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diff --git a/old/chpg10.txt b/old/chpg10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..48ce664 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/chpg10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5855 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Clara Hopgood, by Mark Rutherford +(#3 in our series by Mark Rutherford) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Clara Hopgood + +Author: Mark Rutherford + +Release Date: June, 2004 [EBook #5986] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on October 8, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, CLARA HOPGOOD *** + + + + +Transcribed from the 1907 T. Fisher Unwin edition by David Price, +email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + +CLARA HOPGOOD + + + + +CHAPTER I + + + +About ten miles north-east of Eastthorpe lies the town of Fenmarket, +very like Eastthorpe generally; and as we are already familiar with +Eastthorpe, a particular description of Fenmarket is unnecessary. +There is, however, one marked difference between them. Eastthorpe, +it will be remembered, is on the border between the low uplands and +the Fens, and has one side open to soft, swelling hills. Fenmarket +is entirely in the Fens, and all the roads that lead out of it are +alike level, monotonous, straight, and flanked by deep and stagnant +ditches. The river, also, here is broader and slower; more reluctant +than it is even at Eastthorpe to hasten its journey to the inevitable +sea. During the greater part of the year the visitor to Fenmarket +would perhaps find it dull and depressing, and at times, under a +grey, wintry sky, almost unendurable; but nevertheless, for days and +weeks it has a charm possessed by few other landscapes in England, +provided only that behind the eye which looks there is something to +which a landscape of that peculiar character answers. There is, for +example, the wide, dome-like expanse of the sky, there is the +distance, there is the freedom and there are the stars on a clear +night. The orderly, geometrical march of the constellations from the +extreme eastern horizon across the meridian and down to the west has +a solemn majesty, which is only partially discernible when their +course is interrupted by broken country. + +On a dark afternoon in November 1844, two young women, Clara and +Madge Hopgood, were playing chess in the back parlour of their +mother's house at Fenmarket, just before tea. Clara, the elder, was +about five-and-twenty, fair, with rather light hair worn flat at the +side of her face, after the fashion of that time. Her features were +tolerably regular. It is true they were somewhat marred by an uneven +nasal outline, but this was redeemed by the curved lips of a mouth +which was small and rather compressed, and by a definite, symmetrical +and graceful figure. Her eyes were grey, with a curious peculiarity +in them. Ordinarily they were steady, strong eyes, excellent and +renowned optical instruments. Over and over again she had detected, +along the stretch of the Eastthorpe road, approaching visitors, and +had named them when her companions could see nothing but specks. +Occasionally, however, these steady, strong, grey eyes utterly +changed. They were the same eyes, the same colour, but they ceased +to be mere optical instruments and became instruments of expression, +transmissive of radiance to such a degree that the light which was +reflected from them seemed insufficient to account for it. It was +also curious that this change, though it must have been accompanied +by some emotion, was just as often not attended by any other sign of +it. Clara was, in fact, little given to any display of feeling. + +Madge, four years younger than her sister, was of a different type +altogether, and one more easily comprehended. She had very heavy +dark hair, and she had blue eyes, a combination which fascinated +Fenmarket. Fenmarket admired Madge more than it was admired by her +in return, and she kept herself very much to herself, notwithstanding +what it considered to be its temptations. If she went shopping she +nearly always went with her sister; she stood aloof from all the +small gaieties of the town; walked swiftly through its streets, and +repelled, frigidly and decisively, all offers, and they were not a +few, which had been made to her by the sons of the Fenmarket +tradesfolk. Fenmarket pronounced her 'stuck-up,' and having thus +labelled her, considered it had exhausted her. The very important +question, Whether there was anything which naturally stuck up? +Fenmarket never asked. It was a great relief to that provincial +little town in 1844, in this and in other cases, to find a word which +released it from further mental effort and put out of sight any +troublesome, straggling, indefinable qualities which it would +otherwise have been forced to examine and name. Madge was certainly +stuck-up, but the projection above those around her was not +artificial. Both she and her sister found the ways of Fenmarket were +not to their taste. The reason lay partly in their nature and partly +in their history. + +Mrs Hopgood was the widow of the late manager in the Fenmarket branch +of the bank of Rumbold, Martin & Rumbold, and when her husband died +she had of course to leave the Bank Buildings. As her income was +somewhat straitened, she was obliged to take a small house, and she +was now living next door to the 'Crown and Sceptre,' the principal +inn in the town. There was then no fringe of villas to Fenmarket for +retired quality; the private houses and shops were all mixed +together, and Mrs Hopgood's cottage was squeezed in between the +ironmonger's and the inn. It was very much lower than either of its +big neighbours, but it had a brass knocker and a bell, and distinctly +asserted and maintained a kind of aristocratic superiority. + +Mr Hopgood was not a Fenmarket man. He came straight from London to +be manager. He was in the bank of the London agents of Rumbold, +Martin & Rumbold, and had been strongly recommended by the city firm +as just the person to take charge of a branch which needed thorough +reorganisation. He succeeded, and nobody in Fenmarket was more +respected. He lived, however, a life apart from his neighbours, +excepting so far as business was concerned. He went to church once +on Sunday because the bank expected him to go, but only once, and had +nothing to do with any of its dependent institutions. He was a great +botanist, very fond of walking, and in the evening, when Fenmarket +generally gathered itself into groups for gossip, either in the +street or in back parlours, or in the 'Crown and Sceptre,' Mr +Hopgood, tall, lean and stately, might be seen wandering along the +solitary roads searching for flowers, which, in that part of the +world, were rather scarce. He was also a great reader of the best +books, English, German and French, and held high doctrine, very high +for those days, on the training of girls, maintaining that they need, +even more than boys, exact discipline and knowledge. Boys, he +thought, find health in an occupation; but an uncultivated, unmarried +girl dwells with her own untutored thoughts, which often breed +disease. His two daughters, therefore, received an education much +above that which was usual amongst people in their position, and each +of them--an unheard of wonder in Fenmarket--had spent some time in a +school in Weimar. Mr Hopgood was also peculiar in his way of dealing +with his children. He talked to them and made them talk to him, and +whatever they read was translated into speech; thought, in his house, +was vocal. + +Mrs Hopgood, too, had been the intimate friend of her husband, and +was the intimate friend of her daughters. She was now nearly sixty, +but still erect and graceful, and everybody could see that the +picture of a beautiful girl of one-and-twenty, which hung opposite +the fireplace, had once been her portrait. She had been brought up, +as thoroughly as a woman could be brought up, in those days, to be a +governess. The war prevented her education abroad, but her father, +who was a clergyman, not too rich, engaged a French emigrant lady to +live in his house to teach her French and other accomplishments. She +consequently spoke French perfectly, and she could also read and +speak Spanish fairly well, for the French lady had spent some years +in Spain. Mr Hopgood had never been particularly in earnest about +religion, but his wife was a believer, neither High Church nor Low +Church, but inclined towards a kind of quietism not uncommon in the +Church of England, even during its bad time, a reaction against the +formalism which generally prevailed. When she married, Mrs Hopgood +did not altogether follow her husband. She never separated herself +from her faith, and never would have confessed that she had separated +herself from her church. But although she knew that his creed +externally was not hers, her own was not sharply cut, and she +persuaded herself that, in substance, his and her belief were +identical. As she grew older her relationship to the Unseen became +more and more intimate, but she was less and less inclined to +criticise her husband's freedom, or to impose on the children a rule +which they would certainly have observed, but only for her sake. +Every now and then she felt a little lonely; when, for example, she +read one or two books which were particularly her own; when she +thought of her dead father and mother, and when she prayed her +solitary prayer. Mr Hopgood took great pains never to disturb that +sacred moment. Indeed, he never for an instant permitted a finger to +be laid upon what she considered precious. He loved her because she +had the strength to be what she was when he first knew her and she +had so fascinated him. He would have been disappointed if the +mistress of his youth had become some other person, although the +change, in a sense, might have been development and progress. He did +really love her piety, too, for its own sake. It mixed something +with her behaviour to him and to the children which charmed him, and +he did not know from what other existing source anything comparable +to it could be supplied. Mrs Hopgood seldom went to church. The +church, to be sure, was horribly dead, but she did not give that as a +reason. She had, she said, an infirmity, a strange restlessness +which prevented her from sitting still for an hour. She often +pleaded this excuse, and her husband and daughters never, by word or +smile, gave her the least reason to suppose that they did not believe +her. + + + +CHAPTER II + + + +Both Clara and Madge went first to an English day-school, and Clara +went straight from this school to Germany, but Madge's course was a +little different. She was not very well, and it was decided that she +should have at least a twelvemonth in a boarding-school at Brighton +before going abroad. It had been very highly recommended, but the +head-mistress was Low Church and aggressive. Mr Hopgood, far away +from the High and Low Church controversy, came to the conclusion +that, in Madge's case, the theology would have no effect on her. It +was quite impossible, moreover, to find a school which would be just +what he could wish it to be. Madge, accordingly, was sent to +Brighton, and was introduced into a new world. She was just +beginning to ask herself WHY certain things were right and other +things were wrong, and the Brighton answer was that the former were +directed by revelation and the latter forbidden, and that the 'body' +was an affliction to the soul, a means of 'probation,' our principal +duty being to 'war' against it. + +Madge's bedroom companion was a Miss Selina Fish, daughter of +Barnabas Fish, Esquire, of Clapham, and merchant of the City of +London. Miss Fish was not traitorous at heart, but when she found +out that Madge had not been christened, she was so overcome that she +was obliged to tell her mother. Miss Fish was really unhappy, and +one cold night, when Madge crept into her neighbour's bed, contrary +to law, but in accordance with custom when the weather was very +bitter, poor Miss Fish shrank from her, half-believing that something +dreadful might happen if she should by any chance touch unbaptised, +naked flesh. Mrs Fish told her daughter that perhaps Miss Hopgood +might be a Dissenter, and that although Dissenters were to be pitied, +and even to be condemned, many of them were undoubtedly among the +redeemed, as for example, that man of God, Dr Doddridge, whose Family +Expositor was read systematically at home, as Selina knew. Then +there were Matthew Henry, whose commentary her father preferred to +any other, and the venerable saint, the Reverend William Jay of Bath, +whom she was proud to call her friend. Miss Fish, therefore, made +further inquiries gently and delicately, but she found to her horror +that Madge had neither been sprinkled nor immersed! Perhaps she was +a Jewess or a heathen! This was a happy thought, for then she might +be converted. Selina knew what interest her mother took in missions +to heathens and Jews; and if Madge, by the humble instrumentality of +a child, could be brought to the foot of the Cross, what would her +mother and father say? What would they not say? Fancy taking Madge +to Clapham in a nice white dress--it should be white, thought Selina- +-and presenting her as a saved lamb! + +The very next night she began, - + +'I suppose your father is a foreigner?' + +'No, he is an Englishman.' + +'But if he is an Englishman you must have been baptised, or +sprinkled, or immersed, and your father and mother must belong to +church or chapel. I know there are thousands of wicked people who +belong to neither, but they are drunkards and liars and robbers, and +even they have their children christened.' + +'Well, he is an Englishman,' said Madge, smiling. + +'Perhaps,' said Selina, timidly, 'he may be--he may be--Jewish. +Mamma and papa pray for the Jews every morning. They are not like +other unbelievers.' + +'No, he is certainly not a Jew.' + +'What is he, then?' + +'He is my papa and a very honest, good man.' + +'Oh, my dear Madge! honesty is a broken reed. I have heard mamma say +that she is more hopeful of thieves than honest people who think they +are saved by works, for the thief who was crucified went to heaven, +and if he had been only an honest man he never would have found the +Saviour and would have gone to hell. Your father must be something.' + +'I can only tell you again that he is honest and good.' + +Selina was confounded. She had heard of those people who were +NOTHING, and had always considered them as so dreadful that she could +not bear to think of them. The efforts of her father and mother did +not extend to them; they were beyond the reach of the preacher--mere +vessels of wrath. If Madge had confessed herself Roman Catholic, or +idolator, Selina knew how to begin. She would have pointed out to +the Catholic how unscriptural it was to suppose that anybody could +forgive sins excepting God, and she would at once have been able to +bring the idolator to his knees by exposing the absurdity of +worshipping bits of wood and stone; but with a person who was nothing +she could not tell what to do. She was puzzled to understand what +right Madge had to her name. Who had any authority to say she was to +be called Madge Hopgood? She determined at last to pray to God and +again ask her mother's help. + +She did pray earnestly that very night, and had not finished until +long after Madge had said her Lord's Prayer. This was always said +night and morning, both by Madge and Clara. They had been taught it +by their mother. It was, by the way, one of poor Selina's troubles +that Madge said nothing but the Lord's Prayer when she lay down and +when she rose; of course, the Lord's Prayer was the best--how could +it be otherwise, seeing that our Lord used it?--but those who +supplemented it with no petitions of their own were set down as +formalists, and it was always suspected that they had not received +the true enlightenment from above. Selina cried to God till the +counterpane was wet with her tears, but it was the answer from her +mother which came first, telling her that however praiseworthy her +intentions might be, argument with such a DANGEROUS infidel as Madge +would be most perilous, and she was to desist from it at once. Mrs +Fish had by that post written to Miss Pratt, the schoolmistress, and +Selina no doubt would not be exposed to further temptation. Mrs +Fish's letter to Miss Pratt was very strong, and did not mince +matters. She informed Miss Pratt that a wolf was in her fold, and +that if the creature were not promptly expelled, Selina must be +removed into safety. Miss Pratt was astonished, and instantly, as +her custom was, sought the advice of her sister, Miss Hannah Pratt, +who had charge of the wardrobes and household matters generally. +Miss Hannah Pratt was never in the best of tempers, and just now was +a little worse than usual. It was one of the rules of the school +that no tradesmen's daughters should be admitted, but it was very +difficult to draw the line, and when drawn, the Misses Pratt were +obliged to admit it was rather ridiculous. There was much debate +over an application by an auctioneer. He was clearly not a +tradesman, but he sold chairs, tables and pigs, and, as Miss Hannah +said, used vulgar language in recommending them. However, his wife +had money; they lived in a pleasant house in Lewes, and the line went +outside him. But when a druggist, with a shop in Bond Street, +proposed his daughter, Miss Hannah took a firm stand. What is the +use of a principle, she inquired severely, if we do not adhere to it? +On the other hand, the druggist's daughter was the eldest of six, who +might all come when they were old enough to leave home, and Miss +Pratt thought there was a real difference between a druggist and, +say, a bootmaker. + +'Bootmaker!' said Miss Hannah with great scorn. 'I am surprised that +you venture to hint the remotest possibility of such a contingency.' + +At last it was settled that the line should also be drawn outside the +druggist. Miss Hannah, however, had her revenge. A tanner in +Bermondsey with a house in Bedford Square, had sent two of his +children to Miss Pratt's seminary. Their mother found out that they +had struck up a friendship with a young person whose father +compounded prescriptions for her, and when she next visited Brighton +she called on Miss Pratt, reminded her that it was understood that +her pupils would 'all be taken from a superior class in society,' and +gently hinted that she could not allow Bedford Square to be +contaminated by Bond Street. Miss Pratt was most apologetic, +enlarged upon the druggist's respectability, and more particularly +upon his well-known piety and upon his generous contributions to the +cause of religion. This, indeed, was what decided her to make an +exception in his favour, and the piety also of his daughter was 'most +exemplary.' However, the tanner's lady, although a shining light in +the church herself, was not satisfied that a retail saint could +produce a proper companion for her own offspring, and went away +leaving Miss Pratt very uncomfortable. + +'I warned you,' said Miss Hannah; 'I told you what would happen, and +as to Mr Hopgood, I suspected him from the first. Besides, he is +only a banker's clerk.' + +'Well, what is to be done?' + +'Put your foot down at once.' Miss Hannah suited the action to the +word, and put down, with emphasis, on the hearthrug a very large, +plate-shaped foot cased in a black felt shoe. + +'But I cannot dismiss them. Don't you think it will be better, first +of all, to talk to Miss Hopgood? Perhaps we could do her some good.' + +'Good! Now, do you think we can do any good to an atheist? Besides, +we have to consider our reputation. Whatever good we might do, it +would be believed that the infection remained.' + +'We have no excuse for dismissing the other.' + +'Excuse! none is needed, nor would any be justifiable. Excuses are +immoral. Say at once--of course politely and with regret--that the +school is established on a certain basis. It will be an advantage to +us if it is known why these girls do not remain. I will dictate the +letter, if you like.' + +Miss Hannah Pratt had not received the education which had been given +to her younger sister, and therefore, was nominally subordinate, but +really she was chief. She considered it especially her duty not only +to look after the children's clothes, the servants and the accounts, +but to maintain TONE everywhere in the establishment, and to stiffen +her sister when necessary, and preserve in proper sharpness her +orthodoxy, both in theology and morals. + +Accordingly, both the girls left, and both knew the reason for +leaving. The druggist's faith was sorely tried. If Miss Pratt's had +been a worldly seminary he would have thought nothing of such +behaviour, but he did not expect it from one of the faithful. The +next Sunday morning after he received the news, he stayed at home out +of his turn to make up any medicines which might be urgently +required, and sent his assistant to church. + +As to Madge, she enjoyed her expulsion as a great joke, and her +Brighton experiences were the cause of much laughter. She had +learned a good deal while she was away from home, not precisely what +it was intended she should learn, and she came back with a strong, +insurgent tendency, which was even more noticeable when she returned +from Germany. Neither of the sisters lived at the school in Weimar, +but at the house of a lady who had been recommended to Mrs Hopgood, +and by this lady they were introduced to the great German classics. +She herself was an enthusiast for Goethe, whom she well remembered in +his old age, and Clara and Madge, each of them in turn, learned to +know the poet as they would never have known him in England. Even +the town taught them much about him, for in many ways it was +expressive of him and seemed as if it had shaped itself for him. It +was a delightful time for them. They enjoyed the society and +constant mental stimulus; they loved the beautiful park; not a +separate enclosure walled round like an English park, but suffering +the streets to end in it, and in summer time there were excursions +into the Thuringer Wald, generally to some point memorable in +history, or for some literary association. The drawback was the +contrast, when they went home, with Fenmarket, with its dulness and +its complete isolation from the intellectual world. At Weimar, in +the evening, they could see Egmont or hear Fidelio, or talk with +friends about the last utterance upon the Leben Jesu; but the +Fenmarket Egmont was a travelling wax-work show, its Fidelio psalm +tunes, or at best some of Bishop's glees, performed by a few of the +tradesfolk, who had never had an hour's instruction in music; and for +theological criticism there were the parish church and Ram Lane +Chapel. They did their best; they read their old favourites and +subscribed for a German as well as an English literary weekly +newspaper, but at times they were almost beaten. Madge more than +Clara was liable to depression. + +No Fenmarket maiden, other than the Hopgoods, was supposed to have +any connection whatever, or to have any capacity for any connection +with anything outside the world in which 'young ladies' dwelt, and if +a Fenmarket girl read a book, a rare occurrence, for there were no +circulating libraries there in those days, she never permitted +herself to say anything more than that it was 'nice,' or it was 'not +nice,' or she 'liked it' or did 'not like it;' and if she had +ventured to say more, Fenmarket would have thought her odd, not to +say a little improper. The Hopgood young women were almost entirely +isolated, for the tradesfolk felt themselves uncomfortable and +inferior in every way in their presence, and they were ineligible for +rectory and brewery society, not only because their father was merely +a manager, but because of their strange ways. Mrs Tubbs, the +brewer's wife, thought they were due to Germany. From what she knew +of Germany she considered it most injudicious, and even morally +wrong, to send girls there. She once made the acquaintance of a +German lady at an hotel at Tunbridge Wells, and was quite shocked. +She could see quite plainly that the standard of female delicacy must +be much lower in that country than in England. Mr Tubbs was sure Mrs +Hopgood must have been French, and said to his daughters, +mysteriously, 'you never can tell who Frenchwomen are.' + +'But, papa,' said Miss Tubbs, 'you know Mrs Hopgood's maiden name; we +found that out. It was Molyneux.' + +'Of course, my dear, of course; but if she was a Frenchwoman resident +in England she would prefer to assume an English name, that is to say +if she wished to be married.' + +Occasionally the Miss Hopgoods were encountered, and they confounded +Fenmarket sorely. On one memorable occasion there was a party at the +Rectory: it was the annual party into which were swept all the +unclassifiable odds-and-ends which could not be put into the two +gatherings which included the aristocracy and the democracy of the +place. Miss Clara Hopgood amazed everybody by 'beginning talk,' by +asking Mrs Greatorex, her hostess, who had been far away to Sidmouth +for a holiday, whether she had been to the place where Coleridge was +born, and when the parson's wife said she had not, and that she could +not be expected to make a pilgrimage to the birthplace of an infidel, +Miss Hopgood expressed her surprise, and declared she would walk +twenty miles any day to see Ottery St Mary. Still worse, when +somebody observed that an Anti-Corn-Law lecturer was coming to +Fenmarket, and the parson's daughter cried 'How horrid!' Miss +Hopgood talked again, and actually told the parson that, so far as +she had read upon the subject--fancy her reading about the Corn- +Laws!--the argument was all one way, and that after Colonel Thompson +nothing new could really be urged. + +'What is so--' she was about to say 'objectionable,' but she +recollected her official position and that she was bound to be +politic--'so odd and unusual,' observed Mrs Greatorex to Mrs Tubbs +afterwards, 'is not that Miss Hopgood should have radical views. Mrs +Barker, I know, is a radical like her husband, but then she never +puts herself forward, nor makes speeches. I never saw anything quite +like it, except once in London at a dinner-party. Lady Montgomery +then went on in much the same way, but she was a baronet's wife; the +baronet was in Parliament; she received a good deal and was obliged +to entertain her guests.' + +Poor Clara! she was really very unobtrusive and very modest, but +there had been constant sympathy between her and her father, not the +dumb sympathy as between man and dog, but that which can manifest +itself in human fashion. + + + +CHAPTER III + + + +Clara and her father were both chess-players, and at the time at +which our history begins, Clara had been teaching Madge the game for +about six months. + +'Check!' said Clara. + +'Check! after about a dozen moves. It is of no use to go on; you +always beat me. I should not mind that if I were any better now than +when I started. It is not in me.' + +'The reason is that you do not look two moves ahead. You never say +to yourself, "Suppose I move there, what is she likely to do, and +what can I do afterwards?"' + +'That is just what is impossible to me. I cannot hold myself down; +the moment I go beyond the next move my thoughts fly away, and I am +in a muddle, and my head turns round. I was not born for it. I can +do what is under my nose well enough, but nothing more.' + +'The planning and the forecasting are the soul of the game. I should +like to be a general, and play against armies and calculate the +consequences of manoeuvres.' + +'It would kill me. I should prefer the fighting. Besides, +calculation is useless, for when I think that you will be sure to +move such and such a piece, you generally do not.' + +'Then what makes the difference between the good and the bad player?' + +'It is a gift, an instinct, I suppose.' + +'Which is as much as to say that you give it up. You are very fond +of that word instinct; I wish you would not use it.' + +'I have heard you use it, and say you instinctively like this person +or that.' + +'Certainly; I do not deny that sometimes I am drawn to a person or +repelled from him before I can say why; but I always force myself to +discover afterwards the cause of my attraction or repulsion, and I +believe it is a duty to do so. If we neglect it we are little better +than the brutes, and may grossly deceive ourselves.' + +At this moment the sound of wheels was heard, and Madge jumped up, +nearly over-setting the board, and rushed into the front room. It +was the four-horse coach from London, which, once a day, passed +through Fenmarket on its road to Lincoln. It was not the direct +route from London to Lincoln, but the Defiance went this way to +accommodate Fenmarket and other small towns. It slackened speed in +order to change horses at the 'Crown and Sceptre,' and as Madge stood +at the window, a gentleman on the box-seat looked at her intently as +he passed. In another minute he had descended, and was welcomed by +the landlord, who stood on the pavement. Clara meanwhile had taken +up a book, but before she had read a page, her sister skipped into +the parlour again, humming a tune. + +'Let me see--check, you said, but it is not mate.' + +She put her elbows on the table, rested her head between her hands, +and appeared to contemplate the game profoundly. + +'Now, then, what do you say to that?' + +It was really a very lucky move, and Clara, whose thoughts perhaps +were elsewhere, was presently most unaccountably defeated. Madge was +triumphant. + +'Where are all your deep-laid schemes? Baffled by a poor creature +who can hardly put two and two together.' + +'Perhaps your schemes were better than mine.' + +'You know they were not. I saw the queen ought to take that bishop, +and never bothered myself as to what would follow. Have you not lost +your faith in schemes?' + +'You are very much mistaken if you suppose that, because of one +failure, or of twenty failures, I would give up a principle.' + +'Clara, you are a strange creature. Don't let us talk any more about +chess.' + +Madge swept all the pieces with her hand into the box, shut it, +closed the board, and put her feet on the fender. + +'You never believe in impulses or in doing a thing just because here +and now it appears to be the proper thing to do. Suppose anybody +were to make love to you--oh! how I wish somebody would, you dear +girl, for nobody deserves it more--' Madge put her head caressingly +on Clara's shoulder and then raised it again. 'Suppose, I say, +anybody were to make love to you, would you hold off for six months +and consider, and consider, and ask yourself whether he had such and +such virtues, and whether he could make you happy? Would not that +stifle love altogether? Would you not rather obey your first +impression and, if you felt you loved him, would you not say "Yes"?' + +'Time is not everything. A man who is prompt and is therefore +thought to be hasty by sluggish creatures who are never half awake, +may in five minutes spend more time in consideration than his critics +will spend in as many weeks. I have never had the chance, and am not +likely to have it. I can only say that if it were to come to me, I +should try to use the whole strength of my soul. Precisely because +the question would be so important, would it be necessary to employ +every faculty I have in order to decide it. I do not believe in +oracles which are supposed to prove their divinity by giving no +reasons for their commands.' + +'Ah, well, _I_ believe in Shakespeare. His lovers fall in love at +first sight.' + +'No doubt they do, but to justify yourself you have to suppose that +you are a Juliet and your friend a Romeo. They may, for aught I +know, be examples in my favour. However, I have to lay down a rule +for my own poor, limited self, and, to speak the truth, I am afraid +that great men often do harm by imposing on us that which is +serviceable to themselves only; or, to put it perhaps more correctly, +we mistake the real nature of their processes, just as a person who +is unskilled in arithmetic would mistake the processes of anybody who +is very quick at it, and would be led away by them. Shakespeare is +much to me, but the more he is to me, the more careful I ought to be +to discover what is the true law of my own nature, more important to +me after all than Shakespeare's.' + +'Exactly. I know what the law of mine is. If a man were to present +himself to me, I should rely on that instinct you so much despise, +and I am certain that the balancing, see-saw method would be fatal. +It would disclose a host of reasons against any conclusion, and I +should never come to any.' + +Clara smiled. Although this impetuosity was foreign to her, she +loved it for the good which accompanied it. + +'You do not mean to say you would accept or reject him at once?' + +'No, certainly not. What I mean is that in a few days, perhaps in a +shorter time, something within me would tell me whether we were +suited to one another, although we might not have talked upon half-a- +dozen subjects.' + +'I think the risk tremendous.' + +'But there is just as much risk the other way. You would examine +your friend, catalogue him, sum up his beliefs, note his behaviour +under various experimental trials, and miserably fail, after all your +scientific investigation, to ascertain just the one important point +whether you loved him and could live with him. Your reason was not +meant for that kind of work. If a woman trusts in such matters to +the faculty by which, when she wishes to settle whether she is to +take this house or that, she puts the advantages of the larger back +kitchen on one side and the bigger front kitchen on the other, I pity +her.' + +Mrs Hopgood at this moment came downstairs and asked when in the name +of fortune they meant to have the tea ready. + + + +CHAPTER IV + + + +Frank Palmer, the gentleman whom we saw descend from the coach, was +the eldest son of a wholesale and manufacturing chemist in London. +He was now about five-and-twenty, and having just been admitted as a +partner, he had begun, as the custom was in those days, to travel for +his firm. The elder Mr Palmer was a man of refinement, something +more than a Whig in politics, and an enthusiastic member of the Broad +Church party, which was then becoming a power in the country. He was +well-to-do, living in a fine old red-brick house at Stoke Newington, +with half-a-dozen acres of ground round it, and, if Frank had been +born thirty years later, he would probably have gone to Cambridge or +Oxford. In those days, however, it was not the custom to send boys +to the Universities unless they were intended for the law, divinity +or idleness, and Frank's training, which was begun at St Paul's +school, was completed there. He lived at home, going to school in +the morning and returning in the evening. He was surrounded by every +influence which was pure and noble. Mr Maurice and Mr Sterling were +his father's guests, and hence it may be inferred that there was an +altar in the house, and that the sacred flame burnt thereon. Mr +Palmer almost worshipped Mr Maurice, and his admiration was not +blind, for Maurice connected the Bible with what was rational in his +friend. 