in a state of joy and excitement.</p> +<p>But all the good fellows were like boys. Some of them (with +laughter seasoned by a few tears) read me funny bits out of their +wives' letters—bits too that were not funny, about having "a +pretty fit of hysterics" at reading bad news of us and "wanting to +kiss the newsboy" when he brought the paper contradicting it.</p> +<p>I did my best to play the game of rejoicing, pretending I had +had good news also, and everything was going splendid. But I found +it hard enough to keep it going, especially while we were sailing +back to the world, as we called it, and hearing from the crew the +news of what had happened while we had been away.</p> +<p>First, there was the reason for the delay in the arrival of the +ship, which had been due not to failure of the wireless at our end, +but to a breakdown on Macquarie Island.</p> +<p>And then there was the account of the report of the loss of the +<i>Scotia</i> in the gale going out, which had been believed on +insufficient evidence (as I thought), but recorded in generous +words of regret that sent the blood boiling to a man's face and +made him wish to heaven they could be true.</p> +<p>We were only five or six days sailing to New Zealand, but the +strain to me was terrible, for the thought was always +uppermost:</p> +<p>"Why didn't she write a word of welcome to reach me on my return +to civilisation?"</p> +<p>When I was not talking to somebody that question was constantly +haunting me. To escape from it I joined the sports of my shipmates, +who with joyful news in their hearts and fresh food in their +stomachs were feeling as good as new in spite of all they had +suffered.</p> +<p>But the morning we smelt land, the morning the cloud banks above +the eastern horizon came out hard and fast and sure (no dreamland +this time), I stood at the ship's bow, saying nothing to anybody, +only straining my eyes for the yet distant world we were coming +back to out of that desolate white waste, and thinking:</p> +<p>"Surely I'll have news from her before nightfall."</p> +<p>There was a big warm-hearted crowd on the pier at Port +Lyttelton. Treacle said, "Gawd. I didn't know there was so many +people in the world, Guv'nor;" and O'Sullivan, catching sight of a +pretty figure under a sunshade, tugged at my arm and cried (in the +voice of an astronomer who has discovered a planet), "Commanther! +Commanther! A <i>girl!</i>"</p> +<p>Almost before we had been brought to, a company of scientific +visitors came aboard; but I was more concerned about the telegrams +that had come at the same moment, so hurrying down to my cabin I +tore them open like a vulture riving its prey—always looking +at the signatures first and never touching an envelope without +thinking:</p> +<p>"Oh God, what will be inside of it?"</p> +<p>There was nothing from my dear one! Invitations to dine, to +lecture, to write books, to do this and that and Heaven knows what, +but never a word from her who was more to me than all the world +besides.</p> +<p>This made me more than ever sure of the "voices" that had called +me back from the 88th latitude, so I decided instantly to leave our +ship in New Zealand, in readiness for our next effort, and getting +across to Sydney to take the first fast steamer home.</p> +<p>The good people at Port Lyttelton were loath to let us go. But +after I had made my excuses, ("crazy to get back to wives and +sweethearts, you know") they sent a school of boys (stunning little +chaps in Eton suits) to sing us off with "Forty Years +On"—which brought more of my mother into my eyes than I knew +to be left there.</p> +<p>At Sydney we had the same experience—the same hearty +crowds, the same welcome, the same invitations, to which we made +the same replies, and then got away by a fast liner which happened +to be ready to sail.</p> +<p>On the way "back to the world" I had slung together a sort of a +despatch for the newspaper which had promoted our expedition (a +lame, limping thing for want of my darling's help to make it go), +saying something about the little we had been able to do but more +about what we meant, please God, to do some day.</p> +<p>"She'll see that, anyway, and know we're coming back," I +thought.</p> +<p>But to make doubly sure I sent two personal telegrams, one to my +dear one at Castle Raa and the other to my old people at home, +asking for answers to Port Said.</p> +<p>Out on the sea again I was tormented by the old dream of the +crevassed glacier; and if anybody wonders why a hulking chap who +had not been afraid of a ninety-mile blizzard in the region of the +Pole allowed himself to be kept awake at night by a buzzing in the +brain, all I can say is that it was so, and I know nothing more +about it.</p> +<p>Perhaps my recent experience with the "wireless" persuaded me +that if two sticks stuck in the earth could be made to communicate +with each other over hundreds of miles, two hearts that loved each +other knew no limitations of time or space.</p> +<p>In any case I was now so sure that my dear one had called me +home from the Antarctic that by the time we reached Port Said, and +telegrams were pouring in on me, I had worked myself up to such a +fear that I dared not open them.</p> +<p>From sheer dread of the joy or sorrow that might be enclosed in +the yellow covers, I got O'Sullivan down in my cabin to read my +telegrams, while I scanned his face and nearly choked with my own +tobacco smoke.</p> +<p>There was nothing from my dear one! Nothing from my people at +home either!</p> +<p>O'Sullivan got it into his head that I was worrying about my +parents, and tried to comfort me by saying that old folks never +dreamt of telegraphing, but by the holy immaculate Mother he'd go +bail there would be a letter for me before long.</p> +<p>There was.</p> +<p>We stayed two eternal days at Port Said while the vessel was +taking coal for the rest of the voyage, and almost at the moment of +sailing a letter arrived from Ellan, which, falling into +O'Sullivan's hands first, sent him flying through the steamer and +shouting at the top of his voice:</p> +<p>"Commanther! Commanther!"</p> +<p>The passengers gave room for him, and told me afterwards of his +beaming face. And when he burst into my cabin I too felt sure he +had brought me good news, which he had, though it was not all that +I wanted.</p> +<p>"The way I was sure there would be a letter for you soon, and by +the holy St. Patrick and St. Thomas, here it is," he cried.</p> +<p>The letter was from my father, and I had to brace myself before +I could read it.</p> +<p>It was full of fatherly love, motherly love, too, and the +extravagant pride my dear good old people had of me ("everybody's +talking of you, my boy, and there's nothing else in the +newspapers"); but not a word about my Mary—or only one, and +that seemed worse than none at all.</p> +<p>"You must have heard of the trouble at Castle Raa. Very sad, but +this happy hour is not the time to say anything about it."</p> +<p>Nothing more! Only reams and reams of sweet parental chatter +which (God forgive me!) I would have gladly given over and over +again for one plain sentence about my darling.</p> +<p>Being now more than ever sure that some kind of catastrophe had +overtaken my poor little woman, I telegraphed to her again, this +time (without knowing what mischief I was making) at the house of +Daniel O'Neill—telling myself that, though the man was a +brute who had sacrificed his daughter to his lust of rank and power +and all the rest of his rotten aspirations, he was her father, and, +if her reprobate of a husband had turned her out, he must surely +have taken her in.</p> +<p>"Cable reply to Malta. Altogether too bad not hearing from you," +I said.</p> +<p>A blind, hasty, cruel telegram, but thank God she never received +it!</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-EIGHTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Day by day it became more and more difficult for me to throw +dust in my own eyes about the Olivers.</p> +<p>One evening on reaching their house a little after six, as +usual, I found the front door open, the kitchen empty save for +baby, who, sitting up in her cot, was holding quiet converse with +her toes, and the two Olivers talking loudly (probably by +pre-arrangement) in the room upstairs.</p> +<p>The talk was about baby, which was "a noosance," interfering +with a man's sleep by night and driving him out of his home by day. +And how much did they get for it? Nothing, in a manner of speaking. +What did the woman (meaning me) think the "bleedin' place" +was—"a philanthropic institooshun" or a "charity orginisation +gime"?</p> +<p>After this I heard the bricklayer thunder downstairs in his +heavy boots and go out of the house without coming into the +kitchen, leaving his wife (moral coward that he was) to settle his +account with me.</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Oliver came down, with many sighs, expressed surprise +at seeing me and fear that I might have overheard what had been +said in the room above.</p> +<p>"Sorry to say I've been having a few words with Ted, ma'am, and +tell you the truth it was about you."</p> +<p>Ted had always been against her nursing, and she must admit it +wasn't wise of a woman to let her man go to the public-house to get +out of the way of a crying child; but though she was a-running +herself off her feet to attend to the pore dear, and milk was up a +penny, she had growd that fond of my baby since she lost her own +that she couldn't abear to part with the jewel, and perhaps if I +could pay a little more—Ted said seven, but she said six, and +a shilling a week wouldn't hurt me—she could over-persuade +him to let the dear precious stay.</p> +<p>I was trembling with indignation while I listened to the woman's +whining (knowing well I was being imposed upon), but I was helpless +and so I agreed.</p> +<p>My complacency had a bad effect on the Olivers, who continued to +make fresh extortions, until their demands almost drove me to +despair.</p> +<p>I thought a climax had been reached when one night a neighbour +came to the door and, calling Mrs. Oliver into the lobby, +communicated some news in a whisper which brought her back with a +frightened face for her cloak and hat, saying "something was a +matter with Ted" and she must "run away quick to him."</p> +<p>When she returned an hour or two later she was crying, and with +sobs between her words she told me that Ted (having taken a drop +too much) had "knocked somebody about" at the "Sun." As a +consequence he had fallen into the hands of the police, and would +be brought before the magistrate the following morning, when, being +unable to pay the fine, he would have to "do time"—just as a +strike was a-coming on, too, and he was expecting good pay from the +Strike Committee.</p> +<p>"And what is to happen to me and the baby while my 'usband is in +prison?" she said.</p> +<p>I knew it was an act of weakness, but, thinking of my child and +the danger of its being homeless, I asked what the amount of the +fine would probably be, and being told ten-and-six, I gave the +money, though it was nearly all I had in the world.</p> +<p>I paid for my weakness, though, and have reason to remember +it.</p> +<p>The extortions of the Olivers had brought me to so narrow a +margin between my earnings and expenses that I lay awake nearly all +that night thinking what I could do to increase the one or reduce +the other. The only thing I found possible was to change to cheaper +quarters. So next morning, with a rather heavy heart, I asked Mrs. +Abramovitch if the room at the back of the house was still empty, +and hearing that it was I moved into it the same day.</p> +<p>That was a small and not a very wise economy.</p> +<p>My new room was cheerless as well as dark, with no sights but +the clothes that were drying from the pulley-lines and no sounds +but the whoops of the boys of the neighbourhood playing at "Red +Indians" on the top of the yard walls.</p> +<p>But it was about the same as the other in size and furniture, +and after I had decorated it with my few treasures—the +Reverend Mother's rosary, which I hung on the head of the bed, and +my darling mother's miniature, which I pinned up over the +fire—I thought it looked bright and homelike.</p> +<p>All this time, too, I was between the nether and the upper +mill-stone.</p> +<p>My employer, the Jew (though he must have seen that I was +sweating myself much more than the law would have allowed him to +sweat me), could not forgive himself when he found that I was +earning more by "piece" than he would have had to pay me by the +day, or resist the temptation to square accounts with me at the +earliest possible opportunity.</p> +<p>Unfortunately, his opportunity came only too quickly, and it led +(however indirectly) to the most startling fact that has ever, +perhaps, entered into a woman's life.</p> +<p>I had not been more than three months at the Jew's house when +the Jewish festivals came round—New Year's Day, the Day of +Atonement, and the Feast of Tabernacles—which, falling near +together and occupying many days, disturbed his own habits of work +entirely.</p> +<p>One of the tasks he reserved for himself was that of taking the +best paid of his "best-bespoke" back to the large shops in the West +End, and waiting for the return orders. But finding that the +festivals interfered with these journeys, he decided that they +should be made by me, who was supposed to know the West End (having +lived in it) and to present a respectable appearance.</p> +<p>I was reluctant to undertake the new duty, for though the Jew +was to pay me a few shillings a week for it, I saw I could earn +more in the time with my needle. But when he laid his long, hairy +forefinger on the side of his nose and said with a significant +smile:</p> +<p>"You vill be gradeful, and convenience your employer, mine +child," I agreed.</p> +<p>Thus it came to pass that not only during the Jewish festivals, +but for months after they were over, I carried a rather large black +bag by tram or rail to the district that lies at the back of +Piccadilly and along Oxford Street as far west as the Marble +Arch.</p> +<p>I had to go whenever called upon and to wait as long as wanted, +so that in the height of the tailoring season I was out in the West +End at all irregular hours of night, and even returned to my +lodgings on one or two occasions in the raw sunshine of the early +mornings.</p> +<p>The one terror of my West End journeys was that I might meet +Sister Mildred. I never did. In the multitude of faces which passed +through the streets, flashing and disappearing like waves under the +moon at sea, I never once caught a glimpse of a face I knew.</p> +<p>But what sights I saw for all that! What piercing, piteous +proofs that between the rich and the poor there is a great gulf +fixed!</p> +<p>The splendid carriages driving in and out of the Park; the +sumptuously dressed ladies strolling through Bond Street; the +fashionable church paraders; the white plumes and diamond stars +which sometimes gleamed behind the glow of the electric broughams +gliding down the Mall.</p> +<p>"I used to be a-toffed up like that onct," I heard an old woman +who was selling matches say as a lady in an ermine coat stepped out +of a theatre into an automobile and was wrapped round in a +tiger-skin rug.</p> +<p>Sometimes it happened that, returning to the East End after the +motor 'buses had ceased to ply, I had to slip through the silent +Leicester Square and the empty Strand to the Underground Railway on +the Embankment.</p> +<p>Then I would see the wretched men and women who were huddled +together in the darkness on the steps to the river (whose +ever-flowing waters must have witnessed so many generations of +human wreckage), and, glancing up at the big hotels and palatial +mansions full of ladies newly returned from theatres and +restaurants in their satin slippers and silk stockings, I would +wonder how they could lie in their white beds at night in rooms +whose windows looked down on such scenes.</p> +<p>But the sight that stirred me most (though it did not awaken my +charity, which shows what a lean-souled thing I was myself) was +that of the "public women," the street-walkers, as I used to call +them, whom I saw in Piccadilly with their fine clothes and painted +faces, sauntering in front of the clubs or tripping along with a +light step and trying to attract the attention of the men.</p> +<p>I found no pathos in the position of such women. On the +contrary, I had an unspeakable horror and hatred and loathing of +them, feeling that no temptation, no poverty, no pressure that +could ever be brought to bear upon a woman in life or in death +excused her for committing so great a wrong on the sanctity of her +sex as to give up her womanhood at any call but that of love.</p> +<p>"Nothing could make me do it," I used to think, "nothing in this +world."</p> +<p>But O God! how little I knew then what is in a woman's heart to +do when she has a child to live for, and is helpless and alone!</p> +<p>I cannot expect anybody to forgive me for what I did (or +attempted to do), and now that the time has come to tell of it my +hand trembles, and body and soul seem to be quivering like a +flame.</p> +<p>May God (who has brought everything to such a glorious end) have +mercy on me and forgive me, and help me to be true!</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="NINETY_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"NINETY_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>NINETY-NINTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The worst consequence of my West End journeys was that my +nightly visits to Ilford were fewer than before, and that the +constant narrowing of the margin between my income and my expenses +made it impossible for me to go there during the day.</p> +<p>As a result my baby received less and less attention, and I +could not be blind to the fact that she was growing paler and +thinner.</p> +<p>At length she developed a cough which troubled me a great deal. +Mrs. Oliver made light of it, saying a few pennyworths of paregoric +would drive it away, so I hurried off to a chemist, who recommended +a soothing syrup of his own, saying it was safer and more effectual +for a child.</p> +<p>The syrup seemed to stop the cough but to disturb the digestion, +for I saw the stain of curdled milk on baby's bib and was conscious +of her increasing weakness.</p> +<p>This alarmed me very much, and little as I knew of children's +ailments, I became convinced that she stood in need of more fresh +air, so I entreated Mrs. Oliver to take her for a walk every +day.</p> +<p>I doubt if she ever did so, for as often as I would say:</p> +<p>"Has baby been out to-day, nurse?" Mrs. Oliver would make some +lame excuse and pass quickly to another subject.</p> +<p>At last, being unable to bear the strain any longer, I burst out +on the woman with bitter reproaches, and then she broke down into +tears and explained everything. She was behind with her rent, the +landlord was threatening, and she dared not leave the house for a +moment lest he should lock her out altogether.</p> +<p>"I don't mind telling you, it's all along of Ted, ma'am. He's on +strike wages but he spends it at the 'Sun.' He has never been the +man to me—never once since I married him. I could work and +keep the house comfortable without him, but he wouldn't let me +a-be, because he knows I love, him dear. Yes, I do, I love him +dear," she continued, breaking into hysterical sobs, "and if he +came home and killed me I could kiss him with my last breath."</p> +<p>This touched me more than I can say. A sense of something tragic +in the position of the poor woman, who knew the character of the +man she loved as well as the weakness which compelled her to love +him, made me sympathise with her for the first time, and think +(with a shuddering memory of my own marriage) how many millions of +women there must be in the world who were in a worse position than +myself.</p> +<p>On returning to my room that night I began to look about to see +if I had anything I could sell in order to help Mrs. Oliver, and so +put an end to the condition that kept my baby a prisoner in her +house.</p> +<p>I had nothing, or next to nothing. Except the Reverend Mother's +rosary (worth no more than three or four shillings) I had only my +mother's miniature, which was framed in gold and set in pearls, but +that was the most precious of all my earthly possessions except my +child.</p> +<p>Again and again when I looked at it in my darkest hours I had +found new strength and courage. It had been like a shrine to +me—what the image of the Virgin was in happier days—and +thinking of all that my darling mother had done and suffered and +sacrificed for my sake when I was myself a child, I felt that I +could never part with her picture under the pressure of any +necessity whatever.</p> +<p>"Never," I thought, "never under any circumstances."</p> +<p>It must have been about a week after this that I went to Ilford +on one of those chill, clammy nights which seem peculiar to the +East End of London, where the atmosphere, compounded of smoke and +fog and thin drizzling rain; penetrates to the bone and hangs on +one's shoulders like a shroud.</p> +<p>Thinking of this, as I thought of everything, in relation to +baby, I bought, as I was passing a hosier's shop, a pair of nice +warm stockings and a little woollen jacket.</p> +<p>When I reached the Olivers' I found, to my surprise, two strange +men stretched out at large in the kitchen, one on the sofa and the +other in the rocking-chair, both smoking strong tobacco and baby +coughing constantly.</p> +<p>Before I realised what had happened Mrs. Oliver called me into +the scullery, and, after closing the door on us, she explained the +position, in whispers broken by sobs.</p> +<p>It was the rent. These were the bailiff's men put into +possession by the landlord, and unless she could find two pounds +ten by nine o'clock to-morrow morning, she and her husband would be +sold up and turned into the street.</p> +<p>"The home as I've been scraping and pinching to keep together!" +she cried. "For the sake of two pound ten! . . . You couldn't lend +us that much, could you?"</p> +<p>I told her I could not, but she renewed her entreaties, asking +me to think if I had not something I could pawn for them, and +saying that Ted and she would consider it "a sacred dooty" to +repay.</p> +<p>Again I told her I had nothing—I was trying not to think +of the miniature—but just at that moment she caught sight of +the child's jacket which I was still holding in my hand, and she +fell on me with bitter reproaches.</p> +<p>"You've money enough to spend on baby, though. It's crool. Her +living in lukshry and getting new milk night and day, and fine +clothes being bought for her constant, and my pore Ted without a +roof to cover him in weather same as this. It breaks my heart. It +do indeed. Take your child away, ma'am. Take her to-night, afore +we're turned out of house and home to-morrow morning."</p> +<p>Before the hysterical cries with which Mrs. Oliver said this had +come to an end I was on my way back to my room at the Jew's. But it +was baby I was thinking of in relation to that cold, clammy +night—that it would be impossible to take her out in it (even +if I had somewhere to take her to, which I had not) without risk to +her health and perhaps her life.</p> +<p>With trembling fingers and an awful pain at my heart I took my +mother's miniature from the wall and wrapped it up in tissue +paper.</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards I was back in the damp streets, walking +fast and eagerly, cutting over the lines of the electric trams +without looking for the crossings.</p> +<p>I knew where I was going to—I was going to a pawnbroker's +in the Mile End Waste which I had seen on my West End journeys. +When I got there I stole in at a side door, half-closing my eyes as +I did so, by that strange impulse which causes us to see nothing +when we do not wish to be seen.</p> +<p>I shall never forget the scene inside. I think it must have left +a scar on my brain, for I see it now in every detail—the +little dark compartment; the high counter; the shelves at the back +full of parcels, like those of a left-luggage room at a railway +station; the heavy, baggy, big-faced man in shirt-sleeves with a +long cigar held between his teeth at the corner of his frothy +mouth; and then my own hurried breathing; my thin fingers opening +the tissue paper and holding out the miniature; the man's coarse +hands fumbling it; his casual air as he looked at it and cheapened +it, as if it had been a common thing scarcely worthy of +consideration.</p> +<p>"What's this 'ere old-fashion'd thing? Portrait of your +great-grandmother? Hum! Not 'arf bad-looking fice, neither."</p> +<p>I think my eyes must have been blazing like hot coals. I am sure +I bit my lips (I felt them damp and knew they were bleeding) to +prevent myself from flinging out at the man in spite of my +necessity. But I did my best to control my trembling mouth, and +when he asked me how much I wanted on the miniature I answered, +with a gulp in my throat:</p> +<p>"Two pounds ten, if you please, sir."</p> +<p>"Couldn't do it," said the pawnbroker.</p> +<p>I stood speechless for a moment, not knowing what to say next, +and then the pawnbroker, with apparent indifference, said:</p> +<p>"I'll give you two ten for it out and out."</p> +<p>"You mean I am to <i>sell</i> . . ."</p> +<p>"Yus, take it or leave it, my dear."</p> +<p>It is no use saying what I suffered at that moment. I think I +became ten years older during the few minutes I stood at that +counter.</p> +<p>But they came to an end somehow, and the next thing I knew was +that I was on my way back to Ilford; that the damp air had deepened +into rain; that miserable and perhaps homeless beings, ill-clad and +ill-fed, were creeping along in the searching cold with that +shuffling sound which bad boots make on a wet pavement; and that I +was telling myself with a fluttering heart that the sheltering +wings of my beautiful mother in heaven had come to cover my +child.</p> +<p>On reaching the Olivers', hot and breathless, I put three gold +coins, two sovereigns and a half-sovereign, on to the table to pay +off the broker's men.</p> +<p>They had been settling themselves for the night, and looked +surprised and I thought chagrined, but took up the money and went +away.</p> +<p>As they were going off one of them called me to the door, and in +the little space at the foot of the stairs he said, tipping his +fingers towards the cot:</p> +<p>"If that's your kiddie, miss, I recommend you to get it out o' +this 'ere place quick—see?"</p> +<p>I stayed an hour or two longer because I was troubled about +baby's cough; and before I left, being still uneasy, I did what I +had never done before—wrote my address at the Jew's house, so +that I could be sent for if I was ever wanted.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDREDTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDREDTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDREDTH CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When I awoke next morning the last word of the broker's man +seemed to be ringing in my ears.</p> +<p>I knew it was true; I knew I ought to remove baby from the house +of the Olivers without another day's delay, but I was at a loss to +know what to do with her.</p> +<p>To bring her to my own room at the Jew's was obviously +impossible, and to advertise for a nurse for my child was to run +the risk of falling into the toils of somebody who might do worse +than neglect her.</p> +<p>In my great perplexity I recalled the waitress at the restaurant +whose child had been moved to a Home in the country, and for some +moments I thought how much better it would be that baby should be +"bonny and well" instead of pale and thin as she was now. But when +I reflected that if I took her to a public institution I should see +her only once a month, I told myself that I could not and would not +do so.</p> +<p>"I'll work my fingers to the bone first," I thought.</p> +<p>Yet life makes a fearful tug at a woman when it has once got +hold of her, and, strangely enough, it was in the Jew's house that +I first came to see that for the child's own sake I must part with +her.</p> +<p>Somewhere about the time of my moving into the back room my +employer made a kind of bower of branches and evergreens over the +lead-flat roof of an outhouse in his back-yard—a Succah, as +Miriam called it, built in honour of the Feast of Tabernacles, as a +symbol of the time when the Israelites in the Wilderness dwelt in +booths.</p> +<p>In this Succah the Jew's family ate all their meals during the +seven or eight days of the Jewish feast, and one morning, as I sat +at work by my open window, I heard Miriam after breakfast reading +something from the Books of Moses.</p> +<p>It was the beautiful story of Jacob parting with Benjamin in the +days of the famine, when there was corn in Egypt only—how the +poor old father in his great love could not bring himself to give +up his beloved son, although death threatened him; how Judah +pleaded with Jacob to send the boy with him into the far country +lest they should all die, "both we and thou and also our little +ones;" and how at last Jacob said, "If it must be so, do this," but +"if I be bereaved of my children, I am bereaved."</p> +<p>It would be hard to say how deeply this story moved me while I +listened from my room above. And now that I thought of it again, I +saw that I was only sacrificing my child to my selfish love of her, +and therefore the duty of a true mother was to put her into a +Home.</p> +<p>It would not be for long. The work I was doing was not the only +kind I was capable of. After I had liberated myself from the daily +extortions of the Olivers I should be free to look about for more +congenial and profitable employment; and then by and by baby and I +might live together in that sweet cottage in the country (I always +pictured it as a kind of Sunny Lodge, with roses looking in at the +window of "Mary O'Neill's little room") which still shone through +my dreams.</p> +<p>I spent some sleepless nights in reconciling myself to all this, +and perhaps wept a little, too, at the thought that after years of +separation I might be a stranger to my own darling. But at length I +put my faith in "the call of the blood" to tell her she was mine, +and then nothing remained except to select the institution to which +my only love and treasure was to be assigned.</p> +<p>Accident helped me in this as in other things. One day on my +westward journey a woman who sat beside me in the tram, and was +constantly wiping her eyes (though I could see a sort of sunshine +through her tears), could not help telling me, out of the +overflowing of her poor heart, what had just been happening to +her.</p> +<p>She was a widow, and had been leaving her little girl, three +years old, at an orphanage, and though it had been hard to part +with her, and the little darling had looked so pitiful when she +came away, it would be the best for both of them in the long +run.</p> +<p>I asked which orphanage it was, and she mentioned the name of +it, telling me something about the founder—a good doctor who +had been a father to the fatherless of thousands of poor women like +herself.</p> +<p>That brought me to a quick decision, and the very next morning, +putting on my hat and coat, I set off for the Home, which I knew +where to find, having walked round it on my way back from the West +End and heard the merry voices of happy children who were playing +behind a high wall.</p> +<p>I hardly know whether to laugh or cry when I think of the mood +in which I entered the orphanage. In spite of all that life had +done to me, I really and truly felt as if I were about to confer an +immense favour upon the doctor by allowing him to take care of my +little woman.</p> +<p>Oh, how well I remember that little point of time!</p> +<p>My first disappointment was to learn that the good doctor was +dead, and when I was shown into the office of his successor +(everything bore such a businesslike air) I found an elderly man +with a long "three-decker" neck and a glacial smile, who, pushing +his spectacles up on to his forehead, said in a freezing voice:</p> +<p>"Well, ma'am, what is <i>your</i> pleasure?"</p> +<p>After a moment of giddiness I began to tell him my +story—how I had a child and her nurse was not taking proper +care of her; how I was in uncongenial employment myself, but hoped +soon to get better; how I loved my little one and expected to be +able to provide for her presently; and how, therefore, if he would +receive her for a while, only a little while, on the understanding, +the clear and definite understanding, that I could take her away as +soon as I wished to. . . .</p> +<p>Oh dear! Oh dear:</p> +<p>I do not know what there was in my appearance or speech which +betrayed me, but I had got no further than this when the old +gentleman said sharply:</p> +<p>"Can you provide a copy of the register of your child's birth to +show that it is legitimate?"</p> +<p>What answer I made I cannot recollect, except that I told the +truth in a voice with a tremor in it, for a memory of the registry +office was rolling back on me and I could feel my blushes flushing +into my face.</p> +<p>The result was instantaneous. The old gentleman touched a bell, +drew his spectacles down on to his nose, and said in his icy +tones:</p> +<p>"Don't take illegitimate children if we can help it."</p> +<p>It was several days before I recovered from the deep humiliation +of this experience. Then (the exactions of the Olivers quickening +my memory and at the same time deadening my pride) I remembered +something which I had heard the old actress say during my time at +the boarding-house about a hospital in Bloomsbury for unfortunate +children—how the good man who founded it had been so firm in +his determination that no poor mother in her sorrow should be put +to further shame about her innocent child that he had hung out a +basket at the gate at night in which she could lay her little one, +if she liked, and then ring a bell and hide herself away.</p> +<p>It wasn't easy to reconcile oneself to such philanthropy, but +after a sleepless night, and with rather a sickening pang of +mingled hope and fear, I set off for this hospital.</p> +<p>It was a fine Sunday morning. The working-men in the East End +were sitting at their doors smoking their pipes and reading their +Sunday papers; but when I reached the West all the church bells +were ringing, and people wearing black clothes and shiny black +gloves were walking with measured steps through the wide courtyard +that led to the chapel.</p> +<p>I will not say that I did not feel some qualms at entering a +Protestant church, yet as soon as I had taken my seat and looked up +at the gallery of the organ, where the children sat tier on tier, +so quaint and sweet—the boys like robins in their bright red +waistcoats, and the girls like rabbits in their mob-caps with +fluted frills—and the service began, and the fresh young +voices rose in hymns of praise to the good Father of us all, I +thought Of nothing except the joy of seeing Isabel there some day +and hearing her singing in the choir.</p> +<p>When the service was over I asked for the secretary and was +shown into his room.</p> +<p>I dare say he was a good man, but oh! why will so many good +people wear such wintry weather in their faces that merely to look +at them pierces a poor woman to the soul?</p> +<p>Apologising for the day, I told my story again (my head a little +down), saying I understood that it was no barrier to a child in +that orphanage that she had been born outside the pale of the +law.</p> +<p>"On the contrary," said the secretary, "that is precisely the +kind of child this house is intended for."</p> +<p>But when I went on to say that I assumed they still observed the +wish of the founder that no questions of any kind should be asked +about a child's birth or parentage, he said no, they had altered +all that. Then he proceeded to explain that before a child could be +received the mother must now go before a committee of gentlemen to +satisfy them of her previous good character, and that the father of +her baby had deserted both of them.</p> +<p>More than that, he told me that on being received the child was +immediately re-registered and given a new name, in order that it +might be cut off from the sin of its parents and the contamination +of their shame.</p> +<p>It would be impossible for me to describe the feelings with +which I listened to the secretary while he said all this, with the +cast-metal face of a man who was utterly unconscious of the +enormity of the crime he was describing.</p> +<p>"Before a committee of gentlemen?" I asked.</p> +<p>"That is so."</p> +<p>"Who are to ask her all those questions?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"And then they are to change her baby's name?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Is she told what the new name is to be?"</p> +<p>"No, but she is given a piece of parchment containing a number +which corresponds with the name in our books."</p> +<p>I rose to my feet, flushing up to the eyes I think, trembling +from head to foot I know, and, forgetting who and what I was and +why I was there—a poor, helpless, penniless being seeking +shelter for her child—I burst out on the man in all the mad +wrath of outraged motherhood.</p> +<p>"And you call this a Christian institution!" I said. "You take a +poor woman in her hour of trouble and torture her with an +inquisition into the most secret facts of her life, in public, and +before a committee of men. And then you take her child, and so far +as she is concerned you bury it, and give her a ticket to its +grave. A hospital? This is no hospital. It is a cemetery. And yet +you dare to write over your gates the words of our Lord—our +holy and loving and blessed Lord—who said, 'Suffer little +children. . . .'"</p> +<p>But what is the use of repeating what I said then (perhaps +unjustly) or afterwards in the silence of my own room and the +helpless intoxication of my rage?</p> +<p>It was soon stamped out of me.</p> +<p>By the end of another week I was driven to such despair by the +continued extortions of the Olivers that, seeing an advertisement +in the Underground Railway of a Home for children in the country +(asking for subscriptions and showing a group of happy little +people playing under a chestnut-tree in bloom), I decided to make +one more effort.</p> +<p>"They can't all be machines," I thought, "with the founders' +hearts crushed out of them."