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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/9366-8.txt b/9366-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..212b640 --- /dev/null +++ b/9366-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,17450 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary Olivier: A Life, by May Sinclair + +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: Mary Olivier: A Life + +Author: May Sinclair + +Release Date: November, 2005 [EBook #9366] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on September 25, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY OLIVIER: A LIFE *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Beth Trapaga and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +MARY OLIVIER: + +A LIFE + + +BY + +MAY SINCLAIR + + +1919 + + +CONTENTS + +BOOK ONE INFANCY (1865-1869) + +BOOK TWO CHILDHOOD (1869-1875) + +BOOK THREE ADOLESCENCE (1876-1879) + +BOOK FOUR MATURITY (1879-1900) + +BOOK FIVE MIDDLE AGE (1900-1910) + + + + +BOOK ONE +INFANCY (1865-1869) + + +I + + +I. + +The curtain of the big bed hung down beside the cot. + +When old Jenny shook it the wooden rings rattled on the pole and grey +men with pointed heads and squat, bulging bodies came out of the folds +on to the flat green ground. If you looked at them they turned into +squab faces smeared with green. + +Every night, when Jenny had gone away with the doll and the donkey, +you hunched up the blanket and the stiff white counterpane to hide the +curtain and you played with the knob in the green painted iron railing +of the cot. It stuck out close to your face, winking and grinning at +you in a friendly way. You poked it till it left off and turned grey +and went back into the railing. Then you had to feel for it with your +finger. It fitted the hollow of your hand, cool and hard, with a blunt +nose that pushed agreeably into the palm. + +In the dark you could go tip-finger along the slender, lashing +flourishes of the ironwork. By stretching your arm out tight you could +reach the curlykew at the end. The short, steep flourish took you to +the top of the railing and on behind your head. + +Tip-fingering backwards that way you got into the grey lane where the +prickly stones were and the hedge of little biting trees. When the +door in the hedge opened you saw the man in the night-shirt. He had +only half a face. From his nose and his cheek-bones downwards his +beard hung straight like a dark cloth. You opened your mouth, but +before you could scream you were back in the cot; the room was light; +the green knob winked and grinned at you from the railing, and behind +the curtain Papa and Mamma were lying in the big bed. + +One night she came back out of the lane as the door in the hedge was +opening. The man stood in the room by the washstand, scratching his long +thigh. He was turned slantwise from the nightlight on the washstand so +that it showed his yellowish skin under the lifted shirt. The white +half-face hung by itself on the darkness. When he left off scratching +and moved towards the cot she screamed. + +Mamma took her into the big bed. She curled up there under the shelter +of the raised hip and shoulder. Mamma's face was dry and warm and +smelt sweet like Jenny's powder-puff. Mamma's mouth moved over her wet +cheeks, nipping her tears. + +Her cry changed to a whimper and a soft, ebbing sob. + +Mamma's breast: a smooth, cool, round thing that hung to your hands +and slipped from them when they tried to hold it. You could feel the +little ridges of the stiff nipple as your finger pushed it back into +the breast. + +Her sobs shook in her throat and ceased suddenly. + + +II. + +The big white globes hung in a ring above the dinner table. At first, +when she came into the room, carried high in Jenny's arms, she could +see nothing but the hanging, shining globes. Each had a light inside +it that made it shine. + +Mamma was sitting at the far end of the table. Her face and neck shone +white above the pile of oranges on the dark blue dish. She was dipping +her fingers in a dark blue glass bowl. + +When Mary saw her she strained towards her, leaning dangerously out of +Jenny's arms. Old Jenny said "Tchit-tchit!" and made her arms tight +and hard and put her on Papa's knee. + +Papa sat up, broad and tall above the table, all by himself. He was +dressed in black. One long brown beard hung down in front of him and +one short beard covered his mouth. You knew he was smiling because his +cheeks swelled high up his face so that his eyes were squeezed into +narrow, shining slits. When they came out again you saw scarlet specks +and smears in their corners. + +Papa's big white hand was on the table, holding a glass filled with +some red stuff that was both dark and shining and had a queer, sharp +smell. + +"Porty-worty winey-piney," said Papa. + +The same queer, sharp smell came from between his two beards when he +spoke. + +Mark was sitting up beside Mamma a long way off. She could see them +looking at each other. Roddy and Dank were with them. + +They were making flowers out of orange peel and floating them in the +finger bowls. Mamma's fingers were blue and sharp-pointed in the water +behind the dark blue glass of her bowl. The floating orange-peel +flowers were blue. She could see Mamma smiling as she stirred them +about with the tips of her blue fingers. + +Her underlip pouted and shook. She didn't want to sit by herself on +Papa's knee. She wanted to sit in Mamma's lap beside Mark. She wanted +Mark to make orange-peel flowers for her. She wanted Mamma to look +down at her and smile. + +Papa was spreading butter on biscuit and powdered sugar on the butter. + +"Sugary--Buttery--Bippery," said Papa. + +She shook her head. "I want to go to Mamma. I want to go to Mark." + +She pushed away the biscuit. "No. No. Mamma give Mary. Mark give +Mary." + +"Drinky--winky," said Papa. + +He put his glass to her shaking mouth. She turned her head away, and +he took it between his thumb and finger and turned it back again. Her +neck moved stiffly. Her head felt small and brittle under the weight +and pinch of the big hand. The smell and the sour, burning taste of +the wine made her cry. + +"Don't tease Baby, Emilius," said Mamma. + +"I never tease anybody." + +He lifted her up. She could feel her body swell and tighten under the +bands and drawstrings of her clothes, as she struggled and choked, +straining against the immense clamp of his arms. When his wet red lips +pushed out between his beards to kiss her she kicked. Her toes drummed +against something stiff and thin that gave way and sprang out again +with a cracking and popping sound. + +He put her on the floor. She stood there all by herself, crying, till +Mark came and took her by the hand. + +"Naughty Baby. Naughty Mary," said Mamma. "Don't kiss her, Mark." + +"No, Mamma." + +He knelt on the floor beside her and smiled into her face and wiped it +with his pocket-handkerchief. She put out her mouth and kissed him and +stopped crying. + +"Jenny must come," Mamma said, "and take Mary away." + +"No. Mark take Mary." + +"Let the little beast take her," said Papa. "If he does he shan't come +back again. Do you hear that, sir?" + +Mark said, "Yes, Papa." + +They went out of the room hand in hand. He carried her upstairs +pickaback. As they went she rested her chin on the nape of his neck +where his brown hair thinned off into shiny, golden down. + + +III. + +Old Jenny sat in the rocking-chair by the fireguard in the nursery. +She wore a black net cap with purple rosettes above her ears. You +could look through the black net and see the top of her head laid out +in stripes of grey hair and pinky skin. + +She had a grey face, flattened and wide-open like her eyes. She held +it tilted slightly backwards out of your way, and seemed to be always +staring at something just above your head. Jenny's face had tiny +creases and crinkles all over it. When you kissed it you could feel +the loose flesh crumpling and sliding softly over the bone. There was +always about her a faint smell of sour milk. + +No use trying to talk to Jenny. She was too tired to listen. You +climbed on to her lap and stroked her face, and said "Poor Jenny. Dear +Jenny. Poor Jenny-Wee so tired," and her face shut up and went to +sleep. Her broad flat nose drooped; her eyelids drooped; her long, +grey bands of hair drooped; she was like the white donkey that lived +in the back lane and slept standing on three legs with his ears lying +down. + +Mary loved old Jenny next to Mamma and Mark; and she loved the white +donkey. She wondered why Jenny was always cross when you stroked her +grey face and called her "Donkey-Jenny." It was not as if she minded +being stroked; because when Mark or Dank did it her face woke up +suddenly and smoothed out its creases. And when Roddy climbed up with +his long legs into her lap she hugged him tight and rocked him, +singing Mamma's song, and called him her baby. + +He wasn't. _She_ was the baby; and while you were the baby you could +sit in people's laps. But old Jenny didn't want her to be the baby. + +The nursery had shiny, slippery yellow walls and a brown floor, and a +black hearthrug with a centre of brown and yellow flowers. The greyish +chintz curtains were spotted with small brown leaves and crimson +berries. There were dark-brown cupboards and chests of drawers, and +chairs that were brown frames for the yellow network of the cane. Soft +bits of you squeezed through the holes and came out on the other side. +That hurt and made a red pattern on you where you sat down. + +The tall green fireguard was a cage. When Jenny poked the fire you +peeped through and saw it fluttering inside. If you sat still you +could sometimes hear it say "teck-teck," and sometimes the fire would +fly out suddenly with a soft hiss. + +High above your head you could just see the gleaming edge of the brass +rail. + +"Jenny--where's yesterday and where's to-morrow?" + + +IV. + +When you had run a thousand hundred times round the table you came to +the blue house. It stood behind Jenny's rocking-chair, where Jenny +couldn't see it, in a blue garden. The walls and ceilings were blue; +the doors and staircases were blue; everything in all the rooms was +blue. + +Mary ran round and round. She loved the padding of her feet on the +floor and the sound of her sing-song: + +"The pussies are blue, the beds are blue, the matches are blue and the +mousetraps and all the litty mouses!" + +Mamma was always there dressed in a blue gown; and Jenny was there, +all in blue, with a blue cap; and Mark and Dank and Roddy were there, +all in blue. But Papa was not allowed in the blue house. + +Mamma came in and looked at her as she ran. She stood in the doorway +with her finger on her mouth, and she was smiling. Her brown hair was +parted in two sleek bands, looped and puffed out softly round her +ears, and plaited in one plait that stood up on its edge above her +forehead. She wore a wide brown silk gown with falling sleeves. + +"Pretty Mamma," said Mary. "In a blue dress." + + +V. + +Every morning Mark and Dank and Roddy knocked at Mamma's door, and if +Papa was there he called out, "Go away, you little beasts!" If he was +not there she said, "Come in, darlings!" and they climbed up the big +bed into Papa's place and said "Good morning, Mamma!" + +When Papa was away the lifted curtain spread like a tent over Mary's +cot, shutting her in with Mamma. When he was there the drawn curtain +hung straight down from the head of the bed. + + + + +II + + +I. + +White patterns on the window, sharp spikes, feathers, sprigs with +furled edges, stuck flat on to the glass; white webs, crinkled like +the skin of boiled milk, stretched across the corner of the pane; +crisp, sticky stuff that bit your fingers. + +Out of doors, black twigs thickened with a white fur; white powder +sprinkled over the garden walk. The white, ruffled grass stood out +stiffly and gave under your feet with a pleasant crunching. The air +smelt good; you opened your mouth and drank it in gulps. It went down +like cold, tingling water. + +Frost. + +You saw the sun for the first time, a red ball that hung by itself on +the yellowish white sky. Mamma said, "Yes, of course it would fall if +God wasn't there to hold it up in his hands." + +Supposing God dropped the sun-- + + +II. + +The yellowish white sky had come close up to the house, a dirty +blanket let down outside the window. The tree made a black pattern on +it. Clear glass beads hung in a row from the black branch, each black +twig was tipped with a glass bead. When Jenny opened the window there +was a queer cold smell like the smell of the black water in the butt. + +Thin white powder fluttered out of the blanket and fell. A thick +powder. A white fluff that piled itself in a ridge on the window-sill +and curved softly in the corner of the sash. It was cold, and melted +on your tongue with a taste of window-pane. + +In the garden Mark and Dank and Roddy were making the snow man. + +Mamma stood at the nursery window with her back to the room. She +called to Mary to come and look at the snow man. + +Mary was tired of the snow man. She was making a tower with Roddy's +bricks while Roddy wasn't there. She had to build it quick before he +could come back and take his bricks away, and the quicker you built it +the sooner it fell down. Mamma was not to look until it was finished. + +"Look--look, Mamma! M-m-mary's m-m-made a tar. And it's _not_ falled +down!" + +The tower reached above Jenny's knee. + +"Come and look, Mamma--" But Mamma wouldn't even turn her head. + +"I'm looking at the snow man," she said. + +Something swelled up, hot and tight, in Mary's body and in her face. +She had a big bursting face and a big bursting body. She struck the +tower, and it fell down. Her violence made her feel light and small +again and happy. + +"Where's the tower, Mary?" said Mamma. + +"There isn't any tar. I've knocked it down. It was a nashty tar." + + +III. + +Aunt Charlotte-- + +Aunt Charlotte had sent the Isle of Skye terrier to Dank. + +There was a picture of Aunt Charlotte in Mamma's Album. She stood on a +strip of carpet, supported by the hoops of her crinoline; her black +lace shawl made a pattern on the light gown. She wore a little hat +with a white sweeping feather, and under the hat two long black curls +hung down straight on each shoulder. + +The other people in the Album were sulky, and wouldn't look at you. +The gentlemen made cross faces at somebody who wasn't there; the +ladies hung their heads and looked down at their crinolines. Aunt +Charlotte hung her head too, but her eyes, tilted up straight under +her forehead, pointed at you. And between her stiff black curls she +was smiling--smiling. When Mamma came to Aunt Charlotte's picture she +tried to turn over the page of the Album quick. + +Aunt Charlotte sent things. She sent the fat valentine with the lace +paper border and black letters printed on sweet-smelling white satin +that Papa threw into the fire, and the white china doll with black +hair and blue eyes and no clothes on that Jenny hid in the nursery +cupboard. + +The Skye terrier brought a message tied under his chin: "Tib. For my +dear little nephew Dan with Aunt Charlotte's fond love." He had +high-peaked, tufted ears and a blackish grey coat that trailed on the +floor like a shawl that was too big for him. When you tried to stroke +him the shawl swept and trailed away under the table. You saw nothing +but shawl and ears until Papa began to tease Tib. Papa snapped his +finger and thumb at him, and Tib showed little angry eyes and white +teeth set in a black snarl. + +Mamma said, "Please don't do that again, Emilius." + +And Papa did it again. + + +IV. + +"What are you looking at, Master Daniel?" said Jenny. + +"Nothing." + +"Then what are you looking like that for? You didn't ought to." + +Papa had sent Mark and Dank to the nursery in disgrace. Mark leaned +over the back of Jenny's chair and rocked her. His face was red but +tight; and as he rocked he smiled because of his punishment. + +Dank lay on the floor on his stomach, his shoulders hunched, raised on +his elbows, his chin supported by his clenched fists. He was a dark +and white boy with dusty eyelashes