'What! still believable: no need then to pitch it +overboard: here after all is the Eternal Word!' It can be imagined +how those who dared not close their eyes to the light, and yet clung +to that book which had been so much to their forefathers and +themselves, rejoiced when they were able to declare that it belonged +to them more than to those who misjudged them and could deny that +they were heretics. The boy's education was entirely classical and +athletic, and as he was quick at learning and loved his games, he +took a high position amongst his school-fellows. He was not +particularly reflective, but he was generous and courageous, +perfectly straightforward, a fair specimen of thousands of English +public-school boys. As he grew up, he somewhat disappointed his +father by a lack of any real interest in the subjects in which his +father was interested. He accepted willingly, and even +enthusiastically, the household conclusions on religion and politics, +but they were not properly his, for he accepted them merely as +conclusions and without the premisses, and it was often even a little +annoying to hear him express some free opinion on religious questions +in a way which showed that it was not a growth but something picked +up. Mr Palmer, senior, sometimes recoiled into intolerance and +orthodoxy, and bewildered his son who, to use one of his own phrases, +'hardly knew where his father was.' Partly the reaction was due to +the oscillation which accompanies serious and independent thought, +but mainly it was caused by Mr Palmer's discontent with Frank's +appropriation of a sentiment or doctrine of which he was not the +lawful owner. Frank, however, was so hearty, so affectionate, and so +cheerful, that it was impossible not to love him dearly. + +In his visits to Fenmarket, Frank had often noticed Madge, for the +'Crown and Sceptre' was his headquarters, and Madge was well enough +aware that she had been noticed. He had inquired casually who it was +who lived next door, and when the waiter told him the name, and that +Mr Hopgood was formerly the bank manager, Frank remembered that he +had often heard his father speak of a Mr Hopgood, a clerk in a bank +in London, as one of his best friends. He did not fail to ask his +father about this friend, and to obtain an introduction to the widow. +He had now brought it to Fenmarket, and within half an hour after he +had alighted, he had presented it. + +Mrs Hopgood, of course, recollected Mr Palmer perfectly, and the +welcome to Frank was naturally very warm. It was delightful to +connect earlier and happier days with the present, and she was proud +in the possession of a relationship which had lasted so long. Clara +and Madge, too, were both excited and pleased. To say nothing of +Frank's appearance, of his unsnobbish, deferential behaviour which +showed that he understood who they were and that the little house +made no difference to him, the girls and the mother could not resist +a side glance at Fenmarket and the indulgence of a secret +satisfaction that it would soon hear that the son of Mr Palmer, so +well known in every town round about, was on intimate terms with +them. + +Madge was particularly gay that evening. The presence of sympathetic +people was always a powerful stimulus to her, and she was often +astonished at the witty things and even the wise things she said in +such company, although, when she was alone, so few things wise or +witty occurred to her. Like all persons who, in conversation, do not +so much express the results of previous conviction obtained in +silence as the inspiration of the moment, Madge dazzled everybody by +a brilliancy which would have been impossible if she had communicated +that which had been slowly acquired, but what she left with those who +listened to her, did not always seem, on reflection, to be so much as +it appeared to be while she was talking. Still she was very +charming, and it must be confessed that sometimes her spontaneity was +truer than the limitations of speech more carefully weighed. + +'What makes you stay in Fenmarket, Mrs Hopgood? How I wish you would +come to London!' + +'I do not wish to leave it now; I have become attached to it; I have +very few friends in London, and lastly, perhaps the most convincing +reason, I could not afford it. Rent and living are cheaper here than +in town.' + +'Would you not like to live in London, Miss Hopgood?' + +Clara hesitated for a few seconds. + +'I am not sure--certainly not by myself. I was in London once for +six months as a governess in a very pleasant family, where I saw much +society; but I was glad to return to Fenmarket.' + +'To the scenery round Fenmarket,' interrupted Madge; 'it is so +romantic, so mountainous, so interesting in every way.' + +'I was thinking of people, strange as it may appear. In London +nobody really cares for anybody, at least, not in the sense in which +I should use the words. Men and women in London stand for certain +talents, and are valued often very highly for them, but they are +valued merely as representing these talents. Now, if I had a talent, +I should not be satisfied with admiration or respect because of it. +No matter what admiration, or respect, or even enthusiasm I might +evoke, even if I were told that my services had been immense and that +life had been changed through my instrumentality, I should feel the +lack of quiet, personal affection, and that, I believe, is not common +in London. If I were famous, I would sacrifice all the adoration of +the world for the love of a brother--if I had one--or a sister, who +perhaps had never heard what it was which had made me renowned.' + +'Certainly,' said Madge, laughing, 'for the love of SUCH a sister. +But, Mr Palmer, I like London. I like the people, just the people, +although I do not know a soul, and not a soul cares a brass farthing +about me. I am not half so stupid in London as in the country. I +never have a thought of my own down here. How should I? But in +London there is plenty of talk about all kinds of things, and I find +I too have something in me. It is true, as Clara says, that nobody +is anything particular to anybody, but that to me is rather pleasant. +I do not want too much of profound and eternal attachments. They are +rather a burden. They involve profound and eternal attachment on my +part; and I have always to be at my best; such watchfulness and such +jealousy! I prefer a dressing-gown and slippers and bonds which are +not so tight.' + +'Madge, Madge, I wish you would sometimes save me the trouble of +laboriously striving to discover what you really mean.' + +Mrs Hopgood bethought herself that her daughters were talking too +much to one another, as they often did, even when guests were +present, and she therefore interrupted them. + +'Mr Palmer, you see both town and country--which do you prefer?' + +'Oh! I hardly know; the country in summer-time, perhaps, and town in +the winter.' + +This was a safe answer, and one which was not very original; that is +to say, it expressed no very distinct belief; but there was one valid +reason why he liked being in London in the winter. + +'Your father, I remember, loves music. I suppose you inherit his +taste, and it is impossible to hear good music in the country.' + +'I am very fond of music. Have you heard "St Paul?" I was at +Birmingham when it was first performed in this country. Oh! it IS +lovely,' and he began humming 'Be thou faithful unto death.' + +Frank did really care for music. He went wherever good music was to +be had; he belonged to a choral society and was in great request +amongst his father's friends at evening entertainments. He could +also play the piano, so far as to be able to accompany himself +thereon. He sang to himself when he was travelling, and often +murmured favourite airs when people around him were talking. He had +lessons from an old Italian, a little, withered, shabby creature, who +was not very proud of his pupil. 'He is a talent,' said the Signor, +'and he will amuse himself; good for a ballad at a party, but a +musician? no!' and like all mere 'talents' Frank failed in his songs +to give them just what is of most value--just that which separates an +artistic performance from the vast region of well-meaning, +respectable, but uninteresting commonplace. There was a curious lack +in him also of correspondence between his music and the rest of +himself. As music is expression, it might be supposed that something +which it serves to express would always lie behind it; but this was +not the case with him, although he was so attractive and delightful +in many ways. There could be no doubt that his love for Beethoven +was genuine, but that which was in Frank Palmer was not that of which +the sonatas and symphonies of the master are the voice. He went into +raptures over the slow movement in the C minor Symphony, but no C +minor slow movement was discernible in his character. + +'What on earth can be found in "St Paul" which can be put to music?' +said Madge. 'Fancy a chapter in the Epistle to the Romans turned +into a duet!' + +'Madge! Madge! I am ashamed of you,' said her mother. + +'Well, mother,' said Clara, 'I am sure that some of the settings by +your divinity, Handel, are absurd. "For as in Adam all die" may be +true enough, and the harmonies are magnificent, but I am always +tempted to laugh when I hear it.' + +Frank hummed the familiar apostrophe 'Be not afraid.' + +'Is that a bit of "St Paul"?' said Mrs Hopgood. + +'Yes, it goes like this,' and Frank went up to the little piano and +sang the song through. + +'There is no fault to be found with that,' said Madge, 'so far as the +coincidence of sense and melody is concerned, but I do not care much +for oratorios. Better subjects can be obtained outside the Bible, +and the main reason for selecting the Bible is that what is called +religious music may be provided for good people. An oratorio, to me, +is never quite natural. Jewish history is not a musical subject, +and, besides, you cannot have proper love songs in an oratorio, and +in them music is at its best.' + +Mrs Hopgood was accustomed to her daughter's extravagance, but she +was, nevertheless, a little uncomfortable. + +'Ah!' said Frank, who had not moved from the piano, and he struck the +first two bars of 'Adelaide.' + +'Oh, please,' said Madge, 'go on, go on,' but Frank could not quite +finish it. + +She was sitting on the little sofa, and she put her feet up, lay and +listened with her eyes shut. There was a vibration in Mr Palmer's +voice not perceptible during his vision of the crown of life and of +fidelity to death. + +'Are you going to stay over Sunday?' inquired Mrs Hopgood. + +'I am not quite sure; I ought to be back on Sunday evening. My +father likes me to be at home on that day.' + +'Is there not a Mr Maurice who is a friend of your father?' + +'Oh, yes, a great friend.' + +'He is not High Church nor Low Church?' + +'No, not exactly.' + +'What is he, then? What does he believe?' + +'Well, I can hardly say; he does not believe that anybody will be +burnt in a brimstone lake for ever.' + +'That is what he does not believe,' interposed Clara. + +'He believes that Socrates and the great Greeks and Romans who acted +up to the light that was within them were not sent to hell. I think +that is glorious, don't you?' + +'Yes, but that also is something he does not believe. What is there +in him which is positive? What has he distinctly won from the +unknown?' + +'Ah, Miss Hopgood, you ought to hear him yourself; he is wonderful. +I do admire him so much; I am sure you would like him.' + +'If you do not go home on Saturday,' said Mrs Hopgood, 'we shall be +pleased if you will have dinner with us on Sunday; we generally go +for a walk in the afternoon.' + +Frank hesitated, but at that moment Madge rose from the sofa. Her +hair was disarranged, and she pushed its thick folds backward. It +grew rather low down on her forehead and stood up a little on her +temples, a mystery of shadow and dark recess. If it had been +electrical with the force of a strong battery and had touched him, he +could not have been more completely paralysed, and his half-erect +resolution to go back on Saturday was instantly laid flat. + +'Thank you, Mrs Hopgood,' looking at Madge and meeting her eyes, 'I +think it very likely I shall stay, and if I do I will most certainly +accept your kind invitation.' + + + +CHAPTER V + + + +Sunday morning came, and Frank, being in the country, considered +himself absolved from the duty of going to church, and went for a +long stroll. At half-past one he presented himself at Mrs Hopgood's +house. + +'I have had a letter from London,' said Clara to Frank, 'telling me a +most extraordinary story, and I should like to know what you think of +it. A man, who was left a widower, had an only child, a lovely +daughter of about fourteen years old, in whose existence his own was +completely wrapped up. She was subject at times to curious fits of +self-absorption or absence of mind, and while she was under their +influence she resembled a somnambulist rather than a sane human being +awake. Her father would not take her to a physician, for he dreaded +lest he should be advised to send her away from home, and he also +feared the effect which any recognition of her disorder might have +upon her. He believed that in obscure and half-mental diseases like +hers, it was prudent to suppress all notice of them, and that if he +behaved to her as if she were perfectly well, she would stand a +chance of recovery. Moreover, the child was visibly improving, and +it was probable that the disturbance in her health would be speedily +outgrown. One hot day he went out shopping with her, and he observed +that she was tired and strange in her manner, although she was not +ill, or, at least, not so ill as he had often before seen her. The +few purchases they had to make at the draper's were completed, and +they went out into the street. He took her hand-bag, and, in doing +so, it opened and he saw to his horror a white silk pocket- +handkerchief crumpled up in it, which he instantly recognised as one +which had been shown him five minutes before, but he had not bought. +The next moment a hand was on his shoulder. It was that of an +assistant, who requested that they would both return for a few +minutes. As they walked the half dozen steps back, the father's +resolution was taken. "I am sixty," he thought to himself, "and she +is fourteen." They went into the counting-house and he confessed +that he had taken the handkerchief, but that it was taken by mistake +and that he was about to restore it when he was arrested. The poor +girl was now herself again, but her mind was an entire blank as to +what she had done, and she could not doubt her father's statement, +for it was a man's handkerchief and the bag was in his hands. The +draper was inexorable, and as he had suffered much from petty thefts +of late, had determined to make an example of the first offender whom +he could catch. The father was accordingly prosecuted, convicted and +sentenced to imprisonment. When his term had expired, his daughter, +who, I am glad to say, never for an instant lost her faith in him, +went away with him to a distant part of the country, where they lived +under an assumed name. About ten years afterwards he died and kept +his secret to the last; but he had seen the complete recovery and +happy marriage of his child. It was remarkable that it never +occurred to her that she might have been guilty, but her father's +confession, as already stated, was apparently so sincere that she +could do nothing but believe him. You will wonder how the facts were +discovered. After his death a sealed paper disclosing them was +found, with the inscription, "Not to be opened during my daughter's +life, and if she should have children or a husband who may survive +her, it is to be burnt." She had no children, and when she died as +an old woman, her husband also being dead, the seal was broken.' + +'Probably,' said Madge, 'nobody except his daughter believed he was +not a thief. For her sake he endured the imputation of common +larceny, and was content to leave the world with only a remote chance +that he would ever be justified.' + +'I wonder,' said Frank, 'that he did not admit that it was his +daughter who had taken the handkerchief, and excuse her on the ground +of her ailment.' + +'He could not do that,' replied Madge. 'The object of his life was +to make as little of the ailment as possible. What would have been +the effect on her if she had been made aware of its fearful +consequences? Furthermore, would he have been believed? And then-- +awful thought, the child might have suspected him of attempting to +shield himself at her expense! Do you think you could be capable of +such sacrifice, Mr Palmer?' + +Frank hesitated. 'It would--' + +'The question is not fair, Madge,' said Mrs Hopgood, interrupting +him. 'You are asking for a decision when all the materials to make +up a decision are not present. It is wrong to question ourselves in +cold blood as to what we should do in a great strait; for the +emergency brings the insight and the power necessary to deal with it. +I often fear lest, if such-and-such a trial were to befall me, I +should miserably fail. So I should, furnished as I now am, but not +as I should be under stress of the trial.' + +'What is the use,' said Clara, 'of speculating whether we can, or +cannot, do this or that? It IS now an interesting subject for +discussion whether the lie was a sin.' + +'No,' said Madge, 'a thousand times no.' + +'Brief and decisive. Well, Mr Palmer, what do you say?' + +'That is rather an awkward question. A lie is a lie.' + +'But not,' broke in Madge, vehemently, 'to save anybody whom you +love. Is a contemptible little two-foot measuring-tape to be applied +to such an action as that?' + +'The consequences of such a philosophy, though, my dear,' said Mrs +Hopgood, 'are rather serious. The moment you dispense with a fixed +standard, you cannot refuse permission to other people to dispense +with it also.' + +'Ah, yes, I know all about that, but I am not going to give up my +instinct for the sake of a rule. Do what you feel to be right, and +let the rule go hang. Somebody, cleverer in logic than we are, will +come along afterwards and find a higher rule which we have obeyed, +and will formulate it concisely.' + +'As for my poor self,' said Clara, 'I do not profess to know, without +the rule, what is right and what is not. We are always trying to +transcend the rule by some special pleading, and often in virtue of +some fancied superiority. Generally speaking, the attempt is fatal.' + +'Madge,' said Mrs Hopgood, 'your dogmatic decision may have been +interesting, but it prevented the expression of Mr Palmer's opinion.' + +Madge bent forward and politely inclined her head to the embarrassed +Frank. + +'I do not know what to say. I have never thought much about such +matters. Is not what they call casuistry a science among Roman +Catholics? If I were in a difficulty and could not tell right from +wrong, I should turn Catholic, and come to you as my priest, Mrs +Hopgood.' + +'Then you would do, not what you thought right yourself, but what I +thought right. The worth of the right to you is that it is your +right, and that you arrive at it in your own way. Besides, you might +not have time to consult anybody. Were you never compelled to settle +promptly a case of this kind?' + +'I remember once at school, when the mathematical master was out of +the class-room, a boy named Carpenter ran up to the blackboard and +wrote "Carrots" on it. That was the master's nickname, for he was +red-haired. Scarcely was the word finished, when Carpenter heard him +coming along the passage. There was just time partially to rub out +some of the big letters, but CAR remained, and Carpenter was standing +at the board when "Carrots" came in. He was an excitable man, and he +knew very well what the boys called him. + +'"What have you been writing on the board, sir?" + +'"Carpenter, sir." + +'The master examined the board. The upper half of the second R was +plainly perceptible, but it might possibly have been a P. He turned +round, looked steadily at Carpenter for a moment, and then looked at +us. Carpenter was no favourite, but not a soul spoke. + +'"Go to your place, sir." + +'Carpenter went to his place, the letters were erased and the lesson +was resumed. I was greatly perplexed; I had acquiesced in a cowardly +falsehood. Carrots was a great friend of mine, and I could not bear +to feel that he was humbugged, so when we were outside I went up to +Carpenter and told him he was an infernal sneak, and we had a +desperate fight, and I licked him, and blacked both his eyes. I did +not know what else to do.' + +The company laughed. + +'We cannot,' said Madge, 'all of us come to terms after this fashion +with our consciences, but we have had enough of these discussions on +morality. Let us go out.' + +They went out, and, as some relief from the straight road, they +turned into a field as they came home, and walked along a footpath +which crossed the broad, deep ditches by planks. They were within +about fifty yards of the last and broadest ditch, more a dyke than a +ditch, when Frank, turning round, saw an ox which they had not +noticed, galloping after them. + +'Go on, go on,' he cried, 'make for the plank.' + +He discerned in an instant that unless the course of the animal could +be checked it would overtake them before the bridge could be reached. +The women fled, but Frank remained. He was in the habit of carrying +a heavy walking-stick, the end of which he had hollowed out in his +schooldays and had filled up with lead. Just as the ox came upon +him, it laid its head to the ground, and Frank, springing aside, +dealt it a tremendous, two-handed blow on the forehead with his +knobbed weapon. The creature was dazed, it stopped and staggered, +and in another instant Frank was across the bridge in safety. There +was a little hysterical sobbing, but it was soon over. + +'Oh, Mr Palmer,' said Mrs Hopgood, 'what presence of mind and what +courage! We should have been killed without you.' + +'The feat is not original, Mrs Hopgood. I saw it done by a tough +little farmer last summer on a bull that was really mad. There was +no ditch for him though, poor fellow, and he had to jump a hedge.' + +'You did not find it difficult,' said Madge, 'to settle your problem +when it came to you in the shape of a wild ox.' + +'Because there was nothing to settle,' said Frank, laughing; 'there +was only one thing to be done.' + +'So you believed, or rather, so you saw,' said Clara. 'I should have +seen half-a-dozen things at once--that is to say, nothing.' + +'And I,' said Madge, 'should have settled it the wrong way: I am +sure I should, even if I had been a man. I should have bolted.' + +Frank stayed to tea, and the evening was musical. He left about ten, +but just as the door had shut he remembered he had forgotten his +stick. He gave a gentle rap and Madge appeared. She gave him his +stick. + +'Good-bye again. Thanks for my life.' + +Frank cursed himself that he could not find the proper word. He knew +there was something which might be said and ought to be said, but he +could not say it. Madge held out her hand to him, he raised it to +his lips and kissed it, and then, astonished at his boldness, he +instantly retreated. He went to the 'Crown and Sceptre' and was soon +in bed, but not to sleep. Strange, that the moment we lie down in +the dark, images, which were half obscured, should become so +intensely luminous! Madge hovered before Frank with almost tangible +distinctness, and he felt his fingers moving in her heavy, voluptuous +tresses. Her picture at last became almost painful to him and shamed +him, so that he turned over from side to side to avoid it. He had +never been thrown into the society of women of his own age, for he +had no sister, and a fire was kindled within him which burnt with a +heat all the greater because his life had been so pure. At last he +fell asleep and did not wake till late in the morning. He had just +time to eat his breakfast, pay one more business visit in the town, +and catch the coach due at eleven o'clock from Lincoln to London. As +the horses were being changed, he walked as near as he dared venture +to the windows of the cottage next door, but he could see nobody. +When the coach, however, began to move, he turned round and looked +behind him, and a hand was waved to him. He took off his hat, and in +five minutes he was clear of the town. It was in sight a long way, +but when, at last, it disappeared, a cloud of wretchedness swept over +him as the vapour sweeps up from the sea. What was she doing? +talking to other people, existing for others, laughing with others! +There were miles between himself and Fenmarket. Life! what was life? +A few moments of living and long, dreary gaps between. All this, +however, is a vain attempt to delineate what was shapeless. It was +an intolerable, unvanquishable oppression. This was Love; this was +the blessing which the god with the ruddy wings had bestowed on him. +It was a relief to him when the coach rattled through Islington, and +in a few minutes had landed him at the 'Angel.' + + + +CHAPTER VI + + + +There was to be a grand entertainment in the assembly room of the +'Crown and Sceptre' in aid of the County Hospital. Mrs Martin, widow +of one of the late partners in the bank, lived in a large house near +Fenmarket, and still had an interest in the business. She was +distinctly above anybody who lived in the town, and she knew how to +show her superiority by venturing sometimes to do what her urban +neighbours could not possibly do. She had been known to carry +through the street a quart bottle of horse physic although it was +wrapped up in nothing but brown paper. On her way she met the +brewer's wife, who was more aggrieved than she was when Mrs Martin's +carriage swept past her in the dusty, narrow lane which led to the +Hall. Mrs Martin could also afford to recognise in a measure the +claims of education and talent. A gentleman came from London to +lecture in the town, and showed astonished Fenmarket an orrery and a +magic lantern with dissolving views of the Holy Land. The exhibition +had been provided in order to extinguish a debt incurred in repairing +the church, but the rector's wife, and the brewer's wife, after +consultation, decided that they must leave the lecturer to return to +his inn. Mrs Martin, however, invited him to supper. Of course she +knew Mr Hopgood well, and knew that he was no ordinary man. She knew +also something of Mrs Hopgood and the daughters, and that they were +no ordinary women. She had been heard to say that they were ladies, +and that Mr Hopgood was a gentleman; and she kept up a distant kind +of intimacy with them, always nodded to them whenever she met them, +and every now and then sent them grapes and flowers. She had +observed once or twice to Mrs Tubbs that Mr Hopgood was a remarkable +person, who was quite scientific and therefore did not associate with +the rest of the Fenmarket folk; and Mrs Tubbs was much annoyed, +particularly by a slight emphasis which she thought she detected in +the 'therefore,' for Mr Tubbs had told her that one of the smaller +London brewers, who had only about fifty public-houses, had refused +to meet at dinner a learned French chemist who had written books. +Mrs Martin could not make friends with the Hopgoods, nor enter the +cottage. It would have been a transgression of that infinitely fine +and tortuous line whose inexplicable convolutions mark off what is +forbidden to a society lady. Clearly, however, the Hopgoods could be +requested to co-operate at the 'Crown and Sceptre;' in fact, it would +be impolitic not to put some of the townsfolk on the list of patrons. +So it came about that Mrs Hopgood was included, and that she was made +responsible for the provision of one song and one recitation. For +the song it was settled that Frank Palmer should be asked, as he +would be in Fenmarket. Usually he came but once every half year, but +he had not been able, so he said, to finish all his work the last +time. The recitation Madge undertook. + +The evening arrived, the room was crowded and a dozen private +carriages stood in the 'Crown and Sceptre' courtyard. Frank called +for the Hopgoods. Mrs Hopgood and Clara sat with presentation +tickets in the second row, amongst the fashionable folk; Frank and +Madge were upon the platform. Frank was loudly applauded in 'Il Mio +Tesoro,' but the loudest applause of the evening was reserved for +Madge, who declaimed Byron's 'Destruction of Sennacherib' with much +energy. She certainly looked very charming in her red gown, +harmonising with her black hair. The men in the audience were +vociferous for something more, and would not be contented until she +again came forward. The truth is, that the wily young woman had +prepared herself beforehand for possibilities, but she artfully +concealed her preparation. Looking on the ground and hesitating, she +suddenly raised her head as if she had just remembered something, and +then repeated Sir Henry Wotton's 'Happy Life.' She was again greeted +with cheers, subdued so as to be in accordance with the character of +the poem, but none the less sincere, and in the midst of them she +gracefully bowed and retired. Mrs Martin complimented her warmly at +the end of the performance, and inwardly debated whether Madge could +be asked to enliven one of the parties at the Hall, and how it could, +at the same time, be made clear to the guests that she and her +mother, who must come with her, were not even acquaintances, properly +so called, but were patronised as persons of merit living in the town +which the Hall protected. Mrs Martin was obliged to be very careful. +She certainly was on the list at the Lord Lieutenant's, but she was +in the outer ring, and she was not asked to those small and select +little dinners which were given to Sir Egerton, the Dean of +Peterborough, Lord Francis, and his brother, the county member. She +decided, however, that she could make perfectly plain the conditions +upon which the Hopgoods would be present, and the next day she sent +Madge a little note asking her if she would 'assist in some +festivities' at the Hall in about two months' time, which were to be +given in celebration of the twenty-first birthday of Mrs Martin's +third son. The scene from the 'Tempest,' where Ferdinand and Miranda +are discovered playing chess, was suggested, and it was proposed that +Madge should be Miranda, and Mr Palmer Ferdinand. Mrs Martin +concluded with a hope that Mrs Hopgood and her eldest daughter would +'witness the performance.' + +Frank joyously consented, for amateur theatricals had always +attracted him, and in a few short weeks he was again at Fenmarket. +He was obliged to be there for three or four days before the +entertainment, in order to attend the rehearsals, which Mrs Martin +had put under the control of a professional gentleman from London, +and Madge and he were consequently compelled to make frequent +journeys to the Hall. + +At last the eventful night arrived, and a carriage was hired next +door to take the party. They drove up to the grand entrance and were +met by a footman, who directed Madge and Frank to their dressing- +rooms, and escorted Mrs Hopgood and Clara to their places in the +theatre. They had gone early in order to accommodate Frank and +Madge, and they found themselves alone. They were surprised that +there was nobody to welcome them, and a little more surprised when +they found that the places allotted to them were rather in the rear. +Presently two or three fiddlers were seen, who began to tune their +instruments. Then some Fenmarket folk and some of the well-to-do +tenants on the estate made their appearance, and took seats on either +side of Mrs Hopgood and Clara. Quite at the back were the servants. +At five minutes to eight the band struck up the overture to 'Zampa,' +and in the midst of it in sailed Mrs Martin and a score or two of +fashionably-dressed people, male and female. The curtain ascended +and Prospero's cell was seen. Alonso and his companions were +properly grouped, and Prospero began, - + + + 'Behold, Sir King, +The wronged Duke of Milan, Prospero.' + + +The audience applauded him vigorously when he came to the end of his +speech, but there was an instantaneous cry of 'hush!' when Prospero +disclosed the lovers. It was really very pretty. Miranda wore a +loose, simple, white robe, and her wonderful hair was partly twisted +into a knot, and partly strayed down to her waist. The dialogue +between the two was spoken with much dramatic feeling, and when +Ferdinand came to the lines - + + + 'Sir, she is mortal, +But by immortal Providence