</p> +<p>The day was Friday, when work was apt to heap up at the Jew's, +and Mrs. Abramovitch had brought vests enough to my room to cover +my bed, but nevertheless I put on my hat and coat and set out for +the orphanage.</p> +<p>It was fifteen miles on the north side of London, so it cost me +something to get there. But I was encouraged by the homelike +appearance of the place when I reached it, and still more by +finding that it was conducted by women, for at last, I thought, the +woman-soul would speak to me.</p> +<p>But hardly had I told my story to the matron, repeating my +request (very timidly this time and with such a humble, humble +heart) that I might be allowed to recover my child as soon as I +found myself able to provide for her, than she stopped me and +said:</p> +<p>"My dear young person, we could have half the orphan children in +London on your terms. Before we accept such a child as yours we +expect the parent to give us a legal undertaking that she +relinquishes all rights in it until it is sixteen years of +age."</p> +<p>"Sixteen? Isn't that rather severe on a mother?" I said.</p> +<p>"Justly severe," said the matron. "Such women should be made to +maintain their children, and thus realise that the way of +transgressors is hard."</p> +<p>How I got back to London, whether by rail or tram or on foot, or +what happened on the way (except that darkness was settling down on +me, within and without), I do not know. I only know that very late +that night, as late as eleven o'clock, I was turning out of Park +Lane into Piccadilly, where the poor "public women" with their +painted faces, dangling their little hand-bags from their wrists, +were promenading in front of the gentlemen's clubs and smiling up +at the windows.</p> +<p>These were the scenes which had formerly appalled me; but now I +was suddenly surprised by a different feeling, and found myself +thinking that among the women who sinned against their womanhood +there might be some who sold themselves for bread to keep those +they loved and who loved them.</p> +<p>This thought was passing through my mind when I heard a hollow +ringing laugh from a woman who was standing at the foot of a flight +of steps talking to a group of three gentlemen whose white shirt +fronts beneath their overcoats showed that they were in evening +dress.</p> +<p>Her laughter was not natural. It had no joy in it, yet she +laughed and laughed, and feeling as if I <i>knew</i> (because life +had that day trampled on me also), I said to myself:</p> +<p>"That woman's heart is dead."</p> +<p>This caused me to glance at her as I passed, when, catching a +side glimpse of her face, I was startled by a memory I could not +fix.</p> +<p>"Where and when have I seen that woman's face before?" I +thought.</p> +<p>It seemed impossible that I could have seen it anywhere. But the +woman's resemblance to somebody I had known, coupled with her +joyless laughter, compelled me to stop at the next corner and look +back.</p> +<p>By this time the gentlemen, who had been treating her lightly (O +God, how men treat such women!), had left her and, coming +arm-in-arm in my direction, with their silk hats tilted a little +back, were saying:</p> +<p>"Poor old Aggie! She's off!" "Completely off!" "Is it drink, I +wonder?"</p> +<p>And then, seeing me, they said:</p> +<p>"Gad, here's a nice little gal, though!" "No rouge, neither!" +"By Jove, no! Her face is as white as a waterlily!"</p> +<p>Seeing that they were wheeling round, and fearing they were +going to speak to me, I moved back and so came face to face with +the woman, who was standing where they had left her, silent now, +and looking after the men with fierce eyes under the fair hair that +curled over her forehead.</p> +<p>Then in a moment a memory from the far past swept over me, and I +cried, almost as if the name had been forced out of me:</p> +<p>"Sister Angela!"</p> +<p>The woman started, and it seemed for a moment as if she were +going to run away. Then she laid hold of me by the arm and, looking +searchingly into my face, said:</p> +<p>"Who are you? . . . I know. You are Mary O'Neill, aren't +you?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"I knew you were. I read about your marriage to that . . . that +man. And now you are wondering why I am here. Well, come home with +me and see."</p> +<p>It was not until afterwards that I knew by what mistake about my +presence in that place Angela thought she must justify herself in +my eyes (mine!); but taking me by the hand, just as she used to do +when I was a child, she led, almost pulled, me down Piccadilly, and +my will was so broken that I did not attempt to resist her.</p> +<p>We crossed Piccadilly Circus, with its white sheet of electric +light, and, turning into the darker thoroughfares on the northern +side of it, walked on until, in a narrow street of the Italian +quarter of Soho, we stopped at a private door by the side of a +café that had an Italian name on the window.</p> +<p>"This is where we live. Come in," said Angela, and I followed +her through a long empty lobby and up three flights of bare +stairs.</p> +<p>While we ascended, there was the deadened sound, as from the +café, of men singing (in throbbing voices to mandolines and +guitars) one of the Italian songs which I remembered to have heard +from the piazza outside the convent on that night when Sister +Angela left me in bed while she went off to visit the chaplain:</p> +<p>"<i>Oh bella Napoli, Oh suol beato<br /> +Onde sorridere volle il creato.</i>"</p> +<p>"The Italian Club," said Angela. "Only one flight more. +Come!"</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIRST_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIRST_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND FIRST +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>At length Angela opened, with a key from her satchel, a door on +the top landing, and we entered a darkened room which was partly in +the roof.</p> +<p>As we stepped in I heard rapid breathing, which told me that we +were in a sick chamber, and then a man's voice, very husky and +weak, saying:</p> +<p>"Is that you, Agnes?"</p> +<p>"It's only me, dear," said Angela..</p> +<p>After a moment she turned up the solitary gas-jet, which had +been burning low, and I saw the shadowy form of a man lying in a +bed that stood in a corner. He was wasted with consumption, his +long bony hands were lying on the counterpane, his dark hair was +matted over his forehead as from sweat, but I could not mistake the +large, lively grey eyes that looked out of his long thin face. It +was Father Giovanni.</p> +<p>Angela went up to him and kissed him, and I could see that his +eyes lighted with a smile as he saw her coming into the room.</p> +<p>"There's somebody with you, isn't there?" he said.</p> +<p>"Yes. Who do you think it is?"</p> +<p>"Who?"</p> +<p>"Don't you remember little Margaret Mary at the Sacred +Heart?"</p> +<p>"Is this she?"</p> +<p>"Yes," said Angela, and then in a hoarse, angry voice the man +said:</p> +<p>"What has she come here for?"</p> +<p>Angela told him that I had seen her on Piccadilly, and being a +great lady now, I (Oh heaven!) was one of the people who came out +into the streets at midnight to rescue lost ones.</p> +<p>"She looked as if she wondered what had brought me down to that +life, so I've fetched her home to see."</p> +<p>I was shocked at Angela's mistake, but before I could gather +strength or courage to correct her Giovanni was raising himself in +bed and saying, with a defiant air, his eyes blazing like +watch-fires:</p> +<p>"She does it for me, if you want to know. I've been eleven +months ill—she does it all for me, I tell you."</p> +<p>And then, in one of those outbursts of animation which come to +the victims of that fell disease, he gave me a rapid account of +what had happened to them since they ran away from Rome—how +at first he had earned their living as a teacher of languages; how +it became known that he was an unfrocked and excommunicated priest +who had broken his vows, and then his pupils had left him; how they +had struggled on for some years longer, though pursued by this +character as by a malignant curse; and how at length his health had +quite broken down, and he would have starved but for Agnes (Angela +being her nun's name), who had stuck to him through everything.</p> +<p>While the sick man said this in his husky voice, Angela was +sitting on the bed by his side with her arm about his waist, +listening to him with a sort of pride and looking at me with a kind +of triumph.</p> +<p>"I dare say you wonder why I didn't try to get work," she said. +"I <i>could</i> have got it if I had wanted to. I could have got it +at the Italian laundry. But what was two shillings a day to a man +who was ordered new milk and fresh eggs five times every +twenty-four hours, not to speak of the house rent?"</p> +<p>"She ought to have let me die first," said Giovanni, and then, +looking at me again with his large, glittering, fierce eyes, he +said:</p> +<p>"<i>You</i> think she ought to have let me die, don't you?"</p> +<p>"No, no, no," I said—it was all I <i>could</i> say, for +their mistake about myself was choking me.</p> +<p>Perhaps my emotion appeased both of them, for after a moment +Angela beat out Giovanni's pillow and straightened his counterpane, +and then told him to lie down and be quiet, while she brought a +chair for me and took off her things in her own bedroom.</p> +<p>But hardly had she gone into an adjoining chamber when the sick +man raised himself again and, reaching over in my direction, told +me in a hoarse whisper the story of the first night of her present +way of life—how the doctor had said he must be removed to the +hospital; how Agnes would not part with him; how the landlord had +threatened to turn them out; and how at last, after sitting with +her head in her hands the whole evening, Aggie had got up and gone +out and, coming back at midnight, had thrown two sovereigns on the +table and said, "There you are, Giovanni—that's our rent and +your eggs and milk for one week, anyway."</p> +<p>By this time Angela had returned to the room (her paint and +rouge washed off, and her gay clothes replaced by a simple woollen +jacket over a plain underskirt), and she began to beat up an egg, +to boil some milk, to pour out a dose of medicine, and to do, with +all a good woman's tact, a good woman's tenderness, the little +services of which an invalid stands in need.</p> +<p>Oh heavens, how beautiful it was—fearfully, awfully +tragically beautiful!</p> +<p>I was deeply moved as I sat in silence watching her; and when at +length Giovanni, who had been holding her hand in his own long, +bony ones and sometimes putting it to his lips, dropped off to +sleep (tired out, perhaps, by talking to me), and she, drawing up +to where I sat by the end of the bed, resumed her self-defence, +saying in a whisper that ladies like me could not possibly +understand what a woman would do, in spite of herself, when the +life of one she loved was threatened, I could bear her mistake no +longer, but told her of my real condition—that I was no +longer a lady, that I had run away from my husband, that I had a +child, and was living as a poor seamstress in the East End of +London.</p> +<p>Angela listened to my story in astonishment; and when I had come +to an end she was holding my hand and looking into my eyes with +just that look which she had when she put me to bed for the first +time at school, and, making her voice very low, told me to be a +good child of the Infant Jesus.</p> +<p>"It's nearly one o'clock. You can't go back to the East End +to-night," she whispered.</p> +<p>"Oh, I must, I must," I said, getting up and making for the +door. But before I had reached it my limbs gave way, whether from +the strain of emotion or physical weakness, and if it had not been +for Angela I should have dropped to the floor.</p> +<p>After that she would hear of no excuses. I must stay until +morning. I could sleep in her own bed in the other room, and she +could lay a mattress for herself on the floor by the side of +Giovanni's. There would be no great sacrifice in that. It was going +to be one of Giovanni's bad nights, and she was likely to be up and +down all the time anyway.</p> +<p>Half an hour later I was in bed in a little room that was +separated by a thin papered partition from the room of the poor +consumptive, and Angela, who had brought me a cup of hot milk, was +saying in a whisper:</p> +<p>"He's very bad. The doctor says he can't last longer than a +week. Sister Veronica (you remember her, she's Mildred Bankes that +used to be) tried to get him into a home for the dying. It was all +arranged, too, but at the last moment he wouldn't go. He told them +that, if they wanted to separate him from Agnes, they had better +bring his coffin because he would be dead before they got him to +the door."</p> +<p>When she had gone I lay a long time in the dark, listening to +the sounds on the other side of the partition.</p> +<p>Giovanni awoke with an alarming fit of coughing, and in the +querulous, plaintive, fretful, sometimes angry tones which invalids +have, he grumbled at Angela and then cried over her, saying what a +burden he was to her, while she, moving about the room in her bare +feet, coaxed and caressed him, and persuaded him to take his milk +or his medicine.</p> +<p>Through all this I would hear at intervals the drumming noises +of the singing downstairs, which sounded in my ears (as the singers +were becoming more and more intoxicated) like the swirling and +screeching of an ironical requiem for the dying man before he was +dead:</p> +<p>"<i>Oh bella Napoli, Oh suol beato<br /> +Onde sorridere volle il creato</i>."</p> +<p>But somewhere in those dead hours in which London sleeps +everything became still, and my mind, which had been questioning +the grim darkness on the worst of the world's tragedies (what a +woman will do for those she loves), fell back on myself and I +thought of the Christian institutions which had turned me from +their doors, and then of this "street-walker" who had given up her +own bed to me and was now lying in the next room on a mattress on +the floor.</p> +<p>I could not help it if I felt a startling reverence for Angela, +as a ministering angel faithful unto death, and I remembered that +as I fell asleep I was telling myself that we all needed God's +mercy, God's pardon, and that, God would forgive her because she +had loved much.</p> +<p>But sleep was more tolerant still I dreamt that Angela died, and +on reaching the gates of heaven all the saints of God met her, and +after they had clothed her in a spotless white robe, one of +them—it was the blessed Mary Magdalene—took her hand +and said:</p> +<p>"Here is another of the holy martyrs."</p> +<p>I awoke from that dream with beads of perspiration on my +forehead. But I dare not say what confused and terrible thoughts +came next, except that they were about baby—what I might do +myself if driven to the last extremity. When I slept and dreamt +again, it was I who was dead, and it was my darling mother who met +me and took me to the feet of the Blessed Virgin and said:</p> +<p>"Mother of all Mothers, who knows all that is in a mother's +heart, this is my little daughter. She did not intend to do wrong. +It was all for the sake of her child."</p> +<p>When I awoke in the morning, with the darkness shivering off +through the gloom, this last dream was sitting upon me like a +nightmare. It terrified me. I felt as if I were standing on the +edge of a precipice and some awful forces were trying to push me +over it.</p> +<p>The London sparrows were chirping on the skylight over my head, +and I could faintly hear the Italian criers in the front +street:</p> +<p>"Latte!" "Spazzina!" "Erbaggi freschi!"</p> +<p>In spite of myself (hating myself for it after all the +tenderness that had been shown me), I could not overcome a feeling +of shame at finding myself lying where I was, and I got up to run +away that I might cleanse my soul of the evil thoughts which had +come to me while there.</p> +<p>As I dressed I listened for a sound from the adjoining room. All +was quiet now. The poor restless ones were at last getting a little +rest.</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards I passed on tiptoe through their room +without looking towards the bed, and reaching the door to the +staircase I opened it as noiselessly as I could.</p> +<p>Then I closed it softly after me, on so much suffering and so +much love.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SECOND_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SECOND_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND SECOND +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>The sun was shining in the street. It was one of those clear, +clean, frosty mornings when the very air of London, even in the +worst places, seems to be washed by the sunlight from the sin and +drink of the night before.</p> +<p>I was on my way to that church among the mews of Mayfair to +which I had gone so frequently during the early days of my marriage +when I was struggling against the mortal sin (as I thought it was) +of loving Martin.</p> +<p>Just as I reached the church and was ascending the steps, a +gorgeous landau with high-stepping horses and a powdered footman +drew up at the bottom of them.</p> +<p>The carriage, which bore a coronet on the door, contained a lady +in long furs, a rosy-faced baby-girl in squirrel skins with a large +doll in her arms, and a nurse.</p> +<p>I could see that, like myself, the lady (a young mother) had +come to confess, for as she rose from her seat she told the child +to sit quiet and be good and she would not keep her long.</p> +<p>"Tum out soon, mummy, and dolly will lub you eber and eber," +said the child.</p> +<p>The lady stooped and kissed the little one, and then, with a +proud and happy look, stepped out of the carriage and passed into +the church, while the door-keeper opened the vestibule door for her +and bowed deeply.</p> +<p>I stood at the top of the steps for a moment looking back at the +carriage, the horses, the footman, the nurse, and, above all, the +baby-girl with her doll, and then followed the lady into the +church.</p> +<p>Apparently mass was just over. Little spirelets of smoke were +rising from the candles on the altar which the sacristan was +putting out, a few communicants were still on their knees, and +others with light yet echoing footsteps were making for the +door.</p> +<p>The lady in furs had already taken her place at one of the +confessional boxes, and as there seemed to be no other that was +occupied by a priest, I knelt on a chair in the nave and tried to +fix my mind on the prayers (once so familiar) for the examination +of conscience before confession:</p> +<p>"<i>Oh, Lord Jesus Christ, dispel the darkness of my heart, that +I may bewail my sins and rightly confess them</i>."</p> +<p>But the labouring of my spirit was like the flight of a bat in +the daylight. Though I tried hard to keep my mind from wandering, I +could not do so. Again and again it went back to the lady in furs +with the coroneted carriage and the high-stepping horses.</p> +<p>She was about my own age, and she began to rise before my +tightly closed eyes as a vision of what I might have been myself if +I had not given up everything for love—wealth, rank, title, +luxury.</p> +<p>God is my witness that down to that moment I had never once +thought I had made any sacrifice, but now, as by a flash of cruel +lightning, I saw myself as I was—a peeress who had run away +from her natural condition and was living in the slums, working +like any other work-girl.</p> +<p>Even this did not hurt me much, but when I thought of the +rosy-faced child in the carriage, and then of my own darling at +Mrs. Oliver's as I had seen her last, so thin and pale, and with +her little bib stained by her curdled milk, a feeling I had never +had before pierced to my very soul.</p> +<p>I asked myself if this was what God looked down upon and +permitted—that because I had obeyed what I still believed to +be the purest impulse of my nature, love, my child must be made to +suffer.</p> +<p>Then something hard began to form in my heart. I told myself +that what I had been taught to believe about God was falsehood and +deception.</p> +<p>All this time I was trying to hush down my mind by saying my +prayer, which called on the gracious Virgin Mary to intercede for +me with my Redeemer, and the holy Saints of God to assist me.</p> +<p>"<i>Assist me by thy grace, that I may be able to declare my +sins to the priest, thy Vicar</i>."</p> +<p>It was of no use. Every moment my heart was hardening, and what +I had intended to confess about my wicked thoughts of the night +before was vanishing away. At last I rose to my feet and, lifting +my head, looked boldly up at the altar.</p> +<p>Just at that moment the young peeress, having finished her +confession, went off with a light step and a cheerful face. Her +kneeling-place at the confessional box was now vacant, yet I did +not attempt to take it, and some minutes passed in which I stood +biting my lips to prevent a cry. Then the priest parted his +curtains and beckoned to me, and I moved across and stood +stubbornly by the perforated brass grating.</p> +<p>"Father," I said, as firmly as I could, for my throat was +fluttering, "I came here to make my confession, but something has +come over me since I entered this church, and now I cannot."</p> +<p>"What has come over you, my child?" asked the priest.</p> +<p>"I feel that what is said about God in a place like this, that +He is a kind and beneficent Father, who is just and merciful and +pities the sufferings of His children, is untrue. It is all wrong +and false. <i>God does not care</i>."</p> +<p>The priest did not answer me immediately, but after a moment of +silence he said in a quivering voice:</p> +<p>"My child, I feel just like that myself sometimes. It is the +devil tempting you. He is standing by your side and whispering in +your ear, at this moment."</p> +<p>I shuddered, and the priest added:</p> +<p>"I see how it is, my daughter. You are suffering, and those you +love are suffering too. But must you surrender your faith on that +account? Look round at the pictures on these walls [the Stations of +the Cross]. Think of the Great Sufferer, the Great Martyr, who in +the hour of His death, at the malicious power of the world, cried, +'<i>Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani</i>: My God, My God, why hast Thou +forsaken Me?'"</p> +<p>I had dropped to my knees by now, my head was down, and my hands +were clasped together.</p> +<p>"You are wrong, my child, if you think God does not care for you +because He allows you to suffer. Are you rich? Are you prosperous? +Have you every earthly blessing? Then beware, for Satan is watching +for your soul. But are you poor? Are you going through unmerited +trouble? Have you lost some one who was dearer to you than your +heart of hearts? Then take courage, for our holy and blessed +Saviour has marked you for His own."</p> +<p>I know nothing of that priest except his whispering voice, +which, coming through the grating of the confessional, produced the +effect of the supernatural, but I thought then, and I think now, +that he must have been a great as well as a good man.</p> +<p>I perfectly recollect that, when I left the church and passed +into the streets, it seemed as if his spirit went with me and built +up in my soul a resolution that was bright with heavenly tears and +sunshine.</p> +<p>Work! Work! Work! I should work still harder than before. No +matter how mean, ill-paid, and uncongenial my work might be, I +should work all day and all night if necessary. And since I had +failed to get my child into an orphanage, it was clearly intended +that I should keep her with me, for my own charge and care and +joy.</p> +<p>This was the mood in which I returned to the house of the +Jew.</p> +<p>It was Saturday morning, and though the broader thoroughfares of +the East End were crowded and the narrower streets full of life, +the Jew's house was silent, for it was the Jewish Sabbath.</p> +<p>As I went hurriedly upstairs I heard the Jew himself, who was +dressing for the synagogue, singing his Sabbath hymn: <i>Lerho +daudee likras kollo</i>—"Come, O friend, let us go forth to +meet the Bride, let us receive the Sabbath with joy!"</p> +<p>Then came a shock.</p> +<p>When I reached my room I found, to my dismay, that the pile of +vests which I had left on my bed on going out the day before had +been removed; and just as I was telling myself that no one else +except Mrs. Abramovitch had a key to my door I heard shuffling +footsteps on the stair, and knew that her husband was coming up to +me.</p> +<p>A moment afterwards the Jew stood in my doorway. He was dressed +in his Sabbath suit and, free from the incongruous indications of +his homely calling, the patriarchal appearance which had first +struck me was even more marked than before. His face was pale, his +expression was severe, and if his tongue betrayed the broken +English of the Polish Jew, I, in my confusion and fear, did not +notice it then.</p> +<p>My first thought was that he had come to reprove me for +neglecting my work, and I was prepared to promise to make up for my +absence. But at a second glance I saw that something had happened, +something had become known, and that he was there to condemn and +denounce me.</p> +<p>"You have been out all night," he said. "Can you tell me where +you have been?"</p> +<p>I knew I could not, and though it flashed upon me to say that I +had slept at the house of a friend, I saw that, if he asked who my +friend was, and what, I should be speechless.</p> +<p>The Jew waited for my reply and then said:</p> +<p>"You have given us a name—can you say it is your true and +right one?"</p> +<p>Again I made no answer, and after another moment the Jew +said:</p> +<p>"Can you deny that you have a child whom you have hidden from +our knowledge?"</p> +<p>I felt myself gasping, but still I did not speak.</p> +<p>"Can you say that it was lawfully born according to your +Christian marriage?"</p> +<p>I felt the colour flushing into my face but I was still silent; +and after a moment in which, as I could see, the stern-natured Jew +was summing me up as a woman of double life and evil character, he +said:</p> +<p>"Then it is true? . . . Very well, you will understand that from +this day you cease to be in my service."</p> +<p>All this time my eyes were down, but I was aware that somebody +else had come into the room. It was Miriam, and she was trying to +plead for me.</p> +<p>"Father . . ." she began, but, turning hotly upon her, the Jew +cried passionately:</p> +<p>"Go away! A true daughter of Israel should know better than to +speak for such a woman."</p> +<p>I heard the girl going slowly down the stairs, and then the Jew, +stepping up to me and speaking more loudly than before, said:</p> +<p>"Woman, leave my house at once, before you corrupt the +conscience of my child."</p> +<p>Again I became aware that some one had come into the room. It +was Mrs. Abramovitch, and she, too, was pleading for me.</p> +<p>"Israel! Calm thyself! Do not give way to injustice and anger. +On Shobbos morning, too!"</p> +<p>"Hannah," said the Jew, "thou speakest with thy mouth, not thy +heart. The Christian doth not deny that she hath given thee a false +name, and is the adulterous mother of a misbegotten child. If she +were a Jewish woman she would be summoned before the Beth Din, and +in better days our law of Moses would have stoned her. Shall she, +because she is a Christian, dishonour a good Jewish house? No! The +hand of the Lord would go out against me."</p> +<p>"But she is homeless, and she hath been a good servant to thee, +Israel. Give her time to find another shelter."</p> +<p>There was a moment of silence after that, and then the Jew +said:</p> +<p>"Very well! It shall not be said that Israel Abramovitch knows +not to temper justice with mercy."</p> +<p>And then, my face being still down, I heard him saying over my +head:</p> +<p>"You may stay here another week. After that I wash my hands of +thee."</p> +<p>With these hard words he turned away, and I heard him going +heavily down the stairs. His wife stayed a little longer, saying +something in a kind voice, which I did not comprehend, and then she +followed him.</p> +<p>I do not think I had spoken a word. I continued to stand where +the Jew had left me. After a while I heard him closing and locking +the door of his own apartment, and knew that he was going off to +his synagogue in Brick Lane in his tall silk hat worn on the back +of his head like a skull-cap, and with his wife and daughter behind +him, carrying his leather-bound prayer-book.</p> +<p>I hardly knew what else was happening. My heart was heaving like +a dead body on a billow. All that the priest had said was gone. In +its place there was a paralysing despair as if the wheels of life +were rolling over me.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>My dear, long-suffering, martyred darling!</p> +<p>It makes my blood boil to see how the very powers of darkness, +in the name of religion, morality, philanthropy and the judgment of +God, were persecuting my poor little woman.</p> +<p>But why speak of myself at all, or interrupt my darling's +narrative, except to say what was happening in my efforts to reach +her?</p> +<p>While we were swinging along in our big liner over the heaving +bosom of the Mediterranean the indefinable sense of her danger +never left me day or night.</p> +<p>That old dream of the glacier and the precipice continued to +haunt my sleep, with the difference that, instead of the aurora +glistening in my dear one's eyes, there was now a blizzard behind +her.</p> +<p>The miserable thing so tortured me as we approached Malta (where +I expected to receive a reply to the cable I had sent from Port +Said to the house of Daniel O'Neill) that I felt physically weak at +the thought of the joy or sorrow ahead of me.</p> +<p>Though there was no telegram from my darling at Malta, there was +one from the chairman of my committee, saying he was coming to +Marseilles to meet our steamer and would sail the rest of the way +home with us.</p> +<p>Indirectly this brought me a certain comfort. It reminded me of +the letter I had written for my dear one on the day I left Castle +Raa. Sixteen months had passed since then, serious things had +happened in the interval, and I had never thought of that letter +before.</p> +<p>It was not to her father, as she supposed, and certainly not to +her husband. It was to my chairman, asking him, in the event of my +darling sending it on, to do whatever was necessary to protect her +during my absence.</p> +<p>If my chairman had not received that letter, my conclusion would +be that my dear little woman had never been reduced to such straits +as to require help from any one. If he had in fact received it, he +must have done what I wished, and therefore everything would be +well.</p> +<p>There was a certain suspense as well as a certain consolation in +all this, and before our big ship slowed down at Marseilles I was +on deck searching for my chairman among the people waiting for us +on the pier.</p> +<p>I saw him immediately, waving his travelling cap with a flourish +of joy, and I snatched a little comfort from that.</p> +<p>As soon as the steamer was brought to, he was the first to come +aboard, and I scanned his face as he hurried up the gangway. It was +beaming.</p> +<p>"It's all right," I thought; "a man could not look as happy as +that if he were bringing me bad news."</p> +<p>A moment afterwards he was shaking my hand, clapping me on the +shoulder, and saying:</p> +<p>"Splendid! Magnificent! Glorious achievement! Proved your point +up to the hilt, my boy!"</p> +<p>And when I said something about not having gone all the way he +cried:</p> +<p>"Never mind! You'll do it next time," which made some of my +shipmates who were standing round with shining eyes say, "Aye, aye, +sir," and then one of them (it was good old O'Sullivan) +shouted:</p> +<p>"By the stars of heaven, that's thrue, my lord! And if anybody's +after saying that the Commanther was turned back this time by +anything less than the almighty power of Nature in her wrath, you +may say there's forty-eight of us here to tell him he lies."</p> +<p>"I believe it," said the chairman, and then there were further +congratulations, with messages from members of my committee, but +never a word from my dear one.</p> +<p>Thinking the chairman might hesitate to speak of a private +matter until we were alone, I took him down to my state-room. But +he had nothing to say there, either, except about articles to be +written, reports to be compiled, and invitations to be +accepted.</p> +<p>Several hours passed like this. We were again out at sea, and my +longing to know what had happened was consuming me, but I dared not +ask from fear of a bad answer.</p> +<p>Before the night was out, however, I had gone to work in a +roundabout way. Taking O'Sullivan into my confidence, I told him it +had not been my parents that I had been anxious about (God forgive +me!), but somebody else whom he had seen and spoken to.</p> +<p>"Do you mean Mal . . . I should say Lady . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"By the holy saints, the way I was thinking that when I brought +you the letter at Port Said, and saw the clouds of heaven still +hanging on you."</p> +<p>I found that the good fellow had a similar trouble of his own +(not yet having heard from his mother), so he fell readily into my +plan, which was that of cross-questioning the chairman about my +dear one, and I about his, and then meeting secretly and imparting +what we had learned.</p> +<p>Anybody may laugh who likes at the thought of two big lumbering +fellows afraid to face the truth (scouting round and round it), but +it grips me by the throat to this day to see myself taking our +chairman into a quiet corner of the smoke-room and saying:</p> +<p>"Poor old O'Sullivan! He hasn't heard from his old mother yet. +She was sick when he sailed, and wouldn't have parted with him to +go with anybody except myself. You haven't heard of her, have +you?"</p> +<p>And then to think of O'Sullivan doing the same for me, with:</p> +<p>"The poor Commanther! Look at him there. Faith, he's keeping a +good heart, isn't he? But it's just destroyed he is for want of +news of a great friend that was in trouble. It was a girl . . . a +lady, I mane. You haven't heard the whisper of a word, sir . . . +eh?"</p> +<p>Our chairman had heard nothing. And when (bracing myself at +last) I asked point-blank if anything had been sent to him as from +me, and he answered "No," I might have been relieved, but I wasn't. +Though I did not know then that my darling had burnt my letter, I +began to feel that she was the last person in the world to use it, +being (God bless her!) of the mettle that makes a woman want to +fight her own battles without asking help of any one.</p> +<p>This quite crushed down my heart, for, seeing that she had sent +no reply to my cables, I could not find any escape from the +conclusion that she was where no word could come from her—she +was dead!</p> +<p>Lord God, how I suffered when this phantom got into my mind! I +used to walk up and down the promenade deck late into the night, +trying and condemning myself as if I had been my own judge and +jury.</p> +<p>"She is dead. I have killed her," I thought.</p> +<p>Thank God, the phantom was soon laid by the gladdest sight I +ever saw on earth or ever expect to see, and it wouldn't be +necessary to speak of it now but for the glorious confidence it +brought me.</p> +<p>It was the same with me as with a ship-broken man whom +Providence comes to relieve in his last extremity, and I could fix +the place of mine as certainly as if I had marked it on a chart. We +had called at Gibraltar (where O'Sullivan had received a letter +from his mother, saying she was splendid) and were running along +the coast of Portugal.</p> +<p>It was a dirty black night, with intervals of rain, I remember. +While my shipmates were making cheerful times of it in the +smoke-room (O'Sullivan with heart at ease singing the "Minsthrel +Boy" to a chorus of noisy cheers) I was walking up and down the +deck with my little stock of courage nearly gone, for turn which +way I would it was dark, dark, dark, when just as we picked up the +lights of Finisterre something said to me, as plainly as words +could speak:</p> +<p>"What in the name of thunder are you thinking about? Do you mean +to say that you were turned back in the 88th latitude, and have +been hurried home without the loss of a moment, only to find +everything over at the end of your journey? No, no, no! Your poor, +dear, heroic little woman is alive! She may be in danger, and beset +by all the powers of the devil, but that's just why you have been +brought home to save her, and you <i>will</i> save her, as surely +as the sun will rise to-morrow morning."</p> +<p>There are thoughts which, like great notes in music, grip you by +the soul and lift you into a world which you don't naturally belong +to. This was one of them.</p> +<p>Never after that did I feel one moment's real anxiety. I was my +own man once more; and though I continued to walk the deck while +our good ship sped along in the night, it was only because there +was a kind of wild harmony between the mighty voice of the rolling +billows of the Bay and the unheard anthem of boundless hope that +was singing in my breast.</p> +<p>I recollect that during my walk a hymn was always haunting me. +It was the same that we used to sing in the shuddering darkness of +that perpetual night, when we stood (fifty downhearted men) under +the shelter of our snow camp, with a ninety mile blizzard shrieking +above us:</p> +<p>"<i>Lead, kindly Light, amid th' encircling gloom,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 5em;">Lead Thou me +on."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>But the light was within me now, and I knew as certainly as that +the good ship was under my feet that I was being carried home at +the call of the Spirit to rescue my stricken darling.</p> +<p>God keep her on her solitary way! England! England! England! +Less than a week and I should be there!</p> +<p>That was early hours on Saturday morning—the very Saturday +when my poor little woman, after she had been turned away by those +prating philanthropists, was being sheltered by the prostitute.</p> +<p>Let him explain it who can. I cannot.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRD_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRD_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND THIRD +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I must have been sitting a full hour or more on the end of my +bed—stunned, stupefied, unable to think—when Miriam, +back from the synagogue, came stealthily upstairs to say that a +messenger had come for me about six o'clock the night before.