and rough, doggy hair. He had +puckered up his mouth and made it small; under the scowl of his +twisted eyebrows he was looking at nothing. + +"It's no worse for you than it is for Master Mark," said Jenny. + +"_Isn't_ it? Tib was my dog. If he hadn't been my dog Papa wouldn't have +teased him, and Mamma wouldn't have sent him back to Aunt Charlotte, and +Aunt Charlotte wouldn't have let him be run over." + +"Yes. But what did you say to your Papa?" + +"I said I wish Tib _had_ bitten him. So I do. And Mark said it would +have served him jolly well right." + +"So it would," said Mark. + +Roddy had turned his back on them. Nobody was taking any notice of +him; so he sang aloud to himself the song he was forbidden to sing: + + "John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave, + John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave--" + +The song seemed to burst out of Roddy's beautiful white face; his pink +lips twirled and tilted; his golden curls bobbed and nodded to the tune. + + "John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave, + As we go marching on!" + +"When I grow up," said Dank, "I'll kill Papa for killing Tibby. I'll +bore holes in his face with Mark's gimlet. I'll cut pieces out of him. +I'll get the matches and set fire to his beard. I'll--I'll _hurt_ him." + +"I don't think _I_ shall," said Mark. "But if I do I shan't kick up a +silly row about it first." + +"It's all very well for you. You'd kick up a row if Tibby was your dog." + +Mary had forgotten Tibby. Now she remembered. + +"Where's Tibby? I want him." + +"Tibby's dead," said Jenny. + +"What's 'dead'?" + +"Never you mind." + +Roddy was singing: + + "'And _from_ his nose and _to_ his chin + The worms crawled out and the worms crawled in'-- + +"_That's_ dead," said Roddy. + + +V. + +You never knew when Aunt Charlotte mightn't send something. She forgot +your birthday and sometimes Christmas; but, to make up for that, she +remembered in between. Every time she was going to be married she +remembered. + +Sarah the cat came too long after Mark's twelfth birthday to be his +birthday present. There was no message with her except that Aunt +Charlotte was going to be married and didn't want her any more. +Whenever Aunt Charlotte was going to be married she sent you something +she didn't want. + +Sarah was a white cat with a pink nose and pink lips and pink pads +under her paws. Her tabby hood came down in a peak between her green +eyes. Her tabby cape went on along the back of her tail, tapering to +the tip. Sarah crouched against the fireguard, her haunches raised, her +head sunk back on her shoulders, and her paws tucked in under her +white, pouting breast. + +Mark stooped over her; his mouth smiled its small, firm smile; his eyes +shone as he stroked her. Sarah raised her haunches under the caressing +hand. + +Mary's body was still. Something stirred and tightened in it when she +looked at Sarah. + +"I want Sarah," she said. + +"You can't have her," said Jenny. "She's Master Mark's cat." + +She wanted her more than Roddy's bricks and Dank's animal book or +Mark's soldiers. She trembled when she held her in her arms and kissed +her and smelt the warm, sweet, sleepy smell that came from the top of +her head. + +"Little girls can't have everything they want," said Jenny. + +"I wanted her before you did," said Dank. "You're too little to have a +cat at all." + +He sat on the table swinging his legs. His dark, mournful eyes watched +Mark under their doggy scowl. He looked like Tibby, the terrier that +Mamma sent away because Papa teased him. + +"Sarah isn't your cat either, Master Daniel. Your Aunt Charlotte gave +her to your Mamma, and your Mamma gave her to Master Mark." + +"She ought to have given her to me. She took my dog away." + +"_I_ gave her to you," said Mark. + +"And I gave her to you back again." + +"Well then, she's half our cat." + +"I want her," said Mary. She said it again and again. + +Mamma came and took her into the room with the big bed. + +The gas blazed in the white globes. Lovely white lights washed like +water over the polished yellow furniture: the bed, the great high +wardrobe, the chests of drawers, the twisted poles of the +looking-glass. There were soft rounds and edges of blond light on the +white marble chimney-piece and the white marble washstand. The drawn +curtains were covered with shining silver patterns on a sleek green +ground that shone. All these things showed again in the long, flashing +mirrors. + +Mary looked round the room and wondered why the squat grey men had gone +out of the curtains. + +"Don't look about you," said Mamma. "Look at me. Why do you want +Sarah?" + +She had forgotten Sarah. + +"Because," she said, "Sarah is so sweet." + +"Mamma gave Sarah to Mark. Mary mustn't want what isn't given her. Mark +doesn't say, 'I want Mary's dollies.' Papa doesn't say, 'I want Mamma's +workbox.'" + +"But _I_ want Sarah." + +"And that's selfish and self-willed." + +Mamma sat down on the low chair at the foot of the bed. + +"God," she said, "hates selfishness and self-will. God is grieved every +time Mary is self-willed and selfish. He wants her to give up her +will." + +When Mamma talked about God she took you on her lap and you played with +the gold tassel on her watch chain. Her face was solemn and tender. She +spoke softly. She was afraid that God might hear her talking about him +and wouldn't like it. + +Mary knelt in Mamma's lap and said "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild," and +"Our Father," and played with the gold tassel. Every day began and +ended with "Our Father" and "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild." + +"What's hallowed?" + +"Holy," said Mamma. "What God is. Sacred and holy." + +Mary twisted the gold tassel and made it dance and run through the loop +of the chain. Mamma took it out of her hands and pressed them together +and stooped her head to them and kissed them. She could feel the kiss +tingling through her body from her finger-tips, and she was suddenly +docile and appeased. + +When she lay in her cot behind the curtain she prayed: "Please God keep +me from wanting Sarah." + +In the morning she remembered. When she looked at Sarah she thought: +"Sarah is Mark's cat and Dank's cat." + +She touched her with the tips of her fingers. Sarah's eyes were +reproachful and unhappy. She ran away and crept under the chest of +drawers. + +"Mamma gave Sarah to Mark." + +Mamma was sacred and holy. Mark was sacred and holy. Sarah was sacred +and holy, crouching under the chest of drawers with her eyes gleaming +in the darkness. + + +VI. + +It was a good and happy day. + +She lay on the big bed. Her head rested on Mamma's arm. Mamma's face +was close to her. Water trickled into her eyes out of the wet pad of +pocket-handkerchief. Under the cold pad a hot, grinding pain came from +the hole in her forehead. Jenny stood beside the bed. Her face had +waked up and she was busy squeezing something out of a red sponge into +a basin of pink water. + +When Mamma pressed the pocket-handkerchief tight the pain ground +harder, when she loosened it blood ran out of the hole and the +pocket-handkerchief was warm again. Then Jenny put on the sponge. + +She could hear Jenny say, "It was the Master's fault. She didn't ought +to have been left in the room with him." + +She remembered. The dining-room and the sharp spike on the fender and +Papa's legs stretched out. He had told her not to run so fast and she +had run faster and faster. It wasn't Papa's fault. + +She remembered tripping over Papa's legs. Then falling on the spike. +Then nothing. + +Then waking in Mamma's room. + +She wasn't crying. The pain made her feel good and happy; and Mamma was +calling her her darling and her little lamb. Mamma loved her. Jenny +loved her. + +Mark and Dank and Roddy came in. Mark carried Sarah in his arms. They +stood by the bed and looked at her; their faces pressed close. Roddy +had been crying; but Mark and Dank were excited. They climbed on to the +bed and kissed her. They made Sarah crouch down close beside her and +held her there. They spoke very fast, one after the other. + +"We've brought you Sarah." + +"We've given you Sarah." + +"She's your cat." + +"To keep for ever." + +She was glad that she had tripped over Papa's legs. It was a good and +happy day. + + +VII. + +The sun shone. The polished green blades of the grass glittered. The +gravel walk and the nasturtium bed together made a broad orange blaze. +Specks like glass sparkled in the hot grey earth. On the grey flagstone +the red poppy you picked yesterday was a black thread, a purple stain. + +She was happy sitting on the grass, drawing the fine, sharp blades +between her fingers, sniffing the smell of the mignonette that tingled +like sweet pepper, opening and shutting the yellow mouths of the +snap-dragon. + +The garden flowers stood still, straight up in the grey earth. They +were as tall as you were. You could look at them a long time without +being tired. + +The garden flowers were not like the animals. The cat Sarah bumped her +sleek head under your chin; you could feel her purr throbbing under her +ribs and crackling in her throat. The white rabbit pushed out his nose +to you and drew it in again, quivering, and breathed his sweet breath +into your mouth. + +The garden flowers wouldn't let you love them. They stood still in +their beauty, quiet, arrogant, reproachful. They put you in the wrong. +When you stroked them they shook and swayed from you; when you held +them tight their heads dropped, their backs broke, they shrivelled up +in your hands. All the flowers in the garden were Mamma's; they were +sacred and holy. + +You loved best the flowers that you stooped down to look at and the +flowers that were not Mamma's: the small crumpled poppy by the edge of +the field, and the ears of the wild rye that ran up your sleeve and +tickled you, and the speedwell, striped like the blue eyes of Meta, the +wax doll. + +When you smelt mignonette you thought of Mamma. + +It was her birthday. Mark had given her a little sumach tree in a red +pot. They took it out of the pot and dug a hole by the front door steps +outside the pantry window and planted it there. + +Papa came out on to the steps and watched them. + +"I suppose," he said, "you think it'll _grow_?" + +Mamma never turned to look at him. She smiled because it was her +birthday. She said, "Of course it'll grow." + +She spread out its roots and pressed it down and padded up the earth +about it with her hands. It held out its tiny branches, stiffly, like a +toy tree, standing no higher than the mignonette. Papa looked at Mamma +and Mark, busy and happy with their heads together, taking no notice of +him. He laughed out of his big beard and went back into the house +suddenly and slammed the door. You knew that he disliked the sumach +tree and that he was angry with Mark for giving it to Mamma. + +When you smelt mignonette you thought of Mamma and Mark and the sumach +tree, and Papa standing on the steps, and the queer laugh that came out +of his beard. + +When it rained you were naughty and unhappy because you couldn't go out +of doors. Then Mamma stood at the window and looked into the front +garden. She smiled at the rain. She said, "It will be good for my +sumach tree." + +Every day you went out on to the steps to see if the sumach tree had +grown. + + +VIII. + +The white lamb stood on the table beside her cot. + +Mamma put it there every night so that she could see it first thing in +the morning when she woke. + +She had had a birthday. Suddenly in the middle of the night she was +five years old. + +She had kept on waking up with the excitement of it. Then, in the dark +twilight of the room, she had seen a bulky thing inside the cot, +leaning up against the rail. It stuck out queerly and its weight +dragged the counterpane tight over her feet. + +The birthday present. What she saw was not its real shape. When she +poked it, stiff paper bent in and crackled; and she could feel +something big and solid underneath. She lay quiet and happy, trying to +guess what it could be, and fell asleep again. + +It was the white lamb. It stood on a green stand. It smelt of dried hay +and gum and paint like the other toy animals, but its white coat had a +dull, woolly smell, and that was the real smell of the lamb. Its large, +slanting eyes stared off over its ears into the far corners of the +room, so that it never looked at you. This made her feel sometimes that +the lamb didn't love her, and sometimes that it was frightened and +wanted to be comforted. + +She trembled when first she stroked it and held it to her face, and +sniffed its lamby smell. + +Papa looked down at her. He was smiling; and when she looked up at him +she was not afraid. She had the same feeling that came sometimes when +she sat in Mamma's lap and Mamma talked about God and Jesus. Papa was +sacred and holy. + +He had given her the lamb. + +It was the end of her birthday; Mamma and Jenny were putting her to +bed. She felt weak and tired, and sad because it was all over. + +"Come to that," said Jenny, "your birthday was over at five minutes +past twelve this morning." + +"When will it come again?" + +"Not for a whole year," said Mamma. + +"I wish it would come to-morrow." + +Mamma shook her head at her. "You want to be spoiled and petted every +day." + +"No. No. I want--I want--" + +"She doesn't know what she wants," said Jenny. + +"Yes. I do. I _do_." + +"Well--" + +"I want to love Papa every day. 'Cause he gave me my lamb." + +"Oh," said Mamma, "if you only love people because they give you +birthday presents--" + +"But I don't--I don't--really and truly--" + +"You didn't ought to have no more birthdays," said Jenny, "if they make +you cry." + +Why couldn't they see that crying meant that she wanted Papa to be +sacred and holy every day? + +The day after the birthday when Papa went about the same as ever, +looking big and frightening, when he "Baa'd" into her face and called +out, "Mary had a little lamb!" and "Mary, Mary, quite contrary," she +looked after him sorrowfully and thought: "Papa gave me my lamb." + + +IX. + +One day Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella came over from Chadwell Grange. +They were talking to Mamma a long time in the drawing-room, and when +she came in they stopped and whispered. + +Roddy told her the secret. Uncle Edward was going to give her a live +lamb. + +Mark and Dank said it couldn't be true. Uncle Edward was not a real +uncle; he was only Aunt Bella's husband, and he never gave you +anything. And anyhow the lamb wasn't born yet and couldn't come for +weeks and weeks. + +Every morning she asked, "Has my new lamb come? When is it coming? Do +you think it will come to-day?" + +She could keep on sitting still quite a long time by merely thinking +about the new lamb. It would run beside her when she played in the +garden. It would eat grass out of her hand. She would tie a ribbon +round its neck and lead it up and down the lane. At these moments she +forgot the toy lamb. It stood on the chest of drawers in the nursery, +looking off into the corners of the room, neglected. + +By the time Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella sent for her to come and see +the lamb, she knew exactly what it would be like and what would happen. +She saw it looking like the lambs in the Bible Picture Book, fat, and +covered with thick, pure white wool. She saw Uncle Edward, with his +yellow face and big nose and black whiskers, coming to her across the +lawn at Chadwell Grange, carrying the lamb over his shoulder like +Jesus. + +It was a cold morning. They drove a long time in Uncle Edward's +carriage, over the hard, loud roads, between fields white with frost, +and Uncle Edward was not on his lawn. + +Aunt Bella stood in the big hall, waiting for them. She looked much +larger and more important than Mamma. + +"Aunt Bella, have you got my new lamb?" + +She tried not to shriek it out, because Aunt Bella was nearly always +poorly, and Mamma told her that if you shrieked at her she would be +ill. + +Mamma said "Sh-sh-sh!" And Aunt Bella whispered something and she heard +Mamma answer, "Better not." + +"If she _sees_ it," said Aunt Bella, "she'll understand." + +Mamma