she's mine,' + + +old Boston, a worthy and wealthy farmer, who sat next to Mrs Hopgood, +cried out 'hear, hear!' but was instantly suppressed. + +He put his head down behind the people in front of him, rubbed his +knees, grinned, and then turned to Mrs Hopgood, whom he knew, and +whispered, with his hand to his mouth, - + + +'And a precious lucky chap he is.' + + +Mrs Hopgood watched intently, and when Gonzalo invoked the gods to +drop a blessed crown on the couple, and the applause was renewed, and +Boston again cried 'hear, hear!' without fear of check, she did not +applaud, for something told her that behind this stage show a drama +was being played of far more serious importance. + +The curtain fell, but there were loud calls for the performers. It +rose, and they presented themselves, Alonso still holding the hands +of the happy pair. The cheering now was vociferous, more +particularly when a wreath was flung at the feet of the young +princess, and Ferdinand, stooping, placed it on her head. + +Again the curtain fell, the band struck up some dance music and the +audience were treated to 'something light,' and roared with laughter +at a pretty chambermaid at an inn who captivated and bamboozled a +young booby who was staying there, pitched him overboard; 'wondered +what he meant;' sang an audacious song recounting her many exploits, +and finished with a pas-seul. + +The performers and their friends were invited to a sumptuous supper, +and the Fenmarket folk were not at home until half-past two in the +morning. On their way back, Clara broke out against the +juxtaposition of Shakespeare and such vulgarity. + +'Much better,' she said, 'to have left the Shakespeare out +altogether. The lesson of the sequence is that each is good in its +way, a perfectly hateful doctrine to me. + +Frank and Madge were, however, in the best of humours, especially +Frank, who had taken a glass of wine beyond his customary very +temperate allowance. + +'But, Miss Hopgood, Mrs Martin had to suit all tastes; we must not be +too severe upon her.' + +There was something in this remark most irritating to Clara; the word +'tastes,' for example, as if the difference between Miranda and the +chambermaid were a matter of 'taste.' She was annoyed too with +Frank's easy, cheery tones for she felt deeply what she said, and his +mitigation and smiling latitudinarianism were more exasperating than +direct opposition. + +'I am sure,' continued Frank, 'that if we were to take the votes of +the audience, Miranda would be the queen of the evening;' and he put +the crown which he had brought away with him on her head again. + +Clara was silent. In a few moments they were at the door of their +house. It had begun to rain, and Madge, stepping out of the carriage +in a hurry, threw a shawl over her head, forgetting the wreath. It +fell into the gutter and was splashed with mud. Frank picked it up, +wiped it as well as he could with his pocket-handkerchief, took it +into the parlour and laid it on a chair. + + + +CHAPTER VII + + + +The next morning it still rained, a cold rain from the north-east, a +very disagreeable type of weather on the Fenmarket flats. Madge was +not awake until late, and when she caught sight of the grey sky and +saw her finery tumbled on the floor--no further use for it in any +shape save as rags--and the dirty crown, which she had brought +upstairs, lying on the heap, the leaves already fading, she felt +depressed and miserable. The breakfast was dull, and for the most +part all three were silent. Mrs Hopgood and Clara went away to begin +their housework, leaving Madge alone. + +'Madge,' cried Mrs Hopgood, 'what am I to do with this thing? It is +of no use to preserve it; it is dead and covered with dirt.' + +'Throw it down here.' + +She took it and rammed it into the fire. At that moment she saw +Frank pass. He was evidently about to knock, but she ran to the door +and opened it. + +'I did not wish to keep you waiting in the wet.' + +'I am just off but I could not help calling to see how you are. +What! burning your laurels, the testimony to your triumph?' + +'Triumph! rather transitory; finishes in smoke,' and she pushed two +or three of the unburnt leaves amongst the ashes and covered them +over. He stooped down, picked up a leaf, smoothed it between his +fingers, and then raised his eyes. They met hers at that instant, as +she lifted them and looked in his face. They were near one another, +and his hands strayed towards hers till they touched. She did not +withdraw; he clasped the hand, she not resisting; in another moment +his arms were round her, his face was on hers, and he was swept into +self-forgetfulness. Suddenly the horn of the coach about to start +awoke him, and he murmured the line from one of his speeches of the +night before - + + +'But by immortal Providence she's mine.' + + +She released herself a trifle, held her head back as if she desired +to survey him apart from her, so that the ecstasy of union might be +renewed, and then fell on his neck. + +The horn once more sounded, she let him out silently, and he was off. +Mrs Hopgood and Clara presently came downstairs. + +'Mr Palmer came in to bid you good-bye, but he heard the coach and +was obliged to rush away.' + +'What a pity,' said Mrs Hopgood, 'that you did not call us.' + +'I thought he would be able to stay longer.' + +The lines which followed Frank's quotation came into her head, - + + +'Sweet lord, you play me false.' + 'No, my dearest love, + I would not for the world.' + + +'An omen,' she said to herself; '"he would not for the world."' + +She was in the best of spirits all day long. When the housework was +over and they were quiet together, she said, - + +'Now, my dear mother and sister, I want to know how the performance +pleased you.' + +'It was as good as it could be,' replied her mother, 'but I cannot +think why all plays should turn upon lovemaking. I wonder whether +the time will ever come when we shall care for a play in which there +is no courtship.' + +'What a horrible heresy, mother,' said Madge. + +'It may be so; it may be that I am growing old, but it seems +astonishing to me sometimes that the world does not grow a little +weary of endless variations on the same theme.' + +'Never,' said Madge, 'as long as it does not weary of the thing +itself, and it is not likely to do that. Fancy a young man and a +young woman stopping short and exclaiming, "This is just what every +son of Adam and daughter of Eve has gone through before; why should +we proceed?" Besides, it is the one emotion common to the whole +world; we can all comprehend it. Once more, it reveals character. +In Hamlet and Othello, for example, what is interesting is not solely +the bare love. The natures of Hamlet and Othello are brought to +light through it as they would not have been through any other +stimulus. I am sure that no ordinary woman ever shows what she +really is, except when she is in love. Can you tell what she is from +what she calls her religion, or from her friends, or even from her +husband?' + +'Would it not be equally just to say women are more alike in love +than in anything else? Mind, I do not say alike, but more alike. Is +it not the passion which levels us all?' + +'Oh, mother, mother! did one ever hear such dreadful blasphemy? That +the loves, for example, of two such cultivated, exquisite creatures +as Clara and myself would be nothing different from those of the +barmaids next door?' + +'Well, at anyrate, I do not want to see MY children in love to +understand what they are--to me at least.' + +'Then, if you comprehend us so completely--and let us have no more +philosophy--just tell me, should I make a good actress? Oh! to be +able to sway a thousand human beings into tears or laughter! It must +be divine.' + +'No, I do not think you would,' replied Clara. + +'Why not, miss? YOUR opinion, mind, was not asked. Did I not act to +perfection last night?' + +'Yes.' + +'Then why are you so decisive?' + +'Try a different part some day. I may be mistaken.' + +'You are very oracular.' + +She turned to the piano, played a few chords, closed the instrument, +swung herself round on the music stool, and said she should go for a +walk. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + + +It was Mr Palmer's design to send Frank abroad as soon as he +understood the home trade. It was thought it would be an advantage +to him to learn something of foreign manufacturing processes. Frank +had gladly agreed to go, but he was now rather in the mood for delay. +Mr Palmer conjectured a reason for it, and the conjecture was +confirmed when, after two or three more visits to Fenmarket, +perfectly causeless, so far as business was concerned, Frank asked +for the paternal sanction to his engagement with Madge. Consent was +willingly given, for Mr Palmer knew the family well; letters passed +between him and Mrs Hopgood, and it was arranged that Frank's visit +to Germany should be postponed till the summer. He was now +frequently at Fenmarket as Madge's accepted suitor, and, as the +spring advanced, their evenings were mostly spent by themselves out +of doors. One afternoon they went for a long walk, and on their +return they rested by a stile. Those were the days when Tennyson was +beginning to stir the hearts of the young people in England, and the +two little green volumes had just become a treasure in the Hopgood +household. Mr Palmer, senior, knew them well, and Frank, hearing his +father speak so enthusiastically about them, thought Madge would like +them, and had presented them to her. He had heard one or two read +aloud at home, and had looked at one or two himself, but had gone no +further. Madge, her mother, and her sister had read and re-read +them. + +'Oh,' said Madge, 'for that Vale in Ida. Here in these fens how I +long for something that is not level! Oh, for the roar of - + + +"The long brook falling thro' the clov'n ravine +In cataract after cataract to the sea." + + +Go on with it, Frank.' + +'I cannot.' + +'But you know OEnone?' + +'I cannot say I do. I began it--' + +'Frank, how could you begin it and lay it down unfinished? Besides, +those lines are some of the first; you MUST remember - + + +"Behind the valley topmost Gargarus +Stands up and takes the morning."' + + +'No, I do not recollect, but I will learn them; learn them for your +sake.' + +'I do not want you to learn them for my sake.' + +'But I shall.' + +She had taken off her hat and his hand strayed to her neck. Her head +fell on his shoulder and she had forgotten his ignorance of OEnone. +Presently she awoke from her delicious trance and they moved +homewards in silence. Frank was a little uneasy. + +'I do greatly admire Tennyson,' he said. + +'What do you admire? You have hardly looked at him.' + +'I saw a very good review of him. I will look that review up, by the +way, before I come down again. Mr Maurice was talking about it.' + +Madge had a desire to say something, but she did not know what to +say, a burden lay upon her chest. It was that weight which presses +there when we are alone with those with whom we are not strangers, +but with whom we are not completely at home, and she actually found +herself impatient and half-desirous of solitude. This must be +criminal or disease, she thought to herself, and she forcibly +recalled Frank's virtues. She was so far successful that when they +parted and he kissed her, she was more than usually caressing, and +her ardent embrace, at least for the moment, relieved that unpleasant +sensation in the region of the heart. When he had gone she reasoned +with herself. What a miserable counterfeit of love, she argued, is +mere intellectual sympathy, a sympathy based on books! What did +Miranda know about Ferdinand's 'views' on this or that subject? Love +is something independent of 'views.' It is an attraction which has +always been held to be inexplicable, but whatever it may be it is not +'views.' She was becoming a little weary, she thought, of what was +called 'culture.' These creatures whom we know through Shakespeare +and Goethe are ghostly. What have we to do with them? It is idle +work to read or even to talk fine things about them. It ends in +nothing. What we really have to go through and that which goes +through it are interesting, but not circumstances and character +impossible to us. When Frank spoke of his business, which he +understood, he was wise, and some observations which he made the +other day, on the management of his workpeople, would have been +thought original if they had been printed. The true artist knows +that his hero must be a character shaping events and shaped by them, +and not a babbler about literature. Frank, also, was so susceptible. +He liked to hear her read to him, and her enthusiasm would soon be +his. Moreover, how gifted he was, unconsciously, with all that makes +a man admirable, with courage, with perfect unselfishness! How +handsome he was, and then his passion for her! She had read +something of passion, but she never knew till now what the white +intensity of its flame in a man could be. She was committed, too, +happily committed; it was an engagement. + +Thus, whenever doubt obtruded itself, she poured a self-raised tide +over it and concealed it. Alas! it could not be washed away; it was +a little sharp rock based beneath the ocean's depths, and when the +water ran low its dark point reappeared. She was more successful, +however, than many women would have been, for, although her interest +in ideas was deep, there was fire in her blood, and Frank's arm +around her made the world well nigh disappear; her surrender was +entire, and if Sinai had thundered in her ears she would not have +heard. She was destitute of that power, which her sister possessed, +of surveying herself from a distance. On the contrary, her emotion +enveloped her, and the safeguard of reflection on it was impossible +to her. + +As to Frank, no doubt ever approached him. He was intoxicated, and +beside himself. He had been brought up in a clean household, knowing +nothing of the vice by which so many young men are overcome, and +woman hitherto had been a mystery to him. Suddenly he found himself +the possessor of a beautiful creature, whose lips it was lawful to +touch and whose heartbeats he could feel as he pressed her to his +breast. It was permitted him to be alone with her, to sit on the +floor and rest his head on her knees, and he had ventured to capture +one of her slippers and carry it off to London, where he kept it +locked up amongst his treasures. If he had been drawn over Fenmarket +sluice in a winter flood he would not have been more incapable of +resistance. + +Every now and then Clara thought she discerned in Madge that she was +not entirely content, but the cloud-shadows swept past so rapidly and +were followed by such dazzling sunshine that she was perplexed and +hoped that her sister's occasional moodiness might be due to parting +and absence, or the anticipation of them. She never ventured to say +anything about Frank to Madge, for there was something in her which +forbade all approach from that side. Once when he had shown his +ignorance of what was so familiar to the Hopgoods, and Clara had +expected some sign of dissatisfaction from her sister, she appeared +ostentatiously to champion him against anticipated criticism. Clara +interpreted the warning and was silent, but, after she had left the +room with her mother in order that the lovers might be alone, she +went upstairs and wept many tears. Ah! it is a sad experience when +the nearest and dearest suspects that we are aware of secret +disapproval, knows that it is justifiable, throws up a rampart and +becomes defensively belligerent. From that moment all confidence is +at an end. Without a word, perhaps, the love and friendship of years +disappear, and in the place of two human beings transparent to each +other, there are two who are opaque and indifferent. Bitter, bitter! +If the cause of separation were definite disagreement upon conduct or +belief, we could pluck up courage, approach and come to an +understanding, but it is impossible to bring to speech anything which +is so close to the heart, and there is, therefore, nothing left for +us but to submit and be dumb. + + + +CHAPTER IX + + + +It was now far into June, and Madge and Frank extended their walks +and returned later. He had come down to spend his last Sunday with +the Hopgoods before starting with his father for Germany, and on the +Monday they were to leave London. + +Wordsworth was one of the divinities at Stoke Newington, and just +before Frank visited Fenmarket that week, he had heard the +Intimations of Immortality read with great fervour. Thinking that +Madge would be pleased with him if she found that he knew something +about that famous Ode, and being really smitten with some of the +passages in it, he learnt it, and just as they were about to turn +homewards one sultry evening he suddenly began to repeat it, and +declaimed it to the end with much rhetorical power. + +'Bravo!' said Madge, 'but, of all Wordsworth's poems, that is the one +for which I believe I care the least.' + +Frank's countenance fell. + +'Oh, me! I thought it was just what would suit you.' + +'No, not particularly. There are some noble lines in it; for example +- + + +"And custom lie upon thee with a weight, +Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!" + + +But the very title--Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of +Early Childhood--is unmeaning to me, and as for the verse which is in +everybody's mouth - + + +"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;" + + +and still worse the vision of "that immortal sea," and of the +children who "sport upon the shore," they convey nothing whatever to +me. I find though they are much admired by the clergy of the better +sort, and by certain religiously-disposed people, to whom thinking is +distasteful or impossible. Because they cannot definitely believe, +they fling themselves with all the more fervour upon these cloudy +Wordsworthian phrases, and imagine they see something solid in the +coloured fog.' + +It was now growing dark and a few heavy drops of rain began to fall, +but in a minute or two they ceased. Frank, contrary to his usual +wont, was silent. There was something undiscovered in Madge, a +region which he had not visited and perhaps could not enter. She +discerned in an instant what she had done, and in an instant +repented. He had taken so much pains with a long piece of poetry for +her sake: was not that better than agreement in a set of +propositions? Scores of persons might think as she thought about the +ode, who would not spend a moment in doing anything to gratify her. +It was delightful also to reflect that Frank imagined she would +sympathise with anything written in that temper. She recalled what +she herself had said when somebody gave Clara a copy in 'Parian' of a +Greek statue, a thing coarse in outline and vulgar. Clara was about +to put it in a cupboard in the attic, but Madge had pleaded so +pathetically that the donor had in a measure divined what her sister +loved, and had done her best, although she had made a mistake, that +finally the statue was placed on the bedroom mantelpiece. Madge's +heart overflowed, and Frank had never attracted her so powerfully as +at that moment. She took his hand softly in hers. + +'Frank,' she murmured, as she bent her head towards him, 'it is +really a lovely poem.' + +Suddenly there was a flash of forked lightning at some distance, +followed in a few seconds by a roll of thunder increasing in +intensity until the last reverberation seemed to shake the ground. +They took refuge in a little barn and sat down. Madge, who was timid +and excited in a thunderstorm, closed her eyes to shield herself from +the glare. + +The tumult in the heavens lasted for nearly two hours and, when it +was over, Madge and Frank walked homewards without speaking a word +for a good part of the way. + +'I cannot, cannot go to-morrow,' he suddenly cried, as they neared +the town. + +'You SHALL go,' she replied calmly. + +'But, Madge, think of me in Germany, think what my dreams and +thoughts will be--you here--hundreds of miles between us.' + +She had never seen him so shaken with terror. + +'You SHALL go; not another word.' + +'I must say something--what can I say? My God, my God, have mercy on +me!' + +'Mercy! mercy!' she repeated, half unconsciously, and then rousing +herself, exclaimed, 'You shall not say it; I will not hear; now, +good-bye.' + +They had come to the door; he went inside; she took his face between +her hands, left one kiss on his forehead, led him back to the doorway +and he heard the bolts drawn. When he recovered himself he went to +the 'Crown and Sceptre' and tried to write a letter to her, but the +words looked hateful, horrible on the paper, and they were not the +words he wanted. He dared not go near the house the next morning, +but as he passed it on the coach he looked at the windows. Nobody +was to be seen, and that night he left England. + +'Did you hear,' said Clara to her mother at breakfast, 'that the +lightning struck one of the elms in the avenue at Mrs Martin's +yesterday evening and splintered it to the ground?' + + + +CHAPTER X + + + +In a few days Madge received the following letter:- + + +'FRANKFORT, O. M., +HOTEL WAIDENBUSCH. + +'My dearest Madge,--I do not know how to write to you. I have begun +a dozen letters but I cannot bring myself to speak of what lies +before me, hiding the whole world from me. Forgiveness! how is any +forgiveness possible? But Madge, my dearest Madge, remember that my +love is intenser than ever. What has happened has bound you closer +to me. I IMPLORE you to let me come back. I will find a thousand +excuses for returning, and we will marry. We had vowed marriage to +each other and why should not our vows be fulfilled? Marriage, +marriage AT ONCE. You will not, you CANNOT, no, you CANNOT, you must +see you cannot refuse. My father wishes to make this town his +headquarters for ten days. Write by return for mercy's sake.--Your +ever devoted + +'FRANK.' + + +The reply came only a day late. + + +'My dear Frank,--Forgiveness! Who is to be forgiven? Not you. You +believed you loved me, but I doubted my love, and I know now that no +true love for you exists. We must part, and part forever. Whatever +wrong may have been done, marriage to avoid disgrace would be a wrong +to both of us infinitely greater. I owe you an expiation; your +release is all I can offer, and it is insufficient. I can only plead +that I was deaf and blind. By some miracle, I cannot tell how, my +ears and eyes are opened, and I hear and see. It is not the first +time in my life that the truth has been revealed to me suddenly, +supernaturally, I may say, as if in a vision, and I know the +revelation is authentic. There must be no wavering, no half- +measures, and I absolutely forbid another letter from you. If one +arrives I must, for the sake of my own peace and resolution, refuse +to read it. You have simply to announce to your father that the +engagement is at an end, and give no reasons.--Your faithful friend + +'MADGE HOPGOOD.' + + +Another letter did come, but Madge was true to her word, and it was +returned unopened. + +For a long time Frank was almost incapable of reflection. He dwelt +on an event which might happen, but which he dared not name; and if +it should happen! Pictures of his father, his home his father's +friends, Fenmarket, the Hopgood household, passed before him with +such wild rapidity and intermingled complexity that it seemed as if +the reins had dropped out of his hands and he was being hurried away +to madness. + +He resisted with all his might this dreadful sweep of the +imagination, tried to bring himself back into sanity and to devise +schemes by which, although he was prohibited from writing to Madge, +he might obtain news of her. Her injunction might not be final. +There was but one hope for him, one possibility of extrication, one +necessity--their marriage. It MUST be. He dared not think of what +might be the consequences if they did not marry. + +Hitherto Madge had given no explanation to her mother or sister of +the rupture, but one morning--nearly two months had now passed--Clara +did not appear at breakfast. + +'Clara is not here,' said Mrs Hopgood; 'she was very tired last +night, perhaps it is better not to disturb her.' + +'Oh, no! please let her alone. I will see if she still sleeps.' + +Madge went upstairs, opened her sister's door noiselessly, saw that +she was not awake, and returned. When breakfast was over she rose, +and after walking up and down the room once or twice, seated herself +in the armchair by her mother's side. Her mother drew herself a +little nearer, and took Madge's hand gently in her own. + +'Madge, my child, have you nothing to say to your mother?' + +'Nothing.' + +'Cannot you tell me why Frank and you have parted? Do you not think +I ought to know something about such an event in the life of one so +close to me?' + +'I broke off the engagement: we were not suited to one another.' + +'I thought as much; I honour you; a thousand times better that you +should separate now than find out your mistake afterwards when it is +irrevocable. Thank God, He has given you such courage! But you must +have suffered--I know you must;' and she tenderly kissed her +daughter. + +'Oh, mother! mother!' cried Madge, 'what is the worst--at least to-- +you--the worst that can happen to a woman?' + +Mrs Hopgood did not speak; something presented itself which she +refused to recognise, but she shuddered. Before she could recover +herself Madge broke out again, - + +'It has happened to me; mother, your daughter has wrecked your peace +for ever!' + +'And he has abandoned you?' + +'No, no; I told you it was I who left him.' + +It was Mrs Hopgood's custom, when any evil news was suddenly +communicated to her, to withdraw at once if possible to her own room. +She detached herself from Madge, rose, and, without a word, went +upstairs and locked her door. The struggle was terrible. So much +thought, so much care, such an education, such noble qualities, and +they had not accomplished what ordinary ignorant Fenmarket mothers +and daughters were able to achieve! This fine life, then, was a +failure, and a perfect example of literary and artistic training had +gone the way of the common wenches whose affiliation cases figured in +the county newspaper. She was shaken and bewildered. She was +neither orthodox nor secular. She was too strong to be afraid that +what she disbelieved could be true, and yet a fatal weakness had been +disclosed in what had been set up as its substitute. She could not +treat her child as a sinner who was to be tortured into something +like madness by immitigable punishment, but, on the other hand, she +felt that this sorrow was unlike other sorrows and that it could +never be healed. For some time she was powerless, blown this way and +that way by contradictory storms, and unable to determine herself to +any point whatever. She was not, however, new to the tempest. She +had lived and had survived when she thought she must have gone down. +She had learned the wisdom which the passage through desperate +straits can bring. At last she prayed and in a few minutes a message +was whispered to her. She went into the breakfast-room and seated +herself again by Madge. Neither uttered a word, but Madge fell down +before her, and, with a great cry, buried her face in her mother's +lap. She remained kneeling for some time waiting for a rebuke, but +none came. Presently she felt smoothing hands on her head and the +soft impress of lips. So was she judged. + + + +CHAPTER XI + + + +It was settled that they should leave Fenmarket. Their departure +caused but little surprise. They had scarcely any friends, and it +was always conjectured that people so peculiar would ultimately find +their way to London. They were particularly desirous to conceal +their movements, and therefore determined to warehouse their +furniture in town, to take furnished apartments there for three +months, and then to move elsewhere. Any letters which might arrive +at Fenmarket for them during these three months would be sent to them +at their new address; nothing probably would come afterwards, and as +nobody in Fenmarket would care to take any trouble about them, their +trace would become obliterated. They found some rooms near Myddelton +Square, Pentonville, not a particularly cheerful place, but they +wished to avoid a more distant suburb, and Pentonville was cheap. +Fortunately for them they had no difficulty whatever in getting rid +of the Fenmarket house for the remainder of their term. + +For a little while London diverted them after a fashion, but the +absence of household cares told upon them. They had nothing to do +but to read and to take dismal walks through Islington and Barnsbury, +and the gloom of the outlook thickened as the days became shorter and +the smoke began to darken the air. Madge was naturally more +oppressed than the others, not only by reason of her temperament, but +because she was the author of the trouble which had befallen them. +Her mother and Clara did everything to sustain and to cheer her. +They possessed the rare virtue of continuous tenderness. The love, +which with many is an inspiration, was with them their own selves, +from which they could not be separated; a harsh word could not +therefore escape from them. It was as impossible as that there +should be any failure in the pressure with which the rocks press +towards the earth's centre. Madge at times was very far gone in +melancholy. How different this thing looked when it was close at +hand; when she personally was to be the victim! She had read about +it in history, the surface of which it seemed scarcely to ripple; it +had been turned to music in some of her favourite poems and had lent +a charm to innumerable mythologies, but the actual fact was nothing +like the poetry or mythology, and threatened to ruin her own history +altogether. Nor would it be her own history solely, but more or less +that of her mother and sister. + +Had she believed in the common creed, her attention would have been +concentrated on the salvation of her own soul; she would have found +her Redeemer and would have been comparatively at peace; she would +have acknowledged herself convicted of infinite sin, and hell would +have been opened before her, but above the sin and the hell she would +have seen the distinct image of the Mediator abolishing both. +Popular theology makes personal salvation of such immense importance +that, in comparison therewith, we lose sight of the consequences to +others of our misdeeds. The sense of cruel injustice to those who +loved her remained with Madge perpetually. + +To obtain relief she often went out of London for the day; sometimes +her mother and sister went with her; sometimes she insisted on going +alone. One autumn morning, she found herself at Letherhead, the +longest trip she had undertaken, for there were scarcely any railways +then. She wandered about till she discovered a footpath which took +her to a mill-pond, which spread itself out into a little lake. It +was fed by springs which burst up through the ground. She watched at +one particular point, and saw the water boil up with such force that +it cleared a space of a dozen yards in diameter from every weed, and +formed a transparent pool just tinted with that pale azure which is +peculiar to the living fountains which break out from the bottom of +the chalk. She was fascinated for a moment by the spectacle, and +reflected upon it, but she passed on. In about three-quarters of an +hour she found herself near a church, larger than an ordinary village +church, and, as she was tired, and the gate of the church porch was +open, she entered and sat down. The sun streamed in upon her, and +some sheep which had strayed into the churchyard from the adjoining +open field came almost close to her, unalarmed, and looked in her +face. The quiet was complete, and the air so still, that a yellow +leaf dropping here and there from the churchyard elms--just beginning +to turn--fell quiveringly in a straight path to the earth. Sick at +heart and despairing, she could not help being touched, and she +thought to herself how strange the world is--so transcendent both in +glory and horror; a world capable of such scenes as those before her, +and a world in which such suffering as hers could be; a world +infinite both ways. The porch gate was open because the organist was +about to practise, and in another instant she was listening to the +Kyrie from Beethoven's Mass in C. She knew it; Frank had tried to +give her some notion of it on the piano, and since she had been in +London she had heard it at St Mary's, Moorfields. She broke down and +wept, but there was something new in her sorrow, and it seemed as if +a certain Pity overshadowed her. + +She had barely recovered herself when she saw a woman, apparently +about fifty, coming towards her with a wicker basket on her arm. She +sat down beside Madge, put her basket on the ground, and wiped her +face with her apron. + +'Marnin' miss! its rayther hot walkin', isn't it? I've come all the +way from Darkin, and I'm goin' to Great Oakhurst. That's a longish +step there and back again; not that this is the nearest way, but I +don't like climbing them hills, and then when I get to Letherhead I +shall have a lift in a cart.' + +Madge felt bound to say something as the sunburnt face looked kind +and motherly. + +'I suppose you live at Great Oakhurst?' + +'Yes. I do: my husband, God bless him! he was a kind of foreman at +The Towers, and when he died I was left alone and didn't know what to +be at, as both my daughters were out and one married; so I took the +general shop at Great Oakhurst, as Longwood used to have, but it +don't pay for I ain't used to it, and the house is too big for me, +and there isn't nobody proper to mind it when I goes over to Darkin +for anything.' + +'Are you going to leave?' + +'Well, I don't quite know yet, miss, but I thinks I shall live with +my daughter in London. She's married a cabinetmaker in Great