</p> +<p>"He said his name was Oliver, and father saw him, and that's how +he came to know. 'Tell her that her child is ill, and she is to +come immediately,' he said."</p> +<p>I was hardly conscious of what happened next—hardly aware +of passing through the streets to Ilford. I had a sense of houses +flying by as they seem to do from an express train; of my knees +trembling; of my throat tightening; and of my whole soul crying out +to God to save the life of my child until I could get to her.</p> +<p>When I reached the house of the Olivers the worst of my fears +were relieved. Mrs. Oliver was sitting before the fire with baby on +her lap.</p> +<p>At sight of me the woman began to mumble out something about my +delay, and how she could not be held responsible if anything +happened; but caring nothing about responsibility, hers or mine, I +took baby from her without more words.</p> +<p>My child was in a state of deep drowsiness, and when I tried to +rouse her I could not do so. I gathered that this condition had +lasted twenty-four hours, during which she had taken no +nourishment, with the result that she was now very thin.</p> +<p>I knew nothing of children's ailments but a motherly instinct +must have come to my aid, for I called for a bath, and bathed baby, +and she awoke, and then took a little food.</p> +<p>But again she dropped back into the drowsy condition, and Mrs. +Oliver, who was alarmed, called in some of the neighbours to look +at her.</p> +<p>Apparently the mission of the good women was to comfort Mrs. +Oliver, not me, but they said, "Sleep never did no harm to nobody," +and I found a certain consolation in that.</p> +<p>Hours passed. I was barely sensible of anything that happened +beyond the narrow circle of my own lap, but at one moment I heard +the squirling of a brass band that was going up the street, with +the shuffling of an irregular procession.</p> +<p>"It's the strike," said Mrs. Oliver, running to the window. +"There's Ted, carrying a banner."</p> +<p>A little later I heard the confused noises of a strike meeting, +which was being held on the Green. It was like the croaking of a +frog-pond, with now and then a strident voice (the bricklayer's) +crying "Buckle your belts tighter, and starve rather than give in, +boys." Still later I heard the procession going away, singing with +a slashing sound that was like driving wind and pelting rain:</p> +<p>"<i>The land, the land, the blessed, blessed land,<br /> +Gawd gave the land to the people</i>."</p> +<p>But nothing awakened baby, and towards three in the afternoon +(the idea that she was really ill having taken complete possession +of me) I asked where I could find the nearest doctor, and being +told, I went off in search of him.</p> +<p>The doctor was on his rounds, so I left a written message +indicating baby's symptoms and begging him to come to her +immediately.</p> +<p>On the way back I passed a number of children's +funerals—easily recognisable by the combined coach and +hearse, the white linen "weepers" worn by the coachman and his +assistant, and the little coffin, sprinkled with cheap flowers, in +the glass case behind the driver's seat. These sights, which +brought back a memory of the woman who carried my baby down the +Mile End Road, almost deprived me of my senses.</p> +<p>I had hardly got back and taken off my coat and warmed my hands +and dress by the fire before taking baby in my lap, when the +doctor, in his gig, pulled up at the door.</p> +<p>He was a young man, but he seemed to take in the situation in a +moment. I was the mother, wasn't I? Yes. And this woman was baby's +nurse? Yes.</p> +<p>Then he drew up a chair and looked steadfastly down at baby, and +I went through that breathless moment, which most of us know, when +we are waiting for the doctor's first word.</p> +<p>"Some acute digestive trouble here apparently," he said, and +then something about finding out the cause of it.</p> +<p>But hardly had he put his hands on my child as she lay in my lap +than there came a faintly discoloured vomit.</p> +<p>"What have you been giving her?" he said, looking round at Mrs. +Oliver.</p> +<p>Mrs. Oliver protested that she had given baby nothing except her +milk, but the doctor said sharply:</p> +<p>"Don't talk nonsense, woman. Show me what you've given her."</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Oliver, looking frightened, went upstairs and brought +down a bottle of medicine, saying it was a soothing syrup which I +had myself bought for baby's cough.</p> +<p>"As I thought!" said the doctor, and going to the door and +opening it, he flung the bottle on to the waste ground opposite, +saying as he did so:</p> +<p>"If I hear of you giving your babies any more of your soothing +syrup I'll see what the Inspector has to say."</p> +<p>After that, ignoring nurse, he asked me some searching and +intimate questions—if I had had a great grief or shock or +worry while baby was coming, and whether and how long I had nursed +her.</p> +<p>I answered as truthfully as I could, though I saw the drift of +his inquiries, and was trembling with fear of what he would tell me +next.</p> +<p>He said nothing then, however, except to make his +recommendations. And remembering my loss of work, my heart sank as +he enumerated baby's needs—fresh cow's milk diluted with lime +water, small quantities of meat juice, and twenty to thirty drops +of the best brandy three or four times a day.</p> +<p>When he rose to go I paid his fee. It was only half-a-crown, but +he cannot have known how much that meant to me, for as he was +leaving the kitchen he told me to send for him again in the morning +if there were a change in the symptoms.</p> +<p>Feeling that I did not yet know the whole truth (though I was +trembling in terror of it), I handed baby to Mrs. Oliver and +followed the doctor to the door.</p> +<p>"Doctor," I said, "is my baby very ill?"</p> +<p>He hesitated for a moment and then answered, "Yes."</p> +<p>"Dangerously ill?"</p> +<p>Again he hesitated, and then looking closely at me (I felt my +lower lip trembling) he said:</p> +<p>"I won't say that. She's suffering from marasmus, provoked by +overdoses of the pernicious stuff that is given by ignorant and +unscrupulous people to a restless child to keep it quiet. But her +real trouble comes of maternal weakness, and the only cure for that +is good nourishment and above all fresh air and sunshine."</p> +<p>"Will she get better?"</p> +<p>"If you can take her away, into the country she will, +certainly."</p> +<p>"And if . . . if I can't," I asked, the words fluttering up to +my lips, "will she . . . <i>die</i>?"</p> +<p>The doctor looked steadfastly at me again (I was biting my lip +to keep it firm), and said:</p> +<p>"She <i>may</i>."</p> +<p>When I returned to the kitchen I knew that I was face to face +with another of the great mysteries of a woman's +life—Death—the death of my child, which my very love +and tenderness had exposed her to.</p> +<p>Meantime Mrs. Oliver, who was as white as a whitewashed wall, +was excusing herself in a whining voice that had the sound of a +spent wave. She wouldn't have hurt the pore dear precious for +worlds, and if it hadn't been for Ted, who was so tired at night +and wanted sleep after walking in percession. . . .</p> +<p>Partly to get rid of the woman I sent her out (with almost the +last of my money) for some of the things ordered by the doctor. +While she was away, and I was looking down at the little silent +face on my lap, praying for one more glimpse of my Martin's +sea-blue eyes, the bricklayer came lunging into the house.</p> +<p>"Where's Lizer?" he said.</p> +<p>I told him and he cried:</p> +<p>"The baiby again! Allus the baiby!"</p> +<p>With that he took out of his pocket a cake of moist tobacco, cut +and rolled some of it in his palm, and then charged his pipe and +lit it—filling the air with clouds of rank smoke, which made +baby bark and cough without rousing her.</p> +<p>I pointed this out to him and asked him not to smoke.</p> +<p>"Eh?" he said, and then I told him that the doctor had been +called and what he had said about fresh air.</p> +<p>"So that's it, is it?" he said. "Good! Just reminds me of +something I want to say, so I'll introdooce the matter now, in a +manner o' speaking. Last night I 'ad to go to Mile End for you, and +here's Lizer out on a sim'lar arrand. If people 'ave got to be +'ospital nurses to a sick baiby they ought to be paid, mind ye. +We're only pore, and it may be a sacred dooty walkin' in +percession, but it ain't fillin'."</p> +<p>Choking with anger, I said:</p> +<p>"Put out your pipe, please."</p> +<p>"Ma'am to <i>you</i>!"</p> +<p>"Put it out this moment, sir, or I'll see if I can't find +somebody to make you."</p> +<p>The bricklayer laughed, then pointed with the shank of his pipe +to the two photographs over the mantelpiece, and said:</p> +<p>"See them? Them's me, with my dooks up. If any friend o' yourn +as is interested in the baiby comes to lay a 'and on me I'll see if +I've forgot 'ow to use 'em."</p> +<p>I felt the colour shuddering out of my cheeks, and putting baby +into the cot I turned on the man and cried:</p> +<p>"You scoundrel! The doctor has told me what is the immediate +cause of my baby's illness and your wife has confessed to giving +overdoses of a drug at your direction. If you don't leave this +house in one minute I'll go straight to the police-station and +charge you with poisoning my child."</p> +<p>The bully in the coward was cowed in a moment.</p> +<p>"Don't get 'uffy, ma'am," he said. "I'm the peaceablest man in +the East End, and if I mentioned anything about a friend o' yourn +it slipped out in the 'eat of the moment—see?"</p> +<p>"Out you go! Go! Go!" I cried, and, incredible as it may seem, +the man went flying before my face as if I had been a fury.</p> +<p>It would be a long tale to tell of what happened the day +following, the next and the next and the next—how baby became +less drowsy, but more restless; how being unable to retain her food +she grew thinner and thinner; how I wished to send for the doctor, +but dared not do so from fear of his fee; how the little money I +had left was barely sufficient to buy the food and stimulants which +were necessary to baby's cure: how I sat for long hours with my +little lamb on my lap straining my dry eyes into her face; and how +I cried to God for the life of my child, which was everything I had +or wanted.</p> +<p>All this time I was still lodging at the Jew's, returning to it +late every night, and leaving it early in the morning, but nothing +happened there that seemed to me of the smallest consequence. One +day Miriam, looking at me with her big black eyes, said:</p> +<p>"You must take more rest, dear, or you will make yourself +ill."</p> +<p>"No, no, I am not ill," I answered, and then remembering how +necessary my life was to the life of my child, I said, "I must not +be ill."</p> +<p>At last on the Saturday morning—I know now it must have +been Saturday, but time did not count with me then—I +overheard Mrs. Abramovitch pleading for me with her husband, saying +they knew I was in trouble and therefore I ought to have more time +to find lodging, another week—three days at all events. But +the stern-natured man with his rigid religion was inexorable. It +was God's will that I should be punished, and who was he to step in +between the All-high and his just retribution?</p> +<p>"The woman is displeasing to God," he said, and then he declared +that, the day being Sabbath (the two tall candlesticks and the +Sabbath loaves must have been under his eyes at the moment), he +would give me until nine o'clock that night, and if I had not moved +out by that time he would put my belongings into the street.</p> +<p>I remember that the Jew's threat made no impression upon my +mind. It mattered very little to me where I was to lodge next week +or what roof was to cover me.</p> +<p>When I reached the Olivers' that morning I found baby distinctly +worse. Even the brandy would not stay on her stomach and hence her +strength was plainly diminishing. I sat for some time looking +steadfastly into my child's face, and then I asked myself, as +millions of mothers must have done before me, why my baby should +suffer so. Why? Why? Why?</p> +<p>There seemed to be no answer to that question except one. Baby +was suffering because I was poor. If I had not been poor I could +have taken her into the country for fresh air and sunshine, where +she would have recovered as the doctor had so confidently assured +me.</p> +<p>And why was I poor? I was poor because I had refused to be +enslaved by my father's authority when it was vain and wrong, or my +husband's when it, was gross and cruel, and because I had obeyed +the highest that was in me—the call of love.</p> +<p>And now God looked down on the sufferings of my baby, who was +being killed for my conduct—killed by my poverty!</p> +<p>I tremble to say what wild impulses came at that thought. I felt +that if my baby died and I ever stood before God to be judged I +should judge Him in return. I should ask Him why, if He were +Almighty, He permitted the evil in the world to triumph over the +good, and if He were our heavenly Father why He allowed innocent +children to suffer? Was there any <i>human</i> father who could be +so callous, so neglectful, so cruel, as that?</p> +<p>I dare say it was a terrible thing to bring God to the bar of +judgment, to be judged by His poor weak ignorant creature; but it +was also terrible to sit with a dying baby on my lap (I thought +mine was dying), and to feel that there was nothing—not one +thing—I could do to relieve its sufferings.</p> +<p>My faith went down like a flood during the heavy hours of that +day—all that I had been taught to believe about God's +goodness and the marvellous efficacy of the Sacraments of His +Church.</p> +<p>I thought of the Sacrament of my marriage, which the Pope told +me had been sanctioned by my Redeemer under a natural law that +those who entered into it might live together in peace and +love—and then of my husband and his brutal infidelities.</p> +<p>I thought of the Sacrament of my baby's baptism, which was to +exorcise all the devils out of my child—and then of the worst +devil in the world, poverty, which was taking her very life.</p> +<p>After that a dark shadow crossed my soul, and I told myself that +since God was doing nothing, since He was allowing my only treasure +to be torn away from me, I would fight for my child's life as any +animal fights for her young.</p> +<p>By this time a new kind of despair had taken hold of me. It was +no longer the paralysing despair but the despair that has a driving +force in it.</p> +<p>"My child shall not die," I thought. "At least poverty shall not +kill her!"</p> +<p>Many times during the day I had heard Mrs. Oliver trying to +comfort me with various forms of sloppy sentiment. Children were a +great trial, they were allus makin' and keepin' people pore, and it +was sometimes better for the dears themselves to be in their +'eavenly Father's boosim.</p> +<p>I hardly listened. It was the same as if somebody were talking +to me in my sleep. But towards nightfall my deaf ear caught +something about myself—that "it" (I knew what that meant) +might be better for me, also, for then I should be free of +encumbrances and could marry again.</p> +<p>"Of course you could—you so young and good-lookin'. Only +the other day the person at number five could tell me as you were +the prettiest woman as comes up the Row, and the Vicar's wife +couldn't hold a candle to you. 'Fine feathers makes fine birds,' +says she: 'Give your young lady a nice frock and a bit o' colour in +her checks, and there ain't many as could best her in the West End +neither.'"</p> +<p>As the woman talked dark thoughts took possession of me. I began +to think of Angela. I tried not to, but I could not help it.</p> +<p>And then came the moment of <i>my</i> fiercest trial. With a +sense of Death hanging over my child I told myself that the only +way to drive it off was to make <i>some great sacrifice</i>.</p> +<p>Hitherto I had thought of everything I possessed as belonging to +baby, but now I felt that <i>I myself</i> belonged to her. I had +brought her into the world, and it was my duty to see that she did +not suffer.</p> +<p>All this time the inherited instinct of my religion was fighting +hard with me, and I was saying many Hail Marys to prevent myself +from doing what I meant to do.</p> +<p>"<i>Hail, Mary, full of grace: the Lord is with thee</i> . . +."</p> +<p>I felt as if I were losing my reason. But it was of no use +struggling against the awful impulse of self-sacrifice (for such I +thought it) which had taken hold of my mind, and at last it +conquered me.</p> +<p>"I must get money," I thought. "Unless I get money my child will +die. I—must—get—money."</p> +<p>Towards seven o'clock I got up, gave baby to Mrs. Oliver, put on +my coat and fixed with nervous fingers my hat and hatpins.</p> +<p>"Where are you going to, pore thing?" asked Mrs. Oliver.</p> +<p>"I am going out. I'll be back in the morning," I answered.</p> +<p>And then, after kneeling and kissing my baby again—my +sweet child, my Isabel—I tore the street door open, and +pulled it noisily behind me.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>On reaching the front street, I may have taken the penny tram, +for though I had a sense of growing blind and deaf I have vague +memories of lights flashing past me and of the clanging of electric +cars.</p> +<p>At Bow Church I must have got out (probably to save a further +fare) because I recollect walking along the Bow Road between the +lights in the shops and the coarse flares from the stalls on the +edge of the pavement, where women with baskets on their arms were +doing their Saturday night's shopping.</p> +<p>My heart was still strong (sharpened indeed into, poignancy) and +I know I was not crying, for at one moment as I passed the mirror +in a chemist's window I caught sight of my face and it was fierce +as flame.</p> +<p>At another moment, while I was hurrying along, I collided with a +drunken woman who was coming out of a public-house with her arm +about the neck of a drunken sailor.</p> +<p>"Gawd! Here's the Verging Mary agine!" she cried.</p> +<p>It was the woman who had carried baby, and when I tried to hurry +past her she said:</p> +<p>"You think I'm drunk, don't you, dear? So'am. Don't you never +get drunk? No? What a bleedin' fool you are! Want to get out o' +this 'ere 'ole? Tike my tip then—gettin' drunk's on'y way out +of it."</p> +<p>Farther on I had to steer my way through jostling companies of +young people of both sexes who were going (I thought) the same way +as the woman—girls out of the factories with their free walk, +and their boisterous "fellers" from the breweries.</p> +<p>It was a cold and savage night. As I approached the side street +in which I lived I saw by the light of the arc lamps a small group +of people, a shivering straggle of audience, with the hunched-up +shoulders of beings thinly clad and badly fed, standing in stupid +silence at the corner while two persons wearing blue uniforms (a +man in a peaked cap and a young woman in a poke bonnet) sang a +Salvation hymn of which the refrain was "It is well, it is well +with my soul."</p> +<p>The door of the Jew's house was shut (for the first time in my +experience), so I had to knock and wait, and while I waited I could +not help but hear the young woman in the poke bonnet pray.</p> +<p>Her prayer was about "raising the standard of Calvary," and +making the drunkards and harlots of the East End into "seekers" and +"soul yielders" and "prisoners of the King of Kings."</p> +<p>Before the last words of the prayer were finished the man in the +peaked cap tossed up his voice in another hymn, and the young woman +joined him with an accordion:</p> +<p>"<i>Shall we gather at the river,<br /> +Where bright angel feet have trod</i>. . . ."</p> +<p>The door was opened by the Jew himself, who, assuming a severe +manner, said something to me in his guttural voice which I did not +hear or heed, for I pushed past him and walked firmly upstairs.</p> +<p>When I had reached my room and lit the gas, I closed and locked +the door, as if I were preparing to commit a crime—and +perhaps I was.</p> +<p>I did not allow myself to think of what I intended to do that +night, but I knew quite well, and when at one moment my conscience +pressed me hard something cried out in my heart:</p> +<p>"Who can blame me since my child's life is in danger?"</p> +<p>I opened my trunk and took out my clothes—all that +remained of the dresses I had brought from Ellan. They were few, +and more than a little out of fashion, but one of them, though far +from gay, was bright and stylish—a light blue frock with a +high collar and some white lace over the bosom.</p> +<p>I remember wondering why I had not thought of pawning it during +the week, when I had had so much need of money, and then being glad +that I had not done so.</p> +<p>It was thin and light, being the dress I had worn on the day I +first came to the East End, carrying my baby to Ilford, when the +weather was warm which now was cold; but I paid no heed to that, +thinking only that it was my best and most attractive.</p> +<p>After I had put it on and glanced at myself in my little +swinging looking-glass I was pleased, but I saw at the same time +that my face was deadly pale, and that made me think of some +bottles and cardboard boxes which lay in the pockets of my +trunk.</p> +<p>I knew what they contained—the remains of the cosmetics +which I had bought in Cairo in the foolish days when I was trying +to make my husband love me. Never since then had I looked at them, +but now I took them out (with a hare's foot and some pads and +brushes) and began to paint my pale face—reddening my cracked +and colourless lips and powdering out the dark rings under my +eyes.</p> +<p>While I was doing this I heard (though I was trying not to) the +deadened sound of the singing in the front street, with the young +woman's treble voice above the man's bass and the wheezing of the +accordion:</p> +<p>"<i>Yes, we'll gather, at the river,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where bright angel feet have +trod,</span><br /> +With its, crystal tide for ever<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Flowing by the throne of +God."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>The Dark Spirit must have taken possession of me by this time, +poor vessel of conflicting passions as I was, for I remember that +while I listened I laughed—thinking what mockery was to sing +of "angel feet" and "crystal tides" to those shivering wretches at +the corner of the London street in the smoky night air.</p> +<p>"What a farce!" I thought. "What a heartless farce!"</p> +<p>Then I put on my hat, which was also not very gay, and taking +out of my trunk a pair of long light gloves which I had never worn +since I left Ellan, I began to pull them on.</p> +<p>I was standing before the looking-glass in the act of doing +this, and trying (God pity me!) to smile at myself, when I was +suddenly smitten by a new thought.</p> +<p>I was about to commit suicide—the worst kind of suicide, +not the suicide which is followed by oblivion, but by a life on +earth after death!</p> +<p>After that night Mary O'Neill would no longer exist! I should +never he able to think of her again! I should have killed her and +buried her and stamped the earth down on her and she would be gone +from me for ever!</p> +<p>That made a grip at my heart—awakening memories of happy +days in my childhood, bringing back the wild bliss of the short +period of my great love, and even making me think of my life in +Rome, with its confessions, its masses, and the sweetness of its +church bells.</p> +<p>I was saying farewell to Mary O'Neill! And parting with oneself +seemed so terrible that when I thought of it my heart seemed ready +to burst.</p> +<p>"But who can blame me when my child's life is in danger?" I +asked myself again, still tugging at my long gloves.</p> +<p>By the time I had finished dressing the Salvationists were going +off to their barracks with their followers behind them. Under the +singing I could faintly hear the shuffling of bad shoes, which made +a sound like the wash of an ebbing tide over the teeth of a rocky +beach—up our side street, past the Women's Night Shelter +(where the beds never had time to become cool), and beyond the +public-house with the placard in the window saying the ale sold +there could be guaranteed to make anybody drunk for fourpence.</p> +<p>"<i>We'll stand the storm, it won't be long,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And we'll anchor in the sweet +by-and-by."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>I listened and tried to laugh again, but I could not do so now. +There was one last spasm of my cruelly palpitating heart, in which +I covered my face with both hands, and cried:</p> +<p>"For baby's sake! For my baby's sake!"</p> +<p>And then I opened my bedroom door, walked boldly downstairs and +went out into the streets.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM BY MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>I don't call it Chance that this was the very day of my return +to England.</p> +<p>If I had to believe that, I should have to disbelieve half of +what is best in the human story, and the whole of what we are +taught about a guiding Providence and the spiritual influences +which we cannot reason about and prove.</p> +<p>We were two days late arriving, having made dirty weather of it +in the Bay of Biscay, which injured our propeller and compelled us +to lie to, so I will not say that the sense of certainty which came +to me off Finisterre did not suffer a certain shock.</p> +<p>In fact the pangs of uncertainty grew so strongly upon me as we +neared home that in the middle of the last night of our voyage I +went to O'Sullivan's cabin, and sat on the side of his bunk for +hours, talking of the chances of my darling being lost and of the +possibility of finding her.</p> +<p>O'Sullivan, God bless him, was "certain sure" that everything +would be right, and he tried to take things gaily.</p> +<p>"The way I'm knowing she'll be at Southampton in a new hat and +feather! So mind yer oi, Commanther."</p> +<p>We passed the Channel Islands in the spring of morning, and at +breakfast-time we picked up the pilot, who had brought out a group +of reporters. I did my best for the good chaps (though it is mighty +hard to talk about exploring when you are thinking of another +subject), and then handed them over to my shipmates.</p> +<p>Towards seven o'clock at night we heaved up to the grey stone +pier at the head of Southampton Water. It was then dark, so being +unable to see more than the black forms and waving hands of the +crowd waiting for us with the lights behind them, I arranged with +O'Sullivan that he should slip ashore as soon as we got alongside, +and see if he could find my dear one.</p> +<p>"Will you remember her face?" I asked.</p> +<p>"And why wouldn't I? By the stars of God, there's only one of it +in the world," he answered.</p> +<p>The welcome we got when we were brought to was enough to make a +vain man proud, and a modest one ashamed, and perhaps I should have +had a little of both feelings if the right woman had been there to +share them.</p> +<p>My state-room was on the promenade deck, and I stood at the door +of it as long as I dared, raising my cap at the call of my name, +but feeling as if I were the loneliest man in the world, God help +me!</p> +<p>O'Sullivan had not returned when Treacle came to say that +everything was ready, and it was time to go ashore.</p> +<p>I will not say that I was not happy to be home; I will not +pretend that the warm-hearted welcome did not touch me; but God +knows there was a moment when, for want of a face I did not see, I +could have turned about and gone back to the South Pole there and +then, without an instant's hesitation.</p> +<p>When I got ashore I had as much as I could do to stand +four-square to the storm of hand-shaking that fell on me. And +perhaps if I had been in better trim I should have found lots of +fun in the boyish delight of my shipmates in being back, with old +Treacle shaking hands with everybody from the Mayor of the town to +the messenger-boys (crying "What cheer, matey?"), while the +scientific staff were bringing up their wives to be introduced to +me, just as the lower-form fellows used to do with their big +sisters at school.</p> +<p>At last O'Sullivan came back with a long face to say he could +see nothing of my dear one, and then I braced myself and said:</p> +<p>"Never mind! She'll be waiting for us in London perhaps."</p> +<p>It took a shocking time to pass through the Customs, but we got +off at last in a special train commissioned by our +chairman—half of our company with their wives and a good many +reporters having crammed themselves into the big saloon carriage +reserved for me.</p> +<p>At the last moment somebody threw a sheaf of evening papers +through my window, and as soon as we were well away I took up one +of them and tried to read it, but column after column fell blank on +my eyes, for my mind was full of other matters.</p> +<p>The talk in the carriage, too, did not interest me in the least. +It was about the big, hustling, resonant world, general elections, +the fall of ministries, Acts of Parliament, and the Lord knows +what—things that had looked important when we were in the +dumb solitude of Winter Quarters, but seemed to be of no account +now when I was hungering for something else.</p> +<p>At last I got a quiet pressman in a corner and questioned him +about Ellan.</p> +<p>"That's my native island, you know—anything going on +there?"</p> +<p>The reporter said yes, there was some commotion about the +failure of banks, with the whole island under a cloud, and its +biggest financial man gone smash.</p> +<p>"Is his name O'Neill?" I asked.</p> +<p>"That's it."</p> +<p>"Anything else happened there while I've been away?"</p> +<p>"No . . . yes . . . well, now that I think of it, there was a +big scare a year or so ago about a young peeress who disappeared +mysteriously."</p> +<p>"Was . . . was it Lady Raa?"</p> +<p>"Yes," said the reporter, and then (controlling myself as well +as I could) I listened to a rapid version of what had become known +about my dear one down to the moment when she "vanished as utterly +as if she had been dropped into the middle of the Irish Sea."</p> +<p>It is of no use saying what I felt after that, except that +flying in an express train to London, I was as impatient of space +and time as if I had been in a ship down south stuck fast in the +rigid besetment of the ice.</p> +<p>I could not talk, and I dared not think, so I shouted for a +sing-song, and my shipmates (who had been a little low at seeing me +so silent) jumped at the proposal like schoolboys let loose from +school.</p> +<p>Of course O'Sullivan gave us "The Minsthrel Boy"; and Treacle +sang "Yew are the enny"; and then I, yes I (Oh, God!), sang +"Sally's the gel," and every man of my company joined in the +ridiculous chorus.</p> +<p>Towards ten o'clock we changed lines on the loop at Waterloo and +ran into Charing Cross, where we found another and still bigger +crowd of hearty people behind a barrier, with a group of my +committee, my fellow explorers, and geographers in general, waiting +on the platform.</p> +<p>I could not help it if I made a poor return to their +warm-hearted congratulations, for my eyes were once more searching +for a face I could not see, so that I was glad and relieved when I +heard the superintendent say that the motor-car that was to take me +to the hotel was ready and waiting.</p> +<p>But just then O'Sullivan came up and whispered that a priest and +a nun were asking to speak to me, and he believed they had news of +Mary.</p> +<p>The priest proved to be dear old Father Dan, and the nun to be +Sister Veronica, whom my dear one calls Mildred. At the first sight +of their sad-joyful faces something gripped me by the throat, for I +knew what they had come to say before they said it—that my +darling was lost, and Father Dan (after some priestly qualms) had +concluded that I was the first man who ought to be told of it.</p> +<p>Although this was exactly what I had expected, it fell on me +like a thunderbolt, and in spite of the warmth of my welcome home, +I believe in my soul I was the most downhearted man alive.</p> +<p>Nevertheless I bundled Father Dan and the Sister and O'Sullivan +into the automobile, and jumping in after them, told the chauffeur +to drive like the deuce to the hotel.</p> +<p>He could not do that, though, for the crowd in the station-yard +surrounded the car and shouted for a speech. I gave them one, +saying heaven knows what, except that their welcome made me ashamed +of not having got down to the Pole, but please God I should get +there next time or leave my bones on the way.</p> +<p>We got to the hotel at last (the same that my poor stricken +darling had stayed at after her honeymoon), and as soon as we +reached my room I locked the door and said:</p> +<p>"Now out with it. And please tell me everything."</p> +<p>Father Dan was the first to speak, but his pulpit style was too +slow for me in my present stress of thoughts and feelings. He had +hardly got further than his difference with his Bishop, and the +oath he had sworn by him who died for us to come to London and +never go back until he had found my darling, when I shook his old +hand and looked towards the Sister.</p> +<p>She was quicker by a good deal, and in a few minutes I knew +something of my dear one's story—how she had fled from home +on my account, and for my sake had become poor; how she had lodged +for a while in Bloomsbury; how hard she had been hit by the report +of the loss of my ship; and how (Oh my poor, suffering, heroic, +little woman!) she had disappeared on the approach of another event +of still more serious consequence.</p> +<p>It was no time for modesty, not from me at all events, so while +the Father's head was down, I asked plainly if there was a child, +and was told there was, and the fear of having it taken from her (I +could understand that) was perhaps the reason my poor darling had +hidden herself away.</p> +<p>"And now, when, where, and by whom was she seen last?" I +asked.</p> +<p>"Last week, and again to-day, to-night, here in the West +End—by a fallen woman," answered the Sister.</p> +<p>"And what conclusion do you draw from that?"</p> +<p>The Sister hesitated for a moment and then said:</p> +<p>"That her child is dead; that she does not know you are alive; +and that she is throwing herself away, thinking there is nothing +left to live for."</p> +<p>"What?" I cried. "You believe that? Because she left that brute +of a husband . . . and because she came to me . . . you believe +that she could. . . . Never! Not Mary O'Neill! She would beg her +bread, or die in the streets first."</p> +<p>I dare say my thickening voice was betraying me; but when I +looked at Mildred and saw the tears rolling down her cheeks and +heard her excuses (it was "what hundreds of poor women were driven +to every day"), I was ashamed and said so, and she put her kind +hand in my hand in token of her forgiveness.</p> +<p>"But what's to be done now?" she asked.</p> +<p>O'Sullivan was for sending for the police, but I would not hear +of that. I was beginning to feel as I used to do when I lost a +comrade in a blizzard down south, and (without a fact or a clue to +guide me) sent a score of men in a broad circle from the camp (like +spokes in a wheel) to find him or follow back on their tracks.</p> +<p>There were only four of us, but I mapped out our courses, where +we were to go, when we were to return, and what we were to do if +any of us found my lost one—take her to Sister's flat, which +she gave the address of.</p> +<p>It was half-past eleven when we started on our search, and I +dare say our good old Father Dan, after his fruitless journeys, +thought it a hopeless quest. But I had found myself at last. My +spirits which had been down to zero had gone up with a bound. I had +no ghost of an idea that I had been called home from the 88th +latitude for nothing. And I had no fear that I had come too +late.</p> +<p>Call it frenzy if you like—I don't much mind what people +call it. But I was as sure as I have ever been of anything in this +life, or ever expect to be, that the sufferings of my poor martyred +darling were at an end, and that within an hour I should be holding +her in my arms.</p> +<p>M.C.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>There must be a physical power in fierce emotion to deprive us +of the use of our senses of hearing and even of sight, for my +memory of what happened after I left the Jew's has blank places in +it.</p> +<p>Trying to recall the incidents of that night is like travelling +on a moorland road under a flying moon, with sometimes the whitest +light in which everything is clearly seen, and then the blackest +darkness.</p> +<p>I remember taking the electric car going west, and seeing the +Whitechapel Road shooting by me, with its surging crowds of +pedestrians, its public-houses, its Cinema shows, and its Jewish +theatres.</p> +<p>I remember getting down at Aldgate Pump, and walking through +that dead belt of the City, which, lying between east and west, is +alive like a beehive by day and silent and deserted by night.</p> +<p>I remember seeing an old man, with a face like a rat's, picking +up cigar-ends from the gutters before the dark Banks, and then a +flock of sheep bleating before a barking dog as they were driven +through the echoing streets from the river-side towards the +slaughter-houses near Smithfield Market.</p> +<p>I remember that when I came to St. Paul's the precincts of the +cathedral were very quiet and the big clock was striking nine. But +on Ludgate Hill the traffic was thick, and when I reached Fleet +Street crowds of people were standing in front of the newspaper +offices, reading large placards in written characters which were +pasted on the windows.</p> +<p>I remember that I did not look at these placards, thinking their +news was nothing to me, who had not seen a newspaper for months and +for whom the world was now eclipsed, but that as I stepped round +one of the crowds, which extended to the middle of the street, +somebody said:</p> +<p>"He has landed at Southampton, it seems."</p> +<p>I remember that when I reached Charing Cross I found myself on +the fringe of another and much larger crowd, and that the people, +who seemed to be waiting for somebody and were chatting with a +noise like the crackling of thorns under a pot, were saying:</p> +<p>"His train is fifty minutes late, so we've half an hour to wait +yet."