shook her head at Aunt Bella. + +"Edward would like it," said Aunt Bella. "He wanted to give it her +himself. It's _his_ present." + +Mamma took her hand and they followed Aunt Bella through the servants' +hall into the kitchen. The servants were all there, Rose and Annie and +Cook, and Mrs. Fisher, the housekeeper, and Giles, the young footman. +They all stared at her in a queer, kind way as she came in. + +A low screen was drawn close round one corner of the fireplace; Uncle +Edward and Pidgeon, the bailiff, were doing something to it with a +yellow horse-cloth. + +Uncle Edward came to her, looking down the side of his big nose. He led +her to the screen and drew it away. + +Something lay on the floor wrapped in a piece of dirty blanket. When +Uncle Edward pushed back the blanket a bad smell came out. He said, +"Here's your lamb, Mary. You're just in time." + +She saw a brownish grey animal with a queer, hammer-shaped head and +long black legs. Its body was drawn out and knotted like an enormous +maggot. It lay twisted to one side and its eyes were shut. + +"That isn't my lamb." + +"It's the lamb I always said Miss Mary was to have, isn't it, Pidgeon?" + +"Yes, Squoire, it's the lamb you bid me set asoide for little Missy." + +"Then," said Mary, "why does it look like that?" + +"It's very ill," Mamma said gently. "Poor Uncle Edward thought you'd +like to see it before it died. You _are_ glad you've seen it, aren't +you?" + +"No." + +Just then the lamb stirred in its blanket; it opened its eyes and +looked at her. + +She thought: "It's my lamb. It looked at me. It's _my_ lamb and it's +dying. My _lamb's_ dying." + +The bad smell came again out of the blanket. She tried not to think of +it. She wanted to sit down on the floor beside the lamb and lift it out +of its blanket and nurse it; but Mamma wouldn't let her. + +When she got home Mamma took down the toy lamb from the chest of +drawers and brought it to her. + +She sat quiet a long time holding it in her lap and stroking it. + +The stiff eyes of the toy lamb stared away over its ears. + + + + +III + + +I. + +Jenny was cross and tugged at your hair when she dressed you to go to +Chadwell Grange. + +"Jenny-Wee, Mamma says if I'm not good Aunt Bella will be ill. Do you +think it's really true?" + +Jenny tugged. "I'd thank you for some of your Aunt Bella's illness," +she said. + +"I mean," Mary said, "like Papa was in the night. Every time I get +'cited and jump about I think she'll open her mouth and begin." + +"Well, if she was to you'd oughter be sorry for her." + +"I _am_ sorry for her. But I'm frightened too." + +"That's not being good," said Jenny. But she left off tugging. + +Somehow you knew she was pleased to think you were not really good at +Aunt Bella's, where Mrs. Fisher dressed and undressed you and you were +allowed to talk to Pidgeon. + +Roddy and Dank said you ought to hate Uncle Edward and Pidgeon and Mrs. +Fisher, and not to like Aunt Bella very much, even if she was Mamma's +sister. Mamma didn't really like Uncle Edward; she only pretended +because of Aunt Bella. + +Uncle Edward had an ugly nose and a yellow face widened by his black +whiskers; his mouth stretched from one whisker to the other, and his +black hair curled in large tufts above his ears. But he had no beard; +you could see the whole of his mouth at once; and when Aunt Bella came +into the room his little blue eyes looked up off the side of his nose +and he smiled at her between his tufts of hair. It was dreadful to +think that Mark and Dank and Roddy didn't like him. It might hurt him +so much that he would never be happy again. + +About Pidgeon she was not quite sure. Pidgeon was very ugly. He had +long stiff legs, and a long stiff face finished off with a fringe of +red whiskers that went on under his chin. Still, it was not nice to +think of Pidgeon being unhappy either. But Mrs. Fisher was large and +rather like Aunt Bella, only softer and more bulging. Her round face +had a high red polish on it always, and when she saw you coming her +eyes twinkled, and her red forehead and her big cheeks and her mouth +smiled all together a fat, simmering smile. When you got to the black +and white marble tiles you saw her waiting for you at the foot of the +stairs. + +She wanted to ask Mrs. Fisher if it was true that Aunt Bella would be +ill if she were naughty; but a squeezing and dragging came under her +waist whenever she thought about it, and that made her shy and ashamed. +It went when they left her to play by herself on the lawn in front of +the house. + +Aunt Bella's house was enormous. Two long rows of windows stared out at +you, their dark green storm shutters folded back on the yellow brick +walls. A third row of little squeezed-up windows and little squeezed-up +shutters blinked in the narrow space under the roof. All summer a sweet +smell came from that side of the house where cream-coloured roses hung +on the yellow walls between the green shutters. There was a cedar tree +on the lawn and a sun-dial and a stone fountain. Goldfish swam in the +clear greenish water. The flowers in the round beds were stiff and +shining, as if they had been cut out of tin and freshly painted. When +you thought of Aunt Bella's garden you saw calceolarias, brown velvet +purses with yellow spots. + +She could always get away from Aunt Bella by going down the dark walk +between the yew hedge and the window of Mrs. Fisher's room, and through +the stable-yard into the plantation. The cocks and hens had their black +timber house there in the clearing, and Ponto, the Newfoundland, lived +all by himself in his kennel under the little ragged fir trees. + +When Ponto saw her coming he danced on his hind legs and strained at +his chain and called to her with his loud, barking howl. He played with +her, crawling on his stomach, crouching, raising first one big paw and +then the other. She put out her foot, and he caught it and held it +between his big paws, and looked at it with his head on one side, +smiling. She squealed with delight, and Ponto barked again. + +The stable bell would ring while they played in the plantation, and +Uncle Edward or Pidgeon or Mrs. Fisher would come out and find her and +take her back into the house. Ponto lifted up his head and howled after +her as she went. + +At lunch Mary sat quivering between Mamma and Aunt Bella. The squeezing +and dragging under her waist had begun again. There was a pattern of +green ivy round the dinner plates and a pattern of goats round the +silver napkin rings. She tried to fix her mind on the ivy and the goats +instead of looking at Aunt Bella to see whether she were going to be +ill. She _would_ be if you left mud in the hall on the black and white +marble tiles. Or if you took Ponto off the chain and let him get into +the house. Or if you spilled the gravy. + +Aunt Bella's face was much pinker and richer and more important than +Mamma's face. She thought she wouldn't have minded quite so much if +Aunt Bella had been white and brown and pretty, like Mamma. + +There--she had spilled the gravy. + +Little knots came in Aunt Bella's pink forehead. Her face loosened and +swelled with a red flush; her mouth pouted and drew itself in again, +pulled out of shape by something that darted up the side of her nose +and made her blink. + +She thought: "I know--I know--I _know_ it's going to happen." + +It didn't. Aunt Bella only said, "You should look at your plate and +spoon, dear." + +After lunch, when they were resting, you could feel naughtiness coming +on. Then Pidgeon carried you on his back to the calf-shed; or Mrs. +Fisher took you up into her bedroom to see her dress. + +In Mrs. Fisher's bedroom a smell of rotten apples oozed through the +rosebud pattern on the walls. There were no doors inside, only places +in the wall-paper that opened. Behind one of these places there was a +cupboard where Mrs. Fisher kept her clothes. Sometimes she would take +the lid off the big box covered with wall-paper and show you her Sunday +bonnet. You sat on the bed, and she gave you peppermint balls to suck +while she peeled off her black merino and squeezed herself into her +black silk. You watched for the moment when the brooch with the black +tomb and the weeping willow on it was undone and Mrs. Fisher's chin +came out first by the open collar and Mrs. Fisher began to swell. When +she stood up in her petticoat and bodice she was enormous; her breasts +and hips and her great arms shook as she walked about the room. + +Mary was sorry when she said good-bye to Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella +and Mrs. Fisher. + +For, always, as soon as she got home, Roddy rushed at her with the same +questions. + +"Did you let Uncle Edward kiss you?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you talk to Pidgeon?" + +"Yes." + +"Did you kiss Mrs. Fisher?" + +"Yes." + +And Dank said, "Have they taken Ponto off the chain yet?" + +"No." + +"Well, then, that shows you what pigs they are." + +And when she saw Mark looking at her she felt small and silly and +ashamed. + + +II. + +It was the last week of the midsummer holidays. Mark and Dank had gone +to stay for three days at Aunt Bella's, and on the second day they had +been sent home. + +Mamma and Roddy were in the garden when they came. They were killing +snails in a flower-pot by putting salt on them. The snails turned over +and over on each other and spat out a green foam that covered them like +soapsuds as they died. + +Mark's face was red and he was smiling. Even Dank looked proud of +himself and happy. They called out together, "We've been sent home." + +Mamma looked up from her flower-pot. + +"What did you _do_?" she said. + +"We took Ponto off the chain," said Dank. + +"Did he get into the house?" + +"Of course he did," said Mark. "Like a shot. He got into Aunt Bella's +bedroom, and Aunt Bella was in bed." + +"Oh, _Mark_!" + +"Uncle Edward came up just as we were getting him out. He was in an +awful wax." + +"I'm afraid," Dank said, "I cheeked him." + +"What did you say?" + +"I told him he wasn't fit to have a dog. And he said we weren't to come +again; and Mark said that was all we _had_ come for--to let Ponto +loose." + +Mamma put another snail into the flower-pot, very gently. She was +smiling and at the same time trying not to smile. + +"He went back," said Mark, "and raked it up again about our chasing his +sheep, ages ago." + +"_Did_ you chase the sheep?" + +"No. Of course we didn't. They started to run because they saw Pidgeon +coming, and Roddy ran after them till we told him not to. The mean +beast said we'd made Mary's lamb die by frightening its mother. When he +only gave it her because he knew it wouldn't live. _Then_ he said we'd +frightened Aunt Bella." + +Mary stared at them, fascinated. + +"Oh, Mark, was Aunt Bella ill?" + +"Of course she wasn't. She only says she's going to be to keep you +quiet." + +"Well," said Mamma, "she won't be frightened any more. He'll not ask +you again." + +"We don't care. He's not a bit of good. He won't let us ride his horses +or climb his trees or fish in his stinking pond." + +"Let Mary go there," said Dank. "_She_ likes it. She kisses Pidgeon." + +"I don't," she cried. "I hate Pidgeon. I hate Uncle Edward and Aunt +Bella. I hate Mrs. Fisher." + +Mamma looked up from her flower-pot, and, suddenly, she was angry. + +"For shame! They're kind to _you_," she said. "You little naughty, +ungrateful girl." + +"They're _not_ kind to Mark and Dank. That's why I hate them." + +She wondered why Mamma was not angry with Mark and Dank, who had let +Ponto loose and frightened Aunt Bella. + + + + +IV + + +I. + +That year when Christmas came Papa gave her a red book with a gold +holly wreath on the cover. The wreath was made out of three words: _The +Children's Prize_, printed in letters that pretended to be holly +sprigs. Inside the holly wreath was the number of the year, in fat gold +letters: 1869. + +Soon after Christmas she had another birthday. She was six years old. +She could write in capitals and count up to a hundred if she were left +to do it by herself. Besides "Gentle Jesus," she could say "Cock-Robin" +and "The House that Jack Built," and "The Lord is my Shepherd" and "The +Slave in the Dismal Swamp." And she could read all her own story books, +picking out the words she knew and making up the rest. Roddy never made +up. He was a big boy, he was eight years old. + +The morning after her birthday Roddy and she were sent into the +drawing-room to Mamma. A strange lady was there. She had chosen the +high-backed chair in the middle of the room with the Berlin wool-work +parrot on it. She sat very upright, stiff and thin between the twisted +rosewood pillars of the chair. She was dressed in a black gown made of +a great many little bands of rough crape and a few smooth stretches of +merino. Her crape veil, folded back over her hat, hung behind her head +in a stiff square. A jet necklace lay flat and heavy on her small +chest. When you had seen all these black things she showed you, +suddenly, her white, wounded face. + +Mamma called her Miss Thompson. + +Miss Thompson's face was so light and thin that you thought it would +break if you squeezed it. The skin was drawn tight over her jaw and the +bridge of her nose and the sharp naked arches of her eye-bones. She +looked at you with mournful, startled eyes that were too large for +their lids; and her flat chin trembled slightly as she talked. + +"This is Rodney," she said, as if she were repeating a lesson after +Mamma. + +Rodney leaned up against Mamma and looked proud and handsome. She had +her arm round him, and every now and then she pressed it tighter to +draw him to herself. + +Miss Thompson said after Mamma, "And this is Mary." + +Her mournful eyes moved and sparkled as if she had suddenly thought of +something for herself. + +"I am sure," she said, "they will be very good." + +Mamma shook her head, as much as to say Miss Thompson must not build on +it. + +Every weekday from ten to twelve Miss Thompson came and taught them +reading, writing and arithmetic. Every Wednesday at half-past eleven +the boys' tutor, Mr. Sippett, looked in and taught Rodney "_Mensa_: a +table." + +Mamma told them they must never be naughty with Miss Thompson because +her mother was dead. + +They went away and talked about her among the gooseberry bushes at the +bottom of the garden. + +"I don't know how we're going to manage," Rodney said. "There's no +sense in saying we mustn't be naughty because her mother's dead." + +"I suppose," Mary said, "it would make her think she's deader." + +"We can't help that. We've got to be naughty some time." + +"We mustn't begin," Mary said. "If we begin we shall have to finish." + +They were good for four days, from ten to twelve. And at a quarter past +twelve on the fifth day Mamma found Mary crying in the dining-room. + +"Oh, Mary, have you been naughty?" + +"No; but I shall be to-morrow. I've been so good that I can't keep on +any longer." + +Mamma took her in her lap. She lowered her head to you, holding it +straight and still, ready to pounce if you said the wrong thing. + +"Being good when it pleases you isn't being good," she said. "It's not +what Jesus means by being good. God wants us to be good all the time, +like Jesus." + +"But--Jesus and me is different. He wasn't able to be naughty. And I'm +not able to be good. Not _all_ the time." + +"You're not able to be good of your own will and in your own strength. +You're not good till God makes you good." + +"Did God make me naughty?" + +"No. God couldn't make anybody naughty." + +"Not if he tried _hard_?" + +"No. But," said Mamma, speaking very fast, "he'll make you good if you +ask him." + +"Will he make me good if I don't ask him?" + +"No," said Mamma. + + +II. + +Miss Thompson-- + +She was always sure you would be good. And Mamma was sure you wouldn't +be, or that if you were it would be for some bad reason like being +sorry for Miss Thompson. + +As long as Roddy was in the room Mary was sorry for Miss Thompson. And +when she was left alone with her she was frightened. The squeezing and +dragging under her waist began when Miss Thompson pushed her gentle, +mournful face close up to see what she was doing. + +She was afraid of Miss Thompson