Ormond +Street: they let lodgings, too. Maybe you know that part?' + +'No, I do not.' + +'You don't live in London, then?' + +'Yes, I do. I came from London this morning.' + +'The Lord have mercy on us, did you though! I suppose, then, you're +a-visitin' here. I know most of the folk hereabouts.' + +'No: I am going back this afternoon.' + +Her interrogator was puzzled and her curiosity stimulated. Presently +she looked in Madge's face. + +'Ah! my poor dear, you'll excuse me, I don't mean to be forward, but +I see you've been a-cryin': there's somebody buried here.' + +'No.' + +That was all she could say. The walk from Letherhead, and the +excitement had been too much for her and she fainted. Mrs Caffyn, +for that was her name, was used to fainting fits. She was often 'a +bit faint' herself, and she instantly loosened Madge's gown, brought +out some smelling-salts and also a little bottle of brandy and water. +Something suddenly struck her. She took up Madge's hand: there was +no wedding ring on it. + +Presently her patient recovered herself. + +'Look you now, my dear; you aren't noways fit to go back to London +to-day. If you was my child you shouldn't do it for all the gold in +the Indies, no, nor you sha'n't now. I shouldn't have a wink of +sleep this night if I let you go, and if anything were to happen to +you it would be me as 'ud have to answer for it.' + +'But I must go; my mother and sister will not know what has become of +me.' + +'You leave that to me; I tell you again as you can't go. I've been a +mother myself, and I haven't had children for nothing. I was just a- +goin' to send a little parcel up to my daughter by the coach, and her +husband's a-goin' to meet it. She'd left something behind last week +when she was with me, and I thought I'd get a bit of fresh butter +here for her and put along with it. They make better butter in the +farm in the bottom there, than they do at Great Oakhurst. A note +inside now will get to your mother all right; you have a bit of +something to eat and drink here, and you'll be able to walk along of +me just into Letherhead, and then you can ride to Great Oakhurst; +it's only about two miles, and you can stay there all night.' + +Madge was greatly touched; she took Mrs Caffyn's hands in hers, +pressed them both and consented. She was very weary, and the stamp +on Mrs Caffyn's countenance was indubitable; it was evidently no +forgery, but of royal mintage. They walked slowly to Letherhead, and +there they found the carrier's cart, which took them to Great +Oakhurst. + + + +CHAPTER XII + + + +Mrs Caffyn's house was a roomy old cottage near the church, with a +bow-window in which were displayed bottles of 'suckers,' and of Day & +Martin's blacking, cotton stuffs, a bag of nuts and some mugs, cups +and saucers. Inside were salt butter, washing-blue, drapery, +treacle, starch, tea, tobacco and snuff, cheese, matches, bacon, and +a few drugs, such as black draught, magnesia, pills, sulphur, dill- +water, Dalby's Carminative, and steel-drops. There was also a small +stock of writing-paper, string and tin ware. A boy was behind the +counter. When Mrs Caffyn was out he always asked the customers who +desired any article, the sale of which was in any degree an art, to +call again when she returned. He went as far as those things which +were put up in packets, such as what were called 'grits' for making +gruel, and he was also authorised to venture on pennyworths of +liquorice and peppermints, but the sale of half-a-dozen yards of +cotton print was as much above him as the negotiation of a treaty of +peace would be to a messenger in the Foreign Office. In fact, +nobody, excepting children, went into the shop when Mrs Caffyn was +not to be seen there, and, if she had to go to Dorking or Letherhead +on business, she always chose the middle of the day, when the folk +were busy at their homes or in the fields. Poor woman! she was much +tried. Half the people who dealt with her were in her debt, but she +could not press them for her money. During winter-time they were +discharged by the score from their farms, but as they were not +sufficiently philosophic, or sufficiently considerate for their +fellows to hang or drown themselves, they were obliged to consume +food, and to wear clothes, for which they tried to pay by instalments +during spring, summer and autumn. Mrs Caffyn managed to make both +ends meet by the help of two or three pigs, by great economy, and by +letting some of her superfluous rooms. Great Oakhurst was not a show +place nor a Spa, but the Letherhead doctor had once recommended her +to a physician in London, who occasionally sent her a patient who +wanted nothing but rest and fresh air. She also, during the +shooting-season, was often asked to find a bedroom for visitors to +The Towers. + +She might have done better had she been on thoroughly good terms with +the parson. She attended church on Sunday morning with tolerable +regularity. She never went inside a dissenting chapel, and was not +heretical on any definite theological point, but the rector and she +were not friends. She had lived in Surrey ever since she was a +child, but she was not Surrey born. Both her father and mother came +from the north country, and migrated southwards when she was very +young. They were better educated than the southerners amongst whom +they came; and although their daughter had no schooling beyond what +was obtainable in a Surrey village of that time, she was +distinguished by a certain superiority which she had inherited or +acquired from her parents. She was never subservient to the rector +after the fashion of her neighbours; she never curtsied to him, and +if he passed and nodded she said 'Marnin', sir,' in just the same +tone as that in which she said it to the smallest of the Great +Oakhurst farmers. Her church-going was an official duty incumbent +upon her as the proprietor of the only shop in the parish. She had +nothing to do with church matters except on Sunday, and she even went +so far as to neglect to send for the rector when one of her children +lay dying. She was attacked for the omission, but she defended +herself. + +'What was the use when the poor dear was only seven year old? What +call was there for him to come to a blessed innocent like that? I +did tell him to look in when my husband was took, for I know as +before we were married there was something atween him and that gal +Sanders. He never would own up to me about it, and I thought as he +might to a clergyman, and, if he did, it would ease his mind and make +it a bit better for him afterwards; but, Lord! it warn't no use, for +he went off and we didn't so much as hear her name, not even when he +was a-wandering. I says to myself when the parson left, "What's the +good of having you?"' + +Mrs Caffyn was a Christian, but she was a disciple of St James rather +than of St Paul. She believed, of course, the doctrines of the +Catechism, in the sense that she denied none, and would have assented +to all if she had been questioned thereon; but her belief that +'faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone,' was something +very vivid and very practical. + +Her estimate, too, of the relative values of the virtues and of the +relative sinfulness of sins was original, and the rector therefore +told all his parishioners that she was little better than a heathen. +The common failings in that part of the country amongst the poor were +Saturday-night drunkenness and looseness in the relations between the +young men and young women. Mrs Caffyn's indignation never rose to +the correct boiling point against these crimes. The rector once +ventured to say, as the case was next door to her, - + +'It is very sad, is it not, Mrs Caffyn, that Polesden should be so +addicted to drink. I hope he did not disturb you last Saturday +night. I have given the constable directions to look after the +street more closely on Saturday evening, and if Polesden again +offends he must be taken up.' + +Mrs Caffyn was behind her own counter. She had just served a +customer with two ounces of Dutch cheese, and she sat down on her +stool. Being rather a heavy woman she always sat down when she was +not busy, and she never rose merely to talk. + +'Yes, it is sad, sir, and Polesden isn't no particular friend of +mine, but I tell you what's sad too, sir, and that's the way them +people are mucked up in that cottage. Why, their living room opens +straight on the road, and the wind comes in fit to blow your head +off, and when he goes home o' nights, there's them children a- +squalling, and he can't bide there and do nothing.' + +'I am afraid, though, Mrs Caffyn, there must be something radically +wrong with that family. I suppose you know all about the eldest +daughter?' + +'Yes, sir, I HAVE heard it: it wouldn't be Great Oakhurst if I +hadn't, but p'r'aps, sir, you've never been upstairs in that house, +and yet a house it isn't. There's just two sleeping-rooms, that's +all; it's shameful, it isn't decent. Well, that gal, she goes away +to service. Maybe, sir, them premises at the farm are also unbeknown +to you. In the back kitchen there's a broadish sort of shelf as Jim +climbs into o' nights, and it has a rail round it to keep you from a- +falling out, and there's a ladder as they draws up in the day as goes +straight up from that kitchen to the gal's bedroom door. It's +downright disgraceful, and I don't believe the Lord A'mighty would be +marciful to neither of US if we was tried like that.' + +Mrs Caffyn bethought herself of the 'us' and was afraid that even she +had gone a little too far; 'leastways, speaking for myself, sir,' she +added. + +The rector turned rather red, and repented his attempt to enlist Mrs +Caffyn. + +'If the temptations are so great, Mrs Caffyn, that is all the more +reason why those who are liable to them should seek the means which +are provided in order that they may be overcome. I believe the +Polesdens are very lax attendants at church, and I don't think they +ever communicated.' + +Mrs Polesden at that moment came in for an ounce of tea, and as Mrs +Caffyn rose to weigh it, the rector departed with a stiff 'good- +morning,' made to do duty for both women. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + + +Mrs Caffyn persuaded Madge to go to bed at once, after giving her +'something to comfort her.' In the morning her kind hostess came to +her bedside. + +'You've got a mother, haven't you--leastways, I know you have, +because you wrote to her.' + +'Yes.' + +'Well, and you lives with her and she looks after you?' + +'Yes.' + +'And she's fond of you, maybe?' + +'Oh, yes.' + +'That's a marcy; well then, my dear, you shall go back in the cart to +Letherhead, and you'll catch the Darkin coach to London.' + +'You have been very good to me; what have I to pay you?' + +'Pay? Nothing! why, if I was to let you pay, it would just look as +if I'd trapped you here to get something out of you. Pay! no, not a +penny.' + +'I can afford very well to pay, but if it vexes you I will not offer +anything. I don't know how to thank you enough.' + +Madge took Mrs Caffyn's hand in hers and pressed it firmly. + +'Besides, my dear,' said Mrs Caffyn, smoothing the sheets a little, +'you won't mind my saying it, I expex you are in trouble. There's +something on your mind, and I believe as I knows pretty well what it +is.' + +Madge turned round in the bed so as no longer to face the light; Mrs +Caffyn sat between her and the window. + +'Look you here, my dear; don't you suppose I meant to say anything to +hurt you. The moment I looked on you I was drawed to you like; I +couldn't help it. I see'd what was the matter, but I was all the +more drawed, and I just wanted you to know as it makes no difference. +That's like me; sometimes I'm drawed that way and sometimes t'other +way, and it's never no use for me to try to go against it. I ain't +a-going to say anything more to you; God-A'mighty, He's above us all; +but p'r'aps you may be comm' this way again some day, and then you'll +look in.' + +Madge turned again to the light, and again caught Mrs Caffyn's hand, +but was silent. + +The next morning, after Madge's return, Mrs Cork, the landlady, +presented herself at the sitting-room door and 'wished to speak with +Mrs Hopgood for a minute.' + +'Come in, Mrs Cork.' + +'Thank you, ma'am, but I prefer as you should come downstairs.' + +Mrs Cork was about forty, a widow with no children. She had a face +of which it was impossible to recollect, when it had been seen even a +dozen times, any feature except the eyes, which were steel-blue, a +little bluer than the faceted head of the steel poker in her parlour, +but just as hard. She lived in the basement with a maid, much like +herself but a little more human. Although the front underground room +was furnished Mrs Cork never used it, except on the rarest occasions, +and a kind of apron of coloured paper hung over the fireplace nearly +all the year. She was a woman of what she called regular habits. No +lodger was ever permitted to transgress her rules, or to have meals +ten minutes before or ten minutes after the appointed time. She had +undoubtedly been married, but who Cork could have been was a marvel. +Why he died, and why there were never any children were no marvels. +At two o'clock her grate was screwed up to the narrowest possible +dimensions, and the ashes, potato peelings, tea leaves and cabbage +stalks were thrown on the poor, struggling coals. No meat, by the +way, was ever roasted--it was considered wasteful--everything was +baked or boiled. After half-past four not a bit of anything that was +not cold was allowed till the next morning, and, indeed, from the +first of April to the thirty-first of October the fire was raked out +the moment tea was over. Mrs Hopgood one night was not very well and +Clara wished to give her mother something warm. She rang the bell +and asked for hot water. Maria came up and disappeared without a +word after receiving the message. Presently she returned. + +'Mrs Cork, miss, wishes me to tell you as it was never understood as +'ot water would be required after tea, and she hasn't got any.' + +Mrs Hopgood had a fire, although it was not yet the thirty-first of +October, for it was very damp and raw. She had with much difficulty +induced Mrs Cork to concede this favour (which probably would not +have been granted if the coals had not yielded a profit of threepence +a scuttleful), and Clara, therefore, asked if she could not have the +kettle upstairs. Again Maria disappeared and returned. + +'Mrs Cork says, miss, as it's very ill-convenient as the kettle is +cleaned up agin to-morrow, and if you can do without it she will be +obliged.' + +It was of no use to continue the contest, and Clara bethought herself +of a little 'Etna' she had in her bedroom. She went to the +druggist's, bought some methylated spirit, and obtained what she +wanted. + +Mrs Cork had one virtue and one weakness. Her virtue was +cleanliness, but she persecuted the 'blacks,' not because she +objected to dirt as dirt, but because it was unauthorised, appeared +without permission at irregular hours, and because the glittering +polish on varnished paint and red mahogany was a pleasure to her. +She liked the dirt, too, in a way, for she enjoyed the exercise of +her ill-temper on it and the pursuit of it to destruction. Her +weakness was an enormous tom-cat which had a bell round its neck and +slept in a basket in the kitchen, the best-behaved and most moral cat +in the parish. At half-past nine every evening it was let out into +the back-yard and vanished. At ten precisely it was heard to mew and +was immediately admitted. Not once in a twelvemonth did that cat +prolong its love making after five minutes to ten. + +Mrs Hopgood went upstairs to her room, Mrs Cork following and closing +the door. + +'If you please, ma'am, I wish to give you notice to leave this day +week.' + +'What is the matter, Mrs Cork?' + +'Well, ma'am, for one thing, I didn't know as you'd bring a bird with +you.' + +It was a pet bird belonging to Madge. + +'But what harm does the bird do? It gives no trouble; my daughter +attends to it.' + +'Yes, ma'am, but it worrits my Joseph--the cat, I mean. I found him +the other mornin' on the table eyin' it, and I can't a-bear to see +him urritated.' + +'I should hardly have thought that a reason for parting with good +lodgers.' + +Mrs Hopgood had intended to move, as before explained, but she did +not wish to go till the three months had expired. + +'I don't say as that is everything, but if you wish me to tell you +the truth, Miss Madge is not a person as I like to keep in the house. +I wish you to know'--Mrs Cork suddenly became excited and venomous-- +'that I'm a respectable woman, and have always let my apartments to +respectable people, and do you think I should ever let them to +respectable people again if it got about as I had had anybody as +wasn't respectable? Where was she last night? And do you suppose as +me as has been a married woman can't see the condition she's in? I +say as you, Mrs Hopgood, ought to be ashamed of yourself for bringing +of such a person into a house like mine, and you'll please vacate +these premises on the day named.' She did not wait for an answer, +but banged the door after her, and went down to her subterranean den. + +Mrs Hopgood did not tell her children the true reason for leaving. +She merely said that Mrs Cork had been very impertinent, and that +they must look out for other rooms. Madge instantly recollected +Great Ormond Street, but she did not know the number, and oddly +enough she had completely forgotten Mrs Caffyn's name. It was a +peculiar name, she had heard it only once, she had not noticed it +over the door, and her exhaustion may have had something to do with +her loss of memory. She could not therefore write, and Mrs Hopgood +determined that she herself would go to Great Oakhurst. She had +another reason for her journey. She wished her kind friend there to +see that Madge had really a mother who cared for her. She was +anxious to confirm Madge's story, and Mrs Caffyn's confidence. Clara +desired to go also, but Mrs Hopgood would not leave Madge alone, and +the expense of a double fare was considered unnecessary. + +When Mrs Hopgood came to Letherhead on her return, the coach was full +inside, and she was obliged to ride outside, although the weather was +cold and threatening. In about half an hour it began to rain +heavily, and by the time she was in Pentonville she was wet through. +The next morning she ought to have lain in bed, but she came down at +her accustomed hour as Mrs Cork was more than usually disagreeable, +and it was settled that they would leave at once if the rooms in +Great Ormond Street were available. Clara went there directly after +breakfast, and saw Mrs Marshall, who had already received an +introductory letter from her mother. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + + +The Marshall family included Marshall and his wife. He was rather a +small man, with blackish hair, small lips, and with a nose just a +little turned up at the tip. As we have been informed, he was a +cabinet-maker. He worked for very good shops, and earned about two +pounds a week. He read books, but he did not know their value, and +often fancied he had made a great discovery on a bookstall of an +author long ago superseded and worthless. He belonged to a +mechanic's institute, and was fond of animal physiology; heard +courses of lectures on it at the institute, and had studied two or +three elementary handbooks. He found in a second-hand dealer's shop +a model, which could be taken to pieces, of the inside of the human +body. He had also bought a diagram of a man, showing the +circulation, and this he had hung in his bedroom, his mother-in-law +objecting most strongly on the ground that its effect on his wife was +injurious. He had a notion that the world might be regenerated if +men and women were properly instructed in physiological science, and +if before marriage they would study their own physical peculiarities, +and those of their intended partners. The crossing of peculiarities +nevertheless presented difficulties. A man with long legs surely +ought to choose a woman with short legs, but if a man who was +mathematical married a woman who was mathematical, the result might +be a mathematical prodigy. On the other hand the parents of the +prodigy might each have corresponding qualities, which, mixed with +the mathematical tendency, would completely nullify it. The path of +duty therefore was by no means plain. However, Marshall was sure +that great cities dwarfed their inhabitants, and as he himself was +not so tall as his father, and, moreover, suffered from bad +digestion, and had a tendency to 'run to head,' he determined to +select as his wife a 'daughter of the soil,' to use his own phrase, +above the average height, with a vigorous constitution and plenty of +common sense. She need not be bookish, 'he could supply all that +himself.' Accordingly, he married Sarah Caffyn. His mother and Mrs +Caffyn had been early friends. He was not mistaken in Sarah. She +was certainly robust; she was a shrewd housekeeper, and she never +read anything, except now and then a paragraph or two in the weekly +newspaper, notwithstanding (for there were no children), time hung +rather heavily on her hands. One child had been born, but to +Marshall's surprise and disappointment it was a poor, rickety thing, +and died before it was a twelvemonth old. + +Mrs Marshall was not a very happy woman. Marshall was a great +politician and spent many of his evenings away from home at political +meetings. He never informed her what he had been doing, and if he +had told her, she would neither have understood nor cared anything +about it. At Great Oakhurst she heard everything and took an +interest in it, and she often wished with all her heart that the +subject which occupied Marshall's thoughts was not Chartism but the +draining of that heavy, rush-grown bit of rough pasture that lay at +the bottom of the village. He was very good and kind to her, and she +never imagined, before marriage, that he ought to be more. She was +sure that at Great Oakhurst she would have been quite comfortable +with him but somehow, in London, it was different. 'I don't know how +it is,' she said one day, 'the sort of husband as does for the +country doesn't do for London.' + +At Great Oakhurst, where the doors were always open into the yard and +the garden, where every house was merely a covered bit of the open +space, where people were always in and out, and women never sat down, +except to their meals, or to do a little stitching or sewing, it was +really not necessary, as Mrs Caffyn observed, that husband and wife +should 'hit it so fine.' Mrs Marshall hated all the conveniences of +London. She abominated particularly the taps, and longed to be +obliged in all weathers to go out to the well and wind up the bucket. +She abominated also the dust-bin, for it was a pleasure to be +compelled--so at least she thought it now--to walk down to the muck- +heap and throw on it what the pig could not eat. Nay, she even +missed that corner of the garden against the elder-tree, where the +pig-stye was, for 'you could smell the elder-flowers there in the +spring-time, and the pig-stye wasn't as bad as the stuffy back room +in Great Ormond Street when three or four men were in it.' She did +all she could to spend her energy on her cooking and cleaning, but +'there was no satisfaction in it,' and she became much depressed, +especially after the child died. This was the main reason why Mrs +Caffyn determined to live with her. Marshall was glad she resolved +to come. His wife had her full share of the common sense he desired, +but the experiment had not altogether succeeded. He knew she was +lonely, and he was sorry for her, although he did not see how he +could mend matters. He reflected carefully, nothing had happened +which was a surprise to him, the relationship was what he had +supposed it would be, excepting that the child did not live and its +mother was a little miserable. There was nothing he would not do for +her, but he really had nothing more to offer her. + +Although Mrs Marshall had made up her mind that husbands and wives +could not be as contented with one another in the big city as they +would be in a village, a suspicion crossed her mind one day that, +even in London, the relationship might be different from her own. +She was returning from Great Oakhurst after a visit to her mother. +She had stayed there for about a month after her child's death, and +she travelled back to town with a Letherhead woman, who had married a +journeyman tanner, who formerly worked in the Letherhead tan-yard, +and had now moved to Bermondsey, a horrid hole, worse than Great +Ormond Street. Both Marshall and the tanner were at the 'Swan with +Two Necks' to meet the covered van, and the tanner's wife jumped out +first. + +'Hullo, old gal, here you are,' cried the tanner, and clasped her in +his brown, bark-stained arms, giving her, nothing loth, two or three +hearty kisses. They were so much excited at meeting one another, +that they forgot their friends, and marched off without bidding them +good-bye. Mrs Marshall was welcomed in quieter fashion. + +'Ah!' she thought to herself. 'Red Tom,' as the tanner was called, +'is not used to London ways. They are, perhaps, correct for London, +but Marshall might now and then remember that I have not been brought +up to them.' + +To return, however, to the Hopgoods. Before the afternoon they were +in their new quarters, happily for them, for Mrs Hopgood became +worse. On the morrow she was seriously ill, inflammation of the +lungs appeared, and in a week she was dead. What Clara and Madge +suffered cannot be told here. Whenever anybody whom we love dies, we +discover that although death is commonplace it is terribly original. +We may have thought about it all our lives, but if it comes close to +us, it is quite a new, strange thing to us, for which we are entirely +unprepared. It may, perhaps, not be the bare loss so much as the +strength of the bond which is broken that is the surprise, and we are +debtors in a way to death for revealing something in us which +ordinary life disguises. Long after the first madness of their grief +had passed, Clara and Madge were astonished to find how dependent +they had been on their mother. They were grown-up women accustomed +to act for themselves, but they felt unsteady, and as if deprived of +customary support. The reference to her had been constant, although +it was often silent, and they were not conscious of it. A defence +from the outside waste desert had been broken down, their mother had +always seemed to intervene between them and the world, and now they +were exposed and shelterless. + +Three parts of Mrs Hopgood's little income was mainly an annuity, and +Clara and Madge found that between them they had but seventy-five +pounds a year. + + + +CHAPTER XV + + + +Frank could not rest. He wrote again to Clara at Fenmarket; the +letter went to Mrs Cork's, and was returned to him. He saw that the +Hopgoods had left Fenmarket, and suspecting the reason, he determined +at any cost to go home. He accordingly alleged ill-health, a pretext +not altogether fictitious, and within a few days after the returned +letter reached him he was back at Stoke Newington. He went +immediately to the address in Pentonville which he found on the +envelope, but was very shortly informed by Mrs Cork that 'she knew +nothing whatever about them.' He walked round Myddelton Square, +hopeless, for he had no clue whatever. + +What had happened to him would scarcely, perhaps, have caused some +young men much uneasiness, but with Frank the case was altogether +different. There was a chance of discovery, and if his crime should +come to light his whole future life would be ruined. He pictured his +excommunication, his father's agony, and it was only when it seemed +possible that the water might close over the ghastly thing thrown in +it, and no ripple reveal what lay underneath, that he was able to +breathe again. Immediately he asked himself, however, IF he could +live with his father and wear a mask, and never betray his dreadful +secret. So he wandered homeward in the most miserable of all +conditions; he was paralysed by the intricacy of the coil which +enveloped and grasped him. + +That evening it happened that there was a musical party at his +father's house; and, of course, he was expected to assist. It would +have suited his mood better if he could have been in his own room, or +out in the streets, but absence would have been inconsistent with his +disguise, and might have led to betrayal. Consequently he was +present, and the gaiety of the company and the excitement of his +favourite exercise, brought about for a time forgetfulness of his +trouble. Amongst the performers was a distant cousin, Cecilia +Morland, a young woman rather tall and fully developed; not +strikingly beautiful, but with a lovely reddish-brown tint on her +face, indicative of healthy, warm, rich pulsations. She possessed a +contralto voice, of a quality like that of a blackbird, and it fell +to her and to Frank to sing. She was dressed in a fashion perhaps a +little more courtly than was usual in the gatherings at Mr Palmer's +house, and Frank, as he stood beside her at the piano, could not +restrain his eyes from straying every now and then a way from his +music to her shoulders, and once nearly lost himself, during a solo +which required a little unusual exertion, in watching the movement of +a locket and of what was for a moment revealed beneath it. He +escorted her amidst applause to a corner of the room, and the two sat +down side by side. + +'What a long time it is, Frank, since you and I sang that duet +together. We have seen nothing of you lately.' + +'Of course not; I was in Germany.' + +'Yes, but I think you deserted us before then. Do you remember that +summer when we were all together at Bonchurch, and the part songs +which astonished our neighbours just as it was growing dark? I +recollect you and I tried together that very duet for the first time +with the old lodging-house piano.' + +Frank remembered that evening well. + +'You sang better than you did to-night. You did not keep time: what +were you dreaming about?' + +'How hot the room is! Do you not feel it oppressive? Let us go into +the conservatory for a minute.' + +The door was behind them and they slipped in and sat down, just +inside, and under the orange tree. + +'You must not be away so long again. Now mind, we have a musical +evening this day fortnight. You will come? Promise; and we must +sing that duet again, and sing it properly.' + +He did not reply, but he stooped down, plucked a blood-red begonia, +and gave it to her. + +'That is a pledge. It is very good of you.' + +She tried to fasten it in her gown, underneath the locket, but she +dropped a little black pin. He went down on his knees to find it; +rose, and put the flower in its proper place himself, and his head +nearly touched her neck, quite unnecessarily. + +'We had better go back now,' she said, 'but mind, I shall keep this +flower for a fortnight and a day, and if you make any excuses I shall +return it faded and withered.' + +'Yes, I will come.' + +'Good boy; no apologies like those you sent the last time. No bad +throat. Play me false, and there will be a pretty rebuke for you--a +dead flower.' + +PLAY ME FALSE! It was as if there were some stoppage in a main +artery to his brain. PLAY ME FALSE! It rang in his ears, and for a +moment he saw nothing but the scene at the Hall with Miranda. +Fortunately for him, somebody claimed Cecilia, and he slunk back into +the greenhouse. + +One of Mr Palmer's favourite ballads was The Three Ravens. Its +pathos unfits it for an ordinary drawing-room, but as the music at Mr +Palmer's was not of the common kind, The Three Ravens was put on the +list for that night. + + +'She was dead herself ere evensong time. With a down, hey down, hey +down, +God send every gentleman +Such hawks, such hounds, and such a leman. With down, hey down, hey +down.' + + +Frank knew well the prayer of that melody, and, as he listened, he +painted to himself, in the vividest colours, Madge in a mean room, in +a mean lodging, and perhaps dying. The song ceased, and one for him +stood next. He heard voices calling him, but he passed out into the +garden and went down to the further end, hiding himself behind the +shrubs. Presently the inquiry for him ceased, and he was relieved by +hearing an instrumental piece begin. + +Following on that presentation of Madge came self-torture for his +unfaithfulness. He scourged himself into what he considered to be +his duty. He recalled with an effort all Madge's charms, mental and +bodily, and he tried to break his heart for her. He was in anguish +because he found that in order to feel as he ought to feel some +effort was necessary; that treason to her was possible, and because +he had looked with such eyes upon his cousin that evening. He saw +himself as something separate from himself, and although he knew what +he saw to be flimsy and shallow, he could do nothing to deepen it, +absolutely nothing! It was not the betrayal of that thunderstorm +which now tormented him. He could have represented that as a failure +to be surmounted; he could have repented it. It was his own inner +being from which he revolted, from limitations which are worse than +crimes, for who, by taking thought, can add one cubit to his stature? + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + + +The next morning found Frank once more in Myddelton Square. He +looked up at the house; the windows were all shut, and the blinds +were drawn down. He had half a mind to call again, but Mrs Cork's +manner had been so offensive and repellent that he desisted. +Presently the door opened, and Maria, the maid, came out to clean the +doorsteps. Maria, as we have already said, was a little more human +than her mistress, and having overheard the conversation between her +and Frank at the first interview, had come to the conclusion that +Frank was