</p> +<p>Then I remember that walking at random round St Martin's Church +into Leicester Square I came upon three "public women" who were +swinging along with a high step and laughing loudly, and that one +of them was Angela, and that she stopped on seeing me and +cried:</p> +<p>"Hello! Here I am again, you see! <i>Giovanni's dead, and I +don't care a damn!</i>"</p> +<p>I remember that she said something else—it was about +Sister Mildred, but my mind did not take it in—and at the +next moment she left me, and I heard her laughter once more as she +swept round the corner.</p> +<p>I hardly know what happened next, for here comes one of the +blank places in my memory, with nothing to light it except vague +thoughts of Martin (and that soulless night in Bloomsbury when the +newspapers announced that he was lost), until, wandering aimlessly +through streets and streets of people—such multitudes of +people, no end of people—I found myself back at Charing +Cross.</p> +<p>The waiting crowd was now larger and more excited than before, +and the traffic at both sides of the station was stopped.</p> +<p>"He's coming! He's coming! Here he is!" the people cried, and +then there were deafening shouts and cheers.</p> +<p>I recall the sight of a line of policemen pushing people back (I +was myself pushed back); I recall the sight of a big motor-car +containing three men and a woman, ploughing its way through; I +recall the sight of one of the men raising his cap; of the crowd +rushing to shake hands with him; then of the car swinging away, and +of the people running after it with a noise like that of the racing +of a noisy river.</p> +<p>It is the literal truth that never once did I ask myself what +this tumult was about, and that for some time after it was +over—a full hour at least—I had a sense of walking in +my sleep, as if my body were passing through the streets of the +West End of London while my soul was somewhere else altogether.</p> +<p>Thus at one moment, as I was going by the National Gallery and +thought I caught the sound of Martin's name, I felt as if I were +back in Glen Raa, and it was I myself who had been calling it.</p> +<p>At another moment, when I was standing at the edge of the +pavement in Piccadilly Circus, which was ablaze with electric light +and thronged with people (for the theatres and music-halls were +emptying, men in uniform were running about with whistles, +policemen were directing the traffic, and streams of carriages were +flowing by), I felt as if I were back in my native island, where I +was alone on the dark shore while the sea was smiting me.</p> +<p>Again, after a brusque voice had said, "Move on, please," I +followed the current of pedestrians down Piccadilly—it must +have been Piccadilly—and saw lines of "public women," chiefly +French and Belgian, sauntering along, and heard men throwing light +words to them as they went by, I was thinking of the bleating sheep +and the barking dog.</p> +<p>And again, when I was passing a men's club and the place where I +had met Angela, my dazed mind was harking back to Ilford (with a +frightened sense of the length of time since I had been +there—"Good heavens, it must be five hours at least!"), and +wondering if Mrs. Oliver was giving baby her drops of brandy and +her spoonfuls of diluted milk.</p> +<p>But somewhere about midnight my soul seemed to take full +possession of my body, and I saw things clearly and sharply as I +turned out of Oxford Street into Regent Street.</p> +<p>The traffic was then rapidly dying down, the streets were +darker, the cafés were closing, men and women were coming +Pout of supper rooms, smoking cigarettes, getting into taxis and +driving away; and another London day was passing into another +night.</p> +<p>People spoke to me. I made no answer. At one moment an elderly +woman said something to which I replied, "No, no," and hurried on. +At another moment, a foreign-looking man addressed me, and I pushed +past without replying. Then a string of noisy young fellows, +stretching across the broad pavement arm-in-arm, encircled me and +cried:</p> +<p>"Here we are, my dear. Let's have a kissing-bee."</p> +<p>But with angry words and gestures I compelled them to let me go, +whereupon one of the foreign women who were sauntering by said +derisively:</p> +<p>"What does she think she's out for, I wonder?"</p> +<p>At length I found myself standing under a kind of loggia at the +corner of Piccadilly Circus, which was now half-dark, the theatres +and music-halls being closed, and only one group of arc lamps +burning on an island about a statue.</p> +<p>There were few people now where there had been so dense a crowd +awhile ago; policemen were tramping leisurely along; horse-cabs +were going at walking pace, and taxis were moving slowly; but a few +gentlemen (walking home from their clubs apparently) were passing +at intervals, often looking at me, and sometimes speaking as they +went by.</p> +<p>Then plainly and pitilessly the taunt of the foreign woman came +back to me—what was I there for?</p> +<p>I knew quite well, and yet I saw that not only was I not doing +what I came out to do, but every time an opportunity had offered I +had resisted it. It was just as if an inherited instinct of +repulsion had restrained me, or some strong unseen arm had always +snatched me away.</p> +<p>This led me—was it some angel leading me?—to think +again of Martin and to remember our beautiful and sacred parting at +Castle Raa.</p> +<p>"Whatever happens to either of us, we belong to each other for +ever," he had said, and I had answered, "For ever and ever."</p> +<p>It was a fearful shock to think of this now. I saw that if I did +what I had come out to do, not only would Mary O'Neill be dead to +me after to-night, but Martin Conrad would be dead also.</p> +<p>When I thought of that I realised that, although I had accepted, +without question, the newspaper reports of Martin's death, he had +never hitherto been dead to me at all. He had lived with me every +moment of my life since, supporting me, sustaining me and inspiring +me, so that nothing I had ever done—not one single +thing—would have been different if I had believed him to be +alive and been sure that he was coming back.</p> +<p>But now I was about to kill Martin Conrad as well as Mary +O'Neill, by breaking the pledge (sacred as any sacrament) which +they had made for life and for eternity.</p> +<p>Could I do that? In this hideous way too? Never! Never! Never! I +should die in the streets first.</p> +<p>I remember that I was making a movement to go back to Ilford +(God knows how), when, on the top of all my brave thinking, came +the pitiful thought of my child. My poor helpless little baby, who +had made no promise and was party to no pledge. She needed +nourishment and fresh air and sunshine, and if she could not get +them—if I went back to her penniless—she would die!</p> +<p>My sweet darling! My Isabel, my only treasure! Martin's child +and mine!</p> +<p>That put a quick end to all my qualms. Again I bit my lip until +it bled, and told myself that I should speak to the Very next man +who came along.</p> +<p>"Yes, the very next man who comes along," I thought.</p> +<p>I was standing at that moment in the shadow of one of the +pilasters of the loggia, almost leaning against it, and in the +silence of the street I heard distinctly the sharp firm step of +somebody coming my way.</p> +<p>It was a man. As he came near me he slowed down, and stopped. He +was then immediately behind me. I heard his quick breathing. I felt +that his eyes were fixed on me. One sidelong glance told me that he +was wearing a long ulster and a cap, that he was young, tall, +powerfully built, had a strong, firm, clean-shaven face, and an +indescribable sense of the open air about him.</p> +<p>"Now, now!" I thought, and (to prevent myself from running away) +I turned quickly round to him and tried to speak.</p> +<p>But I said nothing. I did not know what women say to men under +such circumstances. I found myself trembling violently, and before +I was aware of what was happening I had burst into tears.</p> +<p>Then came another blinding moment and a tempest of conflicting +feelings.</p> +<p>I felt that the man had laid hold of me, that his strong hands +were grasping my arms, and that he was looking into my face. I +heard his voice. It seemed to belong to no waking moment but to +come out of the hours of sleep.</p> +<p>"Mary! Mary!"</p> +<p>I looked up at him, but before my eyes could carry the news to +my brain I knew who it was—I knew, I knew, I knew!</p> +<p>"Don't be afraid! It's I!"</p> +<p>Then something—God knows what—made me struggle to +escape, and I cried:</p> +<p>"Let me go!"</p> +<p>But even while I was struggling—trying to fly away from my +greatest happiness—I was praying with all my might that the +strong arms would hold me, conquer me, master me.</p> +<p>They did. And then something seemed to give way within my head, +and through a roaring that came into my brain I heard the voice +again, and it was saying:</p> +<p>"Quick, Sister, call a cab. Open the door, O'Sullivan. No, leave +her to me. I've got her, thank God!"</p> +<p>And then blinding darkness fell over me and everything was +blotted out.</p> +<p>But only a moment afterwards (or what seemed to be a moment) +memory came back in a great swelling wave of joy. Though I did not +open my eyes I knew that I was safe and baby was safe, and all was +well. Somebody—it was the same beloved voice again—was +saying:</p> +<p>"Mally! My Mally! My poor, long-suffering darling! My own again, +God bless her!"</p> +<p>It was he, it was Martin, my Martin. And, oh Mother of my Lord, +he was carrying me upstairs in his arms.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SEVENTH_PART" id="SEVENTH_PART"></a>SEVENTH PART</h2> +<h3>I AM FOUND</h3> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>My return to consciousness was a painful, yet joyful experience. +It was almost like being flung in a frail boat out of a tempestuous +sea into a quiet harbour.</p> +<p>I seemed to hear myself saying, "My child shall not die. Poverty +shall not kill her. I am going to take her into the country . . . +she will recover. . . . No, no, it is not Martin. Martin is dead. . +. . But his eyes . . . don't you see his eyes. . . . Let me +go."</p> +<p>Then all the confused sense of nightmare seemed to be carried +away as by some mighty torrent, and there came a great calm, a kind +of morning sweetness, with the sun shining through my closed +eyelids, and not a sound in my ears but the thin carolling of a +bird.</p> +<p>When I opened my eyes I was in bed in a room that was strange to +me. It was a little like the Reverend Mother's room in Rome, having +pictures of the Saints on the walls, and a large figure of the +Sacred Heart over the mantelpiece; but there was a small gas fire, +and a canary singing in a gilded cage that hung in front of the +window.</p> +<p>I was trying to collect my senses in order to realize where I +was when Sister Mildred's kind face, in her white wimple and +gorget, leaned over me, and she said, with a tender smile, "You are +awake now, my child?"</p> +<p>Then memory came rushing back, and though the immediate past was +still like a stormy dream I seemed to remember everything.</p> +<p>"Is it true that I saw. . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes," said Mildred.</p> +<p>"Then he was not shipwrecked?"</p> +<p>"That was a false report. Within a month or two the newspapers +had contradicted it."</p> +<p>"Where is he?" I asked, rising from my pillow.</p> +<p>"Hush! Lie quiet. You are not to excite yourself. I must call +the doctor."</p> +<p>Mildred was about to leave the room, but I could not let her +go.</p> +<p>"Wait! I must ask you something more."</p> +<p>"Not now, my child. Lie down."</p> +<p>"But I must. Dear Sister, I must. There is somebody else."</p> +<p>"You mean the baby," said Mildred, in a low voice.</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"She has been found, and taken to the country, and is getting +better rapidly. So lie down, and be quiet," said Mildred, and with +a long breath of happiness I obeyed.</p> +<p>A moment afterwards I heard her speaking to somebody over the +telephone (saying I had recovered consciousness and was almost +myself again), and then some indistinct words came hack in the +thick telephone voice like that of a dumb man shouting down a +tunnel, followed by sepulchral peals of merry laughter.</p> +<p>"The doctor will be here presently," said Mildred, returning to +me with a shining face.</p> +<p>"And . . . he?"</p> +<p>"Yes, perhaps he will be permitted to come, too."</p> +<p>She was telling me how baby had been discovered—by means +of Mrs. Oliver's letter which had been found in my +pocket—when there was the whirr of an electric bell in the +corridor outside, followed (as soon as Mildred could reach the +door) by the rich roll of an Irish voice.</p> +<p>It was Dr. O'Sullivan, and in a moment he was standing by my +bed, his face ablaze with smiles.</p> +<p>"By the Saints of heaven, this is good, though," he said. "It's +worth a hundred dozen she is already of the woman we brought here +first."</p> +<p>"That was last night, wasn't it?" I asked.</p> +<p>"Well, not last night exactly," he answered. And then I gathered +that I had been ill, seriously ill, being two days unconscious, and +that Martin had been in a state of the greatest anxiety.</p> +<p>"He's coming, isn't he?" I said. "Will he be here soon? How does +he look? Is he well? Did he finish his work?"</p> +<p>"Now, now, now," said the doctor, with uplifted hands. "If it's +exciting yourself like this you're going to be, it isn't myself +that will he taking the risk of letting him come at all."</p> +<p>But after I had pleaded and prayed and promised to be good he +consented to allow Martin to see me, and then it was as much as I +could do not to throw my arms about his neck and kiss him.</p> +<p>I had not noticed what Mildred was doing during this time, and +almost before I was aware of it somebody else had entered the +room.</p> +<p>It was dear old Father Dan.</p> +<p>"Glory be to God!" he cried at sight of me, and then he +said:</p> +<p>"Don't worry, my daughter, now don't worry,"—with that +nervous emphasis which I knew by long experience to be the surest +sign of my dear Father's own perturbation.</p> +<p>I did not know then, or indeed until long afterwards, that for +six months past he had been tramping the streets of London in +search of me (day after day, and in the dark of the night and the +cold of the morning); but something in his tender old face, which +was seamed and worn, so touched me with the memory of the last +scene in my mother's room that my eyes began to overflow, and +seeing this he began to laugh and let loose his Irish tongue on +us.</p> +<p>"My blissing on you, doctor! It's the mighty proud man ye'll be +entoirely to be saving the life of the swatest woman in the world. +And whisha, Sister, if ye have a nip of something neat anywhere +handy, faith it isn't my cloth will prevent me from drinking the +health of everybody."</p> +<p>If this was intended to cheer me up it failed completely, for +the next thing I knew was that the doctor was bustling the dear old +Father out of the room, and that Mildred was going out after +him.</p> +<p>She left the door open, though, and as soon as I had calmed down +a little I listened intently for every sound outside.</p> +<p>It was then that I heard the whirr of the electric bell again, +but more softly this time, and followed by breathless whispered +words in the corridor (as of some one who had been running) and +once more . . . I knew, I knew, I knew!</p> +<p>After a moment Mildred came to ask me in a whisper if I was +quite sure that I could control myself, and though my heart was +thumping against my breast, I answered Yes.</p> +<p>Then I called for a hand-glass and made my hair a shade neater, +and after that I closed my eyes (God knows why) and waited.</p> +<p>There was a moment of silence, dead silence, and then—then +I opened my eyes and saw him standing in the open doorway.</p> +<p>His big, strong, bronzed face—stronger than ever now, and +marked with a certain change from the struggles he had gone +through—was utterly broken up. For some moments he did not +speak, but I could see that he saw the change that life had made in +me also. Then in a low voice, so low that it was like the breath of +his soul, he said:</p> +<p>"Forgive me! Forgive me!"</p> +<p>And stepping forward he dropped to his knees by the side of my +bed, and kissed the arms and hands I was stretching out to him.</p> +<p>That was more than I could bear, and the next thing I heard was +my darling's great voice crying:</p> +<p>"Sister! Sister! Some brandy! Quick! She has fainted."</p> +<p>But my poor little fit of hysterics was soon at an end, and +though Martin was not permitted to stay more than a moment longer, +a mighty wave of happiness flowed over me, such as I had never +known before and may never know again.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>I had such a beautiful convalescence. For the major operations +of the Great Surgeon an anæsthetic has not yet been found, +but within a week I was sitting up again, mutilated, perhaps, but +gloriously alive and without the whisper of a cry.</p> +<p>By this time Father Dan had gone back to Ellan (parting from me +with a solemn face as he said, "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant +depart in peace"), and Sister Mildred had obtained permission to +give up one of her rooms to me as long as I should need it.</p> +<p>Martin came to see me every day, first for five minutes, then +ten, and finally for a quarter and even half an hour. He brought +such an atmosphere of health with him, that merely to hold his hand +seemed to give me new strength—being so pale and bloodless +now that I thought the sun might have shone through me as through a +sea-gull.</p> +<p>I could scarcely believe it was not a dream that he was sitting +by my side, and sometimes I felt as if I had to touch him to make +sure he was there.</p> +<p>How he talked to keep up my spirits! It was nearly always about +his expedition (never about me or my experiences, for that seemed a +dark scene from which he would not draw the curtain), and I was all +a-tremble as I listened to the story of his hair-breadth escapes, +though he laughed and made so light of them.</p> +<p>It nearly broke my heart that he had not got down to the Pole; +and when he told me that it was the sense of my voice calling to +him which had brought him back from the 88th latitude, I felt as if +I had been a coward, unworthy of the man who loved me.</p> +<p>Sometimes he talked about baby—he called her +"Girlie"—telling a funny story of how he had carried her off +from Ilford, where the bricklayer had suddenly conceived such a +surprising affection for my child ("what he might go so far as to +call a fatherly feeling") that he had been unwilling to part with +her until soothed down by a few sovereigns—not to say +frightened by a grasp of Martin's iron hand which had nearly broken +his wrist.</p> +<p>"She's as right as a trivet now, though," said Martin, "and I'll +run down to Chevening every other day to see how she's getting +on."</p> +<p>My darling was in great demand from the first, but when he could +not be with me in the flesh he was with me in the spirit, by means +of the newspapers which Mildred brought up in armfuls.</p> +<p>I liked the illustrated ones best, with their pictures of scenes +in the Expedition, particularly the portraits of Martin himself in +his Antarctic outfit, with his broad throat, determined lips, clear +eyes, and that general resemblance to the people we all know which +makes us feel that the great men of every age are brothers of one +family.</p> +<p>But what literary tributes there were, too! What interviews, +what articles! A member of the scientific staff had said that "down +there," with Nature in her wrath, where science was nothing and +even physical strength was not all, only one thing really counted, +and that was the heroic soul, and because Martin had it, he had +always been the born leader of them all.</p> +<p>And then, summing up the tangible gains of the Expedition, the +<i>Times</i> said its real value was moral and spiritual, because +it showed that in an age when one half of the world seemed to be +thinking of nothing but the acquisition of wealth (that made me +think of my father) and the other half of nothing but the pursuit +of pleasure (that reminded me of my husband and Alma), there could +be found men like Martin Conrad and his dauntless comrades who had +faced death for the sake of an ideal and were ready to do so +again.</p> +<p>Oh dear! what showers of tears I shed over those newspapers! But +the personal honours that were bestowed on Martin touched me most +of all.</p> +<p>First, the Royal Geographical Society held a meeting at the +Albert Hall, where the Gold Medal was presented to him. I was in a +fever of anxiety on the night of that function, I remember, until +Dr. O'Sullivan (heaven bless, him!) came flying upstairs, to tell +me that it had been a "splendid success," and Martin's speech (he +hadn't prepared a word of it) "a perfect triumph."</p> +<p>Then some of the Universities conferred degrees on my darling, +which was a source of inexpressible amusement to him, especially +when (after coming back from Edinburgh) he marched up and down my +room in his Doctor's cap and gown, and I asked him to spell +"promise" and he couldn't.</p> +<p>Oh, the joy of it all! It was so great a joy that at length it +became a pain.</p> +<p>The climax came when the Home Secretary wrote to say that the +King had been graciously pleased to confer a Knighthood upon +Martin, in recognition of his splendid courage and the substantial +contribution he had already made to the material welfare of the +world.</p> +<p>That frightened me terribly, though only a woman would know why. +It was one thing to share the honours of the man I loved (however +secretly and as it were by stealth), but quite another thing to +feel that they were carrying him away from me, drawing him off, +lifting him up, and leaving me far below.</p> +<p>When the sense of this became acute I used to sit at night, when +Mildred was out at her work, by the lofty window of her room, +looking down on the precincts of Piccadilly, and wondering how much +my darling really knew about the impulse that took me there, and +how nearly (but for the grace of God) its awful vortex had +swallowed me up.</p> +<p>It was then that I began to write these notes (having persuaded +Mildred to buy me this big book with its silver clasp and key), not +intending at first to tell the whole story of my life, but only to +explain to him for whom everything has been written (what I could +not bring myself to say face to face), how it came to pass that I +was tempted to that sin which is the most awful crime against her +sex that a woman can commit.</p> +<p>Three months had gone by this time, the spring was coming and I +was beginning to feel that Martin (who had not yet been home) was +being kept in London on my account, when Dr. O'Sullivan announced +that I was well enough to be moved, and that a little of my native +air would do me good.</p> +<p>Oh, the thrill that came with that prospect! I suppose there is +a sort of call to one's heart from the soil that gave one birth, +but in my case it was coupled with a chilling thought of the poor +welcome I should receive there, my father's house being closed to +me and my husband's abandoned for ever.</p> +<p>The very next morning, however, there came a letter from Father +Dan, giving me all the news of Ellan: some of it sad enough, God +knows (about the downfall of my father's financial schemes); some +of it deliciously wicked, such as it would have required an angel +not to rejoice in (about the bad odour in which Alma and my husband +were now held, making the pendulum of popular feeling swing back in +my direction); and some of it utterly heart-breaking in its +assurances of the love still felt for me in my native place.</p> +<p>Of course the sweetest part of that came from Christian Ann, +who, after a stiff fight with her moral principles, had said that +whatever I had done I was as "pure as the mountain turf," and, who +then charged Father Dan with the message that "Mary O'Neill's +little room" was waiting for her still.</p> +<p>This settled everything—everything except one thing, and +that was the greatest thing of all. But when Martin came later the +same day, having received the same message, and declared his +intention of taking me home, there seemed to be nothing left to +wish for in earth or heaven.</p> +<p>Nevertheless I shouldn't have been a woman If I had not +coquetted with my great happiness, so when Martin had finished I +said:</p> +<p>"But dare you?"</p> +<p>"Dare I—what?" said Martin.</p> +<p>"Dare you go home . . . with <i>me</i>?"</p> +<p>I knew what I wanted him to say, and he said it like a +darling.</p> +<p>"Look here, Mary, I'm just spoiling for a sight of the little +island, and the old people are destroyed at not seeing me; but if I +can't go back with you, by the Lord God! I'll never go back at +all."</p> +<p>I wanted to see baby before going away, but that was forbidden +me.</p> +<p>"Wait until you're well enough, and we'll send her after you," +said Dr. O'Sullivan.</p> +<p>So the end of it all was that inside a week I was on my way to +Ellan, not only with Martin, but also with Mildred, who, being a +little out of health herself, had been permitted to take me +home.</p> +<p>Shall I ever forget our arrival at Blackwater! The steamer we +sailed in was streaming with flags from stem to stern, and as she +slid up the harbour the dense crowds that packed the pier from end +to end seemed frantic with excitement. Such shouting and cheering! +Such waving of hats and handkerchiefs!</p> +<p>There was a sensible pause, I thought, a sort of hush, when the +gangway being run down, Martin was seen to give his arm to me, and +I was recognised as the lost and dishonoured one.</p> +<p>But even that only lasted for a moment, it was almost as if the +people felt that this act of Martin's was of a piece with the +sacred courage that had carried him down near to the Pole, for +hardly had he brought me ashore, and put me into the automobile +waiting to take us away, when the cheering broke out into almost +delirious tumult.</p> +<p>I knew it was all for Martin, but not even the humility of my +position, and the sense of my being an added cause of my darling's +glory, could make me otherwise than proud and happy.</p> +<p>We drove home, with the sunset in our faces, over the mountain +road which I had crossed with my husband on the day of my marriage; +and when we came to our own village I could not help seeing that a +little—just a little—of the welcome waiting for us was +meant for me.</p> +<p>Father Dan was there. He got into the car and sat by my side; +and then some of the village women, who had smartened themselves up +in their Sunday clothes, reached over and shook hands with me, +speaking about things I had said and done as a child and had long +forgotten.</p> +<p>We had to go at a walking pace the rest of the way, and while +Martin saluted old friends (he remembered everybody by name) Father +Dan talked in my ear about the "domestic earthquake" that had been +going on at Sunny Lodge, everything topsy-turvy until to-day, the +little room being made ready for me, and the best bedroom (the +doctor's and Christian Ann's) for Martin, and the "loft" over the +dairy for the old people themselves—as if their beloved son +had been good in not forgetting them, and had condescended in +coming home.</p> +<p>"Is it true?" they had asked each other. "Is he really, really +coming?" "What does he like to eat, mother?" "What does he drink?" +"What does he smoke?"</p> +<p>I had to close my eyes as I came near the gate of my father's +house, and, except for the rumbling of the river under the bridge +and the cawing of the rooks in the elms, I should not have known +when we were there.</p> +<p>The old doctor (his face overflowing with happiness, and his +close-cropped white head bare, as if he had torn out of the house +at the toot of our horn) met us as we turned into the lane, and for +the little that was left of our journey he walked blithely as a boy +by the car, at the side on which Martin sat.</p> +<p>I reached forward to catch the first sight of Sunny Lodge, and +there it was behind its fuchsia hedge, which was just breaking into +bloom.</p> +<p>There was Christian Ann, too, at the gate in her sunbonnet; and +before the automobile had come to a stand Martin was out of it and +had her in his arms.</p> +<p>I knew what that meant to the dear sweet woman, and for a moment +my spirits failed me, because it flashed upon my mind that perhaps +her heart had only warmed to me for the sake of her son.</p> +<p>But just as I was stepping out of the car, feeling physically +weak and slipping a little, though Father Dan and Sister Mildred +were helping me to alight, my Martin's mother rushed at me and +gathered me in her arms, crying:</p> +<p>"Goodness gracious me, doctor—if it isn't little Mary +O'Neill, God bless her!"—just as she did in the old, old days +when I came as a child "singing carvals to her door."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_EIGHTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_EIGHTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>When I awoke next morning in "Mary O'Neill's little room," with +its odour of clean white linen and sweet-smelling scraas, the sun +was shining in at the half-open window, birds were singing, cattle +were lowing, young lambs were bleating, a crow was cawing its way +across the sky, and under the sounds of the land there was a +far-off murmur of the sea.</p> +<p>Through the floor (unceiled beneath) I could hear the Doctor and +Christian Ann chortling away in low tones like two cheerful old +love-birds; and when I got up and looked out I saw the pink and +white blossom of the apple and plum trees, and smelt the smoke of +burning peat from the chimney, as well as the salt of the sea-weed +from the shore.</p> +<p>Sister Mildred came to help me to dress, and when I went +downstairs to the sweet kitchen-parlour, feeling so strong and +fresh, Christian Ann, who was tossing an oat-cake she was baking on +the griddle, cried to me, as to a child:</p> +<p>"Come your ways, <i>villish</i>; you know the house."</p> +<p>And when I stepped over the rag-work hearthrug and sat in the +"elbow-chair" in the <i>chiollagh</i>, under the silver bowls that +stood on the high mantelpiece, she cried again, as if addressing +the universe in general, for there was nobody else in the room:</p> +<p>"Look at that now! She's been out in the big world, and seen +great wonders, and a power of people I'll go bail, but there she +is, as nice and comfortable as if she had never been away!"</p> +<p>Sister Mildred came down next; and then the old doctor, who had +been watching the road for Martin (he had refused to occupy the old +people's bedroom after all and had put up at the "Plough"), came +in, saying:</p> +<p>"The boy's late, mother—what's doing on him, I +wonder?"</p> +<p>We waited awhile longer, and then sat down to breakfast. Oh, the +homely beauty of that morning meal, with its porridge, its milk, +its honey and cakes, its butter like gold, and its eggs like +cream!</p> +<p>In spite of Sister Mildred's protests Christian Ann stood and +served, and I will not say that for me there was not a startling +delight in being waited upon once more, being asked what I would +like, and getting it, giving orders and being obeyed—me, me, +me!</p> +<p>At length in the exercise of my authority I insisted on +Christian Ann sitting down too, which she did, though she didn't +eat, but went on talking in her dear, simple, delicious way.</p> +<p>It was always about Martin, and the best of it was about her +beautiful faith that he was still alive when the report came that +he had been lost at sea.</p> +<p>What? Her son dying like that, and she old and the sun going +down on her? Never! Newspapers? Chut, who cared what people put in +the papers? If Martin had really been lost, wouldn't <i>she</i> +have known it—having borne him on her bosom ("a middling hard +birth, too"), and being the first to hear his living voice in the +world?</p> +<p>So while people thought she was growing "weak in her +intellects," she had clung to the belief that her beloved son would +come back to her. And behold! one dark night in winter, when she +was sitting in the <i>chiollagh</i> alone, and the wind was loud in +the trees, and the doctor upstairs was calling on her to come to +bed ("you're wearing yourself away, woman"), she heard a sneck of +the garden gate and a step on the gravel path, and it was old Tommy +the Mate, who without waiting for her to open the door let a great +yell out of him through the window that a "talegraf" had come to +say her boy was safe.</p> +<p>Father Dan looked in after mass, in his biretta and faded +cassock (the same, I do declare, that he had worn when I was a +child), and then Martin himself came swinging up, with his big +voice, like a shout from the quarter-deck.</p> +<p>"Helloa! Stunning morning, isn't it?"</p> +<p>It was perfectly delightful to see the way he treated his +mother, though there was not too much reverence in his teasing, and +hardly more love than license.</p> +<p>When she told him to sit down if he had not forgotten the house, +and said she hoped he had finished looking for South Poles and was +ready to settle quietly at home, and he answered No, he would have +to go back to London presently, she cried:</p> +<p>"There now, doctor? What was I telling you? Once they've been +away, it's witched they are—longing and longing to go back +again. What's there in London that's wanting him?"</p> +<p>Whereupon the doctor (thinking of the knighthood), with a proud +lift of his old head and a wink at Father Dan, said:</p> +<p>"Who knows? Perhaps it's the King that's wanting him, +woman."</p> +<p>"The King?" cried Christian Ann. "He's got a bonny son of his +own, they're telling me, so what for should he be wanting +mine?"</p> +<p>"Mary," said. Martin, as soon as he could speak for laughing, +"do you want a mother? I've got one to sell, and I wouldn't trust +but I might give her away."</p> +<p>"Cuff him, Mrs. Conrad," cried Father Dan. "Cuff him, the young +rascal! He may be a big man in the great world over the water, but +he mustn't come here expecting his mother and his old priest to +worship him."</p> +<p>How we laughed! I laughed until I cried, not knowing which I was +doing most, but feeling as if I had never had an ache or a care in +all my life before.</p> +<p>Breakfast being over, the men going into the garden to smoke, +and Sister Mildred insisting on clearing the table, Christian Ann +took up her knitting, sat by my side, and told me the "newses" of +home—sad news, most of it, about my father, God pity him, and +how his great schemes for "galvanising the old island into life" +had gone down to failure and fatuity, sending some to the asylum +and some to the graveyard, and certain of the managers of +corporations and banks to gaol.</p> +<p>My father himself had escaped prosecution; but he was supposed +to be a ruined man, dying of cancer, and had gone to live in his +mother's old cottage on the curragh, with only Nessy MacLeod to +care for him—having left the Big House to Aunt Bridget and +cousin Betsy, who declared (so I gathered or guessed) that I had +disgraced their name and should never look on their faces +again.</p> +<p>"But dear heart alive, that won't cut much ice, will it?" said +Christian Ann, catching a word of Martin's.</p> +<p>Later in the day, being alone with the old doctor. I heard +something of my husband also—that he had applied (according +to the laws of Ellan) for an Act of Divorce, and that our insular +legislature was likely to grant it.</p> +<p>Still later, having walked out into the garden, where the +bluebells were in bloom, I, too, heard the sneck of the gate, and +it was old Tommy again, who (having been up to the "Plough" to "put +a sight on himself") had come round to welcome me as well—a +little older, a little feebler, "tacking a bit," as he said, with +"romps in his fetlock joints," but feeling "well tremenjus."</p> +<p>He had brought the "full of his coat-pockets" of lobsters and +crabs for me ("wonderful good for invalids, missie") and the "full +of his mouth" of the doings at Castle Raa, which he had left +immediately after myself—Price also, neither of them being +willing to stay with a master who had "the rough word" for +everybody, and a "misthress" who had "the black curse on her" that +would "carry her naked sowl to hell."</p> +<p>"I wouldn't be gardener there, after the lil missie had gone . . +. no, not for the Bank of Ellan and it full of goold."</p> +<p>What a happy, happy day that was! There was many another day +like it, too, during the sweet time following, when spring was +smiling once more upon earth and man, and body and soul in myself +were undergoing a resurrection no less marvellous.</p> +<p>After three or four weeks I had so far recovered as to be able +to take walks with Martin—through the leafy lanes with the +golden gorse on the high turf hedges and its nutty odour in the +air, as far, sometimes, as to the shore, where we talked about +"asploring" or perhaps (without speaking at all) looked into each +other's eyes and laughed.</p> +<p>There was really only one limitation to my happiness, separation +from my child, and though I was conscious of something anomalous in +my own position which the presence of my baby would make acute +(setting all the evil tongues awag), I could not help it if, as I +grew stronger, I yearned for my little treasure.</p> +<p>The end of it was that, after many timid efforts, I took courage +and asked Martin if I might have my precious darling back.</p> +<p>"Girlie?" he cried. "Certainly you may. You are well enough now, +so why shouldn't you? I'm going to London on Exploration business +soon, and I'll bring her home with me."</p> +<p>But when he was gone (Mildred went with him) I was still +confronted by one cause of anxiety—Christian Ann. I could not +even be sure she knew of the existence of my child, still less that +Martin intended to fetch her.</p> +<p>So once more I took my heart in both hands, and while we sat +together in the garden, with the sunlight pouring through the +trees, Christian Ann knitting and I pretending to read, I told her +all.