because her mother was dead. + +She kept on thinking about Miss Thompson's mother. Miss Thompson's +mother would be like Jenny in bed with her cap off; and she would be +like the dead field mouse that Roddy found in the lane. She would lie +on the bed with her back bent and her head hanging loose like the dear +little field mouse; and her legs would be turned up over her stomach +like his, toes and fingers clawing together. When you touched her she +would be cold and stiff, like the field mouse. They had wrapped her up +in a white sheet. Roddy said dead people were always wrapped up in +white sheets. And Mr. Chapman had put her into a coffin like the one he +was making when he gave Dank the wood for the rabbit's house. + +Every time Miss Thompson came near her she saw the white sheet and +smelt the sharp, bitter smell of the coffin. + +If she was naughty Miss Thompson (who seemed to have forgotten) would +remember that her mother was dead. It might happen any minute. + +It never did. For Miss Thompson said you were good if you knew your +lessons; and at the same time you were not naughty if you didn't know +them. You might not know them to-day; but you would know them to-morrow +or the next day. + +By midsummer Mary could read the books that Dank read. If it had not +been for Mr. Sippett and "_Mensa_: a table," she would have known as +much as Roddy. + +Almost before they had time to be naughty Miss Thompson had gone. Mamma +said that Roddy was not getting on fast enough. + + + + +V + + +I. + +The book that Aunt Bella had brought her was called _The Triumph Over +Midian_, and Aunt Bella said that if she was a good girl it would +interest her. But it did not interest her. That was how she heard Aunt +Bella and Mamma talking together. + +Mamma's foot was tapping on the footstool, which showed that she was +annoyed. + +"They're coming to-morrow," she said, "to look at that house at +Ilford." + +"To live?" Aunt Bella said. + +"To live," Mamma said. + +"And is Emilius going to allow it? What's Victor thinking of, bringing +her down here?" + +"They want to be near Emilius. They think he'll look after her." + +"It was Victor who _would_ have her at home, and Victor might look +after her himself. She was his favourite sister." + +"He doesn't want to be too responsible. They think Emilius ought to +take his share." + +Aunt Bella whispered something. And Mamma said, "Stuff and nonsense! No +more than you or I. Only you never know what queer thing she'll do +next." + +Aunt Bella said, "She was always queer as long as I remember her." + +Mamma's foot went tap, tap again. + +"She's been sending away things worse than ever. Dolls. Those naked +ones." + +Aunt Bella gave herself a shake and said something that sounded like +"Goo-oo-sh!" And then, "Going to be married?" + +Mamma said, "Going to be married." + +And Aunt Bella said "T-t-t." + +They were talking about Aunt Charlotte. + +Mamma went on: "She's packed off all her clothes. Her new ones. Sent +them to Matilda. Thinks she won't have to wear them any more." + +"You mustn't expect me to have Charlotte Olivier in my house," Aunt +Bella said. "If anybody came to call it would be most unpleasant." + +"I wouldn't mind," Mamma said, tap-tapping, "if it was only Charlotte. +But there's Lavvy and her Opinions." + +Aunt Bella said "Pfoo-oof!" and waved her hands as if she were clearing +the air. + +"All I can say is," Mamma said, "that if Lavvy Olivier brings her +Opinions into this house Emilius and I will walk out of it." + +To-morrow--they were coming to-morrow, Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy and +Aunt Charlotte. + + +II. + +They were coming to lunch, and everybody was excited. + +Mark and Dank were in their trousers and Eton jackets, and Roddy in his +new black velvet suit. The drawing-room was dressed out in its green +summer chintzes that shone and crackled with glaze. Mamma had moved the +big Chinese bowl from the cabinet to the round mahogany table and filled +it with white roses. You could see them again in the polish; blurred +white faces swimming on the dark, wine-coloured pool. You held out your +face to be washed in the clear, cool scent of the white roses. + +When Mark opened the door a smell of roast chicken came up the kitchen +stairs. + +It was like Sunday, except that you were excited. + +"Look at Papa," Roddy whispered. "Papa's excited." + +Papa had come home early from the office. He stood by the fireplace in +the long tight frock-coat that made him look enormous. He had twirled +back his moustache to show his rich red mouth. He had put something on +his beard that smelt sweet. You noticed for the first time how the +frizzed, red-brown mass sprang from a peak of silky golden hair under his +pouting lower lip. He was letting himself gently up and down with the +tips of his toes, and he was smiling, secretly, as if he had just thought +of something that he couldn't tell Mamma. Whenever he looked at Mamma she +put her hand up to her hair and patted it. + +Mamma had done her hair a new way. The brown plait stood up farther back +on the edge of the sloping chignon. She wore her new lavender and white +striped muslin. Lavender ribbon streamed from the pointed opening of her +bodice. A black velvet ribbon was tied tight round her neck; a jet cross +hung from it and a diamond star twinkled in the middle of the cross. She +pushed out her mouth and drew it in again, like Roddy's rabbit, and the +tip of her nose trembled as if it knew all the time what Papa was +thinking. + +She was so soft and pretty that you could hardly bear it. Mark stood +behind her chair and when Papa was not looking he kissed her. The +behaviour of her mouth and nose gave you a delicious feeling that with +Aunt Lavvy and Aunt Charlotte you wouldn't have to be so very good. + +The front door bell rang. Papa and Mamma looked at each other, as much as +to say, "_Now_ it's going to begin." And suddenly Mamma looked small and +frightened. She took Mark's hand. + +"Emilius," she said, "what am I to say to Lavinia?" + +"You don't say anything," Papa said. "Mary can talk to Lavinia." + +Mary jumped up and down with excitement. She knew how it would be. In +another minute Aunt Charlotte would come in, dressed in her black lace +shawl and crinoline, and Aunt Lavvy would bring her Opinions. And +something, something that you didn't know, would happen. + + +III. + +Aunt Charlotte came in first with a tight, dancing run. You knew her by +the long black curls on her shoulders. She was smiling as she smiled in +the album. She bent her head as she bent it in the album, and her eyes +looked up close under her black eyebrows and pointed at you. +Pretty--pretty blue eyes, and something frightening that made you look at +them. And something queer about her narrow jaw. It thrust itself forward, +jerking up her smile. + +No black lace shawl and no crinoline. Aunt Charlotte wore a blue and +black striped satin dress, bunched up behind, and a little hat perched on +the top of her chignon and tied underneath it with blue ribbons. + +She had got in and was kissing everybody while Aunt Lavvy and Uncle +Victor were fumbling with the hat stand in the hall. + +Aunt Lavvy came next. A long grey face. Black bands of hair parted on her +broad forehead. Black eyebrows; blue eyes that stuck out wide, that +didn't point at you. A grey bonnet, a grey dress, a little white shawl +with a narrow fringe, drooping. + +She walked slowly--slowly, as if she were still thinking of something +that was not in the room, as if she came into a quiet, empty room. + +You thought at first she was never going to kiss you, she was so tall and +her face and eyes held themselves so still. + +Uncle Victor. Dark and white; smaller than Papa, smaller than Aunt Lavvy; +thin in his loose frock-coat. His forehead and black eyebrows were +twisted above his blue, beautiful eyes. He had a small dark brown +moustache and a small dark brown beard, trimmed close and shaped prettily +to a point. He looked like something, like somebody; like Dank when he +was mournful, like Dank's dog, Tibby, when he hid from Papa. He said, +"Well, Caroline. Well, Emilius." + +Aunt Charlotte gave out sharp cries of "Dear!" and "Darling!" and +smothered them against your face in a sort of moan. + +When she came to Roddy she put up her hands. + +"Roddy--yellow hair. No. No. What have you done with the blue eyes and +black hair, Emilius? That comes of letting your beard grow so long." + +Then they all went into the dining-room. + +It was like a birthday. There was to be real blancmange, and preserved +ginger, and you drank raspberry vinegar out of the silver christening +cups the aunts and uncles gave you when you were born. Uncle Victor had +given Mary hers. She held it up and read her own name on it. + + MARY VICTORIA OLIVIER + 1863. + +They were all telling their names. Mary took them up and chanted them: +"Mark Emilius Olivier; Daniel Olivier; Rodney Olivier; Victor Justus +Olivier; Lavinia Mary Olivier; Charlotte Louisa Olivier." She liked the +sound of them. + +She sat between Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy. Roddy was squeezed into the +corner between Mamma and Mark. Aunt Charlotte sat opposite her between +Mark and Daniel. She _had_ to look at Aunt Charlotte's face. There were +faint grey smears on it as if somebody had scribbled all over it with +pencil. + +A remarkable conversation. + +"Aunt Lavvy! Aunt Lavvy! Have you brought your Opinions?" + +"No, my dear, they were not invited. So I left them at home." + +"I'm glad to hear it," Papa said. + +"Will you bring them next time?" + +"No. Not next time, nor any other time," Aunt Lavvy said, looking +straight at Papa. + +"Did you shut them up in the stair cupboard?" + +"No, but I may have to some day." + +"Then," Mary said, "if there are any little ones, may I have one?" + +"May she, Emilius?" + +"Certainly not," Papa said. "She's got too many little opinions of her +own." + +"What do you know about opinions?" Uncle Victor said. + +Mary was excited and happy. She had never been allowed to talk so much. +She tried to eat her roast chicken in a business-like, grown-up manner, +while she talked. + +"I've read about them," she said. "They are dear little animals with long +furry tails, much bigger than Sarah's tail, and they climb up trees." + +"Oh, they climb up trees, do they?" Uncle Victor was very polite and +attentive. + +"Yes. There's their picture in Bank's Natural History Book. Next to the +Ornythrincus or Duck-billed Plat-i-pus. If they came into the house Mamma +would be frightened. But I would not be frightened. I should stroke +them." + +"Do you think," Uncle Victor said, still politely, "you _quite_ know what +you mean?" + +"_I_ know," Daniel said, "she means opossums." + +"Yes," Mary said. "Opossums." + +"What _are_ opinions?" + +"Opinions," Papa said, "are things that people put in other people's +heads. Nasty, dangerous things, opinions." + +She thought: "That was why Mamma and Papa were frightened." + +"You won't put them into Mamma's head, will you, Aunt Lavvy?" + +Mamma said, "Get on with your dinner. Papa's only teasing." + +Aunt Lavvy's face flushed slowly, and she held her mouth tight, as if she +were trying not to cry. Papa was teasing Aunt Lavvy. + +"How do you like that Ilford house, Charlotte?" Mamma asked suddenly. + +"It's the nicest little house you ever saw," Aunt Charlotte said. "But +it's too far away. I'd rather have any ugly, poky old den that was next +door. I want to see all I can of you and Emilius and Dan and little +darling Mary. Before I go away." + +"You aren't thinking of going away when you've only just come?" + +"That's what Victor and Lavinia say. But you don't suppose I'm going to +stay an old maid all my life to please Victor and Lavinia." + +"I haven't thought about it at all," Mamma said. + +"_They_ have. _I_ know what they're thinking. But it's all settled. I'm +going to Marshall and Snelgrove's for my things. There's a silver-grey +poplin in their window. If I decide on it, Caroline, you shall have my +grey watered silk." + +"You needn't waggle your big beard at me, Emilius," Aunt Charlotte said. + +Papa pretended that he hadn't heard her and began to talk to Uncle +Victor. + +"Did you read John Bright's speech in Parliament last night?" + +Uncle Victor said, "I did." + +"What did you think of it?" + +Uncle Victor raised his shoulders and his eyebrows and spread out his +thin, small hands. + +"A man with a face like that," Aunt Charlotte said, "oughtn't to _be_ in +Parliament." + +"He's the man who saved England," said Papa. + +"What's the good of that if he can't save himself? Where does he expect +to go to with the hats he wears?" + +"Where does Emilius expect to go to," Uncle Victor said, "when his John +Bright and his Gladstone get their way?" + +Suddenly Aunt Charlotte left off smiling. + +"Emilius," she said, "do you uphold Gladstone?" + +"Of course I uphold Gladstone. There's nobody in this country fit to +black his boots." + +"I know nothing about his boots. But he's an infidel. He wants to pull +down the Church. I thought you were a Churchman?" + +"So I am," Papa said. "I've too good an opinion of the Church to imagine +that it can't stand alone." + +"You're a nice one to talk about opinions." + +"At any rate I know what I'm talking about." + +"I'm not so sure of that," said Aunt Charlotte. + +Aunt Lavvy smiled gently at the pattern of the tablecloth. + +"Do you agree with him, Lavvy?" Mamma had found something to say. + +"I agree with him better than he agrees with himself." + +A long conversation about things that interested Papa. Blanc-mange going +round the table, quivering and shaking and squelching under the spoon. + +"There's a silver-grey poplin," said Aunt Charlotte, "at Marshall and +Snelgrove's." + +The blanc-mange was still going round. Mamma watched it as it went. She +was fascinated by the shivering, white blanc-mange. + +"If there was only one man in the world," Aunt Charlotte said in a loud +voice, "and he had a flowing beard, I wouldn't marry him." + +Papa drew himself up. He looked at Mark and Daniel and Roddy as if he +were saying, "Whoever takes notice leaves the room." + +Roddy laughed first. He was sent out of the room. + +Papa looked at Mark. Mark clenched his teeth, holding his laugh down +tight. He seemed to think that as long as it didn't come out of his mouth +he was safe. It came out through his nose like a loud, tearing sneeze. +Mark was sent out of the room. + +Daniel threw down his spoon and fork. + +"If he goes, I go," Daniel said, and followed him. + +Papa looked at Mary. + +"What are _you_ grinning at, you young monkey?" + +"Emilius," said Aunt Charlotte, "if you send another child out of the +room, I go too." + +Mary squealed, "Tee-he-he-he-he-_hee_! Te-_hee_!" and was sent out of the +room. + +She and Aunt Charlotte sat on the stairs outside the dining-room door. +Aunt Charlotte's arm was round her; every now and then it gave her a +sudden, loving squeeze. + +"Darling Mary. Little darling Mary. Love Aunt Charlotte," she said. + +Mark and Dank and Roddy watched them over the banisters. + +Aunt Charlotte put her hand deep down in her pocket and brought out a +little parcel wrapped in white paper. She whispered: + +"If I give you something to keep, will you promise not to show it to +anybody and not to tell?" + +Mary promised. + +Inside the paper wrapper there was a match-box, and inside the match-box +there was a china doll no bigger than your finger. It had blue eyes and +black hair and no clothes on. Aunt Charlotte held it in her hand and +smiled at it. + +"That's Aunt Charlotte's little baby," she said. "I'm going to be married +and I shan't want it any more. + +"There--take it, and cover it up, quick!" + +Mamma had come out of the dining-room. She shut the door behind her. + +"What have you given to Mary?" she said. + +"Butter-Scotch," said Aunt Charlotte. + + +IV. + +All afternoon till tea-time Papa and Uncle Victor walked up and down the +garden path, talking to each other. Every now and then Mark and Mary +looked at them from the nursery window. + +That night she dreamed that she saw Aunt Charlotte standing at the foot +of the kitchen stairs taking off her clothes and wrapping them in white +paper; first, her