to be pitied, and she took a fancy to him. Accordingly, +when he passed her, she looked up and said,--'Good-morning.' Frank +stopped, and returned her greeting. + +'You was here the other day, sir, asking where them Hopgoods had +gone.' + +'Yes,' said Frank, eagerly, 'do you know what has become of them?' + +'I helped the cabman with the boxes, and I heard Mrs Hopgood say +"Great Ormond Street," but I have forgotten the number.' + +'Thank you very much.' + +Frank gave the astonished and grateful Maria half-a-crown, and went +off to Great Ormond Street at once. He paced up and down the street +half a dozen times, hoping he might recognise in a window some +ornament from Fenmarket, or perhaps that he might be able to +distinguish a piece of Fenmarket furniture, but his search was in +vain, for the two girls had taken furnished rooms at the back of the +house. His quest was not renewed that week. What was there to be +gained by going over the ground again? Perhaps they might have found +the lodgings unsuitable and have moved elsewhere. At church on +Sunday he met his cousin Cecilia, who reminded him of his promise. + +'See,' she said, 'here is the begonia. I put it in my prayer-book in +order to preserve it when I could keep it in water no longer, and it +has stained the leaf, and spoilt the Athanasian Creed. You will have +it sent to you if you are faithless. Reflect on your emotions, sir, +when you receive a dead flower, and you have the bitter consciousness +also that you have damaged my creed without any recompense.' + +It was impossible not to protest that he had no thought of breaking +his engagement, although, to tell the truth, he had wished once or +twice he could find some way out of it. He walked with her down the +churchyard path to her carriage, assisted her into it, saluted her +father and mother, and then went home with his own people. + +The evening came, he sang with Cecilia, and it was observed, and he +himself observed it, how completely their voices harmonised. He was +not without a competitor, a handsome young baritone, who was much +commended. When he came to the end of his performance everybody said +what a pity it was that the following duet could not also be given, a +duet which Cecilia knew perfectly well. She was very much pressed to +take her part with him, but she steadily refused, on the ground that +she had not practised it, that she had already sung once, and that +she was engaged to sing once more with her cousin. Frank was sitting +next to her, and she added, so as to be heard by him alone, 'He is no +particular favourite of mine.' + +There was no direct implication that Frank was a favourite, but an +inference was possible, and at least it was clear that she preferred +to reserve herself for him. Cecilia's gifts, her fortune, and her +gay, happy face had made many a young fellow restless, and had +brought several proposals, none of which had been accepted. All this +Frank knew, and how could he repress something more than satisfaction +when he thought that perhaps he might have been the reason why nobody +as yet had been able to win her. She always called him Frank, for +although they were not first cousins, they were cousins. He +generally called her Cecilia, but she was Cissy in her own house. He +was hardly close enough to venture upon the more familiar nickname, +but to-night, as they rose to go to the piano, he said, and the +baritone sat next to her, - + +'Now, CISSY, once more.' + +She looked at him with just a little start of surprise, and a smile +spread itself over her face. After they had finished, and she never +sang better, the baritone noticed that she seemed indisposed to +return to her former place, and she retired with Frank to the +opposite corner of the room. + +'I wonder,' she said, 'if being happy in a thing is a sign of being +born to do it. If it is, I am born to be a musician.' + +'I should say it is; if two people are quite happy in one another's +company, it is as a sign they were born for one another.' + +'Yes, if they are sure they are happy. It is easier for me to be +sure that I am happier with a thing than with a person.' + +'Do you think so? Why?' + +'There is the uncertainty whether the person is happy with me. I +cannot be altogether happy with anybody unless I know I make him +happy.' + +'What kind of person is he with whom you COULD be without making him +happy?' + +The baritone rose to the upper F with a clash of chords on the piano, +and the company broke up. Frank went home with but one thought in +his head--the thought of Cecilia. + +His bedroom faced the south-west, its windows were open, and when he +entered, the wind, which was gradually rising, struck him on the face +and nearly forced the door out of his hand; the fire in his blood was +quenched, and the image of Cecilia receded. He looked out, and saw +reflected on the low clouds the dull glare of the distant city. Just +over there was Great Ormond Street, and underneath that dim, red +light, like the light of a great house burning, was Madge Hopgood. +He lay down, turning over from side to side in the vain hope that by +change of position he might sleep. After about an hour's feverish +tossing, he just lost himself, but not in that oblivion which slumber +usually brought him. He was so far awake that he saw what was around +him, and yet, he was so far released from the control of his reason +that he did not recognise what he saw, and it became part of a new +scene created by his delirium. The full moon, clearing away the +clouds as she moved upwards, had now passed round to the south, and +just caught the white window-curtain farthest from him. He half- +opened his eyes, his mad dream still clung to him, and there was the +dead Madge before him, pale in death, and holding a child in her +arms! He distinctly heard himself scream as he started up in +affright; he could not tell where he was; the spectre faded and the +furniture and hangings transformed themselves into their familiar +reality. He could not lie down again, and rose and dressed himself. +He was not the man to believe that the ghost could be a revelation or +a prophecy, but, nevertheless, he was once more overcome with fear, a +vague dread partly justifiable by the fact of Madge, by the fact that +his father might soon know what had happened, that others also might +know, Cecilia for example, but partly also a fear going beyond all +the facts, and not to be accounted for by them, a strange, horrible +trembling such as men feel in earthquakes when the solid rock shakes, +on which everything rests. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + + +When Frank came downstairs to breakfast the conversation turned upon +his return to Germany. He did not object to going, although it can +hardly be said that he willed to go. He was in that perilous +condition in which the comparison of reasons is impossible, and the +course taken depends upon some chance impulse of the moment, and is a +mere drift. He could not leave, however, in complete ignorance of +Madge, and with no certainty as to her future. He resolved therefore +to make one more effort to discover the house. That was all which he +determined to do. What was to happen when he had found it, he did +not know. He was driven to do something, which could not be of any +importance, save for what must follow, but he was unable to bring +himself even to consider what was to follow. He knew that at +Fenmarket one or other of the sisters went out soon after breakfast +to make provision for the day, and perhaps, if they kept up this +custom, he might be successful in his search. He accordingly +stationed himself in Great Ormond Street at about half-past nine, and +kept watch from the Lamb's Conduit Street end, shifting his position +as well as he could, in order to escape notice. He had not been +there half an hour when he saw a door open, and Madge came out and +went westwards. She turned down Devonshire Street as if on her way +to Holborn. He instantly ran back to Theobalds Road, and when he +came to the corner of Devonshire Street she was about ten yards from +him, and he faced her. She stopped irresolutely, as if she had a +mind to return, but as he approached her, and she found she was +recognised, she came towards him. + +'Madge, Madge,' he cried, 'I want to speak to you. I must speak with +you.' + +'Better not; let me go.' + +'I say I MUST speak to you.' + +'We cannot talk here; let me go.' + +'I must! I must! come with me.' + +She pitied him, and although she did not consent she did not refuse. +He called a cab, and in ten minutes, not a word having been spoken +during those ten minutes, they were at St Paul's. The morning +service had just begun, and they sat down in a corner far away from +the worshippers. + +'Oh, Madge,' he began, 'I implore you to take me back. I love you. +I do love you, and--and--I cannot leave you.' + +She was side by side with the father of her child about to be born. +He was not and could not be as another man to her, and for the moment +there was the danger lest she should mistake this secret bond for +love. The thought of what had passed between them, and of the child, +his and hers, almost overpowered her. + +'I cannot,' he repeated. 'I OUGHT not. What will become of me?' + +She felt herself stronger; he was excited, but his excitement was not +contagious. The string vibrated, and the note was resonant, but it +was not a note which was consonant with hers, and it did not stir her +to respond. He might love her, he was sincere enough to sacrifice +himself for her, and to remain faithful to her, but the voice was not +altogether that of his own true self. Partly, at least, it was the +voice of what he considered to be duty, of superstition and alarm. +She was silent. + +'Madge,' he continued, 'ought you to refuse? You have some love for +me. Is it not greater than the love which thousands feel for one +another. Will you blast your future and mine, and, perhaps, that of +someone besides, who may be very dear to you? OUGHT you not, I say, +to listen?' + +The service had come to an end, the organist was playing a voluntary, +rather longer than usual, and the congregation was leaving, some of +them passing near Madge and Frank, and casting idle glances on the +young couple who had evidently come neither to pray nor to admire the +architecture. Madge recognised the well-known St Ann's fugue, and, +strange to say, even at such a moment it took entire possession of +her; the golden ladder was let down and celestial visitors descended. +When the music ceased she spoke. + +'It would be a crime.' + +'A crime, but I--' She stopped him. + +'I know what you are going to say. I know what is the crime to the +world; but it would have been a crime, perhaps a worse crime, if a +ceremony had been performed beforehand by a priest, and the worst of +crimes would be that ceremony now. I must go.' She rose and began +to move towards the door. + +He walked silently by her side till they were in St Paul's +churchyard, when she took him by the hand, pressed it affectionately +and suddenly turned into one of the courts that lead towards +Paternoster Row. He did not follow her, something repelled him, and +when he reached home it crossed his mind that marriage, after such +delay, would be a poor recompense, as he could not thereby conceal +her disgrace. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + + +It was clear that these two women could not live in London on +seventy-five pounds a year, most certainly not with the prospect +before them, and Clara cast about for something to do. Marshall had +a brother-in-law, a certain Baruch Cohen, a mathematical instrument +maker in Clerkenwell, and to him Marshall accidentally one day talked +about Clara, and said that she desired an occupation. Cohen himself +could not give Clara any work, but he knew a second-hand bookseller, +an old man who kept a shop in Holborn, who wanted a clerk, and Clara +thus found herself earning another pound a week. With this addition +she and her sister could manage to pay their way and provide what +Madge would want. The hours were long, the duties irksome and +wearisome, and, worst of all, the conditions under which they were +performed, were not only as bad as they could be, but their badness +was of a kind to which Clara had never been accustomed, so that she +felt every particle of it in its full force. The windows of the shop +were, of course, full of books, and the walls were lined with them. +In the middle of the shop also was a range of shelves, and books were +stacked on the floor, so that the place looked like a huge cubical +block of them through which passages had been bored. At the back the +shop became contracted in width to about eight feet, and consequently +the central shelves were not continued there, but just where they +ended, and overshadowed by them were a little desk and a stool. All +round the desk more books were piled, and some manoeuvring was +necessary in order to sit down. This was Clara's station. +Occasionally, on a brilliant, a very brilliant day in summer, she +could write without gas, but, perhaps, there were not a dozen such +days in the year. By twisting herself sideways she could just catch +a glimpse of a narrow line of sky over some heavy theology which was +not likely to be disturbed, and was therefore put at the top of the +window, and once when somebody bought the Calvin Joann. Opera Omnia, +9 vol. folio, Amst. 1671--it was very clear that afternoon--she +actually descried towards seven o'clock a blessed star exactly in the +middle of the gap the Calvin had left. + +The darkness was very depressing, and poor Clara often shut her eyes +as she bent over her day-book and ledger, and thought of the +Fenmarket flats where the sun could be seen bisected by the horizon +at sun-rising and sun-setting, and where even the southern Antares +shone with diamond glitter close to the ground during summer nights. +She tried to reason with herself during the dreadful smoke fogs; she +said to herself that they were only half-a-mile thick, and she +carried herself up in imagination and beheld the unclouded azure, the +filthy smother lying all beneath her, but her dream did not continue, +and reality was too strong for her. Worse, perhaps, than the eternal +gloom was the dirt. She was naturally fastidious, and as her skin +was thin and sensitive, dust was physically a discomfort. Even at +Fenmarket she was continually washing her hands and face, and, +indeed, a wash was more necessary to her after a walk than food or +drink. It was impossible to remain clean in Holborn for five +minutes; everything she touched was foul with grime; her collar and +cuffs were black with it when she went home to her dinner, and it was +not like the honest, blowing road-sand of Fenmarket highways, but a +loathsome composition of everything disgusting which could be +produced by millions of human beings and animals packed together in +soot. It was a real misery to her and made her almost ill. However, +she managed to set up for herself a little lavatory in the basement, +and whenever she had a minute at her command, she descended and +enjoyed the luxury of a cool, dripping sponge and a piece of yellow +soap. The smuts began to gather again the moment she went upstairs, +but she strove to arm herself with a little philosophy against them. +'What is there in life,' she moralised, smiling at her sermonising, +'which once won is for ever won? It is always being won and always +being lost.' Her master, fortunately, was one of the kindest of men, +an old gentleman of about sixty-five, who wore a white necktie, clean +every morning. He was really a GENTLEman in the true sense of that +much misused word, and not a mere TRADESman; that is to say, he loved +his business, not altogether for the money it brought him, but as an +art. He was known far and wide, and literary people were glad to +gossip with him. He never pushed his wares, and he hated to sell +them to anybody who did not know their value. He amused Clara one +afternoon when a carriage stopped at the door, and a lady inquired if +he had a Manning and Bray's History of Surrey. Yes, he had a copy, +and he pointed to the three handsome, tall folios. + +'What is the price?' + +'Twelve pounds ten.' + +'I think I will have them.' + +'Madam, you will pardon me, but, if I were you, I would not. I think +something much cheaper will suit you better. If you will allow me, I +will look out for you and will report in a few days.' + +'Oh! very well,' and she departed. + +'The wife of a brassfounder,' he said to Clara; 'made a lot of money, +and now he has bought a house at Dulwich and is setting up a library. +Somebody has told him that he ought to have a county history, and +that Manning and Bray is the book. Manning and Bray! What he wants +is a Dulwich and Denmark Hill Directory. No, no,' and he took down +one of the big volumes, blew the dust off the top edges and looked at +the old book-plate inside, 'you won't go there if I can help it.' He +took a fancy to Clara when he found she loved literature, although +what she read was out of his department altogether, and his perfectly +human behaviour to her prevented that sense of exile and loneliness +which is so horrible to many a poor creature who comes up to London +to begin therein the struggle for existence. She read and meditated +a good deal in the shop, but not to much profit, for she was +continually interrupted, and the thought of her sister intruded +itself perpetually. + +Madge seldom or never spoke of her separation from Frank, but one +night, when she was somewhat less reserved than usual, Clara ventured +to ask her if she had heard from him since they parted. + +'I met him once.' + +'Madge, do you mean that he found out where we are living, and that +he came to see you?' + +'No, it was just round the corner as I was going towards Holborn.' + +'Nothing could have brought him here but yourself,' said Clara, +slowly. + +'Clara, you doubt?' + +'No, no! I doubt you? Never!' + +'But you hesitate; you reflect. Speak out.' + +'God forbid I should utter a word which would induce you to +disbelieve what you know to be right. It is much more important to +believe earnestly that something is morally right than that it should +be really right, and he who attempts to displace a belief runs a +certain risk, because he is not sure that what he substitutes can be +held with equal force. Besides, each person's belief, or proposed +course of action, is a part of himself, and if he be diverted from it +and takes up with that which is not himself, the unity of his nature +is impaired, and he loses himself.' + +'Which is as much as to say that the prophet is to break no idols.' + +'You know I do not mean that, and you know, too, how incapable I am +of defending myself in argument. I never can stand up for anything I +say. I can now and then say something, but, when I have said it, I +run away.' + +'My dearest Clara,' Madge put her arm over her sister's shoulder as +they sat side by side, 'do not run away now; tell me just what you +think of me.' + +Clara was silent for a minute. + +'I have sometimes wondered whether you have not demanded a little too +much of yourself and Frank. It is always a question of how much. +There is no human truth which is altogether true, no love which is +altogether perfect. You may possibly have neglected virtue or +devotion such as you could not find elsewhere, overlooking it because +some failing, or the lack of sympathy on some unimportant point, may +at the moment have been prominent. Frank loved you, Madge.' + +Madge did not reply; she withdrew her arm from her sister's neck, +threw herself back in her chair and closed her eyes. She saw again +the Fenmarket roads, that summer evening, and she felt once more +Frank's burning caresses. She thought of him as he left St Paul's, +perhaps broken-hearted. Stronger than every other motive to return +to him, and stronger than ever, was the movement towards him of that +which belonged to him. + +At last she cried out, literally cried, with a vehemence which +startled and terrified Clara, - + +'Clara, Clara, you know not what you do! For God's sake forbear!' +She was again silent, and then she turned round hurriedly, hid her +face, and sobbed piteously. It lasted, however, but for a minute; +she rose, wiped her eyes, went to the window, came back again, and +said, - + +'It is beginning to snow.' + +The iron pillar bolted to the solid rock had quivered and resounded +under the blow, but its vibrations were nothing more than those of +the rigid metal; the base was unshaken and, except for an instant, +the column had not been deflected a hair's-breadth. + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + + +Mr Cohen, who had obtained the situation indirectly for Clara, +thought nothing more about it until, one day, he went to the shop, +and he then recollected his recommendation, which had been given +solely in faith, for he had never seen the young woman, and had +trusted entirely to Marshall. He found her at her dark desk, and as +he approached her, she hastily put a mark in a book and closed it. + +'Have you sold a little volume called After Office Hours by a man +named Robinson?' + +'I did not know we had it. I have never seen it.' + +'I do not wonder, but I saw it here about six months ago; it was up +there,' pointing to a top shelf. Clara was about to mount the +ladder, but he stopped her, and found what he wanted. Some of the +leaves were torn. + +'We can repair those for you; in about a couple of days it shall be +ready.' + +He lingered a little, and at that moment another customer entered. +Clara went forward to speak to him, and Cohen was able to see that it +was the Heroes and Hero Worship she had been studying, a course of +lectures which had been given by a Mr Carlyle, of whom Cohen knew +something. As the customer showed no signs of departing, Cohen left, +saying he would call again. + +Before sending Robinson's After Office Hours to the binder, Clara +looked at it. It was made up of short essays, about twenty +altogether, bound in dark-green cloth, lettered at the side, and +published in 1841. They were upon the oddest subjects: such as, +Ought Children to learn Rules before Reasons? The Higher Mathematics +and Materialism. Ought We to tell Those Whom We love what We think +about Them? Deductive Reasoning in Politics. What Troubles ought We +to Make Known and What ought We to Keep Secret: Courage as a Science +and an Art. + +Clara did not read any one essay through, she had no time, but she +was somewhat struck with a few sentences which caught her eye; for +example--'A mere dream, a vague hope, ought in some cases to be more +potent than a certainty in regulating our action. The faintest +vision of God should be more determinative than the grossest earthly +assurance.' + +'I knew a case in which a man had to encounter three successive +trials of all the courage and inventive faculty in him. Failure in +one would have been ruin. The odds against him in each trial were +desperate, and against ultimate victory were overwhelming. +Nevertheless, he made the attempt, and was triumphant, by the +narrowest margin, in every struggle. That which is of most value to +us is often obtained in defiance of the laws of probability.' + +'What is precious in Quakerism is not so much the doctrine of the +Divine voice as that of the preliminary stillness, the closure +against other voices and the reduction of the mind to a condition in +which it can LISTEN, in which it can discern the merest whisper, +inaudible when the world, or interest, or passion, are permitted to +speak.' + +'The acutest syllogiser can never develop the actual consequences of +any system of policy, or, indeed, of any change in human +relationship, man being so infinitely complex, and the interaction of +human forces so incalculable.' + +'Many of our speculative difficulties arise from the unauthorised +conception of an OMNIPOTENT God, a conception entirely of our own +creation, and one which, if we look at it closely, has no meaning. +It is because God COULD have done otherwise, and did not, that we are +confounded. It may be distressing to think that God cannot do any +better, but it is not so distressing as to believe that He might have +done better had He so willed.' + +Although these passages were disconnected, each of them seemed to +Clara to be written in a measure for herself, and her curiosity was +excited about the author. Perhaps the man who called would say +something about him. + +Baruch Cohen was now a little over forty. He was half a Jew, for his +father was a Jew and his mother a Gentile. The father had broken +with Judaism, but had not been converted to any Christian church or +sect. He was a diamond-cutter, originally from Holland, came over to +England and married the daughter of a mathematical instrument maker, +at whose house he lodged in Clerkenwell. The son was apprenticed to +his maternal grandfather's trade, became very skilful at it, worked +at it himself, employed a man and a boy, and supplied London shops, +which sold his instruments at about three times the price he obtained +for them. Baruch, when he was very young, married Marshall's elder +sister, but she died at the birth of her first child and he had been +a widower now for nineteen years. He had often thought of taking +another wife, and had seen, during these nineteen years, two or three +women with whom he had imagined himself to be really in love, and to +whom he had been on the verge of making proposals, but in each case +he had hung back, and when he found that a second and a third had +awakened the same ardour for a time as the first, he distrusted its +genuineness. He was now, too, at a time of life when a man has to +make the unpleasant discovery that he is beginning to lose the right +to expect what he still eagerly desires, and that he must beware of +being ridiculous. It is indeed a very unpleasant discovery. If he +has done anything well which was worth doing, or has made himself a +name, he may be treated by women with respect or adulation, but any +passable boy of twenty is really more interesting to them, and, +unhappily, there is perhaps so much of the man left in him that he +would rather see the eyes of a girl melt when she looked at him than +be adored by all the drawing-rooms in London as the author of the +greatest poem since Paradise Lost, or as the conqueror of half a +continent. Baruch's life during the last nineteen years had been +such that he was still young, and he desired more than ever, because +not so blindly as he desired it when he was a youth, the tender, +intimate sympathy of a woman's love. It was singular that, during +all those nineteen years, he should not once have been overcome. It +seemed to him as if he had been held back, not by himself, but by +some external power, which refused to give any reasons for so doing. +There was now less chance of yielding than ever; he was reserved and +self-respectful, and his manner towards women distinctly announced to +them that he knew what he was and that he had no claims whatever upon +them. He was something of a philosopher, too; he accepted, +therefore, as well as he could, without complaint, the inevitable +order of nature, and he tried to acquire, although often he failed, +that blessed art of taking up lightly and even with a smile whatever +he was compelled to handle. 'It is possible,' he said once, 'to +consider death too seriously.' He was naturally more than half a +Jew; his features were Jewish, his thinking was Jewish, and he +believed after a fashion in the Jewish sacred books, or, at anyrate, +read them continuously, although he had added to his armoury +defensive weapons of another type. In nothing was he more Jewish +than in a tendency to dwell upon the One, or what he called God, +clinging still to the expression of his forefathers although +departing so widely from them. In his ethics and system of life, as +well as in his religion, there was the same intolerance of a +multiplicity which was not reducible to unity. He seldom explained +his theory, but everybody who knew him recognised the difference +which it wrought between him and other men. There was a certain +concord in everything he said and did, as if it were directed by some +enthroned but secret principle. + +He had encountered no particular trouble since his wife's death, but +his life had been unhappy. He had no friends, much as he longed for +friendship, and he could not give any reasons for his failure. He +saw other persons more successful, but he remained solitary. Their +needs were not so great as his, for it is not those who have the +least but those who have the most to give who most want sympathy. He +had often made advances; people had called on him and had appeared +interested in him, but they had dropped away. The cause was chiefly +to be found in his nationality. The ordinary Englishman disliked him +simply as a Jew, and the better sort were repelled by a lack of +geniality and by his inability to manifest a healthy interest in +personal details. Partly also the cause was that those who care to +speak about what is nearest to them are very rare, and most persons +find conversation easy in proportion to the remoteness of its topics +from them. Whatever the reasons may have been, Baruch now, no matter +what the pressure from within might be, generally kept himself to +himself. It was a mistake and he ought not to have retreated so far +upon repulse. A word will sometimes, when least expected, unlock a +heart, a soul is gained for ever, and at once there is much more than +a recompense for the indifference of years. + +After the death of his wife, Baruch's affection spent itself upon his +son Benjamin, whom he had apprenticed to a firm of optical instrument +makers in York. The boy was not very much like his father. He was +indifferent to that religion by which his father lived, but he +inherited an aptitude for mathematics, which was very necessary in +his trade. Benjamin also possessed his father's rectitude, trusted +him, and looked to him for advice to such a degree that even Baruch, +at last, thought it would be better to send him away from home in +order that he might become a little more self-reliant and +independent. It was the sorest of trials to part with him, and, for +some time after he left, Baruch's loneliness was intolerable. It +was, however, relieved by a visit to York perhaps once in four or +five months, for whenever business could be alleged as an excuse for +going north, he managed, as he said, 'to take York on his way.' + +The day after he met Clara he started for Birmingham, and although +York was certainly not 'on his way,' he pushed forward to the city +and reached it on a Saturday evening. He was to spend Sunday there, +and on Sunday morning he proposed that they should hear the cathedral +service, and go for a walk in the afternoon. To this suggestion +Benjamin partially assented. He wished to go to the cathedral in the +morning, but thought his father had better rest after dinner. Baruch +somewhat resented the insinuation of possible fatigue consequent on +advancing years. + +'What do you mean?' he said; 'you know well enough I enjoy a walk in +the afternoon; besides, I shall not see much of you, and do not want +to lose what little time I have.' + +About three, therefore, they started, and presently a girl met them, +who was introduced simply as 'Miss Masters.' + +'We are going to your side of the water,' said the son; 'you may as +well cross with us.' + +They came to a point where a boat was moored, and a man was in it. +There was no regular ferry, but on Sundays he earned a trifle by +taking people to the opposite meadow, and thus enabling them to vary +their return journey to the city. When they were about two-thirds of +the way over, Benjamin observed that if they stood up they could see +the Minster. They all three rose, and without an instant's warning-- +they could not tell afterwards how it happened--the boat half +capsized, and they were in eight or nine feet of water. Baruch could +not swim and went down at once, but on coming up close to the gunwale +he caught at it and held fast. Looking round, he saw that Benjamin, +who could swim well, had made for Miss Masters, and, having caught +her by the back of the neck, was taking her ashore. The boatman, who +could also swim, called out to Baruch to hold on, gave the boat three +or four vigorous strokes from the stern, and Baruch felt the ground +under his feet. The boatman's little cottage was not far off, and, +when the party reached it, Benjamin earnestly desired Miss Masters to +take off her wet clothes and occupy the bed which was offered her. +He himself would run home--it was not half-a-mile--and, after having +changed, would go to her house and send her sister with what was +wanted. He was just off when it suddenly struck him that his father +might need some attention. + +'Oh, father--' he began, but the boatman's wife interposed. + +'He can't be left like that, and he can't go home; he'll catch his +death o' cold, and there isn't but one more bed in the house, and +that isn't quite fit to put a gentleman in. Howsomever, he must turn +in there, and my husband, he can go into the back-kitchen and rub +himself down. You won't do yourself no good, Mr Cohen,' addressing +the son, whom she knew, 'by going back; you'd better stay here and +get into bed with your father.' + +In a few minutes the boatman would have gone on the errand, but +Benjamin could not lose the opportunity of sacrificing himself for +Miss Masters. He rushed off, and in three-quarters of an hour had +returned with the sister. Having learned, after anxious inquiry, +that Miss Masters, so far as could be discovered, had not caught a +chill, he went to his father. + +'Well, father, I hope you are none the worse for the ducking,' he +said gaily. 