</p> +<p>She knew everything already, the dear old thing, and had only +been waiting for me to speak. After dropping a good many stitches +she said:</p> +<p>"The world will talk, and dear heart knows what Father Dan +himself will say. But blood's thicker than water even if it's holy +water, and she's my own child's child, God bless her!"</p> +<p>After that we had such delicious times together, preparing for +the little stranger who was to come—cutting up blankets and +sheets, and smuggling down from the "loft" to "Mary O'Neill's room" +the wooden cradle which had once been Martin's, and covering it +with bows and ribbons.</p> +<p>We kept the old doctor in the dark (pretended we did) and when +he wondered "what all the fuss was about," and if "the island +expected a visit from the Queen," we told him (Christian Ann did) +to "ask us no questions and we'd tell no lies."</p> +<p>What children we were, we two mothers, the old one and the young +one! I used to hint, with an air of great mystery, that my baby had +"somebody's eyes," and then the dear simple old thing would +say:</p> +<p>"Somebody's eyes, has she? Well, well! Think of that, now!"</p> +<p>But Christian Ann, from the lofty eminence of the motherhood of +one child twenty-five years before, was my general guide and +counsellor, answering all my foolish questions when I counted up +baby's age (eleven months now) and wondered if she could walk and +talk by this time, how many of her little teeth should have come +and whether she could remember me.</p> +<p>As the time approached for Martin's return our childishness +increased, and on the last day of all we carried on such a game +together as must have made the very Saints themselves look down on +us and laugh.</p> +<p>Before I opened my eyes in the morning I was saying to myself, +"Now they're on their way to Euston," and every time I heard the +clock strike I was thinking, "Now they're in the train," or "Now +they're at Liverpool," or "Now they're on the steamer"; but all the +while I sang "Sally" and other nonsense, and pretended to be as +happy as the day was long.</p> +<p>Christian Ann was even more excited than myself; and though she +was always reproving me for my nervousness and telling me to be +composed, I saw her put the kettle instead of the tea-pot on to the +tablecloth, and the porridge-stick into the fire in place of the +tongs.</p> +<p>Towards evening, when Martin was due, I had reduced myself to +such a state of weakness that Christian Ann wanted to put me to +bed; but sitting down in the <i>chiollagh</i>, and watching the +road from the imprisonment of the "elbow-chair," I saw at last the +two big white eyes of the automobile wheeling round in the dusk by +the gate of my father's house.</p> +<p>A few minutes afterwards Martin came sweeping into the kitchen +with a nice-looking nurse behind him, carrying my darling at her +breast.</p> +<p>She was asleep, but the light of the fire soon wakened her, and +then a strange thing happened.</p> +<p>I had risen from my seat, and Christian Ann had come hurrying +up, and we two women were standing about baby, both ready to clutch +at her, when she blinked her blue eyes and looked at us, and then +held out her arms to her grandmother!</p> +<p>That nearly broke my heart for a moment (though now I thank the +Lord for it), but it raised Christian Ann into the seventh heaven +of rapture.</p> +<p>"Did you see that now?" she cried, clasping my baby to her +bosom—her eyes glistening as with sunshine, though her cheeks +were slushed as with rain.</p> +<p>I got my treasure to myself at last (Christian Ann having to +show the nurse up to her bedroom), and then, being alone with +Martin, I did not care, in the intoxication of my happiness, how +silly I was in my praise of her.</p> +<p>"Isn't she a little fairy, a little angel, a little cherub?" I +cried. "And that nasty, nasty birthmark quite, quite gone."</p> +<p>The ugly word had slipped out unawares, but Martin had caught +it, and though I tried to make light of it, he gave me no peace +until I had told him what it meant—with all the humiliating +story of my last night at Castle Raa and the blow my husband had +struck me.</p> +<p>"But that's all over now," I said.</p> +<p>"Is it? By the Lord God I swear it isn't, though!" said Martin, +and his face was so fierce that it made me afraid.</p> +<p>But just at that moment Christian Ann came downstairs, and the +old doctor returned from his rounds, and then Tommy the Mate looked +in on his way to the "Plough," and hinting at my going to church +again some day, gave it as his opinion that if I put the "boght +mulish" under my "perricut" (our old island custom for legitimising +children) "the Bishop himself couldn't say nothin' against it"-at +which Martin laughed so much that I thought he had forgotten his +vow about my husband.</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM OF MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>I hadn't, though.</p> +<p>The brute! The bully! When my darling told me that story (I had +to drag it out of her) I felt that if I had been within a hundred +miles at the time, and had had to crawl home to the man on my hands +and knees, there wouldn't have been enough of him left now to throw +on the dust-heap.</p> +<p>Nearly two years had passed since the debt was incurred, but I +thought a Christian world could not go on a day longer until I had +paid it back—with interest.</p> +<p>So fearing that my tender-hearted little woman, if she got wind +of my purpose, might make me promise to put away my vow of +vengeance, I got up early next morning and ordered the motor-car to +be made ready for a visit to Castle Raa.</p> +<p>Old Tommy happened to be in the yard of the inn while I was +speaking to the chauffeur, and he asked if he might be allowed to +go with me. I agreed, and when I came out to start he was sitting +in a corner of the car, with his Glengarry pulled down over his +shaggy eyebrows, and his knotty hands leaning on a thick blackthorn +that had a head as big as a turnip.</p> +<p>We did not talk too much on the way—I had to save up my +strength for better business—and it was a long spin, but we +got to our journey's end towards the middle of the morning.</p> +<p>As we went up the drive (sacred to me by one poignant memory) an +open carriage was coming down. The only occupant was a rather +vulgar-looking elderly woman (in large feathers and flowing +furbelows) whom I took to be the mother of Alma.</p> +<p>Three powdered footmen came to the door of the Castle as our car +drove up. Their master was out riding. They did not know when he +would be back.</p> +<p>"I'll wait for him," I said, and pushed into the hall, old Tommy +following me.</p> +<p>I think the footmen had a mind to intercept us, but I suppose +there was something in my face which told them it would be better +not to try, so I walked into the first room with the door open.</p> +<p>It turned out to be the dining-room, with portraits of the +owner's ancestors all round the walls—a solid square of +evil-looking rascals, every mother's son of them.</p> +<p>Tommy, still resting his knotty hands on his big blackthorn, was +sitting on the first chair by the door, and I on the end of the +table, neither saying a word to the other, when there came the +sound of horses' hoofs on the path outside. A little later there +were voices in the hall, both low and loud ones—the footmen +evidently announcing my arrival and their master abusing them for +letting me into the house.</p> +<p>At the next moment the man came sweeping into the dining-room. +He was carrying a heavy hunting-crop and his flabby face was livid. +Behind him came Alma. She was in riding costume and was bending a +lithe whip in her gloved hands.</p> +<p>I saw that my noble lord was furious, but that mood suited me as +well as another, so I continued to sit on the end of the table.</p> +<p>"So I hear, sir," he said, striding up to me, "I hear that you +have taken possession of my place without so much as 'by your +leave'?"</p> +<p>"That's so," I answered.</p> +<p>"Haven't you done enough mischief here, without coming to insult +me by your presence?"</p> +<p>"Not quite. I've a little more to do before I've finished."</p> +<p>"Jim," said the woman (in such a weary voice), "don't put +yourself about over such a person. Better ring the bell for the +servants and have him turned out of doors."</p> +<p>I looked round at her. She tried an insolent smile, but it broke +down badly, and then his lordship strode up to me with quivering +lips.</p> +<p>"Look here, sir," he said. "Aren't you ashamed to show your face +in my house?"</p> +<p>"I'm not," I replied. "But before I leave it, I believe +<i>you'll</i> be ashamed to show your face anywhere."</p> +<p>"Damn it, sir! Will you do me the honour to tell me why you are +here?" said his lordship, with fury in his looks.</p> +<p>"Certainly. That's exactly what I've come for," I said, and then +I stated my business without more ado.</p> +<p>I told him what he had done to the woman who was ten thousand +times too good to be his wife-torturing her with his cruelties, +degrading her with his infidelities, subjecting her to the +domination of his paramour, and finally striking her in the face +like a coward and a cur.</p> +<p>"Liar!" he cried, fairly gasping in his rage. "You're a liar and +your informant is a liar, too."</p> +<p>"Tommy," I said, "will you step outside for a moment?"</p> +<p>Tommy went out of the room at once, and the woman, who was now +looking frightened, tried to follow him.</p> +<p>I stopped her. Rising from the table, I stepped over to the door +and locked it.</p> +<p>"No, madam," I said. "I want you to see what takes place between +his lordship and me."</p> +<p>The wretched woman fell back, but the man, grinding his teeth, +came marching up to me.</p> +<p>"So you've come to fight me in my own house, have you?" he +cried.</p> +<p>"Not at all," I answered. "A man fights his equal. I've come to +<i>thrash you</i>."</p> +<p>That was enough for him, he lifted his hunting-crop to strike, +but it didn't take long to get that from his hand or to paralyse +the arm with which he was lunging out at me.</p> +<p>And then, seizing him by the white stock at his throat, I +thrashed him. I thrashed him as I should have thrashed vicious ape. +I thrashed him while he fumed and foamed, and cursed and swore. I +thrashed him while he cried for help, and then yelled with pain and +whined for mercy. I thrashed him under the eyes of his ancestors, +the mad, bad race he came from, and, him the biggest blackguard of +them all. And then I flung him to the ground, bruised in every +bone, and his hunting-crop after him.</p> +<p>"I hear you're going to court for an Act of Divorce," I said. +"Pity you can't take something to back you, so take that, and say I +gave it you."</p> +<p>I was turning towards the door when I heard a low, whining cry, +like that of a captured she-bear. It was from the woman. The +wretched creature was on her knees at the farthest corner of the +room, apparently mumbling prayers, as if in terror that her own +turn might be coming next.</p> +<p>In her sobbing fear I thought she looked more than ever like a +poisonous snake, and I will not say that the old impulse to put my +foot on it did not come back for a moment. But I only said as I +passed, pointing to the writhing worm on the floor:</p> +<p>"Look at him, madame. I wish you joy of your nobleman, and him +of you."</p> +<p>Then I opened the door, and notwithstanding the grim business I +had been going through, I could have laughed at the scene +outside.</p> +<p>There was old Tommy with his back to the dining-room door, his +Glengarry awry on his tousled head, and his bandy legs stretched +firmly apart, flourishing his big-headed blackthorn before the +faces of the three powdered footmen, and inviting them to "come +on."</p> +<p>"Come on, now, you bleating ould billy-goats, come on, come +on!"</p> +<p>I was in no hurry to get away, but lit a cigar in front of the +house while the chauffeur was starting the motor and Tommy was +wiping his steaming forehead on the sleeve of his coat.</p> +<p>All the way home the old man talked without ceasing, sometimes +to me, and sometimes to the world in general.</p> +<p>"You gave him a piece of your mind, didn't you?" he asked, with +a wink of his "starboard eye."</p> +<p>"I believe I did," I answered.</p> +<p>"I allus said you would. 'Wait till himself is after coming +home, and it'll be the devil sit up for some of them,' says I."</p> +<p>There was only one limitation to Tommy's satisfaction over our +day's expedition—that he had not cracked the powdered skulls +of "some o' them riddiclus dunkeys."</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_NINTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_NINTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND NINTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>Another month passed, and then began the last and most important +phase of my too changeful story.</p> +<p>Every week Martin had been coming and going between Ellan and +London, occupied when he was away with the business of his next +Expedition (for which Parliament had voted a large sum), and when +he was at home with reports, diaries, charts, maps, and photographs +toward a book he was writing about his last one.</p> +<p>As for myself, I had been (or tried to think I had been) +entirely happy. With fresh air, new milk, a sweet bedroom, and +above all, good and tender nursing (God bless Christian Ann for all +she did for me!), my health had improved every day—or +perhaps, by that heavenly hopefulness which goes with certain +maladies, it had seemed to me to do so.</p> +<p>Yet mine was a sort of twilight happiness, nevertheless. Though +the sun was always shining in my sky, it was frequently under +eclipse. In spite of the sheltered life I lived in that home of +charity and love, I was never entirely free from a certain +indefinable uneasiness about my position.</p> +<p>I was always conscious, too, that Martin's mother and father, +not to speak of Father Dan, were suffering from a similar feeling, +for sometimes when we talked about the future their looks would +answer to my thoughts, and it was just as if we were all silently +waiting, waiting, waiting for some event that was to justify and +rehabilitate me.</p> +<p>It came at last—for me with a startling suddenness.</p> +<p>One morning, nurse being out on an errand and Christian Ann +patting her butter in the dairy, I was playing with baby on the +rag-work hearthrug when our village newsman came to the threshold +of the open door.</p> +<p>"Take a <i>Times</i>," he said. "You might as well be out of the +world, ma'am, as not know what's going on in it."</p> +<p>I took one of his island newspapers, and after he had gone I +casually glanced at it.</p> +<p>But what a shock it gave me! The first heading that flew in my +face was—</p> +<p>"INSULAR DIVORCE BILL PASSED."</p> +<p>It was a report of the proceedings of the Supreme Court of our +Ellan legislature, which (notwithstanding the opposition of its +ecclesiastical members) had granted my husband's petition.</p> +<p>Perhaps I ought to have had a sense of immense relief. Or +perhaps I should have gone down on my knees there and then, and +thanked God that the miserable entanglement of the horrible +marriage that had been forced upon me was at last at an end.</p> +<p>But no, I had only one feeling as the newspaper fell from my +fingers—shame and humiliation, not for myself (for what did +it matter about me, anyway?), but for Martin, whose name, now so +famous, I had, through my husband's malice, been the means of +dragging through the dust.</p> +<p>I remember that I thought I should never be able to look into my +darling's face again, that when he came in the afternoon (as he +always did) I should have to run away from him, and that all that +was left to me was to hide myself and die.</p> +<p>But just as these wild thoughts were galloping through my brain +I heard the sneck of the garden gate, and almost before I was aware +of what else was happening Martin had come sweeping into the house +like a rush of wind, thrown his arms around me, and covered my +face, my neck, and my hands with kisses—never having done so +before since I came to live at his mother's home.</p> +<p>"Such news! Such news!" he cried. "We are free, free, free!"</p> +<p>Then, seeing the newspaper at my feet on the floor, he said:</p> +<p>"Ah, I see you know already. I told them to keep everything away +from you—all the miserable legal business. But no matter! +It's over now. Of course it's shocking—perfectly +shocking—that that squirming worm, after his gross +infidelities, should have been able to do what he has done. But +what matter about that either? He has done just what we +wanted—what you couldn't do for yourself before I went away, +your conscience forbidding you. The barrier that has divided us is +down . . . now we can be married at any time."</p> +<p>I was so overcome by Martin's splendid courage, so afraid to +believe fully that the boundless relief I had looked for so long +had come to me at last, that for some time I could not speak. And +when I did speak, though my heart was clamouring loud, I only +said:</p> +<p>"But do you really think that . . . that we can now be husband +and wife?"</p> +<p>"Think it?" he cried, with a peal of laughter. "I should think I +do think it. What's to prevent us? Nothing! You've suffered enough, +my poor girl. But all that you have gone through has to be +forgotten, and you are never to look back again."</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, I know I should be happy, very happy," I said, "but +what about you?"</p> +<p>"Me?"</p> +<p>"I looked forward to being a help—at least not a trouble +to you, Martin."</p> +<p>"And so you will be. Why shouldn't you?"</p> +<p>"Martin," I said (I knew what I was doing, but I couldn't help +doing it), "wouldn't it injure you to marry me . . . being what I +am now . . . in the eyes of the world, I mean?"</p> +<p>He looked at me for a moment as if trying to catch my meaning, +and then snatched me still closer to his breast.</p> +<p>"Mary," he cried, "don't ask me to consider what the damnable +insincerities of society may say to a case like ours. If <i>you</i> +don't care, then neither do I. And as for the world, by the Lord +God I swear that all I ask of it I am now holding in my arms."</p> +<p>That conquered me—poor trembling hypocrite that I was, +praying with all my soul that my objections would be overcome.</p> +<p>In another moment I had thrown my arms about my Martin's neck +and kissed and kissed him, feeling for the first time after my +months and years of fiery struggle that in the eyes of God and man +I had a <i>right</i> to do so.</p> +<p>And oh dear, oh dear! When Martin had gone back to his work, +what foolish rein I gave to my new-born rapture!</p> +<p>I picked baby up from the hearthrug and kissed her also, and +then took her into the dairy to be kissed by her grandmother, who +must have overheard what had passed between Martin and me, for I +noticed that her voice had suddenly become livelier and at least an +octave higher.</p> +<p>Then, baby being sleepy, I took her upstairs for her morning +nap, and after leaning over her cradle, in the soft, damp, +milk-like odour of her sweet body and breath, I stood up before the +glass and looked at my own hot, tingling, blushing cheeks and +sparkling eyes.</p> +<p>Oh, what gorgeous dreams of happiness came to me! I may have +been the unmarried mother of a child, but my girlhood—my lost +girlhood—was flowing back upon me. A vision of my +marriage-day rose up before me and I saw myself as a bride, in my +bridal veil and blossoms.</p> +<p>How happy I was going to be! But indeed I felt just then as if I +had always been happy. It was almost as though some blessed stream +of holy water had washed my memory clean of all the soilure of my +recent days in London, for sure I am that if anybody had at that +moment mentioned Ilford and the East End, the bricklayer and the +Jew, or spoken of the maternity homes and the orphanages, I should +have screamed.</p> +<p>Towards noon the old doctor came back from his morning rounds, +and I noticed that <i>his</i> voice was pitched higher too. We +never once spoke about the great news, the great event, while we +sat at table; but I could not help noticing that we were all +talking loud and fast and on the top of each other, as if some dark +cloud which had hovered over our household had suddenly slid +away.</p> +<p>After luncheon, nurse being back with baby, I went out for a +walk alone, feeling wonderfully well and light, and having two +hours to wait for Martin, who must be still pondering over his +papers at the "Plough."</p> +<p>How beautiful was the day! How blue the sky! How bright the +earth! How joyous the air—so sweet and so full of +song-birds!</p> +<p>I remember that I thought life had been so good to me that I +ought to be good to everybody else—especially to my father, +from whom it seemed wrong for a daughter to be estranged, whatever +he was and whatever he had done to her.</p> +<p>So I turned my face towards my poor grandmother's restored +cottage on the curragh, fully determined to be reconciled to my +father; and I only slackened my steps and gave up my purpose when I +began to think of Nessy MacLeod and how difficult (perhaps +impossible) it might be to reach him.</p> +<p>Even then I faced about for a moment to the Big House with some +vain idea of making peace with Aunt Bridget and then slipping +upstairs to my mother's room—having such a sense of joyous +purity that I wished to breathe the sacred air my blessed saint had +lived in.</p> +<p>But the end of it all was that I found myself on the steps of +the Presbytery, feeling breathlessly happy, and telling myself, +with a little access of pride in my own gratitude, that it was only +right and proper that I should bring my happiness where I had so +often brought my sorrow—to the dear priest who had been my +friend since the day of my birth and my darling mother's friend +before.</p> +<p>Poor old Father Dan! How good I was going to be to him!</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND TENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>A few minutes afterwards I was tripping upstairs (love and hope +work wonderful miracles!) behind the Father's Irish housekeeper, +Mrs. Cassidy, who was telling me how well I was looking ("smart and +well extraordinary"), asking if it "was on my two feet I had walked +all the way," and denouncing the "omathauns" who had been "after +telling her there wasn't the width of a wall itself betune me and +the churchyard."</p> +<p>I found Father Dan in his cosy study lined with books; and being +so much wrapped up in my own impetuous happiness I did not see at +first that he was confused and nervous, or remember until next day +that, though (at the sound of my voice from the landing) he cried +"Come in, my child, come in," he was standing with his back to the +door as I entered—hiding something (it must have been a +newspaper) under the loose seat of his easy-chair.</p> +<p>"Father," I said, "have you heard the news?"</p> +<p>"The news. . . ."</p> +<p>"I mean the news in the newspaper."</p> +<p>"Ah, the news in the newspaper."</p> +<p>"Isn't it glorious? That terrible marriage is over at last! +Without my doing anything, either! Do you remember what you said +the last time I came here?"</p> +<p>"The last time. . . ."</p> +<p>"You said that I, being a Catholic, could not break my marriage +without breaking my faith. But my husband, being a Protestant, had +no compunction. So it has come to the same thing in the end, you +see. And now I'm free."</p> +<p>"You're free . . . free, are you?"</p> +<p>"It seems they have been keeping it all away from +me—making no defence, I suppose—and it was only this +morning I heard the news."</p> +<p>"Only this morning, was it?"</p> +<p>"I first saw it in a newspaper, but afterwards Martin himself +came to tell me."</p> +<p>"Martin came, did he?"</p> +<p>"He doesn't care in the least; in fact, he is glad, and says we +can be married at any time."</p> +<p>"Married at any time—he says that, does he?"</p> +<p>"Of course nothing is arranged yet, dear Father, but I couldn't +help coming to see you about it. I want everything to be simple and +quiet—no display of any kind."</p> +<p>"Simple and quiet, do you?"</p> +<p>"Early in the morning—immediately after mass, +perhaps."</p> +<p>"Immediately after mass. . . ."</p> +<p>"Only a few wild flowers on the altar, and the dear homely souls +who love me gathered around."</p> +<p>"The dear, homely souls. . . ."</p> +<p>"It will be a great, great thing for me, but I don't want to +force myself upon anybody, or to triumph over any one—least +of all over my poor father, now that he is so sick and down."</p> +<p>"No, no . . . now that he is so sick and down."</p> +<p>"I shall want you to marry us, Daddy Dan—not the Bishop or +anybody else of that kind, you know."</p> +<p>"You'll want me to marry you—not the Bishop or anybody +else of that kind."</p> +<p>"But Father Dan," I cried, laughing a little uneasily (for I had +begun to realise that he was only repeating my own words), "why +don't you say something for yourself?"</p> +<p>And then the cheery sunshine of the cosy room began to fade +away.</p> +<p>Father Dan fumbled the silver cross which hung over his cassock +(a sure sign of his nervousness), and said with a grave face and in +a voice all a-tremble with emotion:</p> +<p>"My child. . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes?"</p> +<p>"You believe that I wouldn't pain or distress or shock you if I +could avoid it?"</p> +<p>"Indeed I do."</p> +<p>"Yet I am going to pain and distress and shock you now. I . . . +I cannot marry you to Martin Conrad. I daren't. The Church thinks +that you are married already—that you are still the wife of +your husband."</p> +<p>Though my dear priest had dealt me my death-blow, I had not yet +begun to feel it, so I smiled up into his troubled old face and +said:</p> +<p>"But how can the Church think that, dear Father? My husband has +no rights over me now, and no duties or responsibilities with +respect to me. He can marry again if he likes. And he will, I am +sure he will, and nobody can prevent him. How, then, can the Church +say that I am still his wife?"</p> +<p>"Because marriage, according to the law of the Church, can only +be dissolved by death," said Father Dan. "Haven't I told you that +before, my daughter? Didn't we go over it again and again when you +were here the last time?"</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, but I thought if somebody else sought the +divorce—somebody who had never believed in the +indissolubility of marriage and wasn't bound by the law of the +Church . . . we've heard of cases of that kind, haven't we?"</p> +<p>Father Dan shook his head.</p> +<p>"My poor child, no. The Church thinks marriage is a sacred +covenant which no difference of belief, no sin on either side, can +ever break."</p> +<p>"But, Father," I cried, "don't you see that the law has already +broken it?"</p> +<p>"Only the civil law, my daughter. Remember the words of our +blessed and holy Redeemer: '<i>Every one that putteth away his wife +and marrieth another committeth adultery; and he that marrieth one +that is put away committeth adultery.'</i> . . . My poor child, my +heart bleeds for you, but isn't that the Divine Commandment?"</p> +<p>"Then you think," I said (the room was becoming dark and I could +feel my lip trembling), "you think that because I went through that +marriage ceremony two years ago . . . and though the civil law has +dissolved it . . . you think I am still bound by it, and will +continue to be so . . . to the end of my life?"</p> +<p>Father Dan plucked at his cassock, fumbled his print +handkerchief, and replied:</p> +<p>"I am sorry, my child, very, very sorry."</p> +<p>"Father Dan," I said sharply, for by this time my heart was +beginning to blaze, "have you thought about Martin? Aren't you +afraid that if our Church refuses to marry us he may ask some other +church to do so?"</p> +<p>"Christ's words must be the final law for all true Christians, +my daughter. And besides. . . ."</p> +<p>"Well?"</p> +<p>"Besides that. . . ."</p> +<p>"Yes?"</p> +<p>"It blisters my tongue to say it, my child, knowing your +sufferings and great temptations, but. . . ."</p> +<p>"But what, dear Father?"</p> +<p>"You are in the position of the guilty party, and therefore no +good clergyman of any Christian Church in the world, following the +Commandment of his Master, would dare to marry you."</p> +<p>What happened after that I cannot exactly say. I remember that, +feeling the colour flying to my face, I flung up my hands to cover +it, and that when I came to full possession of my senses again +Father Dan (himself in a state of great agitation) was smoothing my +arms and comforting me.</p> +<p>"Don't be angry with your old priest for telling you the +truth—the bitter truth, my daughter."</p> +<p>He had always seen this dark hour coming to him, and again and +again he had prayed to be delivered from it—in the long +nights of his fruitless wanderings when I was lost in London, and +again since I had been found and had come home and he had looked +on, with many a pang, at our silent hopes and +expectations—Martin's and mine, we two children.</p> +<p>"And when you came into my little den to-day, my daughter, with +a face as bright as stars and diamonds, God knows I would have +given half of what is left of my life that mine should not be the +hand to dash the cup of your happiness away."</p> +<p>As soon as I was sufficiently composed, within and without, +Father Dan led me downstairs (praying God and His Holy Mother to +strengthen me on my solitary way), and then stood at the door in +his cassock to watch me while I walked up the road.</p> +<p>It was hardly more than half an hour since I had passed over the +ground before, yet in that short time the world seemed to have +become pale and grey—the sun gone out, the earth grown dark, +the still air joyless, nothing left but the everlasting heavens and +the heavy song of the sea.</p> +<p>As I approached the doctor's house Martin came swinging down the +road to meet me, with his strong free step and that suggestion of +the wind from the mountain-tops which seemed to be always about +him.</p> +<p>"Hello!" he cried. "Thought you were lost and been hunting all +over the place for you."</p> +<p>But as he came nearer and saw how white and wan my face was, +though I was doing my best to smile, he stopped and said:</p> +<p>"My poor little woman, where have you been, and what have they +been doing to you?"</p> +<p>And then, as well as I could, I told him.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_ELEVENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_ELEVENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>"It's all my fault," he said.</p> +<p>He had led me to the garden-house, which stood among the +bluebells at the end of the orchard, and was striding to and fro in +front of it.</p> +<p>"I knew perfectly what the attitude of the Church would be, and +I ought to have warned you."</p> +<p>I had never before seen him so excited. There was a wild look in +his eyes and his voice was quivering like the string of a bow.</p> +<p>"Poor old Father Dan! He's an old angel, with as good a heart as +ever beat under a cassock. But what a slave a man may be to the +fetish of his faith! Only think what he says, my darling! The +guilty party! I'll never believe you are the guilty party, but +consider! The guilty party may never marry! No good clergyman of +any Christian Church in the world dare marry her! What an infamy! +Ask yourself what the churches are here for. Aren't they here to +bring salvation to the worst of sinners? Yet they cast out the +woman who has sinned against her marriage vow—denying her +access to the altar and turning her out of doors—though she +may have repented a thousand times, with bitter, bitter tears!"</p> +<p>He walked two or three paces in front of the garden-house and +then came back to me with flaming eyes.</p> +<p>"But that's not your case, anyway," he said. "Father Dan knows +perfectly that your marriage was no marriage at all—only a +sordid bit of commercial bargaining, in which your husband gave you +his bad name for your father's unclean money. It was no marriage in +any other sense either, and might have been annulled if there had +been any common honesty in annulment. And now that it has tumbled +to wreck and ruin, as anybody might have seen it would do, you are +told that you are bound to it to the last day and hour of your +life! After all you have gone through—all you have +suffered—never to know another hour of happiness as long as +you live! While your husband, notwithstanding his brutalities and +infidelities, is free to do what he likes, to marry whom he +pleases! How stupid! How disgusting! how damnable!"</p> +<p>His passionate voice was breaking, he could scarcely control +it.</p> +<p>"Oh, I know what they'll say. It will be the old, old song, +'Whom God hath joined together.' That's what this old Church of +ours has been saying for centuries to poor women with broken +hearts. Has the Church itself got a heart to break? +No—nothing but its cast-iron laws which have been broken a +thousand times and nobody a penny the worse."</p> +<p>"But I wonder," he continued, "I wonder why these churchmen, who +would talk about the impossibility of putting asunder those whom +God has joined together, don't begin by asking themselves how and +when and where God joins them. Is it in church, when they stand +before the altar and are asked a few questions, and give a few +answers? If so, then God is responsible for some of the most +shocking transactions that ever disgraced humanity—all the +pride and vanity and deliberate concubinage that have covered +themselves in every age, and are covering themselves still, with +the cloak of marriage."</p> +<p>"But no," said Martin, "it's not in churches that God marries +people. They've got to be married before they go there, or they are +never married at all—never! They've got to be married in +their <i>hearts</i>, for that's where God joins people together, +not in churches and before priests and altars."</p> +<p>I sat listening to him with a rising and throbbing heart, and +after another moment he stepped into the garden-house, and sat +beside me.</p> +<p>"Mary," he said, in his passionate voice, "that's our case, +isn't it? God married us from the very first. There has never been +any other woman for me, and there never has been any other man for +you—isn't that so, my darling? . . . Then what are they +talking about—these churches and churchmen? It's <i>they</i> +who are the real divorcers—trying to put those asunder whom +God Himself has joined together. That's the plain sense of the +matter, isn't it?"</p> +<p>I was trembling with fear and expectation. Perhaps it was the +same with me as it had been before; perhaps I wanted (now more than +ever) to believe what Martin was saying; perhaps I did not know +enough to be able to answer him; perhaps my overpowering love and +the position I stood in compelled me to agree. But I could not help +it if it seemed to me that his clear mind—clear as a mountain +river and as swift and strong—was sweeping away all the +worn-out sophistries.</p> +<p>"Then what . . . what are we to do?" I asked him.</p> +<p>"Do? Our duty to ourselves, my darling, that's what we have to +do. If we cannot be married according to the law of the Church, we +must be married according to the law of the land. Isn't that +enough? This is our own affair, dearest, ours and nobody else's. +It's only a witness we want anyway—a witness before God and +man that we intend to be man and wife in future."</p> +<p>"But Father Dan?"</p> +<p>"Leave him to me," said Martin. "I'll tell him everything. But +come into the house now. You are catching a cold. Unless we take +care they'll kill you before they've done."</p> +<p>Next day he leaned over the back of my chair as I sat in the +<i>chiollagh</i> with baby in my lap, and said, in a low tone:</p> +<p>"I've seen Father Dan."</p> +<p>"Well?"</p> +<p>"The old angel took it badly. 'God forbid that you should do +that same, my boy,' he said, 'putting both yourself and that sweet +child of mine out of the Church for ever.' 'It's the Church that's +putting us out,' I told him. 'But God's holy law condemns it, my +son,' he said. 'God's law is love; and He has no other law,' I +answered."</p> +<p>I was relieved and yet nervous, glad and yet afraid.</p> +<p>A week passed, and then the time came for Martin to go to +Windsor for his investiture. There had been great excitement in +Sunny Lodge in preparation for this event, but being a little +unwell I had been out of the range of it.</p> +<p>At the moment of Martin's departure I was in bed, and he had +come upstairs to say good-bye to me.</p> +<p>What had been happening in the meantime I hardly knew, but I had +gathered that he thought pressure would be brought to bear on +me.</p> +<p>"Our good old Church is like a limpet on the shore," he said. +"Once it gets its suckers down it doesn't let go in a hurry. But +sit tight, little woman. Don't yield an inch while I'm away," he +whispered.</p> +<p>When he left me I reached up to see him going down the road to +the railway station. His old father was walking proudly by his +side, bare-headed as usual and still as blithe as a boy.</p> +<p>Next day I was startled by an unexpected telegram. It came from +a convent in Lancashire and was addressed to "Mary O'Neill, care of +Doctor Conrad." It ran:</p> +<p>"<i>Am making a round of visits to the houses of our Society and +would like to see you on my way to Ireland. May I cross to-morrow? +Mother Magdalene</i>."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TWELFTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_TWELFTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND TWELFTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>She arrived the following afternoon—my dear Reverend +Mother with the pale spiritual face and saint-like eyes.</p> +<p>Except that her habit was now blue and white instead of black, +she seemed hardly changed in any respect since our days at the +Sacred Heart.</p> +<p>Finding that I was in bed, she put up at the "Plough" and came +every day to nurse me.</p> +<p>I was naturally agitated at seeing her again after so many years +and such various experiences, being uncertain how much she knew of +them.</p> +<p>Remembering Martin's warning, I was also fairly certain that she +had been sent for, but my uneasiness on both heads soon wore +off.