black lace shawl; then her chemise. She stood up +without anything on. Her body was polished and shining like an enormous +white china doll. She lowered her head and pointed at you with her eyes. + +When you opened the stair cupboard door to catch the opossum, you found a +white china doll lying in it, no bigger than your finger. That was Aunt +Charlotte. + +In the dream there was no break between the end and the beginning. But +when she remembered it afterwards it split into two pieces with a dark +gap between. She knew she had only dreamed about the cupboard; but Aunt +Charlotte at the foot of the stairs was so clear and solid that she +thought she had really seen her. + +Mamma had told Aunt Bella all about it when they talked together that +day, in the drawing-room. She knew because she could still see them +sitting, bent forward with their heads touching, Aunt Bella in the big +arm-chair by the hearth-rug, and Mamma on the parrot chair. + +END OF BOOK ONE + + + + +BOOK TWO +CHILDHOOD (1869-1875) + + +VI + + +I. + +When Christmas came Papa gave her another _Children's Prize_. This time +the cover was blue and the number on it was 1870. Eighteen-seventy was +the name of the New Year that was coming after Christmas. It meant that +the world had gone on for one thousand eight hundred and seventy years +since Jesus was born. Every year she was to have a _Children's Prize_ +with the name of the New Year on it. + +Eighteen-seventy was a beautiful number. It sounded nice, and there was a +seven in it. Seven was a sacred and holy number; so was three, because of +the three Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, and because of +the seven stars and the seven golden candlesticks. When you said +good-night to Mamma you kissed her either three times or seven times. If +you went past three you had to go on to seven, because something dreadful +would happen if you didn't. Sometimes Mamma stopped you; then you stooped +down and finished up on the hem of her dress, quick, before she could see +you. + +She was glad that the _Children's Prize_ had a blue cover, because blue +was a sacred and holy colour. It was the colour of the ceiling in St. +Mary's Chapel at Ilford, and it was the colour of the Virgin Mary's +dress. + +There were golden stars all over the ceiling of St. Mary's Chapel. Roddy +and she were sent there after they had had chicken-pox and when their +whooping-cough was getting better. They were not allowed to go to the +church at Barkingside for fear of giving whooping-cough to the children +in Dr. Barnardo's Homes; and they were not allowed to go to Aldborough +Hatch Church because of Mr. Propart's pupils. But they had to go to +church somewhere, whooping-cough or no whooping-cough, in order to get to +Heaven; so Mark took them to the Chapel of Ease at Ilford, where the +Virgin Mary in a blue dress stood on a sort of step over the door. Mamma +said you were not to worship her, though you might look at her. She was a +graven image. Only Roman Catholics worshipped graven images; they were +heretics; that meant that they were shut outside the Church of England, +which was God's Church, and couldn't get in. And they had only half a +Sunday. In Roman Catholic countries Sunday was all over at twelve +o'clock, and for the rest of the day the Roman Catholics could do just +what they pleased; they danced and went to theatres and played games, as +if Sunday was one of their own days and not God's day. + +She wished she had been born in a Roman Catholic country. + +Every night she took the _Children's Prize_ to bed with her to keep her +safe. It had Bible Puzzles in it, and among them there was a picture of +the Name of God. A shining white light, shaped like Mamma's vinaigrette, +with black marks in the middle. Mamma said the light was the light that +shone above the Ark of the Covenant, and the black marks were letters and +the word was the real name of God. She said he was sometimes called +Jehovah, but that was not his real name. His real name was a secret name +which nobody but the High Priest was allowed to say. + +When you lay in the dark and shut your eyes tight and waited, you could +see the light, shaped like the vinaigrette, in front of you. It quivered +and shone brighter, and you saw in the middle, first, a dark blue colour, +and then the black marks that were the real name of God. She was glad she +couldn't read it, for she would have been certain to let it out some day +when she wasn't thinking. + +Perhaps Mamma knew, and was not allowed to say it. Supposing she forgot? + +At church they sang "Praise Him in His name Jah and rejoice before Him." +Jah was God's pet-name, short for Jehovah. It was a silly name--Jah. +Somehow you couldn't help thinking of God as a silly person; he was +always flying into tempers, and he was jealous. He was like Papa. Dank +said Papa was jealous of Mark because Mamma was so fond of him. There was +a picture of God in the night nursery. He had a big flowing beard, and a +very straight nose, like Papa, and he was lying on a sort of sofa that +was a cloud. Little Jesus stood underneath him, between the Virgin Mary +and Joseph, and the Holy Ghost was descending on him in the form of a +dove. His real name was Jesus Christ, but they called him Emmanuel. + + "There is a fountain filled with blood + Drawn from Emmanuel's veins; + And sinners plunged beneath that flood + Lose all their guilty stains." + +That was another frightening thing. It would be like the +fountain in Aunt Bella's garden, with blood in it instead of +water. The goldfishes would die. + +Mark was pleased when she said that Sarah wouldn't be allowed to go to +Heaven because she would try to catch the Holy Ghost. + +Jesus was not like God. He was good and kind. When he grew up he was +always dressed in pink and blue, and he had sad dark eyes and a little, +close, tidy beard like Uncle Victor. You could love Jesus. + +Jenny loved him. She was a Wesleyan; and her niece Catty was a Wesleyan. +Catty marched round and round the kitchen table with the dish-cloth, +drying the plates and singing: + + "'I love Jesus, yes, I do, + _For_ the Bible tells me _to_!'" + +and + + "'I am so glad that my Father in Heaven + Tells of His love in the book He has given-- + I am so glad that Jesus loves me, + Jesus loves me, + Jesus loves even me!'" + +On New Year's Eve Jenny and Catty went to the Wesleyan Chapel at Ilford +to sing the New Year in. Catty talked about the Old Year as if it was +horrid and the New Year as if it was nice. She said that at twelve +o'clock you ought to open the window wide and let the Old Year go out and +the New Year come in. If you didn't something dreadful would happen. + +Downstairs there was a party. Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy and Aunt +Charlotte were there, and the big boys from Vinings and the Vicarage at +Aldborough Hatch. Mark and Dank and Roddy were sitting up, and Roddy had +promised to wake her when the New Year was coming. + +He left the door open so that she could hear the clock strike twelve. She +got up and opened the windows ready. There were three in Mamma's room. +She opened them all. + +The air outside was like clear black water and very cold. You couldn't +see the garden wall; the dark fields were close--close against the house. +One--Two--Three. + +Seven--When the last stroke sounded the New Year would have come in. + +Ten--Eleven--Twelve. + +The bells rang out; the bells of Ilford, the bells of Barkingside, and +far beyond the flats and the cemetery there would be Bow bells, and +beyond that the bells of the City of London. They clanged together and +she trembled. The sounds closed over her; they left off and began again, +not very loud, but tight--tight, crushing her heart, crushing tears out +of her eyelids. When the bells stopped there was a faint whirring sound. +That was the Old Year, that was eighteen sixty-nine, going out by itself +in the dark, going away over the fields. + +Mamma was not pleased when she came to bed and found the door and windows +open and Mary awake in the cot. + + +II. + +At the end of January she was seven years old. Something was bound to +happen when you were seven. + +She was moved out of Mamma's room to sleep by herself on the top floor in +the night nursery. And the day nursery was turned into the boys' +schoolroom. + +When you were little and slept in the cot behind the curtain Mamma would +sometimes come and read you to sleep with the bits you wanted: "The Lord +is my Shepherd," and "Or ever the silver cord be loosed or the golden +bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain or the wheel +broken at the cistern," and "the city had no need of the sun, neither of +the moon, to shine in it; for the glory of God did lighten it, and the +Lamb is the light thereof." + +When you were frightened she taught you to say, "He that dwelleth in the +secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the +Almighty.... He shall cover thee with His feathers and under His wings +shalt thou trust.... Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night." +And you were allowed to have a night-light. + +Now it was all different. You went to bed half an hour later, while Mamma +was dressing for dinner, and when she came to tuck you up the bell rang +and she had to run downstairs, quick, so as not to keep Papa waiting. You +hung on to her neck and untucked yourself, and she always got away before +you could kiss her seven times. And there was no night-light. You had to +read the Bible in the morning, and it always had to be the bits Mamma +wanted, out of Genesis and the Gospel of St. John. + +You had to learn about the one God and the three Persons. The one God was +the nice, clever, happy God who made Mamma and Mark and Jenny and the sun +and Sarah and the kittens. He was the God you really believed in. + +At night when you lay on your back in the dark you thought about being +born and about arithmetic and God. The sacred number three went into +eighteen sixty-nine and didn't come out again; so did seven. She liked +numbers that fitted like that with no loose ends left over. Mr. Sippett +said there were things you could do with the loose ends of numbers to +make them fit. That was fractions. Supposing there was somewhere in the +world a number that simply wouldn't fit? Mr. Sippett said there was no +such number. But queer things happened. You were seven years old, yet you +had had eight birthdays. There was the day you were born, January the +twenty-fourth, eighteen sixty-three, at five o'clock in the morning. When +you were born you weren't any age at all, not a minute old, not a second, +not half a second. But there was eighteen sixty-two and there was January +the twenty-third and the minute just before you were born. You couldn't +really tell when the twenty-third ended and the twenty-fourth began; +because when you counted sixty minutes for the hour and sixty seconds for +the minute, there was still the half second and the half of that, and so +on for ever and ever. + +You couldn't tell when you were really born. And nobody could tell you +what being born was. Perhaps nobody knew. Jenny said being born was just +being born. Sarah's grandchildren were born in the garden under the wall +where the jasmine grew. Roddy shouted at the back door, and when you ran +to look he stretched out his arms across the doorway and wouldn't let you +through. Roddy was excited and frightened; and Mamma said he had been +very good because he stood across the door. + +There was being born and there was dying. If you died this minute there +would be the minute after. Then, if you were good, your soul was in +Heaven and your body was cold and stiff like Miss Thompson's mother. And +there was Lazarus. "He hath been in the grave four days and by this time +he stinketh." That was dreadfully frightening; but they had to say it to +show that Lazarus was really dead. That was how you could tell. + +"'Lord, if thou hadst been here our brother had not died.'" + +That was beautiful. When you thought of it you wanted to cry. + +Supposing Mamma died? Supposing Mark died? Or Dank or Roddy? Or even +Uncle Victor? Even Papa? + +They couldn't. Jesus wouldn't let them. + +When you were frightened in the big dark room you thought about God and +Jesus and the Holy Ghost. They didn't leave you alone a single minute. +God and Jesus stood beside the bed, and Jesus kept God in a good temper, +and the Holy Ghost flew about the room and perched on the top of the +linen cupboard, and bowed and bowed, and said, "Rook-ke-heroo-oo! +Rook-ke-keroo-oo!" + +And there was the parroquet. + +Mark had given her the stuffed parroquet on her birthday, and Mamma had +given her the Bible and the two grey china vases to make up, with a bird +painted on each. A black bird with a red beak and red legs. She had set +them up on the chimney-piece under the picture of the Holy Family. She +put the Bible in the middle and the parroquet on the top of the Bible and +the vases one on each side. + +She worshipped them, because of Mamma and Mark. + +She said to herself: "God won't like _that_, but I can't help it. The +kind, clever God won't mind a bit. He's much too busy making things. And +it's not as if they were graven images." + + +III. + +Jenny had taken her for a walk to Ilford and they were going home to the +house in Ley Street. + +There were only two walks that Jenny liked to go: down Ley Street to +Barkingside where the little shops were; and up Ley Street to Ilford and +Mr. Spall's, the cobbler's. She liked Ilford best because of Mr. Spall. +She carried your boots to Mr. Spall just as they were getting +comfortable; she was always ferreting in Sarah's cupboard for a pair to +take to him. Mr. Spall was very tall and lean; he had thick black +eyebrows rumpled up the wrong way and a long nose with a red knob at the +end of it. A dirty grey beard hung under his chin, and his long, shaved +lips curled over in a disagreeable way when he smiled at you. + +When Jenny and Catty went to sing the New Year in at the Wesleyan Chapel +he brought them home. Jenny liked him because his wife was dead, and +because he was a Wesleyan and Deputy Grand Master of the Independent +Order of Good Templars. You had to shake hands with him to say good-bye. +He always said the same thing: "Next time you come, little Missy, I'll +show you the Deputy Regalia." But he never did. + +To-day Jenny had made her stand outside in the shop, among the old boots +and the sheets of leather, while she and Mr. Spall went into the back +parlour to talk about Jesus. The shop smelt of leather and feet and +onions and of Mr. Spall, so that she was glad when they got out again. +She wondered how Jenny could bear to sit in the back parlour with Mr. +Spall. + +Coming home at first she had to keep close by Jenny's side. Jenny was +tired and went slowly; but by taking high prancing and dancing steps she +could pretend that they were rushing along; and once they had turned the +crook of Ley Street she ran on a little way in front of Jenny. Then, +walking very fast and never looking back, she pretended that she had gone +out by herself. + +When she had passed the row of elms and the farm, and the small brown +brick cottages fenced off with putty-coloured palings, she came to the +low ditches and the flat fields on either side and saw on her left the +bare, brown brick, pointed end of the tall house. It was called Five +Elms. + +Further down the road the green and gold sign of The Green Man and the +scarlet and gold sign of the Horns Tavern hung high on white standards +set up in the road. Further down still, where Ley Street swerved slightly +towards Barkingside, three tall poplars stood in the slant of the swerve. + +A queer white light everywhere, like water thin and clear. Wide fields, +flat and still, like water, flooded with the thin, clear light; grey +earth, shot delicately with green blades, shimmering. Ley Street, a grey +road, whitening suddenly where it crossed open country, a hard causeway +thrown over the flood. The high trees, the small, scattered cottages, the +two taverns, the one tall house had the look of standing up in water. + +She saw the queer white light for the first time and drew in her breath +with a sharp