'The next time you come to York you'd better bring +another suit of clothes with you.' + +Baruch turned round uneasily and did not answer immediately. He had +had a narrow escape from drowning. + +'Nothing of much consequence. Is your friend all right?' + +'Oh, yes; I was anxious about her, for she is not very strong, but I +do not think she will come to much harm. I made them light a fire in +her room.' + +'Are they drying my clothes?' + +'I'll go and see.' + +He went away and encountered the elder Miss Masters, who told him +that her sister, feeling no ill effects from the plunge, had +determined to go home at once, and in fact was nearly ready. +Benjamin waited, and presently she came downstairs, smiling. + +'Nothing the matter. I owe it to you, however, that I am not now in +another world.' + +Benjamin was in an ecstasy, and considered himself bound to accompany +her to her door. + +Meanwhile, Baruch lay upstairs alone in no very happy temper. He +heard the conversation below, and knew that his son had gone. In all +genuine love there is something of ferocious selfishness. The +perfectly divine nature knows how to keep it in check, and is even +capable--supposing it to be a woman's nature--of contentment if the +loved one is happy, no matter with what or with whom; but the nature +only a little less than divine cannot, without pain, endure the +thought that it no longer owns privately and exclusively that which +it loves, even when it loves a child, and Baruch was particularly +excusable, considering his solitude. Nevertheless, he had learned a +little wisdom, and, what was of much greater importance, had learned +how to use it when he needed it. It had been forced upon him; it was +an adjustment to circumstances, the wisest wisdom. It was not +something without any particular connection with him; it was rather +the external protection built up from within to shield him where he +was vulnerable; it was the answer to questions which had been put to +HIM, and not to those which had been put to other people. So it came +to pass that, when he said bitterly to himself that, if he were at +that moment lying dead at the bottom of the river, Benjamin would +have found consolation very near at hand, he was able to reflect upon +the folly of self-laceration, and to rebuke himself for a complaint +against what was simply the order of Nature, and not a personal +failure. + +His self-conquest, however, was not very permanent. When he left +York the next morning, he fancied his son was not particularly +grieved, and he was passive under the thought that an epoch in his +life had come, that the milestones now began to show the distance to +the place to which he travelled, and, still worse, that the boy who +had been so close to him, and upon whom he had so much depended, had +gone from him. + +There is no remedy for our troubles which is uniformly and +progressively efficacious. All that we have a right to expect from +our religion is that gradually, very gradually, it will assist us to +a real victory. After each apparent defeat, if we are bravely in +earnest, we gain something on our former position. Baruch was two +days on his journey back to town, and as he came nearer home, he +recovered himself a little. Suddenly he remembered the bookshop and +the book for which he had to call, and that he had intended to ask +Marshall something about the bookseller's new assistant. + + + +CHAPTER XX + + + +Madge was a puzzle to Mrs Caffyn. Mrs Caffyn loved her, and when she +was ill had behaved like a mother to her. The newly-born child, a +healthy girl, was treated by Mrs Caffyn as if it were her own +granddaughter, and many little luxuries were bought which never +appeared in Mrs Marshall's weekly bill. Naturally, Mrs Caffyn's +affection moved a response from Madge, and Mrs Caffyn by degrees +heard the greater part of her history; but why she had separated +herself from her lover without any apparent reason remained a +mystery, and all the greater was the mystery because Mrs Caffyn +believed that there were no other facts to be known than those she +knew. She longed to bring about a reconciliation. It was dreadful +to her that Madge should be condemned to poverty, and that her infant +should be fatherless, although there was a gentleman waiting to take +them both and make them happy. + +'The hair won't be dark like yours, my love,' she said one afternoon, +soon after Madge had come downstairs and was lying on the sofa. 'The +hair do darken a lot, but hers will never be black. It's my opinion +as it'll be fair.' + +Madge did not speak, and Mrs Caffyn, who was sitting at the head of +the couch, put her work and her spectacles on the table. It was +growing dusk; she took Madge's hand, which hung down by her side, and +gently lifted it up. Such a delicate hand, Mrs Caffyn thought. She +was proud that she had for a friend the owner of such a hand, who +behaved to her as an equal. It was delightful to be kissed--no mere +formal salutations--by a lady fit to go into the finest drawing-room +in London, but it was a greater delight that Madge's talk suited her +better than any she had heard at Great Oakhurst. It was natural she +should rejoice when she discovered, unconsciously that she had a +soul, to which the speech of the stars, though somewhat strange, was +not an utterly foreign tongue. + +She retained her hold on Madge's hand. + +'May be,' she continued, 'it'll be like its father's. In our family +all the gals take after the father, and all the boys after the +mother. I suppose as HE has lightish hair?' + +Still Madge said nothing. + +'It isn't easy to believe as the father of that blessed dear could +have been a bad lot. I'm sure he isn't, and yet there's that +Polesden gal at the farm, she as went wrong with Jim, a great ugly +brute, and she herself warnt up to much, well, as I say, her child +was the delicatest little angel as I ever saw. It's my belief as +God-a-mighty mixes Hisself up in it more nor we think. But there WAS +nothing amiss with him, was there, my sweet?' + +Mrs Caffyn inclined her head towards Madge. + +'Oh, no! Nothing, nothing.' + +'Don't you think, my dear, if there's nothing atwixt you, as it was a +flyin' in the face of Providence to turn him off? You were reglarly +engaged to him, and I have heard you say he was very fond of you. I +suppose there were some high words about something, and a kind of a +quarrel like, and so you parted, but that's nothing. It might all be +made up now, and it ought to be made up. What was it about?' + +'There was no quarrel.' + +'Well, of course, if you don't like to say anything more to me, I +won't ask you. I don't want to hear any secrets as I shouldn't hear. +I speak only because I can't abear to see you here when I believe as +everything might be put right, and you might have a house of your +own, and a good husband, and be happy for the rest of your days. It +isn't too late for that now. I know what I know, and as how he'd +marry you at once.' + +'Oh, my dear Mrs Caffyn, I have no secret from you, who have been so +good to me: I can only say I could not love him--not as I ought.' + +'If you can't love a man, that's to say if you can't ABEAR him, it's +wrong to have him, but if there's a child that does make a +difference, for one has to think of the child and of being +respectable. There's something in being respectable; although, for +that matter, I've see'd respectable people at Great Oakhurst as were +ten times worse than those as aren't. Still, a-speaking for myself, +I'd put up with a goodish bit to marry the man whose child wor mine.' + +'For myself I could, but it wouldn't be just to him.' + +'I don't see what you mean.' + +'I mean that I could sacrifice myself if I believed it to be my duty, +but I should wrong him cruelly if I were to accept him and did not +love him with all my heart.' + +'My dear, you take my word for it, he isn't so particklar as you are. +A man isn't so particklar as a woman. He goes about his work, and +has all sorts of things in his head, and if a woman makes him +comfortable when he comes home, he's all right. I won't say as one +woman is much the same as another to a man--leastways to all men--but +still they are NOT particklar. Maybe, though, it isn't quite the +same with gentlefolk like yourself,--but there's that blessed baby a- +cryin'.' + +Mrs Caffyn hastened upstairs, leaving Madge to her reflections. Once +more the old dialectic reappeared. 'After all,' she thought, 'it is, +as Clara said, a question of degree. There are not a thousand +husbands and wives in this great city whose relationship comes near +perfection. If I felt aversion my course would be clear, but there +is no aversion; on the contrary, our affection for one another is +sufficient for a decent household and decent existence undisturbed by +catastrophes. No brighter sunlight is obtained by others far better +than myself. Ought I to expect a refinement of relationship to which +I have no right? Our claims are always beyond our deserts, and we +are disappointed if our poor, mean, defective natures do not obtain +the homage which belongs to those of ethereal texture. It will be a +life with no enthusiasms nor romance, perhaps, but it will be +tolerable, and what may be called happy, and my child will be +protected and educated. My child! what is there which I ought to put +in the balance against her? If our sympathy is not complete, I have +my own little oratory: I can keep the candles alight, close the +door, and worship there alone.' + +So she mused, and her foes again ranged themselves over against her. +There was nothing to support her but something veiled, which would +not altogether disclose or explain itself. Nevertheless, in a few +minutes, her enemies had vanished, like a mist before a sudden wind, +and she was once more victorious. Precious and rare are those divine +souls, to whom that which is aerial is substantial, the only true +substance; those for whom a pale vision possesses an authority they +are forced unconditionally to obey. + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + + +Mrs Caffyn was unhappy, and made up her mind that she would talk to +Frank herself. She had learned enough about him from the two +sisters, especially from Clara, to make her believe that, with a very +little management, she could bring him back to Madge. The difficulty +was to see him without his father's knowledge. At last she +determined to write to him, and she made her son-in-law address the +envelope and mark it private. This is what she said:- + + +'DEAR SIR,--Although unbeknown to you, I take the liberty of telling +you as M. H. is alivin' here with me, and somebody else as I think +you ought to see, but perhaps I'd better have a word or two with you +myself, if not quite ill-convenient to you, and maybe you'll be kind +enough to say how that's to be done to your obedient, humble servant, + +'MRS CAFFYN.' + + +She thought this very diplomatic, inasmuch as nobody but Frank could +possibly suspect what the letter meant. It went to Stoke Newington, +but, alas! he was in Germany, and poor Mrs Caffyn had to wait a week +before she received a reply. Frank of course understood it. +Although he had thought about Madge continually, he had become +calmer. He saw, it is true, that there was no stability in his +position, and that he could not possibly remain where he was. Had +Madge been the commonest of the common, and his relationship to her +the commonest of the common, he could not permit her to cast herself +loose from him for ever and take upon herself the whole burden of his +misdeed. But he did not know what to do, and, as successive +considerations and reconsiderations ended in nothing, and the +distractions of a foreign country were so numerous, Madge had for a +time been put aside, like a huge bill which we cannot pay, and which +staggers us. We therefore docket it, and hide it in the desk, and we +imagine we have done something. Once again, however, the flame leapt +up out of the ashes, vivid as ever. Once again the thought that he +had been so close to Madge, and that she had yielded to him, touched +him with peculiar tenderness, and it seemed impossible to part +himself from her. To a man with any of the nobler qualities of man +it is not only a sense of honour which binds him to a woman who has +given him all she has to give. Separation seems unnatural, +monstrous, a divorce from himself; it is not she alone, but it is +himself whom he abandons. Frank's duty, too, pointed imperiously to +the path he ought to take, duty to the child as well as to the +mother. He determined to go home, secretly; Mrs Caffyn would not +have written if she had not seen good reason for believing that Madge +still belonged to him. He made up his mind to start the next day, +but when the next day came, instructions to go immediately to Hamburg +arrived from his father. There were rumours of the insolvency of a +house with which Mr Palmer dealt; inquiries were necessary which +could better be made personally, and if these rumours were correct, +as Mr Palmer believed them to be, his agency must be transferred to +some other firm. There was now no possibility of a journey to +England. For a moment he debated whether, when he was at Hamburg, he +could not slip over to London, but it would be dangerous. Further +orders might come from his father, and the failure to acknowledge +them would lead to evasion, and perhaps to discovery. He must, +therefore, content himself with a written explanation to Mrs Caffyn +why he could not meet her, and there should be one more effort to +make atonement to Madge. This was what went to Mrs Caffyn, and to +her lodger:- + + +'DEAR MADAM,--Your note has reached me here. I am very sorry that my +engagements are so pressing that I cannot leave Germany at present. +I have written to Miss Hopgood. There is one subject which I cannot +mention to her--I cannot speak to her about money. Will you please +give me full information? I enclose 20 pounds, and I must trust to your +discretion. I thank you heartily for all your kindness.--Truly +yours, + +'FRANK PALMER.' + + +'MY DEAREST MADGE,--I cannot help saying one more word to you, +although, when I last saw you, you told me that it was useless for me +to hope. I know, however, that there is now another bond between us, +the child is mine as well as yours, and if I am not all that you +deserve, ought you to prevent me from doing my duty to it as well as +to you? It is true that if we were to marry I could never right you, +and perhaps my father would have nothing to do with us, but in time +he might relent, and I will come over at once, or, at least, the +moment I have settled some business here, and you shall be my wife. +Do, my dearest Madge, consent.' + + +When he came to this point his pen stopped. What he had written was +very smooth, but very tame and cold. However, nothing better +presented itself; he changed his position, sat back in his chair, and +searched himself, but could find nothing. It was not always so. +Some months ago there would have been no difficulty, and he would not +have known when to come to an end. The same thing would have been +said a dozen times, perhaps, but it would not have seemed the same to +him, and each succeeding repetition would have been felt with the +force of novelty. He took a scrap of paper and tried to draft two or +three sentences, altered them several times and made them worse. He +then re-read the letter; it was too short; but after all it contained +what was necessary, and it must go as it stood. She knew how he felt +towards her. So he signed it after giving his address at Hamburg, +and it was posted. + +Three or four days afterwards Mrs Marshall, in accordance with her +usual custom, went to see Madge before she was up. The child lay +peacefully by its mother's side and Frank's letter was upon the +counterpane. The resolution that no letter from him should be opened +had been broken. The two women had become great friends and, within +the last few weeks, Madge had compelled Mrs Marshall to call her by +her Christian name. + +'You've had a letter from Mr Palmer; I was sure it was his +handwriting when it came late last night.' + +'You can read it; there is nothing private in it.' + +She turned round to the child and Mrs Marshall sat down and read. +When she had finished she laid the letter on the bed again and was +silent. + +'Well?' said Madge. 'Would you say "No?"' + +'Yes, I would.' + +'For your own sake, as well as for his?' + +Mrs Marshall took up the letter and read half of it again. + +'Yes, you had better say "No." You will find it dull, especially if +you have to live in London.' + +'Did you find London dull when you came to live in it?' + +'Rather; Marshall is away all day long.' + +'But scarcely any woman in London expects to marry a man who is not +away all day.' + +'They ought then to have heaps of work, or they ought to have a lot +of children to look after; but, perhaps, being born and bred in the +country, I do not know what people in London are. Recollect you were +country born and bred yourself, or, at anyrate, you have lived in the +country for the most of your life.' + +'Dull! we must all expect to be dull.' + +'There's nothing worse. I've had rheumatic fever, and I say, give me +the fever rather than what comes over me at times here. If Marshall +had not been so good to me, I do not know what I should have done +with myself.' + +Madge turned round and looked Mrs Marshall straight in the face, but +she did not flinch. + +'Marshall is very good to me, but I was glad when mother and you and +your sister came to keep me company when he is not at home. It tired +me to have my meals alone: it is bad for the digestion; at least, so +he says, and he believes that it was indigestion that was the matter +with me. I should be sorry for myself if you were to go away; not +that I want to put that forward. Maybe I should never see much more +of you: he is rich: you might come here sometimes, but he would not +like to have Marshall and mother and me at his house.' + +Not a word was spoken for at least a minute. + +Suddenly Mrs Marshall took Madge's hand in her own hands, leaned over +her, and in that kind of whisper with which we wake a sleeper who is +to be aroused to escape from sudden peril, she said in her ear, - + +'Madge, Madge: for God's sake leave him!' + +'I have left him.' + +'Are you sure?' + +'Quite.' + +'For ever?' + +'For ever!' + +Mrs Marshall let go Madge's hand, turned her eyes towards her +intently for a moment, and again bent over her as if she were about +to embrace her. A knock, however, came at the door, and Mrs Caffyn +entered with the cup of coffee which she always insisted on bringing +before Madge rose. After she and her daughter had left, Madge read +the letter once more. There was nothing new in it, but formally it +was something, like the tolling of the bell when we know that our +friend is dead. There was a little sobbing, and then she kissed her +child with such eagerness that it began to cry. + +'You'll answer that letter, I suppose?' said Mrs Caffyn, when they +were alone. + +'No.' + +'I'm rather glad. It would worrit you, and there's nothing worse for +a baby than worritin' when it's mother's a-feedin it.' + +Mr Caffyn wrote as follows:- + + +'DEAR SIR,--I was sorry as you couldn't come; but I believe now as it +was better as you didn't. I am no scollard, and so no more from your +obedient, humble servant, + +'MRS CAFFYN. + +'P.S.--I return the money, having no use for the same. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + + +Baruch did not obtain any very definite information from Marshall +about Clara. He was told that she had a sister; that they were both +of them gentlewomen; that their mother and father were dead; that +they were great readers, and that they did not go to church nor +chapel, but that they both went sometimes to hear a certain Mr A. J. +Scott lecture. He was once assistant minister to Irving, but was now +heretical, and had a congregation of his own creating at Woolwich. + +Baruch called at the shop and found Clara once more alone. The book +was packed up and had being lying ready for him for two or three +days. He wanted to speak, but hardly knew how to begin. He looked +idly round the shelves, taking down one volume after another, and at +last he said, - + +'I suppose nobody but myself has ever asked for a copy of Robinson?' + +'Not since I have been here.' + +'I do not wonder at it; he printed only two hundred and fifty; he +gave away five-and-twenty, and I am sure nearly two hundred were sold +as wastepaper.' + +'He is a friend of yours?' + +'He was a friend; he is dead; he was an usher in a private school, +although you might have supposed, from the title selected, that he +was a clerk. I told him it was useless to publish, and his +publishers told him the same thing.' + +'I should have thought that some notice would have been taken of him; +he is so evidently worth it.' + +'Yes, but although he was original and reflective, he had no +particular talent. His excellence lay in criticism and observation, +often profound, on what came to him every day, and he was valueless +in the literary market. A talent of some kind is necessary to genius +if it is to be heard. So he died utterly unrecognised, save by one +or two personal friends who loved him dearly. He was peculiar in the +depth and intimacy of his friendships. Few men understand the +meaning of the word friendship. They consort with certain companions +and perhaps very earnestly admire them, because they possess +intellectual gifts, but of friendship, such as we two, Morris and I +(for that was his real name) understood it, they know nothing.' + +'Do you believe, that the good does not necessarily survive?' + +'Yes and no; I believe that power every moment, so far as our eyes +can follow it, is utterly lost. I have had one or two friends whom +the world has never known and never will know, who have more in them +than is to be found in many an English classic. I could take you to +a little dissenting chapel not very far from Holborn where you would +hear a young Welshman, with no education beyond that provided by a +Welsh denominational college, who is a perfect orator and whose depth +of insight is hardly to be matched, save by Thomas A Kempis, whom he +much resembles. When he dies he will be forgotten in a dozen years. +Besides, it is surely plain enough to everybody that there are +thousands of men and women within a mile of us, apathetic and +obscure, who, if, an object worthy of them had been presented to +them, would have shown themselves capable of enthusiasm and heroism. +Huge volumes of human energy are apparently annihilated.' + +'It is very shocking, worse to me than the thought of the earthquake +or the pestilence.' + +'I said "yes and no" and there is another side. The universe is so +wonderful, so intricate, that it is impossible to trace the +transformation of its forces, and when they seem to disappear the +disappearance may be an illusion. Moreover, "waste" is a word which +is applicable only to finite resources. If the resources are +infinite it has no meaning.' + +Two customers came in and Baruch was obliged to leave. When he came +to reflect, he was surprised to find not only how much he had said, +but what he had said. He was usually reserved, and with strangers he +adhered to the weather or to passing events. He had spoken, however, +to this young woman as if they had been acquainted for years. Clara, +too, was surprised. She always cut short attempts at conversation in +the shop. Frequently she answered questions and receipted and +returned bills without looking in the faces of the people who spoke +to her or offered her the money. But to this foreigner, or Jew, she +had disclosed something she felt. She was rather abashed, but +presently her employer, Mr Barnes, returned and somewhat relieved +her. + +'The gentleman who bought After Office Hours came for it while you +were out?' + +'Oh! what, Cohen? Good fellow Cohen is; he it was who recommended +you to me. He is brother-in-law to your landlord.' Clara was +comforted; he was not a mere 'casual,' as Mr Barnes called his chance +customers. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + + +About a fortnight afterwards, on a Sunday afternoon, Cohen went to +the Marshalls'. He had called there once or twice since his mother- +in-law came to London, but had seen nothing of the lodgers. It was +just about tea-time, but unfortunately Marshall and his wife had gone +out. Mrs Caffyn insisted that Cohen should stay, but Madge could not +be persuaded to come downstairs, and Baruch, Mrs Caffyn and Clara had +tea by themselves. Baruch asked Mrs Caffyn if she could endure +London after living for so long in the country. + +'Ah! my dear boy, I have to like it.' + +'No, you haven't; what you mean is that, whether you like it, or +whether you do not, you have to put up with it.' + +'No, I don't mean that. Miss Hopgood, Cohen and me, we are the best +of friends, but whenever he comes here, he allus begins to argue with +me. Howsomever, arguing isn't everything, is it, my dear? There's +some things, after all, as I can do and he can't, but he's just wrong +here in his arguing that wasn't what I meant. I meant what I said, +as I had to like it.' + +'How can you like it if you don't?' + +'How can I? That shows you're a man and not a woman. Jess like you +men. YOU'D do what you didn't like, I know, for you're a good sort-- +and everybody would know you didn't like it--but what would be the +use of me a-livin' in a house if I didn't like it?--with my daughter +and these dear, young women? If it comes to livin', you'd ten +thousand times better say at once as you hate bein' where you are +than go about all day long, as if you was a blessed saint and put +upon.' + +Mrs Caffyn twitched at her gown and pulled it down over her knees and +brushed the crumbs off with energy. She continued, 'I can't abide +people who everlastin' make believe they are put upon. Suppose I +were allus a-hankering every foggy day after Great Oakhurst, and yet +a-tellin' my daughter as I knew my place was here; if I was she, I +should wish my mother at Jericho.' + +'Then you really prefer London to Great Oakhurst?' said Clara. + +'Why, my dear, of course I do. Don't you think it's pleasanter being +here with you and your sister and that precious little creature, and +my daughter, than down in that dead-alive place? Not that I don't +miss my walk sometimes into Darkin; you remember that way as I took +you once, Baruch, across the hill, and we went over Ranmore Common +and I showed you Camilla Lacy, and you said as you knew a woman who +wrote books who once lived there? You remember them beech-woods? +Ah, it was one October! Weren't they a colour--weren't they lovely?' + +Baruch remembered them well enough. Who that had ever seen them +could forget them? + +'And it was I as took you! You wouldn't think it, my dear, though +he's always a-arguin', I do believe he'd love to go that walk again, +even with an old woman, and see them heavenly beeches. But, Lord, +how I do talk, and you've neither of you got any tea.' + +'Have you lived long in London, Miss Hopgood?' inquired Baruch. + +'Not very long.' + +'Do you feel the change?' + +'I cannot say I do not.' + +'I suppose, however, you have brought yourself to believe in Mrs +Caffyn's philosophy?' + +'I cannot say that, but I may say that I am scarcely strong enough +for mere endurance, and I therefore always endeavour to find +something agreeable in circumstances from which there is no escape.' + +The recognition of the One in the Many had as great a charm for +Baruch as it had for Socrates, and Clara spoke with the ease of a +person whose habit it was to deal with principles and +generalisations. + +'Yes, and mere toleration, to say nothing of opposition, at least so +far as persons are concerned, is seldom necessary. It is generally +thought that what is called dramatic power is a poetic gift, but it +is really an indispensable virtue to all of us if we are to be +happy.' + +Mrs Caffyn did not take much interest in abstract statements. 'You +remember,' she said, turning to Baruch, 'that man Chorley as has the +big farm on the left-hand side just afore you come to the common? He +wasn't a Surrey man: he came out of the shires.' + +'Very well.' + +'He's married that Skelton girl; married her the week afore I left. +There isn't no love lost there, but the girl's father said he'd +murder him if he didn't, and so it come off. How she ever brought +herself to it gets over me. She has that big farm-house, and he's +made a fine drawing-room out of the livin' room on the left-hand side +as you go in, and put a new grate in the kitchen and turned that into +the livin' room, and they does the cooking in the back kitchen, but +for all that, if I'd been her, I'd never have seen his face no more, +and I'd have packed off to Australia.' + +'Does anybody go near them?' + +'Near them! of course they do, and, as true as I'm a-sittin' here, +our parson, who married them, went to the breakfast. It isn't +Chorley as I blame so much; he's a poor, snivellin' creature, and he +was frightened, but it's the girl. She doesn't care for him no more +than me, and then again, although, as I tell you, he's such a poor +creature, he's awful cruel and mean, and she knows it. But what was +I a-goin' to say? Never shall I forget that wedding. You know as +it's a short cut to the church across the farmyard at the back of my +house. The parson, he was rather late--I suppose he'd been giving +himself a finishin' touch--and, as it had been very dry weather, he +went across the straw and stuff just at the edge like of the yard. +There was a pig under the straw--pigs, my dear,' turning to Clara, +'nuzzle under the straw so as you can't see them. Just as he came to +this pig it started up and upset him, and he fell and straddled +across its back, and the Lord have mercy on me if it didn't carry him +at an awful rate, as if he was a jockey at Epsom races, till it come +to a puddle of dung water, and then down he plumped in it. You never +see'd a man in such a pickle! I heer'd the pig a-squeakin' like mad, +and I ran to the door, and I called out to him, and I says, "Mr +Ormiston, won't you come in here?" and though, as you know, he allus +hated me, he had to come. Mussy on us, how he did stink, and he saw +me turn up my nose, and he was wild with rage, and he called the pig +a filthy beast. I says to him as that was the pig's way and the pig +didn't know who it was who was a-ridin' it, and I took his coat off +and wiped his stockings, and sent to the rectory for another coat, +and he crept up under the hedge to his garden, and went home, and the +people at church had to wait for an hour. I was glad I was goin' +away from Great Oakhurst, for he never would have forgiven me.' + +There was a ring at the front door bell, and Clara went to see who +was there. It was a runaway ring, but she took the opportunity of +going upstairs to Madge. + +'She has a sister?' said Baruch. + +'Yes, and I may just as well tell you about her now--leastways what I +know--and I believe as I know pretty near everything about her. +You'll have to be told if they stay here. She was engaged to be +married, and how it came about with a girl like that is a bit beyond +me, anyhow, there's a child, and the father's a good sort by what I +can make out, but she won't have anything more to do with him.' + +'What do you mean by "a girl like that."' + +'She isn't one of them as goes wrong; she can talk German and reads +books.' + +'Did he desert her?' + +'No, that's just it. She loves me, although I say it, as if I was +her mother, and yet I'm just as much in the dark as I was the first +day I saw her as to why she left that man.' + +Mrs Caffyn wiped the corners of her eyes with her apron. + +'It's gospel truth as I never took to anybody as I've took to her.' + +After Baruch had gone, Clara returned. + +'He's a curious creature, my dear,' said Mrs Caffyn, 'as good as +gold, but he's too solemn by half. It would do him a world of good +if he'd somebody with him who'd make him laugh more. He CAN laugh, +for I've seen him forced to get up and hold his sides, but he never +makes no noise. He's a Jew, and they say as them as crucified our +blessed Lord never laugh proper. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + + + +Baruch was now in love. He had fallen in love with Clara suddenly +and totally. His tendency to reflectiveness did not diminish his +passion: it rather augmented it. The men and women whose thoughts +are here and there continually are not the people to feel the full +force of love. Those who do feel it are those who are accustomed to +think of one thing at a time, and to think upon it for a long time. +'No man,' said Baruch once, 'can love a woman unless he loves God.' +'I should say,' smilingly replied the Gentile, 'that no man can love +God unless he loves a woman.' 