</p> +<p>Her noiseless step, her soft voice, and her sweet smile soothed +and comforted me. I began to feel afresh the influence she had +exercised over me when I was a child, and to wonder why, during my +dark time in London, I had never thought of writing to her.</p> +<p>During the first days of her visit she said nothing about +painful things—never mentioning my marriage, or what had +happened since she saw me last.</p> +<p>Her talk was generally about our old school and my old +schoolfellows, many of whom came to the convent for her "retreats," +which were under the spiritual direction of one of the Pope's +domestic prelates.</p> +<p>Sometimes she would laugh about our Mother of the Novices who +had "become old and naggledy"; sometimes about the little fat +Maestro of the Pope's choir who had cried when I first sang the +hymn to the Virgin, ("Go on, little angel,"); and sometimes about +the two old lay sisters (now quite toothless) who still said I +might have been a "wonderful washerwoman" if I had "put my mind to +it."</p> +<p>I hate to think that my dear Reverend Mother was doing this +consciously in order to break down my defences, but the effect was +the same. Little by little, during the few days she was with me, +she bridged the space back to my happy girlhood, for insensibly I +found myself stirred by the emotions of the convent, and breathing +again the air of my beloved Rome.</p> +<p>On the afternoon of the fourth day of her visit I was sitting up +by her side in front of my window, which was wide open. It was just +such a peaceful evening as our last one at Nemi. Not a leaf was +stirring; not a breath of wind in the air; the only sounds we heard +were the lowing of the cattle waiting to be milked, the soft murmur +of the sea, and the jolting of a springless cart that was coming up +from the shore, laden with sea wrack.</p> +<p>As the sun began to sink it lit blazing fires in the windows of +the village in front—especially in the window of my mother's +room, which was just visible over the tops of the apple trees in +the orchard.</p> +<p>The Reverend Mother talked of Benediction. If she were in Rome +she would be in church singing the <i>Ora pro nobis</i>.</p> +<p>"Let us sing it now. Shall we?" she said.</p> +<p>At the next moment her deep majestic contralto, accompanied by +my own thin and quavering soprano, were sending out into the silent +air the holy notes which to me are like the reverberations of +eternity:</p> +<p>"Mater purissima<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ora pro nobis.</span><br /> +Mater castissima<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ora pro nobis."</span></p> +<p>When we had finished I found my hand lying in her lap. Patting +it gently she said:</p> +<p>"Mary, I am leaving you to-morrow."</p> +<p>"So soon?"</p> +<p>"Yes, but I can't go without telling you why I came"—and +then her mission was revealed to me.</p> +<p>She had heard about my marriage and the ruin it had fallen to; +my disappearance from home and the circumstances of my recovery; my +husband's petition for divorce and the disclosures that had +followed it.</p> +<p>But sad and serious and even tragic as all this might be, it was +as nothing (in the eyes of the Church and of God) compared with the +awful gravity of the step I now contemplated—a second +marriage while my husband was still alive.</p> +<p>She had nothing to say against Martin. Except the facts that +concerned myself she had never heard a word to his discredit. She +could even understand those facts, though she could not condone +them. Perhaps he had seen my position (married to a cruel and +unfaithful husband) and his pity had developed into love—she +had heard of such happenings.</p> +<p>"But only think, my child, what an abyss he is driving you to! +He asks you to break your marriage vows! . . . Oh, yes, yes, I can +see what he will say—that pressure was put upon you and you +were too young to know what you were doing. That may be true, but +it isn't everything. I thought it wrong, cruelly wrong, that your +father should choose a husband for you without regard to your wish +and will. But it was you, not your father, who made your marriage +vows, and you can never get away from that—never!"</p> +<p>Those marriage vows were sacred; our blessed Saviour had said +they could never be broken, and our holy Church had taken His +Commandment for law.</p> +<p>"Think, my child, only think what would happen to the world if +every woman who has made an unhappy marriage were to do as you +think of doing. What a chaos! What an uprooting of all the sacred +ties of home and family! And how women would suffer—women and +children above all. Don't you see that, my daughter?"</p> +<p>The security of society lay in the sanctity of marriage; the +sanctity of marriage lay in its indissolubility; and its +indissolubility centred in the fact that God was a party to it.</p> +<p>"Perhaps you are told that your marriage will be your own +concern only and that God and the Church have nothing to do with +it. But if women had believed that in all ages, how different the +world would be to-day! Oh, believe me, your marriage vow is sacred, +and you cannot break it without sin—mortal sin, my +daughter."</p> +<p>The moral of all this was that I must renounce Martin Conrad, +wash my heart clean of my love of him, shun the temptation of +seeing him again, and if possible forget him altogether.</p> +<p>"It will be hard. I know it will he hard, but. . . ."</p> +<p>"It will be quite impossible," I said as well as I could, for my +very lips were trembling.</p> +<p>I had been shaken to the depths of my soul by what the Reverend +Mother said, but remembering Martin's warning I now struggled to +resist her.</p> +<p>"Two years ago, while I was living with my husband I tried to do +that and I couldn't," I said. "And if I couldn't do it then, when +the legal barrier stood between us, how can I do it now when the +barrier is gone?"</p> +<p>After that I told her of all I had passed through since as a +result of my love for Martin—how I had parted from him when +he went down to the Antarctic; how I had waited for him in London; +how I had sacrificed family and friends and home, and taken up +poverty and loneliness and hard work for him; how I had fallen into +fathomless depths of despair when I thought I had lost him; and how +joy and happiness had returned only when God, in His gracious +goodness, had given him back.</p> +<p>"No, no, no", I cried. "My love for Martin can never be overcome +or forgotten—never as long as I live in the world!"</p> +<p>"Then," said the Reverend Mother (she had been listening +intently with her great eyes fixed on my hot and tingling face), +"then," she said, in her grave and solemn voice, "If that is the +case, my child, there is only one thing for you to do—to +leave it."</p> +<p>"Leave it?"</p> +<p>"Leave the world, I mean. Return with me to Rome and enter the +convent."</p> +<p>It would be impossible to say how this affected me—how it +shook me to the heart's core—how, in spite of my efforts to +act on my darling's warning, it seemed to penetrate to the inmost +part of my being and to waken some slumbering instinct in my +soul.</p> +<p>For a long time I sat without speaking again, only listening +with a fluttering heart to what the Reverend Mother was +saying—that it was one of the objects of the religious life +to offer refuge to the tortured soul that could not trust itself to +resist temptation; and that taking my vows as a nun to God would be +the only way (known to and acknowledged by the Church) of +cancelling my vows as a wife to my husband.</p> +<p>"You will be a bride still, my child, but a bride of Christ. And +isn't that better—far better? You used to wish to be a nun, +you know, and if your father had not come for you on that most +unhappy errand you might have been one of ourselves already. Think +of it, my child. The Mothers of our convent will be glad to welcome +you, if you can come as a willing and contented Sister. And how can +I leave you here, at the peril of your soul, my daughter?"</p> +<p>I was deeply moved, but I made one more effort.</p> +<p>I told the Reverend Mother that, since the days when I had +wished to be a nun, a great change had come over me. I had become a +woman, with all a woman's passions—the hunger and thirst for +love, human love, the love of the good man who loved me with all +his soul and strength. Therefore I could never be a willing and +contented Sister. I should only break the peace and harmony of +their house. And though she were to put me down in the lowest cell +of her convent, my love would follow me there; it would interrupt +my offices, it would clamour through my prayers, and I should +always be unhappy—miserably unhappy.</p> +<p>"Not so unhappy there as you will be if you remain in the world +and carry out your intention," said the Reverend Mother. "Oh +believe me, my child, I know you better than you know yourself. If +you marry again, you will never be able to forget that you have +broken your vow. Other women may forget it—frivolous +women—women living in society and devoting their lives to +selfish pleasures. Such women may divorce their husbands, or be +divorced by them, and then marry again, without remembering that +they are living in a state of sin, whatever the civil law may +say—open and wicked and shameless sin. But you will remember +it, and it will make you more unhappy than you have ever been in +your life before."</p> +<p>"Worse than that," she continued, after a moment, "it will make +your husband unhappy also. He will see your remorse, and share it, +because he will know he has been the cause. If he is a good man the +mere sight of your grief will torture him. The better man he is the +more will he suffer. If you were a runaway nun he would wish to +take you back to your convent, for though it might tear his heart +out to part with you, he would want to restore your soul. But being +a wife who has broken her marriage vows he will never be able to do +anything. An immense and awful shadow will stand between you and +darken every hour of your lives that is left."</p> +<p>When the Reverend Mother had done I sat motionless and +speechless, with an aching and suffocating heart, staring down on +the garden over which the night was falling.</p> +<p>After a while she patted my cold hand and got up to go, saying +she would call early in the morning to bid me good-bye. Her visit +to Ireland would not last longer than three weeks, and after that +she might come back for me, if I felt on reflection (she was sure I +should) that I ought to return with her to Rome.</p> +<p>I did not reply. Perhaps it was partly because I was physically +weak that my darling's warning was so nearly overcome. But the +moment the door closed on the Reverend Mother a conviction of the +truth of what she had said rushed upon me like the waves of an +overflowing sea.</p> +<p>Yet how cruel! After all our waiting, all our longing, all our +gorgeous day-dreams of future happiness! When I was going to be a +bride, a happy bride, with my lost and stolen girlhood coming back +to me!</p> +<p>For the second time a dark and frowning mountain had risen +between Martin and me. Formerly it had been my marriage—now +it was my God.</p> +<p>But if God forbade my marriage with Martin what was I to do? +What was left in life for me? Was there anything left?</p> +<p>I was sitting with both hands over my face, asking myself these +questions and struggling with a rising tempest of tears, when I +heard baby crying in the room below, and Christian Ann hushing and +comforting her.</p> +<p>"What's doing on the <i>boght</i>, I wonder?"</p> +<p>A few minutes later they came upstairs, Isabel on her +grandmother's arm, in her nightdress, ready for bed.</p> +<p>"If it isn't the wind I don't know in the world what's doing on +the <i>millish</i>," said the old lady.</p> +<p>And then baby smiled through the big round beads that stood in +her sea-blue eyes and held out her arms to me.</p> +<p>Oh God! Oh God! Was not <i>this</i> my answer?</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_THIRTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTEENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>In her different way Christian Ann had arrived at the same +conclusion. Long before the thought came to me she had conceived +the idea that Father Dan and the Reverend Mother were conspiring to +carry me off, and in her dear sweet womanly jealousy (not to speak +of higher and nobler instincts) she had resented this +intensely.</p> +<p>For four days she had smothered her wrath, only revealing it to +baby in half-articulate interviews over the cradle ("We're no women +for these nun bodies, going about the house like ghosts, are we, +<i>villish</i>?"), but on the fifth day it burst into the fiercest +flame and the gentle old thing flung out at everybody.</p> +<p>That was the morning of the departure of the Reverend Mother, +who, after saying good-bye to me in my bedroom, had just returned +to the parlour-kitchen, where Father Dan was waiting to take her to +the railway station.</p> +<p>What provoked Christian Ann's outburst I never rightly knew, for +though the door to the staircase was open, and I could generally +catch anything that was said in the room below (through the open +timbers of the unceiled floor), the soft voice of the Reverend +Mother never reached me, and the Irish roll of Father Dan's vowels +only rumbled up like the sound of a drum.</p> +<p>But Christian Ann's words came sharp and clear as the crack of a +breaker, sometimes trembling with indignation, sometimes quivering +with emotion, and at last thickening into sobs.</p> +<p>"Begging your pardon, ma'am, may I ask what is that you're +saying to the Father about Mary O'Neill? . . . Going back to Rome +is she? To the convent, eh? . . . No, ma'am, that she never will! +Not if I know her, ma'am. Not for any purpose in the world, ma'am. +. . . Temptation, you say? You know best, ma'am, but I don't call +it overcoming temptation—going into hidlands to get out of +the way of it. . . . Yes, I'm a Christian woman and a good Catholic +too, please the Saints, but asking your pardon, ma'am, I'm not +thinking too much of your convents, or believing the women inside +of them are living such very unselfish lives either, ma'am."</p> +<p>Another soft rumble as of a drum, and then—</p> +<p>"No, ma'am, no, that's truth enough, ma'am. I've never been a +nun myself, having had better work to do in the world, ma'am. But +it's all as one—I know what's going on in the convents, I'm +thinking. . . . Harmony and peace, you say? Yes, and jealousy and +envy sometimes, too, or you wouldn't be women like the rest of us, +ma'am. . . . As for Mary O'Neill, <i>she</i> has something better +to do too, I'm thinking. . . . After doing wrong, is she? Maybe she +is, the <i>boght millish</i>, maybe we all are, ma'am, and have +need of God's mercy and forgiveness. But I never heard that praying +is the only kind of penance He asks of us, ma'am. And if it is, I +wouldn't trust but there are poor women who are praying as well +when they're working over their wash-tubs as some ones when they're +saying their rosaries and singing their Tantum Ergos. . . ."</p> +<p>Another interruption and then—"There's Bella Kinnish +herself who keeps the corner shop, ma'am. Her husband was lost at +the 'mackerel' two years for Easter. He left her with three little +children and a baby unborn, and Bella's finding it middling hard to +get a taste of butcher's meat, or even a bit of loaf-bread itself +for them, ma'am. And when she's sitting late at night, as the +doctor's telling me, and all the rest of the village dark, darning +little Liza's stockings, and patching little Willie's coat, or +maybe nursing the baby when it's down with the measles, the Lord is +as pleased with her, I'm thinking, as with some of your nun bodies +in their grand blue cloaks taking turn and turn to kneel before the +tabernacle."</p> +<p>There was another rumble of apologetic voices after that (both +Father Dan's and the Reverend Mother's), and then came Christian +Ann's clear notes again, breaking fast, though, and sometimes +threatening to stop.</p> +<p>"What's that you're saying, ma'am? . . . Motherhood a sacred and +holy state also? 'Deed it is, ma'am! That's truth enough too, +though some ones who shut themselves up in convents don't seem to +think so. . . . A mother's a mother, and what's more, her child is +her child, wedlock or no wedlock. And if she's doing right by her +little one, and bringing it up well, and teaching it true, I don't +know that when her time comes the Lord will be asking her which +side of her wedding-day it was born on. . . .</p> +<p>"As for Mary O'Neill, ma'am, when you're talking and talking +about her saving her soul, you're forgetting she has her child to +save too, ma'am. God gave her the <i>boght villish</i>, and is she +to run away from it? It's a fine blessing would be on her for that, +isn't it? . . . Father Dan, I'm surprised at you—such a +terrible, cruel, shocking, unnatural thing as you're thinking. I +thought you were a better man than that—I really did. . . . +And as for some ones that call themselves Mothers, they're no +mothers at all and never will be—tempting a poor woman in her +trouble to leave her child to be a charge on other people. . . +."</p> +<p>Still another rumble of soft voices and then—</p> +<p>"Not that I'm thinking of myself, ma'am. Dear heart, no! It's +only too eager I'd be to have the lil angel to myself. There she is +on the hearthrug, ma'am, and if anything happens to Mary O'Neill, +it's there she'll be for the rest of <i>my</i> life, and it's sorry +I am for the darling's sake that my time cannot be longer. . . +.</p> +<p>"But Mary O'Neill isn't for leaving her little one to go into +any convent. 'Deed no, ma'am! There would be no rest on her if she +did. I'm a mother myself and I know what she'd be feeling. You +might put the black hood on her head, but Nature's a wonderful +powerful thing, and she'd never go to bed at night or get up in the +morning without thinking of her baby. 'Where's she now?' she'd be +asking herself. 'What's happening to my motherless child?' she'd be +saying. And as the years went on she'd be thinking, 'Is she well, +and has she taken her first communion, and is she growing up a good +woman, and what's the world doing on her?' . . .</p> +<p>"No, ma'am, no! Mary O'Neill will go into no convent while her +child is here to be cared for! 'Deed she won't! Not Mary O'Neill! +I'll never believe it of her! Never in this world!"</p> +<p>I heard nothing more for a long time after that—nothing +but a noise in my own head which drowned all other noises. And when +I recovered my composure the Reverend Mother and Father Dan must +have gone, for there was no sound in the room below except that of +the rocking-chair (which was going rapidly) and Christian Ann's +voice, fierce but broken as if baby had cried and she was +comforting her.</p> +<p>Then a great new spirit came to me. It was Motherhood again! The +mighty passion of motherhood—which another mighty passion had +temporarily overlaid—sweeping down on me once more out of the +big, simple, child-like heart of my Martin's mother.</p> +<p>In the fever of body and brain at that moment it seemed to solve +all the problems of life for me.</p> +<p>If the Commandment of God forbade me to marry again because I +had already taken vows before the altar (no matter how innocently +or under what constraint), and if I had committed a sin, a great +sin, and baby was the living sign of it, there was only one thing +left me to do—to remain as I was and consecrate the rest of +my life to my child.</p> +<p>That would be the real expiation, not burying myself in a +convent. To live for my child! Alone with her! Here, where my sin +had been, to work out my atonement!</p> +<p>This pleased and stirred and uplifted me very much when I first +thought of it. And even when I remembered Martin, and thought how +hard it would be to tear myself away from the love which waited +with open arms for me (So near, so sweet, so precious), there +seemed to be something majestic, almost sublime, in the sacrifice I +was about to make—the sacrifice of everything in the world +(except one thing) that was dearer to me than life itself.</p> +<p>A sort of spiritual pride came with the thought of this +sacrifice. I saw myself as a woman who, having pledged herself to +God in her marriage and sinned against the law in breaking her +marriage vows, was now going to accept her fate and to humble +herself before the bar of Eternal Justice.</p> +<p>But oh, what a weak, vain thing I was, just when I thought I was +so strong and noble!</p> +<p>After a long day in which I had been fighting back the pains of +my poor torn heart and almost persuading myself that I had won a +victory, a letter came by the evening post which turned all my +great plans to dust and ashes.</p> +<p>The letter was from Martin. Only four little pages, written in +my darling's rugged hand, half serious and half playful, yet they +made the earth rock and reel beneath me.</p> +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>"MY DEAR LITTLE WOMAN,—<i>Just back from Windsor. Stunning +'do.' Tell you all about it when I get back home. Meantime up to my +eyes in work. Arrangements for next Expedition going ahead +splendidly. Had a meeting of the committee yesterday and settled to +sail by the 'Orient' third week in August, so as to get down to +Winter Quarters in time to start south in October</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>Our own little affair has got to come off first, though, so +I'll see the High Bailiff as soon as I return</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>And what do you think, my 'chree'? The boys of the 'Scotia' +are all coming over to Ellan for the great event. 'Deed, yes, +though, every man-jack of them! Scientific staff included, not to +speak of O'Sullivan and old Treacle—who swears you blew a +kiss to him. They remember you coming down to Tilbury. Aw, God +bless me soul, gel, the way they're talking of you! There's no +holding them at all at all</i>!</p> +<p>"<i>Seriously, darling, you have no time to lose in making your +preparations. My plan is to take you to New Zealand and leave you +at Wellington (good little town, good people, too) while I make my +bit of a trip to the Pole</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>We'll arrange about Girlie when I reach home, which will be +next week, I hope—or rather fear—for every day is like +a month when I'm away from you</i>.</p> +<p>"<i>But never mind, little woman! Once I get this big Expedition +over we are not going to be separated any more. Not for a single +day as long as we live, dearest! No, by the Lord God—life's +too short for it</i>.</p> +<p>"MART."</p> +</div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FOURTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTEENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>After I had read this letter I saw that my great battle, which I +had supposed to be over, was hardly begun.</p> +<p>Martin was coming home with his big heart full of love for me, +and my own heart ran out to meet him.</p> +<p>He intended to sail for New Zealand the second week in August, +and he expected to take me with him.</p> +<p>In spite of all my religious fears and misgivings, I asked +myself why I should not go? What was to prevent me? What sin had I +really committed? What was there for reparation? Was it anything +more than the letter of the Divine law that I had defied and +broken?</p> +<p>My love was mine and I was his, and I belonged to him for ever. +He was going out on a great errand in the service of humanity. +Couldn't I go to be his partner and helpmate? And if there +<i>had</i> been sin, if the law of God <i>had</i> been broken, +wouldn't that, too, be a great atonement?</p> +<p>Thus my heart fought with my soul, or with my instincts as a +child of the Church, or whatever else it was that brought me back +and back, again and again, in spite of all the struggles of my +love, to the firm Commandment of our Lord.</p> +<p>Father Dan had been right—I could not get away from that. +The Reverend Mother had been right, too—other women might +forget that they had broken the Divine law but I never should. If I +married Martin and went away with him, I should always be thinking +of the falseness of my position, and that would make me unhappy. It +would also make Martin unhappy to witness my unhappiness, and that +would be the worst bitterness life could bring.</p> +<p>Then what was left to me? If it was impossible that I should +bury myself in a convent it was equally impossible that I should +live alone, and Martin in the same world with me.</p> +<p>Not all the spiritual pride I could conjure up in the majesty +and solemnity of my self-sacrifice could conquer the yearning of my +heart as a woman. Not all my religious fervour could keep me away +from Martin. In spite of my conscience, sooner or later I should go +to him—I knew quite well I should. And my child, instead of +being a barrier dividing us, would be a natural bond calling on us +and compelling us to come together.</p> +<p>Then what was left to a woman in my position who believed in the +Divine Commandment—who could not get away from it? Were all +the doors of life locked to her? Turn which way she would, was +there no way out?</p> +<p>Darker and darker every day became this question, but light came +at last, a kind of light or the promise of light. It was terrible, +and yet it brought me, oh, such immense relief!</p> +<p>I am almost afraid to speak of it, so weak and feeble must any +words be in which I attempt to describe that unforgetable change. +Already I had met some of the mysteries of a woman's life—now +I was to meet the last, the greatest, the most tragic, and yet the +kindest of them all.</p> +<p>I suppose the strain of emotion I had been going through had +been too much for my physical strength, for three days after the +arrival of Martin's letter I seemed to be really ill.</p> +<p>I am ashamed to dwell on my symptoms, but for a moment I am +forced to do so. My eyes were bright, my cheeks were coloured, and +there was no outward indication of any serious malady. But towards +evening I always had a temperature, and in the middle of the night +(I was sleeping badly) it rose very high, with a rapid pulse and +anxious breathing, and in the morning there was great +exhaustion.</p> +<p>Old Doctor Conrad, who had been coming to me twice a day, began +to look very grave. At last, after a short examination, he said, +rather nervously:</p> +<p>"I should like a colleague from Blackwater to consult with me. +Will you receive him?"</p> +<p>I said "Yes" on one condition—that if the new doctor had +anything serious to say he should report it first to me.</p> +<p>A little reluctantly Martin's father agreed to my terms and the +consulting physician was sent for. He came early the next +day—a beautiful Ellan morning with a light breeze from the +sea bringing the smell of new-mown hay from the meadows lying +between.</p> +<p>He was an elderly man, and I could not help seeing a shadow +cross his clean-shaven face the moment his eyes first fell on me. +They were those tender but searching eyes which are so often seen +in doctors, who are always walking through the Valley of the Shadow +and seem to focus their gaze accordingly.</p> +<p>Controlling his expression, he came up to my bed and, taking the +hand I held out to him, he said:</p> +<p>"I trust we'll not frighten you, my lady."</p> +<p>I liked that (though I cared nothing about my lost title, I +thought it was nice of him to remember it), and said I hoped I +should not be too restless.</p> +<p>While he took out and fixed his stethoscope (he had such +beautiful soft hands) he told me that he had had a daughter of my +own age once.</p> +<p>"Once? Where is she now?" I asked him.</p> +<p>"In the Kingdom. She died like a Saint," he answered.</p> +<p>Then he made a long examination (returning repeatedly to the +same place), and when it was over and he raised his face I thought +it looked still more serious.</p> +<p>"My child," he said (I liked that too), "you've never spared +yourself, have you?"</p> +<p>I admitted that I had not.</p> +<p>"When you've had anything to do you've done it, whatever it +might cost you."</p> +<p>I admitted that also. He looked round to see if there was +anybody else in the room (there was only the old doctor, who was +leaning over the end of the bed, watching the face of his +colleague) and then said, in a low voice:</p> +<p>"Has it ever happened that you have suffered from privation and +hard work and loss of sleep and bad lodgings and . . . and +exposure?"</p> +<p>His great searching eyes seemed to be looking straight into my +soul, and I could not have lied to him if I had wished, so I told +him a little (just a little) about my life in London—at +Bayswater, in the East End and Ilford.</p> +<p>"And did you get wet sometimes, very wet, through all your +clothes?" he asked me.</p> +<p>I told him No, but suddenly remembering that during the cold +days after baby came (when I could not afford a fire) I had dried +her napkins on my body, I felt that I could not keep that fact from +him.</p> +<p>"You dried baby's napkins on your own body?" he asked.</p> +<p>"Sometimes I did. Just for a while," I answered, feeling a +little ashamed, and my tears rising.</p> +<p>"Ah!" he said, and then turning to the old doctor, "What a +mother will do for her child, Conrad!"</p> +<p>The eyes of Doctor Conrad (which seemed to have become swollen) +were still fixed on the face of his colleague, and, speaking as if +he had forgotten that I was present with them in the room, he +said:</p> +<p>"You think she's very ill, don't you?"</p> +<p>"We'll talk of that in your consulting-room," said the strange +doctor.</p> +<p>Then, telling me to lie quiet and they would come back +presently, he went downstairs and Martin's father followed him.</p> +<p>Nurse came up while they were away (she had taken possession of +me during the last few days), and I asked her who were in the +parlour-kitchen.</p> +<p>"Only Father Donovan and Mrs. Conrad—and baby," she told +me.</p> +<p>Then the doctors came back—the consultant first, trying to +look cheerful, and the old doctor last, with a slow step and his +head down, as if he had been a prisoner coming back to court to +receive sentence.</p> +<p>"My lady," said the strange doctor, "you are a brave woman if +ever there was one, so we have decided to tell you the truth about +your condition."</p> +<p>And then he told me.</p> +<p>I was not afraid. I will not say that I was not sorry. I could +have wished to live a little longer—especially now when (but +for the Commandment of God) love and happiness seemed to be within +my grasp.</p> +<p>But oh, the relief! There was something sacred in it, something +supernatural. It was as if God Himself had come down to me in the +bewildering maze that was haunted by the footsteps of my fate and +led me out of it.</p> +<p>Yet why these poor weak words? They can mean so little to +anybody except a woman who has been what I was, and she can have no +need of them.</p> +<p>All fear had vanished from my thoughts. I had no fear for +myself, I remembered, and none for baby. The only regret I felt was +for Martin—he loved me so; there had never been any other +woman in the world for him.</p> +<p>After a moment I thanked the doctors and hoped I had not given +them too much trouble. Doctor Conrad seemed crushed into +stupefaction and said nothing; but the strange doctor tried to +comfort me by saying there would be no pain, and that my malady was +of a kind that would probably make no outward manifestation.</p> +<p>Being a woman to the end I was very glad of that, and then I +asked him if it would last long. He said No, not long, he feared, +although everything was in God's hands and nobody could say +certainly.</p> +<p>I was saying I was glad of that too, when my quick ears caught a +sound of crying. It was Christian Ann, and Father Dan was hushing +her. I knew what was happening—the good souls were listening +at the bottom of the stairs.</p> +<p>My first impulse was to send nurse to say they were not to cry. +Then I had half a mind to laugh, so that they might hear me and +know that what I was going through was nothing. But finally I +bethought me of Martin, and asked that they might both be brought +up, for I had something to say to them.</p> +<p>After a moment they came into the room, Christian Ann in her +simple pure dress, and Father Dan in his shabby sack coat, both +looking very sorrowful, the sweet old children.</p> +<p>Then (my two dear friends standing together at the foot of the +bed) I told them what the doctor had said, and warned them that +they were to tell nobody else—nobody whatever, especially +Martin.</p> +<p>"Leave <i>me</i> to tell <i>him</i>," I said. "Do you faithfully +promise me?"</p> +<p>I could see how difficult it was for them to keep back their +tears, but they gave me their word and that was all I wanted.</p> +<p>"My boy! My poor boy <i>veen!</i> He's thinking there isn't +another woman in the world like her," said Christian Ann.</p> +<p>And then Father Dan said something about my mother extracting +the same promise concerning myself, when I was a child at +school.</p> +<p>After that the Blackwater doctor stepped up to say good-bye.</p> +<p>"I leave you in good hands, but you must let me come to see you +again some day," he said, and then with a playful smile he +added:</p> +<p>"They've got lots of angels up in heaven—we must try to +keep some of them on earth, you know."</p> +<p>That was on the fifth of July, old Midsummer Day, which is our +national day in Ellan, and flags were flying over many of the +houses in the village.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_FIFTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTEENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>JULY 6. I feel so much better to-day. I hardly know what +reaction of my whole being, physical and spiritual, has set in +since yesterday, but my heart is lighter than for a long time, and +sleep, which I had come to look upon as a lost blessing, came to me +last night for four solid hours—beautiful and untroubled as a +child's.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 8. Martin writes that he expects to be here on the 12th. +Letter full of joyous spirits. "Lots to tell you when I reach home, +dearest." Strange! No mortal can imagine how anxious I am to get +him back, yet I almost dread his coming. When he was away before, +Time could not go fast enough for me. Now it is going too fast. I +know what that means—the story I have to tell. How am I to +tell it?</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 10. Only two days more and Martin will be here. Of course I +must be up when he arrives. Nurse says No, but I say Yes. To be in +bed when he comes would be too much a shock for him.</p> +<p>"Servants are such domineering tyrants," says Christian Ann, who +never had but one, and "the strange woman" was such a phantom in +the house that the poor mistress was grateful to God when +Hollantide came round and the ghost walked away of itself. My nurse +is a dear, though. How glad I am now that I persuaded Christian Ann +to let her stay.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 12. Martin comes to-day, and the old doctor (with such a +proud and stately step) has gone off to Blackwater to meet him. I +am terribly weak (no pain whatever), but perfectly resolute on +dressing and going downstairs towards tea-time. I shall wear a +white tea-gown, which Sister Mildred gave me in London. Martin +likes me best in white.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>LATER. My Martin has come! We had counted it up that travelling +across the island by motor-car he would arrive at five, so I was +dressed and downstairs by four, sitting in the <i>chiollagh</i> and +watching the road through the window opposite. But he was half an +hour late, and Christian Ann and I were in such a fever that +anybody would have believed it to be half a century and that the +world had stood still.</p> +<p>We might have known what would happen. At Blackwater "the boys" +(the same that "got up the spree" when Martin went away) had +insisted on a demonstration. Then, on reaching our village, Martin +had got down and shaken hands with everybody—the joiner and +the grocer and the blacksmith and the widow who keeps the corner +shop—so that it had taken him a quarter of an hour to get +through, amid a general chorus of "The boy he is, though!" and "No +pride at all at all!"</p> +<p>After that he drove home at top speed, and my quick ears caught +the musical hum of the motor as it crossed the bridge. Good +gracious, what excitement!</p> +<p>"Quick nurse, help me to the gate."</p> +<p>I got there just in time to hear a shout, and to see a +precipitate bound out of the car and then . . . what an +embrace!</p> +<p>It is such a good thing my Martin is a big, brawny person, for I +don't know how I should have got back to the house, being so weak +and breathless just then, if his strong arm had not been round my +waist.</p> +<p>Dr. O'Sullivan had come too, looking as gay as a humming-bird, +and after I had finished with Martin I kissed him also (having such +a largesse of affection to distribute generally), whereupon he +blushed like a boy, bless him, and stammered out something about +St. Patrick and St. Thomas, and how he wouldn't have believed +anybody who had said there was anything so sweet, etc.</p> +<p>Martin said I was looking so well, and he, too, declared he +wouldn't have believed any man who had sworn I could have looked so +much better in the time.</p> +<p>My nervous thermometer must have gone up by leaps and bounds +during the next hour, for immediately after tea the old doctor +ordered me back to bed, though I refused to go until he had +faithfully promised that the door to the staircase should be kept +open, so that I could hear what was said downstairs.</p> +<p>What lots of fun they had there! Half the parish must have come +in "to put a sight" on Martin after his investiture, including old +Tommy the Mate, who told everybody over and over again that he had +"known the lad since he was a lump" and "him and me are same as +brothers."</p> +<p>The old doctor's stately pride must have been something to see. +It was "Sir Martin" here and "Sir Martin" there, until I could have +cried to hear him. I felt just as foolish myself, too, for though I +cannot remember that my pulse gave one extra beat when they made me +"your ladyship," now that Martin has become. . . . But that's what +we women are, you see!