check. She knew that the fields were beautiful. + +She saw Five Elms for the first time: the long line of its old red-tiled +roof, its flat brown face; the three rows of narrow windows, four at the +bottom, with the front door at the end of the row, five at the top, five +in the middle; their red brick eye-brows; their black glassy stare +between the drawn-back curtains. She noticed how high and big the house +looked on its slender plot of grass behind the brick wall that held up +the low white-painted iron railing. + +A tall iron gate between brown brick pillars, topped by stone balls. A +flagged path to the front door. Crocuses, yellow, white, white and +purple, growing in the border of the grass plot. She saw them for the +first time. + +The front door stood open. She went in. + +The drawing-room at the back was full of the queer white light. Things +stood out in it, sharp and suddenly strange, like the trees and houses in +the light outside: the wine-red satin stripes in the grey damask curtains +at the three windows; the rings of wine-red roses on the grey carpet; the +tarnished pattern on the grey wall-paper; the furniture shining like dark +wine; the fluted emerald green silk in the panel of the piano and the +hanging bag of the work-table; the small wine-red flowers on the pale +green chintz; the green Chinese bowls in the rosewood cabinet; the blue +and red parrot on the chair. + +Her mother sat at the far end of the room. She was sorting beads into +trays in a box lined with sandal wood. + +Mary stood at the doorway looking in, swinging her hat in her hand. +Suddenly, without any reason, she was so happy that she could hardly bear +it. + +Mamma looked up. She said, "What are you doing standing there?" + +She ran to her and hid her face in her lap. She caught Mamma's hands and +kissed them. They smelt of sandal wood. They moved over her hair with +slight quick strokes that didn't stay, that didn't care. + +Mamma said, "There. That'll do. That'll do." + +She climbed up on a chair and looked out of the window. She could see +Mamma's small beautiful nose bending over the tray of beads, and her +bright eyes that slid slantwise to look at her. And under the window she +saw the brown twigs of the lilac bush tipped with green. + +Her happiness was sharp and still like the white light. + +Mamma said, "What did you see when you were out with Jenny to-day?" + +"Nothing." + +"Nothing? And what are you looking at?" + +"Nothing, Mamma." + +"Then go upstairs and take your things off. Quick!" + +She went very slowly, holding herself with care, lest she should jar her +happiness and spill it. + +One of the windows of her room was open. She stood a little while looking +out. + +Beyond the rose-red wall of the garden she saw the flat furrowed field, +stripes of grey earth and vivid green. In the middle of the field the +five elms in a row, high and slender; four standing close together, one +apart. Each held up a small rounded top, fine as a tuft of feathers. + +On her left towards Ilford, a very long row of high elms screened off the +bare flats from the village. Where it ended she saw Drake's Farm; black +timbered barns and sallow haystacks beside a clump of trees. Behind the +five elms, on the edge of the earth, a flying line of trees set wide +apart, small, thin trees, flying away low down under the sky. + +She looked and looked. Her happiness mixed itself up with the queer light +and with the flat fields and the tall, bare trees. + +She turned from the window and saw the vases that Mamma had given her +standing on the chimney-piece. The black birds with red beaks and red +legs looked at her. She threw herself on the bed and pressed her face +into the pillow and cried "Mamma! Mamma!" + + +IV. + +Passion Week. It gave you an awful feeling of something going to happen. + +In the long narrow dining-room the sunlight through the three windows +made a strange and solemn blue colour in the dark curtains. Mamma sat up +at the mahogany table, looking sad and serious, with the Prayer Book open +before her at the Litany. When you went in you knew that you would have +to read about the Crucifixion. Nothing could save you. + +Still you did find out things about God. In the Epistle it said: +"'Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel and thy garments like him that +treadeth the wine-fat? I have trodden the wine-press alone, and of the +people there was none with me: for I will tread them in my anger, and +trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my +garments, and I will stain all my raiment.'" + +The Passion meant that God had flown into another temper and that Jesus +was crucified to make him good again. Mark said you mustn't say that to +Mamma; but he owned that it looked like it. Anyhow it was easier to think +of it that way than to think that God sent Jesus down to be crucified +because you were naughty. + +There were no verses in the Prayer-Book Bible, only long grey slabs like +tombstones. You kept on looking for the last tombstone. When you came to +the one with the big black letters, THE KING OF THE JEWS, you knew that +it would soon be over. + +"'They clothed him with purple, and platted a crown of thorns and put it +on his head....'" She read obediently: "'And when the sixth hour was +come ... and when the sixth hour was come there was darkness over the whole +land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a +loud voice.... And Jesus cried with a loud voice ... with a loud voice, +and gave up the ghost.'" + +Mamma was saying that the least you could do was to pay attention. But +you couldn't pay attention every time. The first time it was beautiful +and terrible; but after many times the beauty went and you were only +frightened. When she tried to think about the crown of thorns she thought +of the new hat Catty had bought for Easter Sunday and what Mr. Spall did +when he ate the parsnips. + +Through the barred windows of the basement she could hear Catty singing +in the pantry: + + "'I am so glad that Jesus loves me, + Jesus loves me, + Jesus loves me....'" + +Catty was happy when she sang and danced round and round with the +dish-cloth. And Jenny and Mr. Spall were happy when they talked about +Jesus. But Mamma was not happy. She had had to read the Morning Prayer +and the Psalms and the Lessons and the Litany to herself every morning; +and by Thursday she was tired and cross. + +Passion Week gave you an awful feeling. + +Good Friday would be the worst. It was the real day that Jesus died. +There would be the sixth hour and the ninth hour. Perhaps there would be +a darkness. + +But when Good Friday came you found a smoking hot-cross bun on +everybody's plate at breakfast, tasting of spice and butter. And you went +to Aldborough Hatch for Service. She thought: "If the darkness does come +it won't be so bad to bear at Aldborough Hatch." She liked the new +white-washed church with the clear windows, where you could stand on the +hassock and look out at the green hill framed in the white arch. That was +Chigwell. + + "'There is a green hill far a-a-way + Without a city wall--'" + +The green hill hadn't got any city wall. Epping Forest and Hainault +Forest were there. You could think of them, or you could look at Mr. +Propart's nice clean-shaved face while he read about the Crucifixion and +preached about God's mercy and his justice. He did it all in a soothing, +inattentive voice; and when he had finished he went quick into the vestry +as if he were glad it was all over. And when you met him at the gate he +didn't look as if Good Friday mattered very much. + +In the afternoon she forgot all about the sixth hour and the ninth hour. +Just as she was going to think about them Mark and Dank put her in the +dirty clothes-basket and rolled her down the back stairs to make her +happy. They shut themselves up in the pantry till she had stopped +laughing, and when Catty opened the door the clock struck and Mark said +that was the ninth hour. + +It was all over. And nothing had happened. Nothing at all. + +Only, when you thought of what had been done to Jesus, it didn't seem +right, somehow, to have eaten the hot-cross buns. + + +V. + +Grandmamma and Grandpapa Olivier were buried in the City of London +Cemetery. A long time ago, so long that even Mark couldn't remember it, +Uncle Victor had brought Grandmamma in a coffin all the way from +Liverpool to London in the train. + +On Saturday afternoon Mamma had to put flowers on the grave for Easter +Sunday, because of Uncle Victor and Aunt Lavvy. She took Roddy and Mary +with her. They drove in Mr. Parish's wagonette, and called for Aunt Lavvy +at Uncle Victor's tall white house at the bottom of Ilford High Street. +Aunt Lavvy was on the steps, waiting for them, holding a big cross of +white flowers. You could see Aunt Charlotte's face at the dining-room +window looking out over the top of the brown wire blind. She had her hat +on, as if she had expected to be taken too. Her eyes were sharp and +angry, and Uncle Victor stood behind her with his hand on her shoulder. + +Aunt Lavvy gave Mary the flower cross and climbed stiffly into the +wagonette. Mary felt grown up and important holding the big cross on her +knee. The white flowers gave out a thick, sweet smell. + +As they drove away she kept on thinking about Aunt Charlotte, and about +Uncle Victor bringing Grandmamma in a coffin in the train. It was very, +very brave of him. She was sorry for Aunt Charlotte. Aunt Charlotte had +wanted to go to the cemetery and they hadn't let her go. Perhaps she was +still looking over the blind, sharp and angry because they wouldn't let +her go. + +Aunt Lavvy said, "We couldn't take Charlotte. It excited her too much +last time." As if she knew what you were thinking. + +The wagonette stopped by the railway-crossing at Manor Park, and they got +out. Mamma told Mr. Parish to drive round to the Leytonstone side and +wait for them there at the big gates. They wanted to walk through the +cemetery and see what was to be seen. + +Beyond the railway-crossing a muddy lane went along a field of coarse +grass under a hedge of thorns and ended at a paling. Roddy whispered +excitedly that they were in Wanstead Flats. The hedge shut off the +cemetery from the flats; through thin places in the thorn bushes you +could see tombstones, very white tombstones against very dark trees. +There was a black wooden door in the hedge for you to go in by. The lane +and the thorn bushes and the black door reminded Mary of something she +had seen before somewhere. Something frightening. + +When they got through the black door there were no tombstones. What +showed through the hedge were the tops of high white pillars standing up +among trees a long way off. They had come into a dreadful, bare, +clay-coloured plain, furrowed into low mounds, as if a plough had gone +criss-cross over it. + +You saw nothing but mounds. Some of them were made of loose earth; some +were patched over with rough sods that gaped in a horrible way. Perhaps +if you looked through the cracks you would see down into the grave where +the coffin was. The mounds had a fresh, raw look, as if all the people in +the City of London had died and been buried hurriedly the night before. +And there were no stones with names, only small, flat sticks at one end +of each grave to show where the heads were. + +Roddy said, "We've got to go all through this to get to the other side." + +They could see Mamma and Aunt Lavvy a long way on in front picking their +way gingerly among the furrows. If only Mark had been there instead of +Roddy. Roddy _would_ keep on saying: "The great plague of London. The +great plague of London," to frighten himself. He pointed to a heap of +earth and said it was the first plague pit. + +In the middle of the ploughed-up plain she saw people in black walking +slowly and crookedly behind a coffin that went staggering on black legs +under a black pall. She tried not to look at them. + +When she looked again they had stopped beside a heap that Roddy said was +the second plague pit. Men in black crawled out from under the coffin as +they put it down. She could see the bulk of it flattened out under the +black pall. Against the raw, ochreish ground the figures of two mutes +stood up, black and distinct in their high hats tied in the bunched out, +streaming weepers. There was something filthy and frightful about the +figures of the mutes. And when they dragged the pall from the coffin +there was something filthy and frightful about the action. + +"Roddy," she said, "I'm frightened." + +Roddy said, "So am I. I say, supposing we went back? By ourselves. Across +Wanstead Flats." He was excited. + +"We mustn't. That would frighten Mamma." + +"Well, then, we'll have to go straight through." + +They went, slowly, between the rows of mounds, along a narrow path of +yellow clay that squeaked as their boots went in and out. Roddy held her +hand. They took care not to tread on the graves. Every step brought them +nearer to the funeral. They hadn't pointed it out to each other. They had +pretended it wasn't there. Now it was no use pretending; they could see +the coffin. + +"Roddy--I can't--I can't go past the funeral." + +"We've got to." + +He looked at her with solemn eyes, wide open in his beautiful face. He +was not really frightened, he was only trying to be because he liked it. + +They went on. The tight feeling under her waist had gone; her body felt +loose and light as if it didn't belong to her; her knees were soft and +sank under her. Suddenly she let go Roddy's hand. She stared at the +funeral, paralysed with fright. + +At the end of the path Mamma and Aunt Lavvy stood and beckoned to them. +Aunt Lavvy was coming towards them, carrying her white flower cross. They +broke into a stumbling, nightmare run. + +The bare clay plain stretched on past the place where Mamma and Aunt +Lavvy had turned. The mounds here were big and high. They found Mamma and +Aunt Lavvy standing by a very deep and narrow pit. A man was climbing up +out of the pit on a ladder. You could see a pool of water shining far +down at the bottom. + +Mamma was smiling gently and kindly at the man and asking him why the +grave was dug so deep. He said, "Why, because this 'ere lot and that +there what you've come acrost is the pauper buryin' ground. We shovel 'em +in five at a time this end." + +Roddy said, "Like they did in the great plague of London." + +"I don't know about no plague. But there's five coffins in each of these +here graves, piled one atop of the other." + +Mamma seemed inclined to say more to the grave-digger; but Aunt Lavvy +frowned and shook her head at her, and they went on to where a path of +coarse grass divided the pauper burying ground from the rest. They were +now quite horribly near the funeral. And going down the grass path they +saw another that came towards them; the palled coffin swaying on headless +shoulders. They turned from it into a furrow between the huddled mounds. +The white marble columns gleamed nearer among the black trees. + +They crossed a smooth gravel walk into a crowded town of dead people. +Tombstones as far as you could see; upright stones, flat slabs, rounded +slabs, slabs like coffins, stone boxes with flat tops, broken columns; +pointed pillars. Rows of tall black trees. Here and there a single tree +sticking up stiffly among the tombstones. Very little trees that were +queer and terrifying. People in black moving about the tombstones. A +broad road and a grey chapel with pointed gables. Under a black tree a +square plot enclosed by iron railings. + +Grandmamma and Grandpapa Olivier were buried in one half of the plot +under a white marble slab. In the other half, on the bare grass, a white +marble curb marked out a place for another grave. + +Roddy said, "Who's buried there?" + +Mamma said, "Nobody. Yet. That's for--" + +Mary saw Aunt Lavvy frown again and put her finger to her mouth. + +She said, "Who? For who?" An appalling curiosity and fear possessed her. +And when Aunt Lavvy took her hand she knew that the empty place was +marked out for Mamma and Papa. + +Outside the cemetery gates, in the white road, the black funeral horses +tossed their heads and neighed, and the black plumes quivered on the +hearses. In