'I am right,' said Baruch, 'and so are +you.' + +But Baruch looked in the glass: his hair, jet black when he was a +youth, was marked with grey, and once more the thought came to him-- +this time with peculiar force--that he could not now expect a woman +to love him as she had a right to demand that he should love, and +that he must be silent. He was obliged to call upon Barnes in about +a fortnight's time. He still read Hebrew, and he had seen in the +shop a copy of the Hebrew translation of the Moreh Nevochim of +Maimonides, which he greatly coveted, but could not afford to buy. +Like every true book-lover, he could not make up his mind when he +wished for a book which was beyond his means that he ought once for +all to renounce it, and he was guilty of subterfuges quite unworthy +of such a reasonable creature in order to delude himself into the +belief that he might yield. For example, he wanted a new overcoat +badly, but determined it was more prudent to wait, and a week +afterwards very nearly came to the conclusion that as he had not +ordered the coat he had actually accumulated a fund from which the +Moreh Nevochim might be purchased. When he came to the shop he saw +Barnes was there, and he persuaded himself he should have a quieter +moment or two with the precious volume when Clara was alone. Barnes, +of course, gossiped with everybody. + +He therefore called again in the evening, about half an hour before +closing time, and found that Barnes had gone home. Clara was busy +with a catalogue, the proof of which she was particularly anxious to +send to the printer that night. He did not disturb her, but took +down the Maimonides, and for a few moments was lost in revolving the +doctrine, afterwards repeated and proved by a greater than +Maimonides, that the will and power of God are co-extensive: that +there is nothing which might be and is not. It was familiar to +Baruch, but like all ideas of that quality and magnitude--and there +are not many of them--it was always new and affected him like a +starry night, seen hundreds of times, yet for ever infinite and +original. + +But was it Maimonides which kept him till the porter began to put up +the shutters? Was he pondering exclusively upon God as the folio lay +open before him? He did think about Him, but whether he would have +thought about Him for nearly twenty minutes if Clara had not been +there is another matter. + +'Do you walk home alone?' he said as she gave the proof to the boy +who stood waiting. + +'Yes, always.' + +'I am going to see Marshall to-night, but I must go to Newman Street +first. I shall be glad to walk with you, if you do not mind +diverging a little.' + +She consented and they went along Oxford Street without speaking, the +roar of the carriages and waggons preventing a word. + +They turned, however, into Bloomsbury, and were able to hear one +another. He had much to say and he could not begin to say it. There +was a great mass of something to be communicated pent up within him, +and he would have liked to pour it all out before her at once. It is +just at such times that we often take up as a means of expression and +relief that which is absurdly inexpressive and irrelevant. + +'I have not seen your sister yet; I hope I may see her this evening.' + +'I hope you may, but she frequently suffers from headache and prefers +to be alone.' + +'How do you like Mr Barnes?' + +The answer is not worth recording, nor is any question or answer +which was asked or returned for the next quarter of an hour worth +recording, although they were so interesting then. When they were +crossing Bedford Square on their return Clara happened to say amongst +other commonplaces, - + +'What a relief a quiet space in London is.' + +'I do not mind the crowd if I am by myself.' + +'I do not like crowds; I dislike even the word, and dislike "the +masses" still more. I do not want to think of human beings as if +they were a cloud of dust, and as if each atom had no separate +importance. London is often horrible to me for that reason. In the +country it was not quite so bad.' + +'That is an illusion,' said Baruch after a moment's pause. + +'I do not quite understand you, but if it be an illusion it is very +painful. In London human beings seem the commonest, cheapest things +in the world, and I am one of them. I went with Mr Marshall not long +ago to a Free Trade Meeting, and more than two thousand people were +present. Everybody told me it was magnificent, but it made me very +sad.' She was going on, but she stopped. How was it, she thought +again, that she could be so communicative? How was it? How is it +that sometimes a stranger crosses our path, with whom, before we have +known him for more than an hour, we have no secrets? An hour? we +have actually known him for centuries. + +She could not understand it, and she felt as if she had been +inconsistent with her constant professions of wariness in self- +revelation. + +'It is an illusion, nevertheless--an illusion of the senses. It is +difficult to make what I mean clear, because insight is not possible +beyond a certain point, and clearness does not come until penetration +is complete and what we acquire is brought into a line with other +acquisitions. It constantly happens that we are arrested short of +this point, but it would be wrong to suppose that our conclusions, if +we may call them so, are of no value.' + +She was silent, and he did not go on. At last he said, - + +'The illusion lies in supposing that number, quantity and terms of +that kind are applicable to any other than sensuous objects, but I +cannot go further, at least not now. After all, it is possible here +in London for one atom to be of eternal importance to another.' + +They had gone quite round Bedford Square without entering Great +Russell Street, which was the way eastwards. A drunken man was +holding on by the railings of the Square. He had apparently been +hesitating for some time whether he could reach the road, and, just +as Baruch and Clara came up to him, he made a lurch towards it, and +nearly fell over them. Clara instinctively seized Baruch's arm in +order to avoid the poor, staggering mortal; they went once more to +the right, and began to complete another circuit. Somehow her arm +had been drawn into Baruch's, and there it remained. + +'Have you any friends in London?' said Baruch. + +'There are Mrs Caffyn, her son and daughter, and there is Mr A. J. +Scott. He was a friend of my father.' + +'You mean the Mr Scott who was Irving's assistant?' + +'Yes.' + +'An addition--' he was about to say, 'an additional bond' but he +corrected himself. 'A bond between us; I know Mr Scott.' + +'Do you really? I suppose you know many interesting people in +London, as you are in his circle.' + +'Very few; weeks, months have passed since anybody has said as much +to me as you have.' + +His voice quivered a little, for he was trembling with an emotion +quite inexplicable by mere intellectual relationship. Something came +through Clara's glove as her hand rested on his wrist which ran +through every nerve and sent the blood into his head. + +Clara felt his excitement and dreaded lest he should say something to +which she could give no answer, and when they came opposite Great +Russell Street, she withdrew her arm from his, and began to cross to +the opposite pavement. She turned the conversation towards some +indifferent subject, and in a few minutes they were at Great Ormond +Street. Baruch would not go in as he had intended; he thought it was +about to rain, and he was late. As he went along he became calmer, +and when he was fairly indoors he had passed into a despair entirely +inconsistent--superficially--with the philosopher Baruch, as +inconsistent as the irrational behaviour in Bedford Square. He could +well enough interpret, so he believed, Miss Hopgood's suppression of +him. Ass that he was not to see what he ought to have known so well, +that he was playing the fool to her; he, with a grown-up son, to +pretend to romance with a girl! At that moment she might be mocking +him, or, if she was too good for mockery, she might be contriving to +avoid or to quench him. The next time he met her, he would be made +to understand that he was PITIED, and perhaps he would then learn the +name of the youth who was his rival, and had won her. He would often +meet her, no doubt, but of what value would anything he could say be +to her. She could not be expected to make fine distinctions, and +there was a class of elderly men, to which of course he would be +assigned, but the thought was too horrible. + +Perhaps his love for Clara might be genuine; perhaps it was not. He +had hoped that as he grew older he might be able really to SEE a +woman, but he was once more like one of the possessed. It was not +Clara Hopgood who was before him, it was hair, lips, eyes, just as it +was twenty years ago, just as it was with the commonest shop-boy he +met, who had escaped from the counter, and was waiting at an area +gate. It was terrible to him to find that he had so nearly lost his +self-control, but upon this point he was unjust to himself, for we +are often more distinctly aware of the strength of the temptation +than of the authority within us, which falteringly, but decisively, +enables us at last to resist it. + +Then he fell to meditating how little his studies had done for him. +What was the use of them? They had not made him any stronger, and he +was no better able than other people to resist temptation. After +twenty years continuous labour he found himself capable of the +vulgarest, coarsest faults and failings from which the remotest skiey +influence in his begetting might have saved him. + +Clara was not as Baruch. No such storm as that which had darkened +and disheartened him could pass over her, but she could love, perhaps +better than he, and she began to love him. It was very natural to a +woman such as Clara, for she had met a man who had said to her that +what she believed was really of some worth. Her father and mother +had been very dear to her; her sister was very dear to her, but she +had never received any such recognition as that which had now been +offered to her: her own self had never been returned to her with +such honour. She thought, too--why should she not think it?--of the +future, of the release from her dreary occupation, of a happy home +with independence, and she thought of the children that might be. +She lay down without any misgiving. She was sure he was in love with +her; she did not know much of him, certainly, in the usual meaning of +the word, but she knew enough. She would like to find out more of +his history; perhaps without exciting suspicion she might obtain it +from Mrs Caffyn. + + + +CHAPTER XXV + + + +Mr Frank Palmer was back again in England. He was much distressed +when he received that last letter from Mrs Caffyn, and discovered +that Madge's resolution not to write remained unshaken. He was +really distressed, but he was not the man upon whom an event, however +deeply felt at the time, could score a furrow which could not be +obliterated. If he had been a dramatic personage, what had happened +to him would have been the second act leading to a fifth, in which +the Fates would have appeared, but life seldom arranges itself in +proper poetic form. A man determines that he must marry; he makes +the shop-girl an allowance, never sees her or her child again, +transforms himself into a model husband, is beloved by his wife and +family; the woman whom he kissed as he will never kiss his lawful +partner, withdraws completely, and nothing happens to him. + +Frank was sure he could never love anybody as he had loved Madge, nor +could he cut indifferently that other cord which bound him to her. +Nobody in society expects the same paternal love for the offspring of +a housemaid or a sempstress as for the child of the stockbroker's or +brewer's daughter, and nobody expects the same obligations, but Frank +was not a society youth, and Madge was his equal. A score of times, +when his fancy roved, the rope checked him as suddenly as if it were +the lasso of a South American Gaucho. But what could he do? that was +the point. There were one or two things which he could have done, +perhaps, and one or two things which he could not have done if he had +been made of different stuff; but there was nothing more to be done +which Frank Palmer could do. After all, it was better that Madge +should be the child's mother than that it should belong to some +peasant. At least it would be properly educated. As to money, Mrs +Caffyn had told him expressly that she did not want it. That might +be nothing but pride, and he resolved, without very clearly seeing +how, and without troubling himself for the moment as to details, that +Madge should be entirely and handsomely supported by him. Meanwhile +it was of great importance that he should behave in such a manner as +to raise no suspicion. He did not particularly care for some time +after his return from Germany to go out to the musical parties to +which he was constantly invited, but he went as a duty, and wherever +he went he met his charming cousin. They always sang together; they +had easy opportunities of practising together, and Frank, although +nothing definite was said to him, soon found that his family and hers +considered him destined for her. He could not retreat, and there was +no surprise manifested by anybody when it was rumoured that they were +engaged. His story may as well be finished at once. He and Miss +Cecilia Morland were married. A few days before the wedding, when +some legal arrangements and settlements were necessary, Frank made +one last effort to secure an income for Madge, but it failed. Mrs +Caffyn met him by appointment, but he could not persuade her even to +be the bearer of a message to Madge. He then determined to confess +his fears. To his great relief Mrs Caffyn of her own accord assured +him that he never need dread any disturbance or betrayal. + +'There are three of us,' she said, 'as knows you--Miss Madge, Miss +Clara and myself--and, as far as you are concerned, we are dead and +buried. I can't say as I was altogether of Miss Madge's way of +looking at it at first, and I thought it ought to have been +different, though I believe now as she's right, but,' and the old +woman suddenly fired up as if some bolt from heaven had kindled her, +'I pity you, sir--you, sir, I say--more nor I do her. You little +know what you've lost, the blessedest, sweetest, ah, and the +cleverest creature, too, as ever I set eyes on.' + +'But, Mrs Caffyn,' said Frank, with much emotion, 'it was not I who +left her, you know it was not, and, and even--' + +The word 'now' was coming, but it did not come. + +'Ah,' said Mrs Caffyn, with something like scorn, '_I_ know, yes, I +do know. It was she, you needn't tell me that, but, God-a-mighty in +heaven, if I'd been you, I'd have laid myself on the ground afore +her, I'd have tore my heart out for her, and I'd have said, "No other +woman in this world but you"--but there, what a fool I am! Goodbye, +Mr Palmer.' + +She marched away, leaving Frank very miserable, and, as he imagined, +unsettled, but he was not so. The fit lasted all day, but when he +was walking home that evening, he met a poor friend whose wife was +dying. + +'I am so grieved,' said Frank 'to hear of your trouble--no hope?' + +'None, I am afraid.' + +'It is very dreadful.' + +'Yes, it is hard to bear, but to what is inevitable we must submit.' + +This new phrase struck Frank very much, and it seemed very +philosophic to him, a maxim, for guidance through life. It did not +strike him that it was generally either a platitude or an excuse for +weakness, and that a nobler duty is to find out what is inevitable +and what is not, to declare boldly that what the world oftentimes +affirms to be inevitable is really evitable, and heroically to set +about making it so. Even if revolt be perfectly useless, we are not +particularly drawn to a man who prostrates himself too soon and is +incapable of a little cursing. + +As it was impossible to provide for Madge and the child now, Frank +considered whether he could not do something for them in the will +which he had to make before his marriage. He might help his daughter +if he could not help the mother. + +But his wife would perhaps survive him, and the discovery would cause +her and her children much misery; it would damage his character with +them and inflict positive moral mischief. The will, therefore, did +not mention Madge, and it was not necessary to tell his secret to his +solicitor. + +The wedding took place amidst much rejoicing; everybody thought the +couple were most delightfully matched; the presents were magnificent; +the happy pair went to Switzerland, came back and settled in one of +the smaller of the old, red brick houses in Stoke Newington, with a +lawn in front, always shaved and trimmed to the last degree of +smoothness and accuracy, with paths on whose gravel not the smallest +weed was ever seen, and with a hot-house that provided the most +luscious black grapes. There was a grand piano in the drawing-room, +and Frank and Cecilia became more musical than ever, and Waltham +Lodge was the headquarters of a little amateur orchestra which +practised Mozart and Haydn, and gave local concerts. A twelvemonth +after the marriage a son was born and Frank's father increased +Frank's share in the business. Mr Palmer had long ceased to take any +interest in the Hopgoods. He considered that Madge had treated Frank +shamefully in jilting him, but was convinced that he was fortunate in +his escape. It was clear that she was unstable; she probably threw +him overboard for somebody more attractive, and she was not the woman +to be a wife to his son. + +One day Cecilia was turning out some drawers belonging to her +husband, and she found a dainty little slipper wrapped up in white +tissue paper. She looked at it for a long time, wondering to whom it +could have belonged, and had half a mind to announce her discovery to +Frank, but she was a wise woman and forbore. It lay underneath some +neckties which were not now worn, two or three silk pocket +handkerchiefs also discarded, and some manuscript books containing +school themes. She placed them on the top of the drawers as if they +had all been taken out in a lump and the slipper was at the bottom. + +'Frank my dear,' she said after dinner, 'I emptied this morning one +of the drawers in the attic. I wish you would look over the things +and decide what you wish to keep. I have not examined them, but they +seem to be mostly rubbish.' + +He went upstairs after he had smoked his cigar and read his paper. +There was the slipper! It all came back to him, that never-to-be- +forgotten night, when she rebuked him for the folly of kissing her +foot, and he begged the slipper and determined to preserve it for +ever, and thought how delightful it would be to take it out and look +at it when he was an old man. Even now he did not like to destroy +it, but Cecilia might have seen it and might ask him what he had done +with it, and what could he say? Finally he decided to burn it. +There was no fire, however, in the room, and while he stood +meditating, Cecilia called him. He replaced the slipper in the +drawer. He could not return that evening, but he intended to go back +the next morning, take the little parcel away in his pocket and burn +it at his office. At breakfast some letters came which put +everything else out of mind. The first thing he did that evening was +to revisit the garret, but the slipper had gone. Cecilia had been +there and had found it carefully folded up in the drawer. She pulled +it out, snipped and tore it into fifty pieces, carried them +downstairs, threw them on the dining-room fire, sat down before it, +poking them further and further into the flames, and watched them +till every vestige had vanished. Frank did not like to make any +inquiries; Cecilia made none, and thence-forward no trace existed at +Waltham Lodge of Madge Hopgood. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + + + +Baruch went neither to Barnes's shop nor to the Marshalls for nearly +a month. One Sunday morning he was poring over the Moreh Nevochim, +for it had proved too powerful a temptation for him, and he fell upon +the theorem that without God the Universe could not continue to +exist, for God is its Form. It was one of those sayings which may be +nothing or much to the reader. Whether it be nothing or much depends +upon the quality of his mind. + +There was certainly nothing in it particularly adapted to Baruch's +condition at that moment, but an antidote may be none the less +efficacious because it is not direct. It removed him to another +region. It was like the sight and sound of the sea to the man who +has been in trouble in an inland city. His self-confidence was +restored, for he to whom an idea is revealed becomes the idea, and is +no longer personal and consequently poor. + +His room seemed too small for him; he shut his book and went to Great +Ormond Street. He found there Marshall, Mrs Caffyn, Clara and a +friend of Marshall's named Dennis. + +'Where is your wife?' said Baruch to Marshall. + +'Gone with Miss Madge to the Catholic chapel to hear a mass of +Mozart's.' + +'Yes,' said Mrs Caffyn. 'I tell them they'll turn Papists if they do +not mind. They are always going to that place, and there's no +knowing, so I've hear'd, what them priests can do. They aren't like +our parsons. Catch that man at Great Oakhurst a-turnin' anybody.' + +'I suppose,' said Baruch to Clara, 'it is the music takes your sister +there?' + +'Mainly, I believe, but perhaps not entirely.' + +'What other attraction can there be?' + +'I am not in the least disposed to become a convert. Once for all, +Catholicism is incredible and that is sufficient, but there is much +in its ritual which suits me. There is no such intrusion of the +person of the minister as there is in the Church of England, and +still worse amongst dissenters. In the Catholic service the priest +is nothing; it is his office which is everything; he is a mere means +of communication. The mass, in so far as it proclaims that miracle +is not dead, is also very impressive to me.' + +'I do not quite understand you,' said Marshall, 'but if you once +chuck your reason overboard, you may just as well be Catholic as +Protestant. Nothing can be more ridiculous than the Protestant +objection, on the ground of absurdity, to the story of the saint +walking about with his head under his arm.' + +The tea things had been cleared away, and Marshall was smoking. Both +he and Dennis were Chartists, and Baruch had interrupted a debate +upon a speech delivered at a Chartist meeting that morning by Henry +Vincent. + +Frederick Dennis was about thirty, tall and rather loose-limbed. He +wore loose clothes, his neck-cloth was tied in a big, loose knot, his +feet were large and his boots were heavy. His face was quite smooth, +and his hair, which was very thick and light brown, fell across his +forehead in a heavy wave with just two complete undulations in it +from the parting at the side to the opposite ear. It had a trick of +tumbling over his eyes, so that his fingers were continually passed +through it to brush it away. He was a wood engraver, or, as he +preferred to call himself, an artist, but he also wrote for the +newspapers, and had been a contributor to the Northern Star. He was +well brought up and was intended for the University, but he did not +stick to his Latin and Greek, and as he showed some talent for +drawing he was permitted to follow his bent. His work, however, was +not of first-rate quality, and consequently orders were not abundant. +This was the reason why he had turned to literature. When he had any +books to illustrate he lived upon what they brought him, and when +there were no books he renewed his acquaintance with politics. If +books and newspapers both failed, he subsisted on a little money +which had been left him, stayed with friends as long as he could, and +amused himself by writing verses which showed much command over +rhyme. + +'I cannot stand Vincent,' said Marshall, 'he is too flowery for me, +and he does not belong to the people. He is middle-class to the +backbone.' + +'He is deficient in ideas,' said Dennis. + +'It is odd,' continued Marshall, turning to Cohen, 'that your race +never takes any interest in politics.' + +'My race is not a nation, or, if a nation, has no national home. It +took an interest in politics when it was in its own country, and +produced some rather remarkable political writing.' + +'But why do you care so little for what is going on now?' + +'I do care, but all people are not born to be agitators, and, +furthermore, I have doubts if the Charter will accomplish all you +expect.' + +'I know what is coming'--Marshall took the pipe out of his mouth and +spoke with perceptible sarcasm--'the inefficiency of merely external +remedies, the folly of any attempt at improvement which does not +begin with the improvement of individual character, and that those to +whom we intend to give power are no better than those from whom we +intend to take it away. All very well, Mr Cohen. My answer is that +at the present moment the stockingers in Leicester are earning four +shillings and sixpence a week. It is not a question whether they are +better or worse than their rulers. They want something to eat, they +have nothing, and their masters have more than they can eat.' + +'Apart altogether from purely material reasons,' said Dennis, 'we +have rights; we are born into this planet without our consent, and, +therefore, we may make certain demands.' + +'Do you not think,' said Clara, 'that the repeal of the corn laws +will help you?' + +Dennis smiled and was about to reply, but Marshall broke out +savagely, - + +'Repeal of the corn laws is a contemptible device of manufacturing +selfishness. It means low wages. Do you suppose the great +Manchester cotton lords care one straw for their hands? Not they! +They will face a revolution for repeal because it will enable them to +grind an extra profit out of us.' + +'I agree with you entirely,' said Dennis, turning to Clara, 'that a +tax upon food is wrong; it is wrong in the abstract. The notion of +taxing bread, the fruit of the earth, is most repulsive; but the +point is--what is our policy to be? If a certain end is to be +achieved, we must neglect subordinate ends, and, at times, even +contradict what our own principles would appear to dictate. That is +the secret of successful leadership.' + +He took up the poker and stirred the fire. + +'That will do, Dennis,' said Marshall, who was evidently fidgety. +'The room is rather warm. There's nothing in Vincent which irritates +me more than those bits of poetry with which he winds up. + + +"God made the man--man made the slave," + + +and all that stuff. If God made the man, God made the slave. I know +what Vincent's little game is, and it is the same game with all his +set. They want to keep Chartism religious, but we shall see. Let us +once get the six points, and the Established Church will go, and we +shall have secular education, and in a generation there will not be +one superstition left.' + +'Theological superstition, you mean?' said Clara. + +'Yes, of course, what others are there worth notice?' + +'A few. The superstition of the ordinary newspaper reader is just as +profound, and the tyranny of the majority may be just as injurious as +the superstition of a Spanish peasant, or the tyranny of the +Inquisition.' + +'Newspapers will not burn people as the priests did and would do +again if they had the power, and they do not insult us with fables +and a hell and a heaven.' + +'I maintain,' said Clara with emphasis, 'that if a man declines to +examine, and takes for granted what a party leader or a newspaper +tells him, he has no case against the man who declines to examine, or +takes for granted what the priest tells him. Besides, although, as +you know, I am not a convert myself, I do lose a little patience when +I hear it preached as a gospel to every poor conceited creature who +goes to your Sunday evening atheist lecture, that he is to believe +nothing on one particular subject which his own precious intellect +cannot verify, and the next morning he finds it to be his duty to +swallow wholesale anything you please to put into his mouth. As to +the tyranny, the day may come, and I believe is approaching, when the +majority will be found to be more dangerous than any ecclesiastical +establishment which ever existed.' + +Baruch's lips moved, but he was silent. He was not strong in +argument. He was thinking about Marshall's triumphant inquiry +whether God is not responsible for slavery. He would have liked to +say something on that subject, but he had nothing ready. + +'Practical people,' said Dennis, who had not quite recovered from the +rebuke as to the warmth of the room, 'are often most unpractical and +injudicious. Nothing can be more unwise than to mix up politics and +religion. If you DO,' Dennis waved his hand, 'you will have all the +religious people against you. My friend Marshall, Miss Hopgood, is +under the illusion that the Church in this country is tottering to +its fall. Now, although I myself belong to no sect, I do not share +his illusion; nay, more, I am not sure'--Mr Dennis spoke slowly, +rubbed his chin and looked up at the ceiling--'I am not sure that +there is not something to be said in favour of State endowment--at +least, in a country like Ireland.' + +'Come along, Dennis, we shall be late,' said Marshall, and the two +forthwith took their departure in order to attend another meeting. + +'Much either of 'em knows about it,' said Mrs Caffyn when they had +gone. 'There's Marshall getting two pounds a week reg'lar, and goes +on talking about people at Leicester, and he has never been in +Leicester in his life; and, as for that Dennis, he knows less than +Marshall, for he does nothing but write for newspapers and draw for +picture-books, never nothing what you may call work, and he does +worrit me so whenever he begins about poor people that I can't sit +still. _I_ do know what the poor is, having lived at Great Oakhurst +all these years.' + +'You are not a Chartist, then?' said Baruch. + +'Me--me a Chartist? No, I ain't, and yet, maybe, I'm something +worse. What would be the use of giving them poor creatures votes? +Why, there isn't one of them as wouldn't hold up his hand for anybody +as would give him a shilling. Quite right of 'em, too, for the one +thing they have to think about from morning to night is how to get a +bit of something to fill their bellies, and they won't fill them by +voting.' + +'But what would you do for them?' + +'Ah! that beats me! Hang somebody, but I don't know who it ought to +be. There's a family by the name of Longwood, they live just on the +slope of the hill nigh the Dower Farm, and there's nine of them, and +the youngest when I left was a baby six months old, and their living- +room faces the road so that the north wind blows in right under the +door, and I've seen the snow lie in heaps inside. As reg'lar as +winter comes Longwood is knocked off--no work. I've knowed them not +have a bit of meat for weeks together, and him a-loungin' about at +the corner of the street. Wasn't that enough to make him feel as if +somebody ought to be killed? And Marshall and Dennis say as the +proper thing to do is to give him a vote, and prove to him there was +never no Abraham nor Isaac, and that Jonah never was in a whale's +belly, and that nobody had no business to have more children than he +could feed. And what goes on, and what must go on, inside such a +place as Longwood's, with him and his wife, and with them boys and +gals all huddled together--But I'd better hold my tongue. We'll let +the smoke out of this room, I think, and air it a little.' + +She opened the window, and Baruch rose and went home. + +Whenever Mrs Caffyn talked about the labourers at Great Oakhurst, +whom she knew so well, Clara always felt as if all her reading had +been a farce, and, indeed, if we come into close contact with actual +life, art, poetry and philosophy seem little better than trifling. +When the mist hangs over the heavy clay land in January, and men and +women shiver in the bitter cold and eat raw turnips, to indulge in +fireside ecstasies over the divine Plato or Shakespeare is surely not +such a virtue as we imagine it to be. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + + + +Baruch sat and mused before he went to bed. He had gone out stirred +by an idea, but it was already dead. Then he began to think about +Clara. Who was this Dennis who visited the Marshalls and the +Hopgoods? Oh! for an hour of his youth! Fifteen years ago the word +would have come unbidden if he had seen Clara, but now, in place of +the word, there was hesitation, shame. He must make up his mind to +renounce for ever. But, although this conclusion had forced itself +upon him overnight as inevitable, he could not resist the temptation +when he rose the next morning of plotting to meet Clara, and he +walked up and down the street opposite the shop door that evening +nearly a quarter of an hour, just before closing time, hoping that +she might come out and that he might have the opportunity of +overtaking her apparently by accident. At last, fearing he might +miss her, he went in and found she had a companion whom he instantly +knew, before any induction, to be her sister. Madge was not now the +Madge whom we knew at Fenmarket. She was thinner in the face and +paler. Nevertheless, she was not careless; she was even more +particular in her costume, but it was simpler. If anything, perhaps, +she was a little prouder. She was more attractive, certainly, than +she had ever been, although her face could not be said to be +handsomer. The slight prominence of the cheek-bone, the slight +hollow underneath, the loss of colour, were perhaps defects, but they +said something which had a meaning in it superior to that of the tint +of the peach. She had been reading a book while Clara was balancing +her cash, and she attempted to replace it. The shelf was a little +too high, and the volume fell upon the ground. It contained +Shelley's Revolt of Islam. + +'Have you read Shelley?' said Baruch. + +'Every line--when I was much younger.' + +'Do you read him now?' + +'Not much. I was an enthusiast for him when I was nineteen, but I +find that his subject matter is rather thin, and his themes are a +little worn. He was entirely enslaved by the ideals of the French +Revolution. Take away what the French Revolution contributed to his +poetry, and there is not much left.' + +'As a man he is not very attractive to me.' + +'Nor to me; I never shall forgive his treatment of Harriet.' + +'I suppose he had ceased to love her, and he thought, therefore, he +was justified in leaving her.' + +Madge turned and fixed her eyes, unobserved, on Baruch. He was +looking straight at the bookshelves. There was not, and, indeed, how +could there be, any reference to herself. + +'I should put it in this way,' she said, 'that he thought he was +justified in sacrificing a woman for the sake of an IMPULSE. Call +this a defect or a crime--whichever you like--it is repellent to me. +It makes no difference to me to know that he believed the impulse to +be divine.' + +'I wish,' interrupted Clara, 'you two would choose less exciting +subjects of conversation; my totals will not come right.' + +They were silent, and Baruch, affecting to study a Rollin's Ancient +History, wondered, especially when he called to mind Mrs Caffyn's +report, what this girl's history could have been. He presently +recovered himself, and it occurred to him that he ought to give some +reason why he had called. Before, however, he was able to offer any +excuse, Clara closed her book. + +'Now, it is right,' she said, 'and I am ready.' + +Just at that moment Barnes appeared, hot with hurrying. + +'Very sorry, Miss Hopgood, to ask you to stay for a few minutes. I +recollected after I left that the doctor particularly wanted those +books sent off to-night. I should not like to disappoint him. I +have been to the booking-office, and the van will be here in about +twenty minutes. If you will make out the invoice and check me, I +will pack them.' + +'I will be off,' said Madge. 