</p> +<p>At length Martin's big voice came up clear above the rest, and +then the talk was about the visit to Windsor. Christian Ann wanted +to know if he wasn't "freckened" to be there, "not being used of +Kings," whereupon he cried:</p> +<p>"What! Frightened of another man—and a stunning good one, +too!"</p> +<p>And then came a story of how the King had asked if he hadn't +been in fear of icebergs, and how he had answered No, you could +strike more of them in a day in London (meaning icy-hearted people) +than in a life-time in the Antarctic.</p> +<p>I suppose I must have laughed at that, for the next I heard +was:</p> +<p>"Hush! Isn't that Mary!"</p> +<p>"Aw, yes, the poor <i>veg veen</i>," said a sad voice. It was +Christian Ann's. At the bottom of her heart I shall always be the +child who "sang carvals to her door."</p> +<p>What a wonderful day! I shall not sleep a wink to-night, though. +To-morrow I must tell him.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 13. I intended to tell Martin this morning, but I really +couldn't.</p> +<p>I was going downstairs to breakfast, holding on to the +bannisters at one side and using nurse's shoulder as my other +crutch, when I saw the brightest picture I have ever beheld. Baby +and Martin were on hands and knees on the rag-work hearthrug, face +to face—Martin calling her to come, Isabel lifting up her +little head to him, like a fledgling in a nest, and both laughing +with that gurgling sound as of water bubbling out of a bottle.</p> +<p>This sight broke all the breath out of me at the very first +moment. And when Martin, after putting me into my place in the +<i>chiollagh</i>, plunged immediately into a rapturous account of +his preparations for our departure—how we were to be married +by special license at the High Bailiff's on the tenth (if that date +would do), how I was to rest a day and then travel up to London on +the twelfth, and then rest other four days (during which warm +clothes could be bought for me), and sail by the <i>Orient</i> on +the sixteenth—I could not find it in my heart to tell him +then of the inexorable fate that confronted us.</p> +<p>It was cowardice, I knew, and sooner or later I should have to +pay for it. But when he went on to talk about baby, and appealed to +his mother to say if she wouldn't look after Girlie when I was +gone, and Christian Ann (in such a different tone) said Yes, she +would look after Girlie when I was gone, I decided that I dared not +tell him at all—I would die rather than do so.</p> +<p>The end of it all is that I have arranged with Christian Ann, +the old doctor, and Father Dan that Time and Martin's own +observation are to tell him what is going to happen, and none of us +are to say anything about it.</p> +<p>What a deceiver I am, though! I put it all down to my unselfish +love for Martin. It would be such a blow to him—disturbing +his plans, upsetting everything, perhaps causing him to postpone +his Expedition, or even to abandon it altogether. "Let the truth +fall soft on him. He'll see it soon enough. Don't let us be +cruel."</p> +<p>The dear sweet, unsuspecting old darlings have taken it all +in—all my vain and cowardly selfishness. I am to play the +part of pretending to fall in with Martin's plans, and they are to +stand by and say nothing.</p> +<p>Can I do it? I wonder, I wonder!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 15. I am becoming quite a great actress! It's astonishing +to see how I develop my deceptions under all sorts of veils and +disguises.</p> +<p>Martin told me to-day that he had given up the idea of leaving +me at Wellington and had determined to take me on to Winter +Quarters, having met, on the way to Windsor, some great specialist +in my kind of malady (I wonder how much he knows of it), who +declared that the climate of the Antarctic would act on me like +magic.</p> +<p>Such glorious sunshine in summer! Such crisp, dry, stimulating +air! New life with every breath! Such a stunning little house, too, +so cosy and comfortable! And then the men whom he would leave +behind while he slipped down South—they would worship me!</p> +<p>"How splendid! How glorious!" I cried. "How delightful to be +mistress over a houseful of big, hungry, healthy boys, who come in +out of the snow and want to eat up everything!"</p> +<p>Sometimes I feel myself being carried away by my own acting, and +then I see the others (Christian Ann and the old doctor and Father +Dan) dropping their heads or stealing out of the room.</p> +<p>I wish I were not so weak. I feel no pain whatever. Only this +temperature during the nights and the ever-deepening exhaustion in +the mornings.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 16. I am keeping it up! To-day I was alone with Martin for +a long hour in the garden-house. Weather soft and beautiful, the +heavens blue, and gleams of sunshine coming through the +trellis-work.</p> +<p>Merely to sit beside my darling with his odour of health is to +feel a flood of bodily strength coursing through me, enough to make +me forget that I am a frail thing myself, who could be blown away +by a puff of wind. But to hear him talk on his own subject is to be +lifted up to the highest reaches of the soul.</p> +<p>I always say there is a dumb poet in every explorer; but the +poet wasn't dumb to-day when Martin talked about the cyclone or +anticyclone, or whatever it is which covers the region of the South +Pole like a cap, and determines the weather of a great part of the +habitable globe.</p> +<p>"We are going to take from God his word and pass it on to the +world," he said.</p> +<p>After that he made reference (for the first time since his +return) to the difficulties of our position, saying what a glorious +thing it would be to escape to that great free region from the +world of civilisation, with its effete laws and worn-out creeds +which enslave humanity.</p> +<p>"Only a month to-day until we start, and you'll be well enough +to travel then, dearest."</p> +<p>"Yes, yes, only a month to-day, and I shall be well enough then, +dearest."</p> +<p>Oh, Mary O'Neill! How much longer will you be able to keep it +up, dear?</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 17. Martin brought the proofs of his new book from London, +and to-day in the summer-house (bluebells paling out and hanging +their heads, but the air full of the odour of fruit trees) he and +Dr. O'Sullivan and I have been correcting "galleys"—the +doctor reading aloud, Martin smoking his briar-root pipe, and I (in +a crater of cushions) supposed to be sitting as judge and jury.</p> +<p>Such simple, straight, natural writing! There may have been a +thousand errors but my ears heard none of them. The breathless bits +about the moments when death was near; the humorous bits about +patching the tent with the tails of their shirts when an overturned +lamp burnt a hole in the canvas—this was all I was conscious +of until I was startled by the sound of a sepulchral voice, +groaning out "Oh Lord a-massy me!" and by the sight of a Glengarry +cap over the top of the fuchsia hedge. Old Tommy was listening from +the road.</p> +<p>We sat late over our proofs and then, the dew having begun to +fall, Martin said he must carry me indoors lest my feet should get +wet—which he did, with the result that, remembering what had +happened on our first evening at Castle Raa, I had a pretty fit of +hysterics as soon as we reached the house.</p> +<p>"Let's skip, Commanther," was the next thing I heard, and then I +was helped upstairs to bed.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 18. What a flirt I am becoming! Having conceived the idea +that Dr. O'Sullivan is a little wee bit in love with me too, I have +been playing him off against Martin.</p> +<p>It was so delicious (after all I have gone through) to have two +magnificent men, out of the heroic youth of the world, waiting hand +and foot on one little woman, that the feminine soul in me to-day +couldn't resist the temptation to an innocent effort at +coquetry.</p> +<p>So before we began business on the proofs I told Martin that, if +he was determined to leave me behind at winter quarters while he +went away to the Pole, he must allow Dr. O'Sullivan to remain +behind to take care of me.</p> +<p>Of course the doctor rose to my bait like a dear, crying:</p> +<p>"He will too—by St. Patrick and St. Thomas he will, and a +mighty proud man he'll be entirely. . . ."</p> +<p>But good gracious! A momentary shadow passed over Martin's face, +then came one of his big broad smiles, then out shot his clinched +fist, and . . . the poor doctor and his garden seat were rolling +over each other on the grass.</p> +<p>However, we got through without bloodshed, and did good day's +work on the book.</p> +<p>I must not write any more. I have always written in my own book +at night, when I haven't been able to get any kind of Christian +sleep; but I'm weaker now, so must stop, lest I shouldn't have +strength enough for Martin's.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 20. Oh dear! I am dragging all these other poor dears into +my deceptions. Christian Ann does not mind what lies, or half-lies, +she has to tell in order to save pain to her beloved son. But the +old doctor! And Father Dan!</p> +<p>To-day itself, as Martin's mother would say, I had to make my +poor old priest into a shocking story-teller.</p> +<p>I developed a cough a few weeks ago, and though it is not really +of much account I have been struggling to smother it while Martin +has been about, knowing he is a doctor himself, and fearing his ear +might detect the note.</p> +<p>But this afternoon (whether a little damp, with a soft patter of +sweet rain on the trees and the bushes) I had a rather bad bout, at +which Martin's face looked grave, until I laughed and said:</p> +<p>"It's nothing! I've had this sort of cough every summer since I +was born—haven't I, Father Dan?"</p> +<p>"Ye-es."</p> +<p>I shall have to remember that in my next confession, but what +Father Dan is to do I really don't know.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 21. I have been rather down to-day about a newspaper that +came to me anonymously from Paris, with a report marked for my +special delectation.</p> +<p>"FASHIONABLE MARRIAGE OF AN ENGLISH PEER AND AN AMERICAN +HEIRESS."</p> +<p>My husband's and Alma's! It took place at the American Embassy, +and was attended by great numbers of smart people. There was a long +account of the grandeur of the bride's dress and of the splendour +of the bridegroom's presents. They have taken an apartment on the +Champs Elysées and will spend most of the year in Paris.</p> +<p>Ah well, why should I trouble about a matter that so little +concerns me? Alma is still beautiful; she will be surrounded by +admirers; her salon will be frequented by the fashionable parasites +of Europe and America.</p> +<p>As for my husband, the straw-fire of his wife's passion for him +will soon burn out, especially now that she has gained what she +wanted—his name, his title.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>Martin carried me upstairs to bed to-night. I was really feeling +weaker than usual, but we made a great game of it. Nurse went +first, behind a mountain of pillows; Martin and I came next, with +his arms about my body and mine around his neck; and Dr. O'Sullivan +last, carrying two tall brass candlesticks.</p> +<p>How we laughed! We all laughed together, as if trying to see +which of us could laugh the loudest. Only Christian Ann looked +serious, standing at the bottom of the stairs, nursing baby in her +nightdress.</p> +<p>It is three o'clock in the morning as I write, and I can hear +our laughter still—only it sounds like sobbing now.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 22. Have heard something to-day that has taken all the +warmth of life out of me. It is about my father, whom the old +doctor still attends. Having been told of my husband's marriage he +has announced his intention of claiming my child if anything +happens to me!</p> +<p>What his object may be I do not know. He cannot be thinking of +establishing a claim to my husband's title—Isabel being a +girl. Remembering something his lawyer said about the marriage +settlement when I consulted him on the subject of divorce, I can +only assume that (now he is poor) he is trying to recover the +inheritance he settled on my husband.</p> +<p>It frightens me—raising my old nightmare of a lawsuit +about the legitimacy of my child. I want to speak to Martin about +it. Yet how can I do so without telling him the truth which I have +been struggling so hard to conceal?</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 23. Oh, Mary O'Neill, what are you coming to?</p> +<p>I told Martin about father's threat, only I gave it another +colour. He had heard of the Reverend Mother's visit, so I said the +rumour had reached my father that I intended to enter a convent, +and he had declared that, if I did so, he would claim my child from +Christian Ann, being its nearest blood relation.</p> +<p>"Can he do so—when I am . . . when we are gone?" I +asked.</p> +<p>I thought Martin's strong face looked sterner than I had ever +seen it. He made a vague reply and left me soon afterwards on some +sort of excuse.</p> +<p>About an hour later he came back to carry me upstairs, and just +as he was setting me down, and Christian Ann was coming in with the +candles, he whispered:</p> +<p>"Don't worry about Girlie. I've settled that matter, I'm +thinking."</p> +<p>What has he done, I wonder?</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM OF MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>What I had done is easily told. I had gone straight to Daniel +O'Neill himself, intending to know the truth of the story and to +act accordingly.</p> +<p>Already I knew enough to scent mischief. I could not be so +stupefied into blindness of what was going on under my eyes as not +to see that the dirty question of money, and perhaps the dirtier +question of the aims and expectations of the woman MacLeod, were at +the root of the matter that was distressing my darling.</p> +<p>Daniel O'Neill had left the Big House and gone to live in his +mother's old cottage for two reasons—first, to delude the law +into the idea that he was himself utterly ruined by the bankruptcy +to which he had brought the whole island; and next, to gratify the +greed of his mistress, who wanted to get him to herself at the end, +so that he might be persuaded to marry her (if it were only on his +death-bed) and so establish, against any claim of his daughter's, +her widow's rights in what a husband leaves behind him—which +is half of everything in Ellan.</p> +<p>What connection this had with the man's desire to get hold of +the child I had yet to learn; but I meant to learn it without +another hour's delay, so I set off for the cottage on the +curragh.</p> +<p>It was growing dark, and not being sure of my way through the +ever-changing bypaths of the bog land, I called on Father Dan to +guide me. The old priest seemed to know my errand (the matter my +darling had communicated as a secret being common knowledge), and +at first he looked afraid.</p> +<p>"Well . . . yes, yes . . . why shouldn't I?" he said, and then, +"Yes, I will, I will"—with the air of a man who had made up +his mind to a daring enterprise.</p> +<p>Our curragh is a stretch of wild marsh lying over against the +sea, undrained, only partly cultivated, half covered with sedge and +sallow bushes, and consequently liable to heavy mists. There was a +mist over it that night, and hence it was not easy even for Father +Dan (accustomed to midnight visits to curragh cottages) to find the +house which had once been the home of "Neale the Lord."</p> +<p>We rooted it out at last by help of the parish constable, who +was standing at the corner of a by-road talking to the coachman of +a gorgeous carriage waiting there, with its two splendid horses +smoking in the thick night air.</p> +<p>When, over the shingle of what we call "the street," we reached +the low straggling crofter-cottage under its thick trammon tree +(supposed to keep off the evil spirits), I rapped with my knuckles +at the door, and it was opened by a tall scraggy woman with a +candle in her hand.</p> +<p>This was Nessy MacLeod, harder and uglier than ever, with her +red hair combed up, giving her the appearance of a bunch of carrots +over two stalks of rhubarb.</p> +<p>Almost before I had time to say that we had come to see Mr. +O'Neill, and to step into the house while saying so, a hoarse, +husky, querulous man's voice cried from within:</p> +<p>"Who is it, Nessy?"</p> +<p>It's Father Dan, and Martin . . . I mean Sir. . . ."</p> +<p>"That'll do," I said, and the next moment we were in the +living-room—a bare, bleak, comfortless Curraghman's +kitchen.</p> +<p>A more incongruous sight than we saw there human eyes never +beheld.</p> +<p>Daniel O'Neill, a shadow of the big brute creature he once was, +a shrivelled old man, with his bony hands scored and contracted +like an autumn leaf, his shrunken legs scarcely showing through his +baggy trousers, his square face whiter than the wall behind it, and +a piece of red flannel hanging over his head like a cowl, sat in +the elbow-chair at the side of the hearth-fire, while at a deal +table, which was covered with papers that looked like law deeds and +share certificates (being stamped and sealed), sat the Bishop of +the island, and its leading lawyer, Mr. Curphy.</p> +<p>On hearing my name and seeing me enter the house, Daniel O'Neill +lost all control of himself. He struggled to his feet by help of a +stick, and as I walked up to him he laid hold of me.</p> +<p>"You devil!" he cried. "You infernal villain! You. . . ."</p> +<p>But it is of no use to repeat what else he said in the fuming of +his rage, laying hold of me by the collar of my coat, and tugging +at it as if he would drag me to his feet.</p> +<p>I was half sorry for the man, badly as I thought of him, so I +only opened his hand (easy enough to do, for the grip was gone from +it) and said:</p> +<p>"You're an old man, sir, and you're a sick man—don't tempt +me to forget that you are the father of Mary O'Neill. Sit +down."</p> +<p>He sat down, breathless and broken, without another word. But +the Bishop, with a large air of outraged dignity, faced about to +poor Father Dan (who was standing near the door, turning his round +hat in his trembling hands) and said:</p> +<p>"Father Donovan, did you know that Mr. O'Neill was very +ill?"</p> +<p>"I did, Monsignor," said Father Dan.</p> +<p>"And that a surgeon is coming from London to perform an +operation upon him—did you know that?"</p> +<p>"I did, Monsignor."</p> +<p>"Did you know also that I was here to-night to attend with Mr. +Curphy to important affairs and perhaps discharge some sacred +duties?"</p> +<p>"I knew that too, Monsignor."</p> +<p>"Then," said the Bishop, pointing at me, "how dare you bring +this man here—this man of all others, who has been the chief +instrument in bringing shame and disgrace upon our poor sick friend +and his deeply injured family?"</p> +<p>"So that's how you look at it, is it, Monsignor?"</p> +<p>"Yes, sir, that is how I look at it, and I am sorry for a priest +of my Church who has so weakened his conscience by sympathy with +notorious sinners as to see things in any other light."</p> +<p>"Sinners, Bishop?"</p> +<p>"Didn't you hear me, Father Donovan? Or do you desire me to use +a harder name for them—for one of them in particular, on whom +you have wasted so much weak sentimentality, to the injury of your +spiritual influence and the demoralisation of your parish. I have +warned you already. Do you wish me to go further, to remove you +from your Presbytery, or perhaps report your conduct to those who +have power to take the frock off your back? What standard of +sanctity for the sacrament of Holy Matrimony do you expect to +maintain while you degrade it by openly associating with a woman +who has broken her marriage vows and become little better . . . I +grieve to say it [with a deep inclination of the head towards the +poor wreck in the elbow-chair] little better than a common. . . +."</p> +<p>I saw the word that was coming, and I was out in an instant. But +there was somebody before me. It was Father Dan. The timid old +priest seemed to break in one moment the bonds of a life-long +tyranny.</p> +<p>"What's that you say, Monsignor?" he cried in a shrill voice. +"<i>I</i> degrade the sacrament of Holy Matrimony? Never in this +world! But if there's anybody in the island of Ellan who has done +that same every day of his life, it's yourself, and never more +cruelly and shamefully than in the case we're talking of at this +present speaking."</p> +<p>"I'm not used to this kind of language from my clergy, Father +Donovan," began the Bishop, but before he could say more Father Dan +caught him up by crying:</p> +<p>"Perhaps not, Monsignor. But you've got to hear for once, and +that's now. When this man [pointing to Daniel O'Neill] for his own +purposes wanted to marry his daughter (who was a child and had no +choice in the matter) to one of another faith, a man who didn't +believe in the sacrament of marriage as we know it, who was it that +paved the way for him?"</p> +<p>"You actually mean that <i>I</i>. . . ."</p> +<p>"I mean that without your help, Monsignor, a good girl could +never have been married to a bad man. You didn't act in ignorance, +either. When somebody told you—somebody who is here +now—that the man to whom you were going to marry that +innocent girl was a notorious loose liver, a profligate, a +reprobate, a betrayer of women, and a damned scoundrel. . . ."</p> +<p>"Go on, Father Dan; that's God's own name for him," I said, when +the old priest caught his breath for a moment, terrified by the +word that had burst from his lips.</p> +<p>"Let's have an end of this," said the Bishop mightily.</p> +<p>"Wait a bit, sir," I said, and then Father Dan went on to say +how he had been told there was nothing to my story, and how he had +been forbidden to inquire into it.</p> +<p>"That's how you made <i>me</i> a party to this wicked marriage, +God and his Holy Mother pardon me! And now that it has come to the +end you might have expected, and the poor helpless child who was +bought and sold like a slave is in the position of the sinner, you +want me to cut her off, to turn the hearts of all good people +against her, to cast her out of communion, to make her a thing to +point the finger at—me, her spiritual father who baptized +her, taking her out of the arms of the angel who bore her and +giving her to Christ—or if I won't you'll deprive me of my +living, you'll report me to Rome, you'll unfrock me. . . ."</p> +<p>"Do it, Monsignor," cried Father Dan, taking a step nearer to +the Bishop and lifting a trembling hand over his head. "Do it, if +our holy Church will permit you, and I'll put a wallet on my old +shoulders and go round the houses of my parish in my old age, +begging a bite of bread and a basin of meal, and sleeping under a +thorn bush, rather than lay my head on my pillow and know that that +poor victim of your wicked scheming is in the road."</p> +<p>The throbbing and breaking of the old priest's voice had +compelled me to drop my head, and it was not until I heard the +sneck of the lock of the outer door that I realised that, overcome +by his emotion, he had fled from the house.</p> +<p>"And now I guess you can follow your friend," said Daniel +O'Neill.</p> +<p>"Not yet, sir," I answered; "I have something to say first."</p> +<p>"Well, well, what is it, please?" said the lawyer sharply and +insolently, looking to where I was standing with folded arms at one +side of the hearth-place.</p> +<p>"You'll hear soon enough, Master Curphy," I answered.</p> +<p>Then, turning back to Daniel O'Neill, I told him what rumour had +reached my dear one of his intentions with regard to her child, and +asked him to say whether there was any truth in it.</p> +<p>"Answer the man, Curphy," said Daniel O'Neill, and thereupon the +lawyer, with almost equal insolence, turned to me and said:</p> +<p>"What is it you wish to know, sir?"</p> +<p>"Whether, if Mary O'Neill is unable from any cause to keep +control of her child (which God forbid!), her father intends to +take possession of it."</p> +<p>"Why shouldn't he? If the mother dies, for instance, her father +will be the child's legal guardian."</p> +<p>"But if by that time the father is dead too—what +then?"</p> +<p>"Then the control of the child will—with the consent of +the court—devolve upon his heir and representative."</p> +<p>"Meaning this lady?" I asked, pointing to the woman MacLeod, who +was now standing at the back of Daniel O'Neill's chair.</p> +<p>"Possibly."</p> +<p>"And what will she do with it?"</p> +<p>"Do with it?"</p> +<p>The lawyer was running his fingers through his long beard and +trying to look perplexed.</p> +<p>"Mr. Curphy, I'll ask you not to pretend to be unable to +understand me. If and when this lady gets possession of Mary +O'Neill's child, what is she going to do with it?"</p> +<p>"Very well," said the advocate, seeing I meant business, "since +my client permits me to speak, I'll tell you plainly. Whatever the +child's actual parentage . . . perhaps you know best. . . ."</p> +<p>"Go on, sir."</p> +<p>"Whatever the child's parentage, it was born in wedlock. Even +the recent divorce proceedings have not disturbed that. Therefore +we hold that the child has a right to the inheritance which in due +time should come to Mary O'Neill's offspring by the terms of the +settlement upon her husband."</p> +<p>It was just as I expected, and every drop of my blood boiled at +the thought of my darling's child in the hands of that +frozen-hearted woman.</p> +<p>"So that is the law, is it?"</p> +<p>"That is the law in Ellan."</p> +<p>"In the event of Mary O'Neill's death, and her father's death, +her child and all its interests will come into the hands of. . . +."</p> +<p>"Of her father's heir and representative."</p> +<p>"Meaning, again, this lady?"</p> +<p>"Probably."</p> +<p>The woman at the back of the chair began to look restless.</p> +<p>"I don't know, sir," she said, "if your repeated references to +me are intended to reflect upon my character, or my ability to +bring up the child well and look after its interests properly."</p> +<p>"They are, madam—they most certainly and assuredly are," I +answered.</p> +<p>"Daniel!" she cried.</p> +<p>"Be quiet, gel," said Daniel O'Neill. "Let the man speak. We'll +see what he has come for presently. Go on, sir."</p> +<p>I took him at his word, and was proceeding to say that as I +understood things it was intended to appeal to the courts in order +to recover (nominally for the child) succession to the money which +had been settled on Mary O'Neill's husband at the time of their +marriage, when the old man cried, struggling again to his feet:</p> +<p>"There you are! The money! It's the money the man's after! He +took my daughter, and now he's for taking my fortune—what's +left of it, anyway. He shan't, though! No, by God he shan't! . . . +Go back to your woman, sir. Do you hear me?—your woman, and +tell her that neither you nor she shall touch one farthing of my +fortune. I'm seeing to that now. It's what we're here for +to-night—before that damnable operation to-morrow, for nobody +knows what will come of it. She has defied me and ruined me, and +made me the byword of the island, God's curse on her. . . ."</p> +<p>"Daniel! Daniel!" cried the MacLeod woman, trying to pacify the +infuriated madman and to draw him back to his seat.</p> +<p>I would have given all I had in the world if Daniel O'Neill +could have been a strong man at that moment, instead of a poor wisp +of a thing with one foot in the grave. But I controlled myself as +well as I could and said:</p> +<p>"Mr. O'Neill, your daughter doesn't want your fortune, and as +for myself, you and your money are no more to me than an old hen +sitting on a nest of addled eggs. Give it to the lady at the back +of your chair—she has earned it, apparently."</p> +<p>"Really," said the Bishop, who had at length recovered from +Father Dan's onslaught. "Really, Sir What-ever-your-name is, this +is too outrageous—that you should come to this lonely house +at this time of night, interrupting most urgent business, not to +speak of serious offices, and make injurious insinuations against +the character of a respectable person—you, sir, who had the +audacity to return openly to the island with the partner of your +sin, and to lodge her in the house of your own mother—your +own mother, sir, though Heaven knows what kind of mother it can be +who harbours her son's sin-laden mistress, his woman, as our sick +friend says. . . ."</p> +<p>Lord! how my hands itched! But controlling myself again, with a +mighty effort I said:</p> +<p>"Monsignor, I don't think I should advise you to say that +again."</p> +<p>"Why not, sir?"</p> +<p>"Because I have a deep respect for your cloth and should be +sorry to see it soiled."</p> +<p>"Violence!" cried the Bishop, rising to his feet. "You threaten +me with violence? . . . Is there no policeman in this parish, Mr. +Curphy?"</p> +<p>"There's one at the corner of the road, Bishop," I said. "I +brought him along with me. I should have brought the High Bailiff +too, if there had been time. You would perhaps be no worse for a +few witnesses to the business that seems to be going on here."</p> +<p>Saying this, as I pointed to the papers on the table, I had hit +harder than I knew, for both the Bishop and the lawyer (who had +also risen) dropped back into their seats and looked at each other +with expressions of surprise.</p> +<p>Then, stepping up to the table, so as to face the four of them, +I said, as calmly and deliberately as I could:</p> +<p>"Now listen to me. I am leaving this island in about three weeks +time, and expect to be two years—perhaps three +years—away. Mary O'Neill is going with me—as my wife. +She intends to leave her child in the care of my mother, and I +intend to promise her that she may set her mind at ease that it +shall never under any circumstances be taken away. You seem to have +made up your minds that she is going to die. Please God she may +disappoint your expectations and come back strong and well. But if +she does not, and I have to return alone, and if I find that her +child has been removed from the protection in which she left it, do +you know what I shall do?"</p> +<p>"Go to the courts, I presume," said the lawyer.</p> +<p>"Oh dear, no! I'll go to no courts, Mr. Curphy. I'll go to the +people who have set the courts in motion—which means that +I'll go to <i>you</i> and <i>you</i> and <i>you</i> and <i>you</i>. +Heaven knows how many of us may be living when that day comes; but +as surely as I am, if I find that the promise I made to Mary +O'Neill has been a vain one, and that her child is under this +woman's control and the subject of a lawsuit about this man's +money, and she in her grave, as surely as the Lord God is above us +there isn't one soul of you here present who will be alive the +following morning."</p> +<p>That seemed to be enough for all of them. Even old Daniel +O'Neill (the only man in the house who had an ounce of fight in +him) dropped his head back in his chair, with his mouth wide open +and his broken teeth showing behind his discoloured lips.</p> +<p>I thought Father Dan would have been waiting for me under the +trammon on "the street," but he had gone back to the Presbytery and +sent Tommy the Mate to lead me through the mist and the by-lanes to +the main road.</p> +<p>The old salt seemed to have a "skute" into the bad business +which had brought out the Bishop and the lawyer at that late hour, +and on parting from me at the gate of Sunny Lodge he said:</p> +<p>"Lord-a-massy me, what for hasn't ould Tom Dug a fortune coming +to him?"</p> +<p>And when I asked him what he would do with a fortune if he had +one he answered:</p> +<p>"Do? Have a tunderin' [thundering] good law-shoot and sattle +some o' them big fellas."</p> +<p>Going to bed in the "Plough" that night, I had an ugly vision of +the scene being enacted in the cottage on the curragh (a scene not +without precedent in the history of the world, though the +priesthood as a whole is so pure and noble)—the midnight +marriage of a man dying in unnatural hatred of his own daughter +(and she the sweetest woman in the world) while the priest and the +prostitute divided the spoils.</p> +<p>[END OF MARTIN CONRAD'S MEMORANDUM]</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER" id= +"ONE_HUNDRED_AND_SIXTEENTH_CHAPTER"></a>ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTEENTH +CHAPTER</h2> +<p>JULY 25. The old doctor brought me such sad and startling news +to-day. My poor father is dead—died yesterday, after an +operation which he had deferred too long, refusing to believe it +necessary.</p> +<p>The dreadful fact has hitherto been kept secret not only from me +but from everybody, out of fear of legal proceedings arising from +the failure of banks, &c., which has brought the whole island +to the verge of bankruptcy.</p> +<p>He was buried this morning at old St. Mary's—very early, +almost before daybreak, to suit the convenience of the Bishop, who +wished to catch the first steamer <i>en route</i> for Rome.</p> +<p>As a consequence of these strange arrangements, and the secrecy +that has surrounded my father's life of late, people are saying +that he is not dead at all, that in order to avoid prosecution he +has escaped from the island (going off with the Bishop in a sort of +disguise), and that the coffin put into the grave this morning did +not contain a human body.</p> +<p>"But that's all wrong," said the old doctor. "Your father is +really dead and buried, and the strange man who went away with the +Bishop was the London surgeon who performed the operation."</p> +<p>I can hardly realise it—that the strong, stalwart being, +the stern old lion whose heavy foot, tramping through my poor +mother's room, used to make the very house shake, is gone.</p> +<p>He died as he had lived, it seems. To the last self-centred, +inflexible, domineering—a peasant yet a great man (if +greatness is to be measured by power), ranking, I think, in his own +little scene of life with the tragic figures of history.</p> +<p>I have spent the day in bitter grief. Ever since I was a child +there has been a dark shadow between my father and me. He was like +a beetling mountain, always hanging over my head. I wonder whether +he wished to see me at the end. Perhaps he did, and was +over-persuaded by the cold and savourless nature of Nessy MacLeod, +who is giving it out, I hear, that grief and shame for me killed +him.</p> +<p>People will say he was a vulgar parvenu, a sycophant, a +snob—heaven knows what. All wrong! For the true reading of +his character one has to go back to the day when he was a ragged +boy and the liveried coachman of the "bad Lord Raa" lashed at his +mother on the road, and he swore that when he was a man she should +have a carriage of her own, and then "nobody should never lash +her."</p> +<p>He found Gessler's cap in the market-place and was no more +willing than Tell to bend the knee to it.</p> +<p>My poor father! He did wrong to use another life, another soul, +for either his pride or his revenge. But God knows best how it will +be with him, and if he was the first cause of making my life what +it has been, I send after him (I almost tremble to say it) if not +my love, my forgiveness.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 26. I begin to realise that after all I was not romancing +when I told the old dears that Martin and his schemes would +collapse if I failed him. Poor boy, he is always talking as it +everything depended upon me. It is utterly frightening to think +what would happen to the Expedition if he thought I could not sail +with him on the sixteenth.</p> +<p>Martin is not one of the men who weep for their wives as if the +sun had suffered eclipse, and then marry again before their graves +are green. So, having begun on my great scheme of pretending that I +am getting better every day, and shall be "ready to go, never +fear," I have to keep it up.</p> +<p>I begin to suspect, though, that I am not such a wonderful +actress after all. Sometimes in the midst of my raptures I see him +looking at me uneasily as if he were conscious of a certain effort. +At such moments I have to avoid his eyes lest anything should +happen, for my great love seems to be always lying in wait to break +down my make-believe.</p> +<p>To-day (though I had resolved not to give way to tears) when he +was talking about the voyage out, and how it would "set me up" and +how the invigorating air of the Antarctic would "make another woman +of me," I cried:</p> +<p>"How splendid! How glorious!"</p> +<p>"Then why are you crying?" he asked.</p> +<p>"Oh, good gracious, that's nothing—for <i>me</i>," I +answered.</p> +<p>But if I am throwing dust in Martin's eyes I am deceiving nobody +else, it seems. To-night after he and Dr. O'Sullivan had gone back +to the "Plough," Father Dan came in to ask Christian Ann how she +found me, and being answered rather sadly, I heard him say:</p> +<p>"<i>Ugh cha nee!</i> [Woe is me!] What is life? It is even a +vapour which appeareth for a little while and then vanisheth +away."</p> +<p>And half an hour later, when old Tommy came to bring me some +lobsters (he still declares they are the only food for invalids) +and to ask "how's the lil woman now?" I heard him moaning, as he +was going out:</p> +<p>"There'll be no shelter for her this voyage, the <i>vogh!</i> +She'll carry the sea in with her to the Head, I'm thinking."</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 27. I <i>must</i> keep it up—I must, I must! To allow +Martin's hopes and dreams to be broken in upon now would be enough +to kill me outright.</p> +<p>I don't want to be unkind, but some explorers leave the +impression that their highest impulse is the praise of achievement, +and once they have done something all they've got to do next is to +stay at home and talk about it. Martin is not like that. +Exploration is a passion with him. The "lure of the little voices" +and the "call of the Unknown" have been with him from the +beginning, and they will be with him to the end.</p> +<p>I cannot possibly think of Martin dying in bed, and being laid +to rest in the green peace of English earth—dear and sweet as +that is to tamer natures, mine for instance. I can only think of +that wild heroic soul going up to God from the broad white +wilderness of the stormy South, and leaving his body under heaving +hummocks of snow with blizzards blowing a requiem over his +grave.</p> +<p>Far off may that glorious ending be, but shall my poor failing +heart make it impossible? Never, never, never!</p> +<p>Moral—I'm going to get up every day—whatever my +nurse may say.