the wagonette she sat close beside Aunt Lavvy, with Aunt +Lavvy's shawl over her eyes. + +She wondered how she knew that you were frightened when Mamma didn't. +Mamma couldn't, because she was brave. She wasn't afraid of the funeral. + +When Roddy said, "She oughtn't to have taken us, she ought to have known +it would frighten us," Mark was angry with him. He said, "She thought +you'd like it, you little beast. Because of the wagonette." + +Darling Mamma. She had taken them because she thought they would like it. +Because of the wagonette. Because she was brave, like Mark. + + +VI. + +Dead people really did rise. Supposing all the dead people in the City of +London Cemetery rose and came out of their graves and went about the +city? Supposing they walked out as far as Ilford? Crowds and crowds of +them, in white sheets? Supposing they got into the garden? + +"Please, God, keep me from thinking about the Resurrection. Please God, +keep me from dreaming about coffins and funerals and ghosts and skeletons +and corpses." She said it last, after the blessings, so that God couldn't +forget. But it was no use. + +If you said texts: "Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night." +"Yea, though I walk through the City of London Cemetery." It was no use. + + "The trumpet shall sound and the dead shall arise ... Incorruptible." + +That was beautiful. Like a bright light shining. But you couldn't think +about it long enough. And the dreams went on just the same: the dream of +the ghost in the passage, the dream of the black coffin coming round the +turn of the staircase and squeezing you against the banister; the dream +of the corpse that came to your bed. She could see the round back and the +curled arms under the white sheet. + +The dreams woke her with a sort of burst. Her heart was jumping about and +thumping; her face and hair were wet with water that came out of her +skin. + +The grey light in the passage was like the ghost-light of the dreams. + +Gas light was a good light; but when you turned it on Jenny came up and +put it out again. She said, "Goodness knows when you'll get to sleep with +_that_ light flaring." + +There was never anybody about at bedtime. Jenny was dishing up the +dinner. Harriet was waiting. Catty only ran up for a minute to undo the +hooks and brush your hair. + +When Mamma sent her to bed she came creeping back into the dining-room. +Everybody was eating dinner. She sickened with fright in the steam and +smell of dinner. She leaned her head against Mamma and whimpered, and +Mamma said in her soft voice, "Big girls don't cry because it's bed-time. +Only silly baby girls are afraid of ghosts." + +Mamma wasn't afraid. + +When she cried Mark left his dinner and carried her upstairs, past the +place where the ghost was, and stayed with her till Catty came. + + + + +VII + + +I. + +"Minx! Minx! Minx!" + +Mark had come in from the garden with Mamma. He was calling to Mary. Minx +was the name he had given her. Minx was a pretty name and she loved it +because he had given it her. Whenever she heard him call she left what +she was doing and ran to him. + +Papa came out of the library with Boag's Dictionary open in his hand. +"'Minx: A pert, wanton girl. A she-puppy.' Do you hear that, Caroline? He +calls his sister a wanton she-puppy." But Mamma had gone back into the +garden. + +Mark stood at the foot of the stairs and Mary stood at the turn. She had +one hand on the rail of the banister, the other pressed hard against the +wall. She leaned forward on tiptoe, measuring her distance. When she +looked at the stairs they fell from under her in a grey dizziness, so +that Mark looked very far away. + +They waited till Papa had gone back into the library--Mark held out his +arms. + +"Jump, Minky! Jump!" + +She let go the rail and drew herself up. A delicious thrill of danger +went through her and out at her fingers. She flung herself into space and +Mark caught her. His body felt hard and strong as it received her. They +did it again and again. + +That was the "faith-jump." You knew that you would be killed if Mark +didn't catch you, but you had faith that he would catch you; and he +always did. + +Mark and Dan were going to school at Chelmsted on the thirteenth of +September, and it was the last week in August now. Mark and Mamma were +always looking for each other. Mamma would come running up to the +schoolroom and say, "Where's Mark? Tell Mark I want him"; and Mark would +go into the garden and say, "Where's Mamma? I want her." And Mamma would +put away her trowel and gardening gloves and go walks with him which she +hated; and Mark would leave Napoleon Buonaparte and the plan of the +Battle of Austerlitz to dig in the garden (and he loathed digging) with +Mamma. + +This afternoon he had called to Mary to come out brook-jumping. Mark +could jump all the brooks in the fields between Ilford and Barkingside, +and in the plantations beyond Drake's Farm; he could jump the Pool of +Siloam where the water from the plantations runs into the lake below +Vinings. Where there was no place for a little girl of seven to cross he +carried her in his arms and jumped. He would stand outside in the lane +and put his hands on the wall and turn heels over head into the garden. + +She said to herself: "In six years and five months I shall be fourteen. I +shall jump the Pool of Siloam and come into the garden head over heels." +And Mamma called her a little humbug when she said she was afraid to go +for a walk with Jenny lest a funeral should be coming along the road. + + +II. + +The five elm trees held up their skirts above the high corn. The flat +surface of the corn-tops was still. Hot glassy air quivered like a thin +steam over the brimming field. + +The glazed yellow walls of the old nursery gave out a strong light and +heat. The air indoors was dry and smelt dusty like the hot, crackling air +above the corn. The children had come in from their play in the fields; +they leaned out of the windows and talked about what they were going to +be. + +Mary said, "I shall paint pictures and play the piano and ride in a +circus. I shall go out to the countries where the sand is and tame +zebras; and I shall marry Mark and have thirteen children with blue eyes +like Meta." + +Roddy was going to be the captain of a cruiser. Dan was going to Texas, +or some place where Papa couldn't get at him, to farm. Mark was going to +be a soldier like Marshal McMahon. + +It was Grandpapa and Grandmamma's fault that he was not a soldier now. + +"If," he said, "they'd let Papa marry Mamma when he wanted to, I might +have been born in eighteen fifty-two. I'd be eighteen by this time. I +should have gone into the French Army and I should have been with McMahon +at Sedan now." + +"You might have been killed," Mary said. + +"That wouldn't have mattered a bit. I should have been at Sedan. Nothing +matters, Minky, as long as you get what you want." + +"If you were killed Mamma and me would die, too, the same minute. Papa +would be sorry, then; but not enough to kill him, so that we should go to +heaven together without him and be happy." + +"Mamma wouldn't be happy without him. We couldn't shut him out." + +"No," Mary said; "but we could pray to God not to let him come up too +soon." + + +III. + +Sedan--Sedan--Sedan. + +Papa came out into the garden where Mamma was pulling weeds out of the +hot dry soil. He flapped the newspaper and read about the Battle of +Sedan. Mamma left off pulling weeds out and listened. + +Mark had stuck the picture of Marshal McMahon over the schoolroom +chimney-piece. Papa had pinned the war-map to the library door. Mark was +restless. He kept on going into the library to look at the war-map and +Papa kept on turning him out again. He was in a sort of mysterious +disgrace because of Sedan. Roddy was excited about Sedan. Dan followed +Mark as he went in and out; he was furious with Papa because of Mark. + +Mamma had been a long time in the library talking to Papa. They sent for +Mark just before dinner-time. When Mary ran in to say good-night she +found him there. + +Mark was saying, "You needn't think I want your beastly money. I shall +enlist." + +Mamma said, "If he enlists, Emilius, it'll kill me." + +And Papa, "You hear what your mother says, sir. Isn't that enough for +you?" + +Mark loved Mamma; but he was not going to do what she wanted. He was +going to do something that would kill her. + + +IV. + +Papa walked in the garden in the cool of the evening, like the Lord God. +And he was always alone. When you thought of him you thought of Jehovah. + +There was something funny about other people's fathers. Mr. Manisty, of +Vinings, who rode along Ley Street with his two tall, thin sons, as if he +were actually proud of them; Mr. Batty, the Vicar of Barkingside, who +called his daughter Isabel his "pretty one"; Mr. Farmer, the curate of +St. Mary's Chapel, who walked up and down the room all night with the +baby; and Mr. Propart, who went about the public roads with Humphrey and +Arthur positively hanging on him. Dan said Humphrey and Arthur were tame +and domestic because they were always going about with Mr. Propart and +talking to him as if they liked it. Mark had once seen Mr. Propart trying +to jump a ditch on the Aldborough Road. It was ridiculous. Humphrey and +Arthur had to grab him by the arms and pull him over. Mary was sorry for +the Propart boys because they hadn't got a mother who was sweet and +pretty like Mamma and a father called Emilius Olivier. Emilius couldn't +jump ditches any more than Mr. Propart; but then he knew he couldn't, and +as Mark said, he had the jolly good sense not to try. You couldn't be +Jehovah and jump ditches. + +Emilius Olivier was everything a father ought to be. + +Then suddenly, for no reason at all, he left off being Jehovah and began +trying to behave like Mr. Batty. + +It was at dinner, the last Sunday before the thirteenth. Mamma had moved +Roddy and Mary from their places so that Mark and Dan could sit beside +her. Mary was sitting at the right hand of Papa in the glory of the +Father. The pudding had come in; blanc-mange, and Mark's pudding with +whipped cream hiding the raspberry jam. It was Roddy's turn to be helped; +his eyes were fixed on the snow-white, pure blanc-mange shuddering in the +glass dish, and Mamma had just asked him which he would have when Papa +sent Mark and Dan out of the room. You couldn't think why he had done it +this time unless it was because Mark laughed when Roddy said in his +proud, dignified voice, "I'll have a little piece of the Virgin's womb, +please, first." Or it may have been because of Mark's pudding. He never +liked it when they had Mark's pudding. Anyhow, Mark and Dan had to go, +and as they went he drew Mary's chair closer to him and heaped her plate +with cream and jam, looking very straight at Mamma as he did it. + +"You might have left them alone," Mamma said, "on their last Sunday. They +won't be here to annoy you so very long." + +Papa said, "There are three days yet till the thirteenth." + +"Three days! You'll count the hours and the minutes till you've got what +you want." + +"What I want is peace and quiet in my house and to get a word in +edgeways, sometimes, with my own wife." + +"You've no business to have a wife if you can't put up with your own +children." + +"It isn't my business to have a wife," Papa said. "It's my pleasure. My +business is to insure ships. And you see me putting up with Mary very +well. I suppose she's my own child." + +"Mark and Dan are your own children first." + +"_Are_ they? To judge by your infatuation I should have said they +weren't. 'Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow? Silver +bells and cockle shells, and chocolate creams all in a row.'" + +He took a large, flat box of chocolates out of his pocket and laid it +beside her plate. And he looked straight at Mamma again. + +"If those are the chocolates I reminded you to get for--for the hamper, I +won't have them opened." + +"They are _not_ the chocolates you reminded me to get for--the hamper. I +suppose Mark's stomach _is_ a hamper. They are the chocolates I reminded +myself to get for Mary." + +Then Mamma said a peculiar thing. + +"Are you trying to show me that you're not jealous of Mary?" + +"I'm not trying to show you anything. You know I'm not jealous of Mary. +And you know there's no reason why I should be." + +"To hear you, Emilius, anybody would think I wasn't fond of my own +daughter. Mary darling, you'd better run away." + +"And Mary darling," he mocked her, "you'd better take your chocolates +with you." + +Mary said: "I don't want any chocolates, Papa." + +"Is that her contrariness, or just her Mariness?" + +"Whatever it is it's all the thanks _you_ get, and serve you right, too," +said Mamma. + +She went upstairs to persuade Dan that Papa didn't mean it. It was just +his way, and they'd see he would be different to-morrow. + +But to-morrow and the next day and the next he was the same. He didn't +actually send Mark and Dan out of the room again, but he tried to pretend +to himself that they weren't there by refusing to speak to them. + +"Do you think," Mark said, "he'll keep it up till the last minute?" + +He did; even when he heard the sound of Mr. Parish's wagonette in the +road, coming to take Mark and Dan away. They were sitting at breakfast, +trying not to look at him for fear they should laugh, or at Mamma for +fear they should cry, trying not to look at each other. Catty brought in +the cakes, the hot buttered Yorkshire cakes that were never served for +breakfast except on Christmas Day and birthdays. Mary wondered whether +Papa would say or do anything. He couldn't. Everybody knew those cakes +were sacred. Catty set them on the table with a sort of crash and ran out +of the room, crying. Mamma's mouth quivered. + +Papa looked at the cakes; he looked at Mamma; he looked at Mark. Mark was +staring at nothing with a firm grin on his face. + +"The assuagers of grief," Papa said. "Pass round the assuagers." + +The holy cakes were passed round. Everybody took a piece except Dan. + +Papa pressed him. "Try an assuager. Do." + +And Mamma pleaded, "Yes, Dank." + +"Do you hear what your mother says?" + +Dan's eyes were red-rimmed. He took a double section of cake and tried to +bite his way through. + +At the first taste tears came out of his eyes and fell on his cake. And +when Mamma saw that she burst out crying. + +Mary put her piece down untasted and bit back her sobs. Roddy pushed his +piece away; and Mark began to eat his, suddenly, bowing over it with an +affectation of enjoyment. + +Outside in the road Mr. Parish was descending from the box of his +wagonette. Papa looked at his watch. He was going with them to Chelmsted. + +And Mamma whispered to Mark and Dan with her last kiss, "He'll be all +right in the train." + +It was all over. Mary and Roddy sat in the dining-room where Mamma had +left them. They had shut their eyes so as not to see the empty chairs +pushed back and the pieces of the sacred cakes, bitten and abandoned. +They had stopped their ears so as not to hear the wheels of Mr. Parish's +wagonette taking Mark and Dan away. + +Hours afterwards Mamma came upon Mary huddled up in a corner of the +drawing-room. + +"Mamma--Mamma--I _can't_ bear it. I can't live without Mark. And Dan." + +Mamma sat down and took her in her arms and rocked her, rocked her +without a word, soothing her own grief. + +Papa found them like that when he came back from Chelmsted. He stood in +the doorway looking at them for a moment, then slunk out of the room as +if he were ashamed of himself. When Mamma sent Mary out to say good-bye +to him, he was standing beside the little sumach tree that Mark gave +Mamma on her birthday. He was smiling at the sumach tree as if he loved +it and was sorry for it. + +And Mamma got a letter from Mark in the morning to say she was right. +Papa had been quite decent in the train. + + +V. + +After Mark and Dan had gone a great and very remarkable change came over +Papa and Mamma. Mamma left off saying the funny things that Mary could +not understand, and Papa left off teasing and flying into tempers and +looking like Jehovah and walking by himself in the cool of the evening. +He followed Mamma about