'The shop will be shut if I do not make +haste.' + +'You are not going alone, are you?' said Baruch. 'May I not go with +you, and cannot we both come back for your sister?' + +'It is very kind of you.' + +Clara looked up from her desk, watched them as they went out at the +door and, for a moment, seemed lost. Barnes turned round. + +'Now, Miss Hopgood.' She started. + +'Yes, sir.' + +'Fabricius, J. A. Bibliotheca Ecclesiastica in qua continentur.' + +'I need not put in the last three words.' + +'Yes, yes.' Barnes never liked to be corrected in a title. 'There's +another Fabricius Bibliotheca or Bibliographia. Go on--Basili opera +ad MSS. codices, 3 vols.' + +Clara silently made the entries a little more scholarly. In a +quarter of an hour the parcel was ready and Cohen returned. + +'Your sister would not allow me to wait. She met Mrs Marshall; they +said they should have something to carry, and that it was not worth +while to bring it here. I will walk with you, if you will allow me. +We may as well avoid Holborn.' + +They turned into Gray's Inn, and, when they were in comparative +quietude, he said, - + +'Any Chartist news?' and then without waiting for an answer, 'By the +way, who is your friend Dennis?' + +'He is no particular friend of mine. He is a wood-engraver, and +writes also, I believe, for the newspapers.' + +'He can talk as well as write.' + +'Yes, he can talk very well.' + +'Do you not think there was something unreal about what he said?' + +'I do not believe he is actually insincere. I have noticed that men +who write or read much often appear somewhat shadowy.' + +'How do you account for it?' + +'What they say is not experience.' + +'I do not quite understand. A man may think much which can never +become an experience in your sense of the word, and be very much in +earnest with what he thinks; the thinking is an experience.' + +'Yes, I suppose so, but it is what a person has gone through which I +like to hear. Poor Dennis has suffered much. You are perhaps +surprised, but it is true, and when he leaves politics alone he is a +different creature.' + +'I am afraid I must be very uninteresting to you?' + +'I did not mean that I care for nothing but my friend's aches and +pains, but that I do not care for what he just takes up and takes +on.' + +'It is my misfortune that my subjects are not very--I was about to +say--human. Perhaps it is because I am a Jew.' + +'I do not know quite what you mean by your "subjects," but if you +mean philosophy and religion, they are human.' + +'If they are, very few people like to hear anything about them. Do +you know, Miss Hopgood, I can never talk to anybody as I can to you.' + +Clara made no reply. A husband was to be had for a look, for a +touch, a husband whom she could love, a husband who could give her +all her intellect demanded. A little house rose before her eyes as +if by Arabian enchantment; there was a bright fire on the hearth, and +there were children round it; without the look, the touch, there +would be solitude, silence and a childless old age, so much more to +be feared by a woman than by a man. Baruch paused, waiting for her +answer, and her tongue actually began to move with a reply, which +would have sent his arm round her, and made them one for ever, but it +did not come. Something fell and flashed before her like lightning +from a cloud overhead, divinely beautiful, but divinely terrible. + +'I remember,' she said, 'that I have to call in Lamb's Conduit Street +to buy something for my sister. I shall just be in time.' Baruch +went as far as Lamb's Conduit Street with her. He, too, would have +determined his own destiny if she had uttered the word, but the power +to proceed without it was wanting and he fell back. He left her at +the door of the shop. She bid him good-bye, obviously intending that +he should go no further with her, and he shook hands with her, taking +her hand again and shaking it again with a grasp which she knew well +enough was too fervent for mere friendship. He then wandered back +once more to his old room at Clerkenwell. The fire was dead, he +stirred it, the cinders fell through the grate and it dropped out all +together. He made no attempt to rekindle it, but sat staring at the +black ashes, not thinking, but dreaming. Thirty years more perhaps +with no change! The last chance that he could begin a new life had +disappeared. He cursed himself that nothing drove him out of himself +with Marshall and his fellowmen; that he was not Chartist nor +revolutionary; but it was impossible to create in himself enthusiasm +for a cause. He had tried before to become a patriot and had failed, +and was conscious, during the trial, that he was pretending to be +something he was not and could not be. There was nothing to be done +but to pace the straight road in front of him, which led nowhere, so +far as he could see. + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + + + +A month afterwards Marshall announced that he intended to pay a +visit. + +'I am going,' he said, 'to see Mazzini. Who will go with me?' + +Clara and Madge were both eager to accompany him. Mrs Caffyn and Mrs +Marshall chose to stay at home. + +'I shall ask Cohen to come with us,' said Marshall. 'He has never +seen Mazzini and would like to know him.' Cohen accordingly called +one Sunday evening, and the party went together to a dull, dark, +little house in a shabby street of small shops and furnished +apartments. When they knocked at Mazzini's door Marshall asked for +Mr --- for, even in England, Mazzini had an assumed name which was +always used when inquiries were made for him. They were shown +upstairs into a rather mean room, and found there a man, really about +forty, but looking older. He had dark hair growing away from his +forehead, dark moustache, dark beard and a singularly serious face. +It was not the face of a conspirator, but that of a saint, although +without that just perceptible touch of silliness which spoils the +faces of most saints. It was the face of a saint of the Reason, of a +man who could be ecstatic for rational ideals, rarest of all +endowments. It was the face, too, of one who knew no fear, or, if he +knew it, could crush it. He was once concealed by a poor woman whose +house was surrounded by Austrian soldiers watching for him. He was +determined that she should not be sacrificed, and, having disguised +himself a little, walked out into the street in broad daylight, went +up to the Austrian sentry, asked for a light for his cigar and +escaped. He was cordial in his reception of his visitors, +particularly of Clara, Madge and Cohen, whom he had not seen before. + +'The English,' he said, after some preliminary conversation, 'are a +curious people. As a nation they are what they call practical and +have a contempt for ideas, but I have known some Englishmen who have +a religious belief in them, a nobler belief than I have found in any +other nation. There are English women, also, who have this faith, +and one or two are amongst my dearest friends.' + +'I never,' said Marshall, 'quite comprehend you on this point. I +should say that we know as clearly as most folk what we want, and we +mean to have it.' + +'That may be, but it is not Justice, as Justice which inspires you. +Those of you who have not enough, desire to have more, that is all.' + +'If we are to succeed, we must preach what the people understand.' + +'Pardon me, that is just where you and I differ. Whenever any real +good is done it is by a crusade; that is to say, the cross must be +raised and appeal be made to something ABOVE the people. No system +based on rights will stand. Never will society be permanent till it +is founded on duty. If we consider our rights exclusively, we extend +them over the rights of our neighbours. If the oppressed classes had +the power to obtain their rights to-morrow, and with the rights came +no deeper sense of duty, the new order, for the simple reason that +the oppressed are no better than their oppressors, would be just as +unstable as that which preceded it.' + +'To put it in my own language,' said Madge, 'you believe in God.' + +Mazzini leaned forward and looked earnestly at her. + +'My dear young friend, without that belief I should have no other.' + +'I should like, though,' said Marshall, 'to see the church which +would acknowledge you and Miss Madge, or would admit your God to be +theirs.' + +'What is essential,' replied Madge, 'in a belief in God is absolute +loyalty to a principle we know to have authority.' + +'It may, perhaps,' said Mazzini, 'be more to me, but you are right, +it is a belief in the supremacy and ultimate victory of the +conscience.' + +'The victory seems distant in Italy now,' said Baruch. 'I do not +mean the millennial victory of which you speak, but an approximation +to it by the overthrow of tyranny there.' + +'You are mistaken; it is far nearer than you imagine.' + +'Do you obtain,' said Clara, 'any real help from people here? Do you +not find that they merely talk and express what they call their +sympathy?' + +'I must not say what help I have received; more than words, though, +from many.' + +'You expect, then,' said Baruch, 'that the Italians will answer your +appeal?' + +'If I had no faith in the people, I do not see what faith could +survive.' + +'The people are the persons you meet in the street.' + +'A people is not a mere assemblage of uninteresting units, but it is +not a phantom. A spirit lives in each nation which is superior to +any individual in it. It is this which is the true reality, the +nation's purpose and destiny, it is this for which the patriot lives +and dies.' + +'I suppose,' said Clara, 'you have no difficulty in obtaining +volunteers for any dangerous enterprise?' + +'None. You would be amazed if I were to tell you how many men and +women at this very moment would go to meet certain death if I were to +ask them.' + +'Women?' + +'Oh, yes; and women are of the greatest use, but it is rather +difficult to find those who have the necessary qualifications.' + +'I suppose you employ them in order to obtain secret information?' + +'Yes; amongst the Austrians.' + +The party broke up. Baruch manoeuvred to walk with Clara, but +Marshall wanted to borrow a book from Mazzini, and she stayed behind +for him. Madge was outside in the street, and Baruch could do +nothing but go to her. She seemed unwilling to wait, and Baruch and +she went slowly homewards, thinking the others would overtake them. +The conversation naturally turned upon Mazzini. + +'Although,' said Madge, 'I have never seen him before, I have heard +much about him and he makes me sad.' + +'Why?' + +'Because he has done something worth doing and will do more.' + +'But why should that make you sad?' + +'I do not think there is anything sadder than to know you are able to +do a little good and would like to do it, and yet you are not +permitted to do it. Mazzini has a world open to him large enough for +the exercise of all his powers.' + +'It is worse to have a desire which is intense but not definite, to +be continually anxious to do something, you know not what, and always +to feel, if any distinct task is offered, your incapability of +attempting it.' + +'A man, if he has a real desire to be of any service, can generally +gratify it to some extent; a woman as a rule cannot, although a +woman's enthusiasm is deeper than a man's. You can join Mazzini to- +morrow, I suppose, if you like.' + +'It is a supposition not quite justifiable, and if I were free to go +I could not.' + +'Why?' + +'I am not fitted for such work; I have not sufficient faith. When I +see a flag waving, a doubt always intrudes. Long ago I was forced to +the conclusion that I should have to be content with a life which did +not extend outside itself.' + +'I am sure that many women blunder into the wrong path, not because +they are bad, but simply because--if I may say so--they are too +good.' + +'Maybe you are right. The inability to obtain mere pleasure has not +produced the misery which has been begotten of mistaken or baffled +self-sacrifice. But do you mean to say that you would like to enlist +under Mazzini?' + +'No!' + +Baruch thought she referred to her child, and he was silent. + +'You are a philosopher,' said Madge, after a pause. 'Have you never +discovered anything which will enable us to submit to be useless?' + +'That is to say, have I discovered a religion? for the core of +religion is the relationship of the individual to the whole, the +faith that the poorest and meanest of us is a person. That is the +real strength of all religions.' + +'Well, go on; what do you believe?' + +'I can only say it like a creed; I have no demonstration, at least +none such as I would venture to put into words. Perhaps the highest +of all truths is incapable of demonstration and can only be stated. +Perhaps, also, the statement, at least to some of us, is a sufficient +demonstration. I believe that inability to imagine a thing is not a +reason for its non-existence. If the infinite is a conclusion which +is forced upon me, the fact that I cannot picture it does not +disprove it. I believe, also, in thought and the soul, and it is +nothing to me that I cannot explain them by attributes belonging to +body. That being so, the difficulties which arise from the perpetual +and unconscious confusion of the qualities of thought and soul with +those of body disappear. Our imagination represents to itself souls +like pebbles, and asks itself what count can be kept of a million, +but number in such a case is inapplicable. I believe that all +thought is a manifestation of the Being, who is One, whom you may +call God if you like, and that, as It never was created, It will +never be destroyed.' + +'But,' said Madge, interrupting him, 'although you began by warning +me not to expect that you would prove anything, you can tell me +whether you have any kind of basis for what you say, or whether it is +all a dream.' + +'You will be surprised, perhaps, to hear that mathematics, which, of +course, I had to learn for my own business, have supplied something +for a foundation. They lead to ideas which are inconsistent with the +notion that the imagination is a measure of all things. Mind, I do +not for a moment pretend that I have any theory which explains the +universe. It is something, however, to know that the sky is as real +as the earth.' + +They had now reached Great Ormond Street, and parted. Clara and +Marshall were about five minutes behind them. Madge was unusually +cheerful when they sat down to supper. + +'Clara,' she said, 'what made you so silent to-night at Mazzini's?' +Clara did not reply, but after a pause of a minute or two, she asked +Mrs Caffyn whether it would not be possible for them all to go into +the country on Whitmonday? Whitsuntide was late; it would be warm, +and they could take their food with them and eat it out of doors. + +'Just the very thing, my dear, if we could get anything cheap to take +us; the baby, of course, must go with us. + +'I should like above everything to go to Great Oakhurst.' + +'What, five of us--twenty miles there and twenty miles back! +Besides, although I love the place, it isn't exactly what one would +go to see just for a day. No! Letherhead or Mickleham or Darkin +would be ever so much better. They are too far, though, and, then, +that man Baruch must go with us. He'd be company for Marshall, and +he sticks up in Clerkenwell and never goes nowhere. You remember as +Marshall said as he must ask him the next time we had an outing.' + +Clara had not forgotten it. + +'Ah,' continued Mrs Caffyn, 'I should just love to show you +Mickleham.' + +Mrs Caffyn's heart yearned after her Surrey land. The man who is +born in a town does not know what it is to be haunted through life by +lovely visions of the landscape which lay about him when he was +young. The village youth leaves the home of his childhood for the +city, but the river doubling on itself, the overhanging alders and +willows, the fringe of level meadow, the chalk hills bounding the +river valley and rising against the sky, with here and there on their +summits solitary clusters of beech, the light and peace of the +different seasons, of morning, afternoon and evening, never forsake +him. To think of them is not a mere luxury; their presence modifies +the whole of his life. + +'I don't see how it is to be managed,' she mused; 'and yet there's +nothing near London as I'd give two pins to see. There's Richmond as +we went to one Sunday; it was no better, to my way of thinking, than +looking at a picture. I'd ever so much sooner be a-walking across +the turnips by the footpath from Darkin home.' + +'Couldn't we, for once in a way, stay somewhere over-night?' + +'It might as well be two,' said Mrs Marshall; 'Saturday and Sunday.' + +'Two,' said Madge; 'I vote for two.' + +'Wait a bit, my dears, we're a precious awkward lot to fit in-- +Marshall and his wife me and you and Miss Clara and the baby; and +then there's Baruch, who's odd man, so to speak; that's three +bedrooms. We sha'n't do it--Otherwise, I was a-thinking--' + +'What were you thinking?' said Marshall. + +'I've got it,' said Mrs Caffyn, joyously. 'Miss Clara and me will go +to Great Oakhurst on the Friday. We can easy enough stay at my old +shop. Marshall and Sarah, Miss Madge, the baby and Baruch can go to +Letherhead on the Saturday morning. The two women and the baby can +have one of the rooms at Skelton's, and Marshall and Baruch can have +the other. Then, on Sunday morning, Miss Clara and me we'll come +over for you, and we'll all walk through Norbury Park. That'll be +ever so much better in many ways. Miss Clara and me, we'll go by the +coach. Six of us, not reckoning the baby, in that heavy ginger-beer +cart of Masterman's would be too much.' + +'An expensive holiday, rather,' said Marshall. + +'Leave that to me; that's my business. I ain't quite a beggar, and +if we can't take our pleasure once a year, it's a pity. We aren't +like some folk as messes about up to Hampstead every Sunday, and +spends a fortune on shrimps and donkeys. No; when I go away, it IS +away, maybe it's only for a couple of days, where I can see a blessed +ploughed field; no shrimps nor donkeys for me.' + + + +CHARTER XXIX + + + +So it was settled, and on the Friday Clara and Mrs Caffyn journeyed +to Great Oakhurst. They were both tired, and went to bed very early, +in order that they might enjoy the next day. Clara, always a light +sleeper, woke between three and four, rose and went to the little +casement window which had been open all night. Below her, on the +left, the church was just discernible, and on the right, the broad +chalk uplands leaned to the south, and were waving with green barley +and wheat. Underneath her lay the cottage garden, with its row of +beehives in the north-east corner, sheltered from the cold winds by +the thick hedge. It had evidently been raining a little, for the +drops hung on the currant bushes, but the clouds had been driven by +the south-westerly wind into the eastern sky, where they lay in a +long, low, grey band. Not a sound was to be heard, save every now +and then the crow of a cock or the short cry of a just-awakened +thrush. High up on the zenith, the approach of the sun to the +horizon was proclaimed by the most delicate tints of rose-colour, but +the cloud-bank above him was dark and untouched, although the blue +which was over it, was every moment becoming paler. Clara watched; +she was moved even to tears by the beauty of the scene, but she was +stirred by something more than beauty, just as he who was in the +Spirit and beheld a throne and One sitting thereon, saw something +more than loveliness, although He was radiant with the colour of +jasper and there was a rainbow round about Him like an emerald to +look upon. In a few moments the highest top of the cloud-rampart was +kindled, and the whole wavy outline became a fringe of flame. In a +few moments more the fire just at one point became blinding, and in +another second the sun emerged, the first arrowy shaft passed into +her chamber, the first shadow was cast, and it was day. She put her +hands to her face; the tears fell faster, but she wiped them away and +her great purpose was fixed. She crept back into bed, her agitation +ceased, a strange and almost supernatural peace overshadowed her and +she fell asleep not to wake till the sound of the scythe had ceased +in the meadow just beyond the rick-yard that came up to one side of +the cottage, and the mowers were at their breakfast. + +Neither Mrs Caffyn nor Clara thought of seeing the Letherhead party +on Saturday. They could not arrive before the afternoon, and it was +considered hardly worth while to walk from Great Oakhurst to +Letherhead merely for the sake of an hour or two. In the morning Mrs +Caffyn was so busy with her old friends that she rather tired +herself, and in the evening Clara went for a stroll. She did not +know the country, but she wandered on until she came to a lane which +led down to the river. At the bottom of the lane she found herself +at a narrow, steep, stone bridge. She had not been there more than +three or four minutes before she descried two persons coming down the +lane from Letherhead. When they were about a couple of hundred yards +from her they turned into the meadow over the stile, and struck the +river-bank some distance below the point where she was. It was +impossible to mistake them; they were Madge and Baruch. They +sauntered leisurely; presently Baruch knelt down over the water, +apparently to gather something which he gave to Madge. They then +crossed another stile and were lost behind the tall hedge which +stopped further view of the footpath in that direction. + +'The message then was authentic,' she said to herself. 'I thought I +could not have misunderstood it.' + +On Sunday morning Clara wished to stay at home. She pleaded that she +preferred rest, but Mrs Caffyn vowed there should be no Norbury Park +if Clara did not go, and the kind creature managed to persuade a pig- +dealer to drive them over to Letherhead for a small sum, +notwithstanding it was Sunday. The whole party then set out; the +baby was drawn in a borrowed carriage which also took the provisions, +and they were fairly out of the town before the Letherhead bells had +ceased ringing for church. It was one of the sweetest of Sundays, +sunny, but masses of white clouds now and then broke the heat. The +park was reached early in the forenoon, and it was agreed that dinner +should be served under one of the huge beech trees at the lower end, +as the hill was a little too steep for the baby-carriage in the hot +sun. + +'This is very beautiful,' said Marshall, when dinner was over, 'but +it is not what we came to see. We ought to move upwards to the +Druid's grove.' + +'Yes, you be off, the whole lot of you,' said Mrs Caffyn. 'I know +every tree there, and I ain't going there this afternoon. Somebody +must stay here to look after the baby; you can't wheel her, you'll +have to carry her, and you won't enjoy yourselves much more for +moiling along with her up that hill.' + +'I will stay with you,' said Clara. + +Everybody protested, but Clara was firm. She was tired, and the sun +had given her a headache. Madge pleaded that it was she who ought to +remain behind, but at last gave way for her sister looked really +fatigued. + +'There's a dear child,' said Clara, when Madge consented to go. 'I +shall lie on the grass and perhaps go to sleep.' + +'It is a pity,' said Baruch to Madge as they went away, 'that we are +separated; we must come again.' + +'Yes, I am sorry, but perhaps it is better she should be where she +is; she is not particularly strong, and is obliged to be very +careful.' + +In due time they all came to the famous yews, and sat down on one of +the seats overlooking that wonderful gate in the chalk downs through +which the Mole passes northwards. + +'We must go,' said Marshall, 'a little bit further and see the oak.' + +'Not another step,' said his wife. 'You can go it you like.' + +'Content; nothing could be pleasanter than to sit here,' and he +pulled out his pipe; 'but really, Miss Madge, to leave Norbury +without paying a visit to the oak is a pity.' + +He did not offer, however, to accompany her. + +'It is the most extraordinary tree in these parts,' said Baruch; 'of +incalculable age and with branches spreading into a tent big enough +to cover a regiment. Marshall is quite right.' + +'Where is it?' + +'Not above a couple of hundred yards further; just round the corner.' + +Madge rose and looked. + +'No; it is not visible here; it stands a little way back. If you +come a little further you will catch a glimpse of it.' + +She followed him and presently the oak came in view. They climbed up +the bank and went nearer to it. The whole vale was underneath them +and part of the weald with the Sussex downs blue in the distance. +Baruch was not much given to raptures over scenery, but the +indifference of Nature to the world's turmoil always appealed to him. + +'You are not now discontented because you cannot serve under +Mazzini?' + +'Not now.' + +There was nothing in her reply on the face of it of any particular +consequence to Baruch. She might simply have intended that the +beauty of the fair landscape extinguished her restlessness, or that +she saw her own unfitness, but neither of these interpretations +presented itself to him. + +'I have sometimes thought,' continued Baruch, slowly, 'that the love +of any two persons in this world may fulfil an eternal purpose which +is as necessary to the Universe as a great revolution.' + +Madge's eyes moved round from the hills and they met Baruch's. No +syllable was uttered, but swiftest messages passed, question and +answer. There was no hesitation on his part now, no doubt, the woman +and the moment had come. The last question was put, the final answer +was given; he took her hand in his and came closer to her. + +'Stop!' she whispered, 'do you know my history?' + +He did not reply, but fell upon her neck. This was the goal to which +both had been journeying all these years, although with much weary +mistaking of roads; this was what from the beginning was designed for +both! Happy Madge! happy Baruch! There are some so closely akin +that the meaning of each may be said to lie in the other, who do not +approach till it is too late. They travel towards one another, but +are waylaid and detained, and just as they are within greeting, one +of them drops and dies. + +They left the tree and went back to the Marshalls, and then down the +hill to Mrs Caffyn and Clara. Clara was much better for her rest, +and early in the evening the whole party returned to Letherhead, +Clara and Mrs Caffyn going on to Great Oakhurst. Madge kept close to +her sister till they separated, and the two men walked together. On +Whitmonday morning the Letherhead people came over to Great Oakhurst. +They had to go back to London in the afternoon, but Mrs Caffyn and +Clara were to stay till Tuesday, as they stood a better chance of +securing places by the coach on that day. Mrs Caffyn had as much to +show them as if the village had been the Tower of London. The wonder +of wonders, however, was a big house, where she was well known, and +its hot-houses. Madge wanted to speak to Clara, but it was difficult +to find a private opportunity. When they were in the garden, +however, she managed to take Clara unobserved down one of the twisted +paths, under pretence of admiring an ancient mulberry tree. + +'Clara,' she said, 'I want a word with you. Baruch Cohen loves me.' + +'Do you love him?' + +'Yes.' + +'Without a shadow of a doubt?' + +'Without a shadow of a doubt.' + +Clara put her arm round her sister, kissed her tenderly and said, - + +'Then I am perfectly happy.' + +'Did you suspect it?' + +'I knew it.' + +Mrs Caffyn called them; it was time to be moving, and soon afterwards +those who had to go to London that afternoon left for Letherhead. +Clara stood at the gate for a long time watching them along the +straight, white road. They came to the top of the hill; she could +just discern them against the sky; they passed over the ridge and she +went indoors. In the evening a friend called to see Mrs Caffyn, and +Clara went to the stone bridge which she had visited on Saturday. +The water on the upper side of the bridge was dammed up and fell over +the little sluice gates under the arches into a clear and deep basin +about forty or fifty feet in diameter. The river, for some reason of +its own, had bitten into the western bank, and had scooped out a +great piece of it into an island. The main current went round the +island with a shallow, swift ripple, instead of going through the +pool, as it might have done, for there was a clear channel for it. +The centre and the region under the island were deep and still, but +at the farther end, where the river in passing called to the pool, it +broke into waves as it answered the appeal, and added its own +contribution to the stream, which went away down to the mill and +onwards to the big Thames. On the island were aspens and alders. +The floods had loosened the roots of the largest tree, and it hung +over heavily in the direction in which it had yielded to the rush of +the torrent, but it still held its grip, and the sap had not forsaken +a single branch. Every one was as dense with foliage as if there had +been no struggle for life, and the leaves sang their sweet song, just +perceptible for a moment every now and then in the variations of the +louder music below them. It is curious that the sound of a weir is +never uniform, but is perpetually changing in the ear even of a +person who stands close by it. One of the arches of the bridge was +dry, and Clara went down into it, stood at the edge and watched that +wonderful sight--the plunge of a smooth, pure stream into the great +cup which it has hollowed out for itself. Down it went, with a +dancing, foamy fringe playing round it just where it met the surface; +a dozen yards away it rose again, bubbling and exultant. + +She came up from the arch and went home as the sun was setting. She +found Mrs Caffyn alone. + +'I have news to tell you,' she said. 'Baruch Cohen is in love with +my sister, and she is in love with him.' + +'The Lord, Miss Clara! I thought sometimes that perhaps it might be +you; but there, it's better, maybe, as it is, for--' + +'For what?' + +'Why, my dear, because somebody's sure to turn up who'll make you +happy, but there aren't many men like Baruch. You see what I mean, +don't you? He's always a-reading books, and, therefore, he don't +think so much of what some people would make a fuss about. Not as +anything of that kind would ever stop me, if I were a man and saw +such a woman as Miss Madge. He's really as good a creature as ever +was born, and with that child she might have found it hard to get +along, and now it will be cared for, and so will she be to the end of +their lives.' + +The evening after their return to Great Ormond Street, Mazzini was +surprised by a visit from Clara alone. + +'When I last saw you,' she said, 'you told us that you had been +helped by women. I offer myself.' + +'But, my dear madam, you hardly know what the qualifications are. To +begin with, there must be a knowledge of three foreign languages, +French, German and Italian, and the capacity and will to endure great +privation, suffering and, perhaps, death.' + +'I was educated abroad, I can speak German and French. I do not know +much Italian, but when I reach Italy I will soon learn.' + +'Pardon me for asking you what may appear a rude question. Is it a +personal disappointment which sends you to me, or love for the cause? +It is not uncommon to find that young women, when earthly love is +impossible, attempt to satisfy their cravings with a love for that +which is impersonal.' + +'Does it make any difference, so far as their constancy is +concerned?' + +'I cannot say that it does. The devotion of many of the martyrs of +the Catholic church was repulsion from the world as much as +attraction to heaven. You must understand that I am not prompted by +curiosity. If you are to be my friend, it is necessary that I should +know you thoroughly.' + +'My motive is perfectly pure.' + +They had some further talk and parted. After a few more interviews, +Clara and another English lady started for Italy. Madge had letters +from her sister at intervals for eighteen months, the last being from +Venice. Then they ceased, and shortly afterwards Mazzini told Baruch +that his sister-in-law was dead. + +All efforts to obtain more information from Mazzini were in vain, but +one day when her name was mentioned, he said to Madge, - + +'The theologians represent the Crucifixion as the most sublime fact +in the world's history. It was sublime, but let us reverence also +the Eternal Christ who is for ever being crucified for our +salvation.' + +'Father,' said a younger Clara to Baruch some ten years later as she +sat on his knee, 'I had an Aunt Clara once, hadn't I?' + +'Yes, my child.' + +'Didn't she go to Italy and die there?' + +'Yes.' + +'Why did she go?' + +'Because she wanted to free the poor people of Italy who were +slaves.' + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, CLARA HOPGOOD *** + +This file should be named chpg10.txt or chpg10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, chpg11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, chpg10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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