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 28. I was rocking baby to sleep this afternoon when +Christian Ann, who was spinning by the fire, told me of a quarrel +between Aunt Bridget and Nessy MacLeod.</p> +<p>It seems that Nessy (who says she was married to my father +immediately before the operation) claims to be the heiress of all +that is left, and as the estate includes the Big House she is +"putting the law on" Aunt Bridget to obtain possession.</p> +<p>Poor Aunt Bridget! What a pitiful end to all her scheming for +Betsy Beauty, all her cruelties to my long-suffering mother, all +her treatment of me—to be turned out of doors by her own +step-daughter!</p> +<p>When old Tommy heard of the lawsuit, he said:</p> +<p>"Chut! Sarves her right, I say! It's the black life the Big +Woman lived before, and it's the black life she'll be living now, +and her growing old, and the Death looking in on her."</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 29. We have finished the proofs to-day and Dr. O'Sullivan +has gone back with them. I thought he looked rather <i>wae</i> when +he came to say good-bye to me, and though he made a great deal of +noise his voice was husky when (swearing by his favourite Saints) +he talked about "returning for the tenth with all the boys, +including Treacle."</p> +<p>Of course that was nonsense about his being in love with me. But +I'm sure he loves me all the same—many, many people love me. +I don't know what I've done to deserve all this love. I have had a +great deal of love in my life now that I come to think of it.</p> +<p>We worked hard over the last of the proofs, and I suppose I was +tired at the end of them, for when Martin carried me upstairs +to-night there was less laughter than usual, and I thought he +looked serious as he set me down by the bed.</p> +<p>I bantered him about that ("A penny for your thoughts, mister"), +but towards midnight the truth flashed upon me— I am becoming +thinner and therefore lighter every day, and he is beginning to +notice it.</p> +<p>Moral—I must try to walk upstairs in future.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 30. Ah, me! it looks as if it were going to be a race +between me and the Expedition—which shall come off +first—and sometimes I am afraid I am going to be the +loser!</p> +<p>Martin ought to sail on the sixteenth—only seventeen days! +I am expected to be married on the tenth—only eleven! Oh, +Mary O'Neill, what a strange contradictory war you are waging! Look +straight before you, dear, and don't be afraid.</p> +<p>I had a letter from the Reverend Mother this evening. She is +crossing from Ireland to-morrow, which is earlier than she +intended, so I suppose Father Dan must have sent for her.</p> +<p>I do hope Martin and she will get on comfortably together. A +struggle between my religion and my love would he more than I could +bear now.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>JULY 31. When I awoke this morning very late (I had slept after +daybreak) I was thinking of the Reverend Mother, but lo! who should +come into the room but the doctor from Blackwater!</p> +<p>He was very nice; said I had promised to let him see me again, +so he had taken me at my word.</p> +<p>I watched him closely while he examined me, and I could see that +he was utterly astonished—couldn't understand how I came to +be alive—and said he would never again deny the truth of the +old saying about dying of a broken heart, because I was clearly +living by virtue of a whole one.</p> +<p>I made pretence of wanting something in order to get nurse out +of the room, and then reached lip to the strange doctor and +whispered "<i>When?</i>"</p> +<p>He wasn't for telling me, talked about the miraculous power of +God which no science could reckon with, but at last I got a word +out of him which made me happy, or at least content.</p> +<p>Perhaps it's sad, but many things look brighter that are far +more sorrowful—dying of a broken heart, for example, and +(whatever else is amiss with me) mine is not broken, but healed, +gloriously healed, after its bruises, so thank God for that, +anyway!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>Just had some heavenly sleep and such a sweet dream! I thought +my darling mother came to me. "You're cold, my child," she said, +and then covered me up in the bedclothes. I talked about leaving my +baby, and she said she had had to do the same—leaving me. +"That's what we mothers come to—so many of us—but +heaven is over all," she whispered.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 1. I really cannot understand myself, so it isn't a +matter for much surprise if nobody else understands me. In spite of +what the strange doctor said yesterday I dressed up grandly to-day, +not only in my tea-gown, but some beautiful old white Irish lace +which nurse lent me to wrap about my throat.</p> +<p>I think the effect was rather good, and when I went downstairs +leaning on nurse's shoulder, there was Martin waiting for me, and +though he did not speak (couldn't perhaps), the look that came into +his blue eyes was the same as on that last night at Castle Raa when +he said something about a silvery fir-tree with its dark head +against the sky.</p> +<p>Oh, my own darling, I could wish to live for you, such as I am, +if I could be of any use, if I would not be a hindrance rather than +a help, if our union were right, if, in short, God Himself had not +already answered to all such questionings and beseechings, His +great; unalterable, irrevocable No!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 2. The Reverend Mother, who arrived in the island last +night, has been with me all day. I think she <i>knows</i>, for she +has said nothing more about the convent—only (with her eyes +so soft and tender) that she intends to remain with me a little +while, having need of rest herself.</p> +<p>To my surprise and joy, Martin and she have got on famously. +This evening she told me that, in spite of all (I know what she +meant by that), she is willing to believe that he is a true man, +and, notwithstanding his unhappy opinions about the Church, a +Christian gentleman.</p> +<p>Such a touching thing happened to-day. We were all sitting in +the garden, (sun warm, light breeze off the sea, ripe corn +chattering in the field opposite), when I felt a tugging at my +skirts, and who should it be but Isabel, who had been crawling +along the dry grass plucking daisies, and now, dragging herself up +to my side, emptied them into my lap.</p> +<p>No, I will not give way to tears any more as long as I live, yet +it rather "touches me up," as Martin says, to see how one's vainest +dreams seem to come to pass.</p> +<p>I don't know if Martin thought I was going to break down, but he +rattled away about Girlie having two other mothers +now—Grandma, who would keep her while we were down South, and +the Reverend Mother, who would take her to school when she was old +enough.</p> +<p>So there's nothing more to fear about baby.</p> +<p>But what about Martin himself? Am I dealing fairly in allowing +him to go on with his preparations? isn't it a kind of cruelty not +to tell him the truth?</p> +<p>This problem is preying on my mind. If I could only get some +real sleep perhaps I could solve it.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 3. I am growing weaker every day. No pain; no cough; +nothing but exhaustion. Father Dan told me this morning that I was +growing more than ever like my mother—that "sweet saint whom +the Lord has made his own." I know what he means—like her as +she was at the last.</p> +<p>My poor old priest is such a child! A good old man is always a +child—a woman can see through and through him.</p> +<p>Ah, me! I am cared for now as I never was before, yet I feel +like baby when she is tired after walking round the chairs and +comes to be nursed. What children we all are at the end—just +children!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 4. Father Dan came across, in breathless excitement +to-day. It seems the poor soul has been living in daily dread of +some sort of censure from Rome through his Bishop—about his +toleration of me, I suppose—but behold! it's the Bishop +himself who has suffered censure, having been sent into quarantine +at one of the Roman Colleges and forbidden to return to his +diocese.</p> +<p>And now, lo! a large sum of money comes from Rome for the poor +of Ellan, to be distributed by Father Dan!</p> +<p>I think I know whose money it is that has been returned; but the +dear Father suspects nothing, and is full of a great scheme for a +general thanksgiving, with a procession of our village people to +old St. Mary's and then Rosary and Benediction.</p> +<p>It is to come off on the afternoon of the tenth, it seems, my +last day in Ellan, after my marriage, but before my departure.</p> +<p>How God governs everything!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 6. It is really wrong of me to allow Martin to go on. +This morning he told me he had bought the special license for our +marriage, and this evening he showed me our tickets for +Sydney—two berths, first cabin, steadiest part of the ship. +Oh, my dear heart, if you only knew that I have had my ticket these +many days, and that it is to take me out first on the Great +Expedition—to the still bigger Unknown, the Everlasting Sea, +the Immeasurable Eternity!</p> +<p>I must be brave. Although I am a little cowardly sometimes, I +<i>can</i> be brave.</p> +<p>I have definitely decided to-night that I will tell him. But how +can I look into his face and say. . . .</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>AUGUST 7. I have made up my mind to write to Martin. One can say +things so much easier in a letter—I can, anyway. Even my +voice affects me—swelling and falling when I am moved, like a +billow on the ocean.</p> +<p>I find my writing cannot any longer be done in a sitting +position in bed, but I can prop my book on my breast and write +lying down.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>MARY O'NEILL'S LETTER TO MARTIN CONRAD</h2> +<p><i>August 9th</i>, 6 A.M.</p> +<p>MY OWN DARLING,—Strengthen yourself for what I am going to +say. It will be very hard for you—I know that, dear.</p> +<p>To-morrow we were to have gone to the High Bailiff; this day +week we were to have sailed for Sydney, and two months hence we +were to have reached Winter Quarters.</p> +<p>But I cannot go with you to the High Bailiff's; I cannot go with +you to Sydney; I cannot go with you to Winter Quarters; I cannot go +anywhere from here. It is impossible, quite impossible.</p> +<p>I have loved too much, dear, so the power of life is burnt out +for me. My great love—love for my mother, for my darling +baby, and above all for you—has consumed me and I cannot live +much longer.</p> +<p>Forgive me for not telling you this before—for deceiving +you by saying that I was getting better and growing stronger when I +knew I was not. I used to think it was cowardice which kept me from +telling you the truth, but I see now that it was love, too.</p> +<p>I was so greedy of the happiness I have had since I came to this +house of love that I could not reconcile myself to the loss of it. +You will try to understand that (won't you, dear?), and so forgive +me for keeping you in the dark down to the very last moment.</p> +<p>This will be a great grief to you. I would die with a glad heart +to save you a moment's pain, yet I could not die at ease if I did +not think you would miss me and grieve for me. I like to think that +in the time to come people will say, "Once he loved Mary O'Neill, +and now there is no other woman in the world for him." I should not +be a woman if I did not feel like that—should I?</p> +<p>But don't grieve too much, dearest. Only think! If I had been +strong and had years and years still to live, what a life would +have been before me—before both of us.</p> +<p>We couldn't have lived apart, could we? And if we had married I +should never have been able to shake off the thought that the +world, which would always be opening its arms to you, did not want +me. That would be so, wouldn't it—after all I have gone +through? The world never forgives a woman for the injuries it +inflicts on her itself, and I have had too many wounds, darling, to +stand by your side and be any help to you.</p> +<p>Oh, I know what you would say, dearest. "She gave up everything +for love of me, choosing poverty, obscurity, and pain above wealth +and rank and ease, and therefore I will choose her before +everything else in the world." But I know what would come to us in +the end, dear, and I should always feel that your love for me had +dragged you down, closed many of the doors of life to you. I should +know that you were always hearing behind you the echoing footsteps +of my fate, and that is the only thing I could not bear.</p> +<p>Besides, my darling, there is something else between us in this +world—the Divine Commandment! Our blessed Lord says we can +never be man and wife, and there is no getting beyond that, is +there?</p> +<p>Oh, don't think I reproach myself with loving you—that I +think it a sin to do so. I do not now, and never shall. He who made +my heart what it is must know that I am doing no wrong.</p> +<p>And don't think I regret that night at Castle Raa. If I have to +answer to God for that I will do so without fear, because I know He +will know that, when the cruelty and self-seeking of others were +trying to control my most sacred impulses, I was only claiming the +right He gave me to be mistress of myself and sovereign of my +soul.</p> +<p><i>You</i> must not regret it either, dearest, or reproach +yourself in any way, for when we stand together before God's +footstool He will see that from the beginning I was yours and you +were mine, and He will cover us with the wings of His loving +mercy.</p> +<p>Then don't think, dear, that I have ever looked upon what +happened afterwards—first in Ellan and then in +London—as, in any sense, a punishment. I have never done that +at any time, and now I believe from the bottom of my heart that, if +I suffered while you were away, it was not for my sin but my +salvation.</p> +<p>Think, dear! If you and I had never met again after my marriage, +and if I had gone on living with the man they had married me to, my +soul would have shrivelled up and died. That is what happens to the +souls of so many poor women who are fettered for life to coarse and +degrading husbands. But my soul has not died, dearest, and it is +not dying, whatever my poor body may do, so I thank my gracious God +for the sweet and pure and noble love that has kept it alive.</p> +<p>All the same, my darling, to marry again is another matter. I +took my vow before the altar, dear, and however ignorantly I took +it, or under whatever persuasion or constraint, it is registered in +heaven.</p> +<p>It cannot be for nothing, dear, that our blessed Lord made that +stern Commandment. The Church may have given a wrong interpretation +to it—you say it has, and I am too ignorant to answer you, +even if I wished to, which I don't. But I am sure my Lord foresaw +all such mistakes, and all the hardships that would come to many +poor women (perhaps some men, too), as well as the wreck the world +might fall to for want of this unyielding stay, when He issued his +divine and irrevocable law that never under any circumstances +should marriage be broken.</p> +<p>Oh, I am sure of it, dear, quite sure, and before His +unsearchable wisdom I bow my head, although my heart is torn.</p> +<p>Yet think, darling, how light is the burden that is laid upon +us! Marriage vows are for this world only. The marriage law of the +Church which lasts as long as life does not go on one moment +longer. The instant death sets my body free, my soul may fly to +where it belongs. If I were going to live ten, twenty, thirty +years, this might be cold comfort, but I am not.</p> +<p>Then why should we be sorry? You cannot be mine in this life and +I cannot be yours, so Death comes in its mercy and majesty to unite +us! Our love will go far beyond life, and the moment the barrier of +death is passed our union will begin! And once it begins it will +never end! So Death is not really a separator, but a great uniter! +Don't you see that, dearest? One moment of parting—hardly a +moment, perhaps—and then we shall be together through all +Eternity! How wonderful! How glorious! How triumphant!</p> +<p>Do you believe in individual immortality, dear? I do. I believe +that in the other life I shall meet and know my dear ones who are +in heaven. More than that, I believe that the instant I pass from +this life I shall live with my dear ones who are still on earth. +That is why I am willing to go—because I am sure that the +moment I draw my last breath I shall be standing by your side.</p> +<p>So don't let there be any weeping for me, dear. "Nothing is here +for tears; nothing but well and fair." Always remember—love +is immortal.</p> +<p>I will not say that I could not have wished to live a little +longer—if things had been otherwise with both of us. I should +like to live to see your book published and your work finished (I +know it will be some day), and baby grow up to be a good girl and a +beautiful one too (for that's something, isn't it?); and I should +like to live a little longer for another reason, a woman's +reason—simply to be loved, and to be told that I am loved, +for though a woman may know that, she likes to hear it said and is +never tired of hearing it.</p> +<p>But things have gone against us, and it is almost sinfully +ungrateful to regret anything when we have so many reasons for +thankfulness.</p> +<p>And then about Girlie—I used to think it would be terrible +(for me, I mean) to die before she could be old enough to have any +clear memory of her mother (such as I have of mine) to cherish and +love—only the cold, blank, unfilled by a face, which must be +all that remains to most of those whose parents passed away while +they were children. But I am not afraid of that now, because I know +that in the future, when our little girl asks about her mother, you +will describe me to her as <i>you</i> saw and remember me—and +that will be <i>so</i> much sweeter and lovelier than I ever was, +and it will be <i>such</i> a joy to think that my daughter sees me +through her father's eyes.</p> +<p>Besides, dearest, there is something still more +thrilling—the thought that Girlie may grow to be like me +(like what you <i>think</i> me), and that in the time to come she +may startle you with undescribable resemblances, in her voice or +smile, or laugh, to her mother in heaven, so that some day, +perhaps, years and years hence, when she is quite grown up, she may +touch your arm and you may turn quickly to look at her, and lo! it +will seem to you as if Mary herself (<i>your</i> Mary) were by your +side. Oh Death, where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy +victory?</p> +<p>Go on with your great work, dearest. Don't let it flag from any +cold feeling that I am lost to you. Whenever you think of me, say +to yourself, "Mary is here; Love is stronger than death, many +waters cannot quench it."</p> +<p>Did you ever read Browning? I have been doing so during the last +few days, nurse (she is quite a thoughtful woman) having lent me +his last volume. When I read the last lines of what is said to have +been his last poem I thought of you, dear:</p> +<p>"<i>No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work-time<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Greet the unseen with a +cheer!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Bid him forward, breast and back as +either should be,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">'Strive and thrive!' Cry +'Speed,—fight on, fare ever</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">There as +here!'"</span><br /></i></p> +<p>I am going to get up again to-day, dear, having something to do +that is just a little important—to give you this manuscript +book, in which I have been writing every day (or rather every night +since you found me in London.)</p> +<p>You will see what it is, and why it was written, so I'll say no +more on that subject.</p> +<p>I am afraid you'll find it very egotistical, being mainly about +myself; but I seem to have been looking into my soul all the time, +and when one does that, and gets down to the deep places, one meets +all other souls there, so perhaps I have been writing the lives of +some women as well.</p> +<p>I once thought I could write a real book (you'll see what vain +and foolish things I thought, especially in my darker moments) to +show what a woman's life may be when, from any cause whatsoever, +she is denied the right God gave her of choosing the best for +herself and her children.</p> +<p>There is a dream lying somewhere there, dear, which is stirring +the slumber of mankind, but the awakening will not be in my time +certainly, and perhaps not even in Girlie's.</p> +<p>And yet, why not?</p> +<p>Do you know, dearest, what it was in your wonderful book which +thrilled me most? It was your description of the giant iceberg you +passed in the Antarctic Ocean—five hundred feet above the +surface of the sea and therefore five hundred below it, going +steadily on and on, against all the force of tempestuous wind and +wave, by power of the current underneath.</p> +<p>Isn't the movement of all great things in life like that, +dearest? So perhaps the world will be a better place for Girlie +than it has been for me. And in any case, I shall always feel that, +after all and in spite of everything, it has been glorious to be a +woman.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>And now, my own darling, though we are only to be separated for +a little while, I want to write what I should like to say when I +part from you to-morrow if I did not know that something in my +throat would choke me.</p> +<p>I want to tell you again that I love you dearly, that I have +never loved anybody but you, and that no marriage vows will keep me +from loving you to the last.</p> +<p>I want to thank you for the great, great love you have given me +in return—all the way back from the time when I was a child. +Oh, my dearest, may God for ever bless you for the sunshine you +have brought into my life—every single day of it, joyful days +and sorrowful ones, bright days and dark, but all shining with the +glory of your love.</p> +<p>Never allow yourself to think that my life has not been a happy +one. Looking back on it now I feel as if I have always had +happiness. And when I have not had happiness I have had something +far higher and better—blessedness.</p> +<p>I have had <i>such</i> joy in my life, dear—joy in the +beauty of the world, in the sunshine and the moon and the stars and +the flowers and the songs of the birds, and then (apart from the +divine love that is too holy to speak about) in my religion, in my +beloved Church, in the love of my dear mother and my sweet child, +and above all—above all in <i>you</i>.</p> +<p>I feel a sense of sacred thankfulness to God for giving you to +me, and if it has not been for long in this life, it will be for +ever in the next.</p> +<p>So good-bye, my dearest me—<i>just for a little +moment</i>! My dearest one, Good-bye!</p> +<p>MARY O'NEILL.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div> +<h2>MARY O'NEILL'S LAST NOTE<br /> +WRITTEN ON THE FLY-LEAVES OF HER MISSAL</h2> +</div> +<p>AUGUST 9-10.</p> +<p>It is all over. I have given him my book. My secret is out. He +knows now. I almost think he has known all along.</p> +<p>I had dressed even more carefully than usual, with nurse's Irish +lace about my neck as a collar, and my black hair brushed smooth in +my mother's manner, and when I went downstairs by help of my usual +kind crutch (it is wonderful how strong I have been to-day) +everybody said how much better I was looking.</p> +<p>Martin was there, and he took me into the garden. It was a +little late in the afternoon, but such a sweet and holy time, with +its clear air and quiet sunshine—one of those evenings when +Nature is like a nun "breathless with adoration."</p> +<p>Although I had a feeling that it was to be our last time +together we talked on the usual subjects—the High Bailiff, +the special license, "the boys" of the <i>Scotia</i> who were +coming over for my wedding, and how some of them would have to +start out early in the morning.</p> +<p>But it didn't matter what we talked about. It was only what we +felt, and I felt entirely happy—sitting there in my cushions, +with my white hand in his brown one, looking into his clear eyes +and ruddy face or up to the broad blue of the sky.</p> +<p>The red sun had begun to sink down behind the dark bar of St. +Mary's Rock, and the daisies in the garden to close their eyes and +drop their heads in sleep, when Martin became afraid of the +dew.</p> +<p>Then we went back to the house—I walking firmly, by +Martin's side, though I held his arm so close.</p> +<p>The old doctor was in his consulting room, nurse was in my room, +and we could hear Christian Ann upstairs putting baby into her +darling white cot—she sleeps with grandma now.</p> +<p>The time came for me to go up also, and then I gave him my book, +which I had been carrying under my arm, telling him to read the +last pages first.</p> +<p>Although we had never spoken of my book before he seemed to know +all about it; and it flashed upon me at that moment that, while I +thought I had been playing a game of make-believe with him, he had +been playing a game of make-believe with me, and had known +everything from the first. There was a certain relief in that, yet +there was a certain sting in it, too. What strange creatures we +are, we women!</p> +<p>For some moments we stood together at the bottom of the stairs, +holding each other's hands. I was dreadfully afraid he was going to +break down as he did at Castle Raa, and once again I had that +thrilling, swelling feeling (the most heavenly emotion that comes +into a woman's life, perhaps) that I, the weak one, had to +strengthen the strong.</p> +<p>It was only for a moment, though, and then he put his great +gentle arms about me, and kissed me on the lips, and said, +<i>silently</i> but oh, so eloquently, "Good-bye darling, and God +bless you!"</p> +<p>Then I walked upstairs alone, quite alone, and when I reached +the top he was still at the bottom looking up at me. I smiled down +to him, then walked firmly into my room and up to my bed, and then +. . . down, all my strength gone in a moment.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>I have had such a wonderful experience during the night. It was +like a dream, and yet something more than a dream. I don't want to +make too much of it—to say that it was a vision or any +supernatural manifestation such as the blessed Margaret Mary speaks +about. Perhaps it was only the result of memory operating on my +past life, my thoughts and desires. But perhaps it was something +higher and more spiritual, and God, for my comforting, has +permitted me to look for one moment behind the veil.</p> +<p>I thought it was to-morrow—my wedding day, and the day of +Father Dan's thanksgiving celebration—and I was sitting by my +French window (which was wide open) to look at the procession.</p> +<p>I seemed to see everything—Father Dan in his surplice, the +fishermen in their clean "ganzies," the village people in their +Sunday clothes, the Rechabites, the Foresters, and the Odd-fellows +with their coloured badges and banners coming round the corner of +the road, and the mothers with babies too young to be left looking +on from the bridge.</p> +<p>I thought the procession passed under my window and went on to +the church, which was soon crowded, leaving numbers of people to +kneel on the path in front, as far down as the crumbling gate piers +which lean towards each other, their foundations having given +way.</p> +<p>Then I thought Benediction began, and when the congregation sang +I sang also. I heard myself singing:</p> +<p>"<i>Mater purissima,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ora pro +nobis."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>Down to this moment I thought I had been alone, but now the +Reverend Mother entered my room, and she joined me. I heard her +deep rich voice under mine:</p> +<p>"<i>Mater castissima<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ora pro +nobis."</span><br /></i></p> +<p>Then I thought the <i>Ora</i> ended, and in the silence that +followed it I heard Christian Arm talking to baby on the gravel +path below. I had closed my eyes, yet I seemed to see them, for I +felt as if I were under some strange sweet anæsthetic which +had taken away all pain but not all consciousness.</p> +<p>Then I thought I saw Martin come close under my window and lift +baby up to me, and say something about her.</p> +<p>I tried to answer him and could not, but I smiled, and then +there was darkness, in which I heard voices about me, with somebody +sobbing and Father Dan saying, as he did on the morning my mother +died:</p> +<p>"Don't call her back. She's on her way to God's beautiful +paradise after all her suffering."</p> +<p>After that the darkness became still deeper, and the voices +faded away, and then gradually a great light came, a beautiful, +marvellous, celestial light, such as Martin describes when he +speaks about the aurora, and then . . . I was on a broad white +snowy plateau, and Martin was walking by my side.</p> +<p>How wonderful! How joyful! How eternally glorious!</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>It is 4 A.M. Some of "the boys" will be on their way to my +wedding. Though I have been often ashamed of letting them come I am +glad now for his sake that I didn't try to keep them back. With his +comrades about him he will control himself and be strong.</p> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p>Such a peaceful morning! There is just light enough to see St. +Mary's Rock. It is like a wavering ghost moving in the vapour on +the face of the deep. I can hear the far-off murmur of the sea. It +is like the humming in a big shell. A bird is singing in the garden +and the swallows are twittering in a nest under the thatch. A mist +is lying over the meadows, and the tree tops seem to be floating +between the earth and the sky.</p> +<p>How beautiful the world is!</p> +<p>Very soon the mist will rise, and the day will break and the sun +will come again and . . . there will be no more night.</p> +<p>[END OF THE NARRATIVE OF MARY O'NEILL]</p> +<p>MEMORANDUM OF MARTIN CONRAD</p> +<p>My darling was right. I had known all along, but I had been +hoping against hope—that the voyage would set her up, and the +air of the Antarctic cure her.</p> +<p>Then her cheerfulness never failed her, and when she looked at +me with her joyous eyes, and when her soft hand slipped into mine I +forgot all my fears, so the blow fell on me as suddenly as if I had +never expected it.</p> +<p>With a faint pathetic smile she gave me her book and I went back +to my room at the inn and read it. I read all night and far into +the next day—all her dear story, straight from her heart, +written out in her small delicate, beautiful characters, with +scarcely an erasure.</p> +<p>No use saying what I thought or went through. So many things I +had never known before! Such love as I had never even dreamt of, +and could never repay her for now!</p> +<p>How my whole soul rebelled against the fate that had befallen my +dear one! If I have since come to share, however reluctantly, her +sweet resignation, to bow my head stubbornly where she bowed hers +so meekly (before the Divine Commandment), and to see that +marriage, true marriage, is the rock on which God builds His world, +it was not then that I thought anything about that.</p> +<p>I only thought with bitter hatred of the accursed hypocrisies of +civilised society which, in the names of Law and Religion, had been +crushing the life out of the sweetest and purest woman on earth, +merely because she wished to be "mistress of herself and sovereign +of her soul."</p> +<p>What did I care about the future of the world? Or the movement +of divine truths? Or the new relations of man and woman in the good +time that was to come? Or the tremendous problems of lost and +straying womanhood, or the sufferings of neglected children, or the +tragedies of the whole girlhood of the world? What did I care about +anything but my poor martyred darling? The woman God gave me was +mine and I could not give her up—not now, after all she had +gone through.</p> +<p>Sometime in the afternoon (heaven knows when) I went back to +Sunny Lodge. The house was very quiet. Baby was babbling on the +hearth-rug. My mother was silent and trying not to let me see her +swollen eyes. My dear one was sleeping, had been sleeping all day +long, the sleep of an angel. Strange and frightening fact, nobody +being able to remember that she had ever been seen to sleep +before!</p> +<p>After a while, sick and cold at heart, I went down to the shore +where we had played as children. The boat we sailed in was moored +on the beach. The tide was far out, making a noise on the teeth of +the Rock, which stood out against the reddening sky, stern, grand, +gloomy.</p> +<p>Old Tommy the Mate came to the door of his cabin. I went into +the quiet smoky place with its earthen floor and sat in a dull +torpor by the hearth, under the sooty "laff" and rafters. The old +man did not say a word to me. He put some turf on the fire and then +sat on a three-legged stool at the other side of the +hearth-place.</p> +<p>Once he got up and gave me a basin of buttermilk, then stirred +the peats and sat down again without speaking. Towards evening, +when the rising sea was growing louder, I got up to go. The old man +followed me to the door, and there, laying his hand on my arm he +said:</p> +<p>"She's been beating to windward all her life, boy. But mind ye +this—<i>she's fetching the harbour all right at +last</i>."</p> +<p>Going up the road I heard a band of music in the distance, and +saw a procession of people coming down. It was Father Dan's +celebration of thanksgiving to God for what was left of Daniel +O'Neill's ill-gotten wealth sent back from Rome for the poor.</p> +<p>Being in no humour to thank God for anything, I got over a sod +hedge and crossed a field until I came to a back gate to our +garden, near to "William Rufus's" burial place—stone +overgrown with moss, inscription almost obliterated.</p> +<p>On the path I met my mother, with baby, toddling and tumbling by +her side.</p> +<p>"How is she now?" I asked.</p> +<p>She was awake—had been awake these two hours, but in a +strange kind of wakefulness, her big angel eyes open and shining +like stars as if smiling at someone whom nobody else could see, and +her lips moving as if speaking some words which nobody else could +hear.</p> +<p>"What art thou saying, <i>boght millish</i>?" my mother had +asked, and after a moment in which she seemed to listen in rapture, +my darling had answered:</p> +<p>"Hush! I am speaking to mamma—telling her I am leaving +Isabel with Christian Ann. And she is saying she is very glad."</p> +<p>We walked round to the front of the house until we came close +under the window of "Mary O'Neill's little room," which was wide +open.</p> +<p>The evening was so still that we could hear the congregation +singing in the church and on the path in front of it.</p> +<p>Presently somebody began to sing in the room above. It was my +darling—in her clear sweet silvery voice which I have never +heard the like of in this world and never shall again.</p> +<p>After a moment another voice joined hers—a deep voice, the +Reverend Mother's.</p> +<p>All else was quiet. Not a sound on earth or in the air. A hush +had fallen on the sea itself, which seemed to be listening for my +precious darling's last breath. The sun was going down, very red in +its setting, and the sky was full of glory.</p> +<p>When the singing came to an end baby was babbling in my mother's +arms—"Bo-loo-la-la-ma-ma." I took her and held her up to the +open window, crying:</p> +<p>"Look, darling! Here's Girlie!"</p> +<p>There was no answer, but after another moment the Reverend +Mother came to the window. Her pale face was even paler than usual, +and her lips trembled. She did not speak, but she made the sign of +the Cross.</p> +<p>And by that . . . I knew.</p> +<p>"Out of the depths I cry unto thee, O Lord, Lord, hear my +cry."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>THE AUTHOR TO THE READER</h2> +<p>I saw him off at Tilbury when he left England on his last +Expedition. Already he was his own man once more. After the +blinding, stunning effect of the great event there had been a quick +recuperation. His spirit had risen to a wonderful strength and even +a certain cheerfulness.</p> +<p>I did not find it hard to read the secret of this change. It was +not merely that Time, the great assuager, had begun to do its work +with him, but that he had brought himself to accept without qualm +or question Mary O'Neill's beautiful belief (the old, old belief) +in the immortality of personal love, and was firmly convinced that, +freed from the imprisonment of the flesh, she was with him every +day and hour, and that as long as he lived she always would be.</p> +<p>There was nothing vague, nothing fantastic, nothing mawkish, +nothing unmanly about this belief, but only the simple faith of a +steady soul and a perfectly clear brain. It was good to see how it +braced a strong man for life to face Death in that way.</p> +<p>As for his work I found him quite hopeful. His mission apart, I +thought he was looking forward to his third trip to the Antarctic, +in expectation of the silence and solitude of that strengthening +region.</p> +<p>As I watched the big liner that was taking him away disappear +down the Thames I had no more doubt that he would get down to the +South Pole, and finish his task there, than that the sun would rise +the following morning.</p> +<p>Whatever happens this time he will "march breast forward."</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>MARTIN CONRAD TO THE AUTHOR</h2> +<p>WIRELESS—ANTARCTIC CONTINENT (<i>via</i> MACQUARIE ISLAND +AND RADIO HOBART 16).</p> +<p>Arrived safe. All well. Weather excellent. Blue sky. Warm. Not a +breath of wind. Sun never going down. Constellations revolving +without dipping. Feel as if we can see the movement of the world. +Start south to-morrow. Calmer than I have ever been since She was +taken from me. But She was right. She is here. "Love is stronger +than death, many waters cannot quench it."</p> +<h3>THE END</h3> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14597 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/14597-h/images/001.png b/14597-h/images/001.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..874b8b9 --- /dev/null +++ b/14597-h/images/001.png |