the garden. He hung over her chair, like Mark, as +she sat sewing. You came upon him suddenly on the stairs and in the +passages, and he would look at you as if you were not there, and say, +"Where's your mother? Go and tell her I want her." And Mamma would put +away her trowel and her big leather gloves and go to him. She would sit +for hours in the library while he flapped the newspaper and read to her +in a loud voice about Mr. Gladstone whom she hated. + +Sometimes he would come home early from the office, and Mamma and Mary +would be ready for him, and they would all go together to call at Vinings +or Barkingside Vicarage or on the Proparts. + +Or Mr. Parish's wagonette would be ordered, and Mamma and Mary would put +on their best clothes very quick and go up to London with him, and he +would take them to St. Paul's or Maskelyne and Cooke's, or the National +Gallery or the British Museum. Or they would walk slowly, very slowly, up +Regent Street, stopping at the windows of the bonnet shops while Mamma +picked out the bonnet she would buy if she could afford it. And perhaps +the next day a bonnet would come in a bandbox, a bonnet that frightened +her when she put it on and looked at herself in the glass. She would +pretend it was one of the bonnets she had wanted; and when Papa had +forgotten about it she would pull all the trimming off and put it all on +again a different way, and Papa would say it was an even more beautiful +bonnet than he had thought. + +You might have supposed that he was sorry because he was thinking about +Mark and Dan and trying to make up for having been unkind to them. But he +was not sorry. He was glad. Glad about something that Mamma had done. He +would go about whistling some gay tune, or you caught him stroking his +moustache and parting it over his rich lips that smiled as if he were +thinking of what Mamma had done to make him happy. The red specks and +smears had gone from his eyes, they were clear and blue, and they looked +at you with a kind, gentle look, like Uncle Victor's. His very beard was +happy. + +"You may not know it, but your father is the handsomest man in Essex," +Mamma said. + +Perhaps it wasn't anything that Mamma had done. Perhaps he was only happy +because he was being good. Every Sunday he went to church at Barkingside +with Mamma, kneeling close to her in the big pew and praying in a great, +ghostly voice, "Good Lord, deliver us!" When the psalms and hymns began +he rose over the pew-ledge, yards and yards of him, as if he stood on +many hassocks, and he lifted up his beard and sang. All these times the +air fairly tingled with him; he seemed to beat out of himself and spread +around him the throb of violent and overpowering life. And in the +evenings towards sunset they walked together in the fields, and Mary +followed them, lagging behind in the borders where the sharlock and wild +rye and poppies grew. When she caught up with them she heard them +talking. + +Once Mamma said, "Why can't you always be like this, Emilius?" + +And Papa said, "Why, indeed!" + +And when Christmas came and Mark and Dan were back again he was as cruel +and teasing as he had ever been. + + +VI. + +Eighteen seventy-one. + +One cold day Roddy walked into the Pool of Siloam to recover his sailing +boat which had drifted under the long arch of the bridge. + +There was no Passion Week and no Good Friday and no Easter that spring, +only Roddy's rheumatic fever. Roddy in bed, lying on his back, his face +white and sharp, his hair darkened and glued with the sweat that poured +from his hair and soaked into the bed. Roddy crying out with pain when +they moved him. Mamma and Jenny always in Roddy's room, Mr. Spall's +sister in the kitchen. Mary going up and down, tiptoe, on messages, +trying not to touch Roddy's bed. + +Dr. Draper calling, talking in a low voice to Mamma, and Mamma crying. +Dr. Draper looking at you through his spectacles and putting a thing like +a trumpet to your chest and listening through it. + +"You're quite right, Mrs. Olivier. There's nothing wrong with the little +girl's heart. She's as sound as a bell." + +A dreadful feeling that you had no business to be as sound as a bell. It +wasn't fair to Roddy. + +Something she didn't notice at the time and remembered afterwards when +Roddy was well again. Jenny saying to Mamma, "If it had to be one of them +it had ought to have been Miss Mary." + +And Mamma saying to Jenny, "It wouldn't have mattered so much if it had +been the girl." + + +VII. + +You knew that Catty loved you. There was never the smallest uncertainty +about it. Her big black eyes shone when she saw you coming. You kissed +her smooth cool cheeks, and she hugged you tight and kissed you back +again at once; her big lips made a noise like a pop-gun. When she tucked +you up at night she said, "I love you so much I could eat you." + +And she would play any game you liked. You had only to say, "Let's play +the going-away game," and she was off. You began: "I went away to the big +hot river where the rhinoceroses and hippopotamuses are"; or: "I went +away to the desert where the sand is, to catch zebras. I rode on a +dromedary, flump-flumping through the sand," and Catty would follow it up +with: "I went away with the Good Templars. We went in a row-boat on a +lake, and we landed on an island where there was daffodillies growing. We +had milk and cake; and it blew such a cool breeze." + +Catty was full of love. She loved her father and mother and her little +sister Amelia better than anything in the whole world. Her home was in +Wales. Tears came into her eyes when she thought about her home and her +little sister Amelia. + +"Catty--how much do you love me?" + +"Armfuls and armfuls." + +"As much as your mother?" + +"Very near as much." + +"As much as Amelia?" + +"Every bit as much." + +"How much do you think Jenny loves me?" + +"Ever so much." + +"No. Jenny loves Roddy best; then Mark; then Dank; then Mamma; then Papa; +then me. That isn't ever so much." + +Catty was vexed. "You didn't oughter go measuring people's love, Miss +Mary." + +Still, that was what you did do. With Catty and Jenny you could measure +till you knew exactly where you were. + +Mamma was different. + +You knew _when_ she loved you. You could almost count the times: the time +when Papa frightened you; the time when you cut your forehead; the time +the lamb died; all the whooping-cough and chicken-pox times, and when +Meta, the wax doll, fell off the schoolroom table and broke her head; and +when Mark went away to school. Or when you were good and said every word +of your lessons right; when you watched Mamma working in the garden, +planting and transplanting the flowers with her clever hands; and when +you were quiet and sat beside her on the footstool, learning to knit and +sew. On Sunday afternoons when she played the hymns and you sang: + + "There's a Friend for little children + Above the bright blue sky," + +quite horribly out of tune, and when you listened while she sang herself, +"Lead, kindly light," or "Abide with me," and her voice was so sweet and +gentle that it made you cry. Then you knew. + +Sometimes, when it was not Sunday, she played the Hungarian March, that +went, with loud, noble noises: + + Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room + Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room + Droom rer-room-room droom-room-room + Droom--Droom--Droom. + +It was wonderful. Mamma was wonderful. She swayed and bowed to the beat +of the music, as if she shook it out of her body and not out of the +piano. She smiled to herself when she saw that you were listening. You +said "Oh--Mamma! Play it again," and she played it again. When she had +finished she stooped suddenly and kissed you. And you knew. + +But she wouldn't say it. You couldn't make her. + +"Say it, Mamma. Say it like you used to." + +Mamma shook her head. + +"I want to hear you say it." + +"Well, I'm not going to." + +"I love you. I ache with loving you. I love you so much that it hurts me +to say it." + +"Why do you do it, then?" + +"Because it hurts me more not to. Just once. 'I love you.' Just a weeny +once." + +"You're going to be like your father, tease, tease, tease, all day long, +till I'm worn out." + +"I'm not going to be like Papa. I don't tease. It's you that's teasing. +How'm I to know you love me if you won't say it?" + +Mamma said, "Can't you see what I'm doing?" + +"No." + +She was not interested in the thin white stuff and the lace--Mamma's +needle-work. + +"Well, then, look in the basket." + +The basket was full of tiny garments made of the white stuff, petticoats, +drawers and nightgown, sewn with minute tucks and edged with lace. Mamma +unfolded them. + +"New clothes," she said, "for your new dolly." + +"Oh--oh--oh--I love you so much that I can't bear it; you little holy +Mamma!" + +Mamma said, "I'm not holy, and I won't be called holy. I want deeds, not +words. If you love me you'll learn your lessons properly the night +before, not just gabble them over hot from the pan." + +"I will, Mamma, I will. Won't you say it?" + +"No," Mamma said, "I won't." + +She sat there with a sort of triumph on her beautiful face, as if she +were pleased with herself because she hadn't said it. And Mary would +bring the long sheet that dragged on her wrist, and the needle that +pricked her fingers, and sit at Mamma's knee and sew, making a thin trail +of blood all along the hem. + +"Why do you look at me so kindly when I'm sewing?" + +"Because I like to see you behaving like a little girl, instead of +tearing about and trying to do what boys do." + +And Mamma would tell her a story, always the same story, going on and on, +about the family of ten children who lived in the farm by the forest. +There were seven boys and three girls. The six youngest boys worked on +the farm with their father--yes, he was a _very_ nice father--and the +eldest boy worked in the garden with his mother, and the three girls +worked in the house. They could cook and make butter and cheese, and bake +bread; and even the youngest little girl could knit and sew. + +"Had they any children?" + +"No, they were too busy to think about having children. They were all +very, very happy together, just as they were." + +The story was like the hem, there was never any end to it, for Mamma was +always finding something else for the three girls to do. She smiled as +she told it, as if she saw something that pleased her. + +Mary felt that she could go on sewing at the hem and pricking her finger +for ever if Mamma would only keep that look on her face. + + + + +VIII + + +I. + +"I can't, Jenny, I can't. I know there's a funeral coming." + +Mary stood on the flagstone inside the arch of the open gate. She looked +up and down the road and drew back again into the garden. Jenny, tired +and patient, waited outside. + +"I've told you, Miss Mary, there isn't any funeral." + +"If there isn't there will be. There! I can see it." + +"You see Mr. Parish's high 'at a driving in his wagonette." + +It _was_ Mr. Parish's high hat. When he put the black top on his +wagonette it looked like a hearse. + +They started up Ley Street towards Mr. Spall's cottage. + +Jenny said, "I thought you was going to be such a good girl when Master +Roddy went to school. But I declare if you're not twice as tiresome." + +Roddy had gone to Chelmsted after midsummer. She had to go for walks on +the roads with Jenny now at the risk of meeting funerals. + +This week they had been every day to Ilford to call at Mr. Spall's +cottage or at Benny's, the draper's shop in the High Street. + +Jenny didn't believe that a big girl, nine next birthday, could really be +afraid of funerals. She thought you were only trying to be tiresome. She +said you could stop thinking about funerals well enough when you wanted. +You did forget sometimes when nice things happened; when you went to see +Mrs. Farmer's baby undressed, and when Isabel Batty came to tea. Isabel +was almost a baby. It felt nice to lift her and curl up her stiff, +barley-sugar hair and sponge her weak, pink silk hands. And there were +things that you could do. You could pretend that you were not Mary +Olivier but somebody else, that you were grown-up and that the baby and +Isabel belonged to you and were there when they were not there. But all +the time you knew there would be a funeral on the road somewhere, and +that some day you would see it. + +When they got into the High Street the funeral was coming along the +Barking Road. She saw, before Jenny could see anything at all, the mutes, +sitting high, and their black, bunched-up weepers. She turned and ran out +of the High Street and back over the railway bridge. Jenny called after +her, "Come back!" and a man on the bridge shouted "Hi, Missy! Stop!" as +she ran down Ley Street. Her legs shook and gave way under her. Once she +fell. She ran, staggering, but she ran. People came out of their cottages +to look at her. She thought they had come out to look at the funeral. + +After that she refused to go outside the front door or to look through +the front windows for fear she should see a funeral. + +They couldn't take her and carry her out; so they let her go for walks in +the back garden. When Papa came home she was sent up to the schoolroom to +play with the doll's house. You could see the road through the high bars +of the window at the end of the passage, so that even when Catty lit the +gas the top floor was queer and horrible. + +Sometimes doubts came with her terror. She thought: "Nobody loves me +except Mark. And Mark isn't here." Mark's image haunted her. She shut her +eyes and it slid forward on to the darkness, the strong body, the brave, +straight up and down face, the steady, light brown eyes, shining; the +firm, sweet mouth; the sparrow-brown hair with feathery golden tips. She +could hear Mark's voice calling to her: "Minx! Minky!" + +And there was something that Mamma said. It was unkind to be afraid of +the poor dead people. Mamma said, "Would you run away from Isabel if you +saw her lying in her little coffin?" + + +II. + +Jenny's new dress had come. + +It was made of grey silk trimmed with black lace, and it lay spread out +on the bed in the spare room. Mamma and Aunt Bella stood and looked at +it, and shook their heads as if they thought that Jenny had no business +to wear a silk dress. + +Aunt Bella said, "She's a silly woman to go and leave a good home. At her +age." + +And Mamma said, "I'd rather see her in her coffin. It would be less +undignified. She meant to do it at Easter; she was only waiting till +Roddy went to school. She's waiting now till after the Christmas +holidays." + +Jenny was going to do something dreadful. + +She was going to be married. The grey silk dress was her wedding-dress. +She was going to marry Mr. Spall. Even Catty thought it was rather +dreadful. + +But Jenny was happy because she was going to wear the grey silk dress and +live in Mr. Spall's cottage and talk to him about Jesus. Only one half of +her face drooped sleepily; the other half had waked up, and looked +excited; there was a flush on it as bright as paint. + + +III. + +Mary's bed stood in a corner of the night nursery, and beside it was the +high yellow linen cupboard. When the doors were opened there was a faint +india-rubbery smell from the mackintosh sheet that had been put away on +the top shelf. + +One night she was wakened by Catty coming into the room and opening the +cupboard doors. Catty climbed on a chair and took something from the top +shelf. She didn't answer when Mary asked what she was doing, but hurried +away, leaving the door on the latch. Her feet made quick thuds along the +passage. A door opened and shut, and there was a sound of Papa going +downstairs. Somebody came up softly and pulled the door to, and Mary went +to sleep again. + +When she woke the room was full of the grey light that frightened her. +But she was not frightened. She woke sitting up on her pillow, staring +into the grey light, and saying to herself, "Jenny is dead." + +But she was not afraid of Jenny. The stillness in her heart spread into +the grey light of the room. She lay back waiting for seven o'clock when +Catty would come and call her. + +At seven o'clock Mamma came. She wore the dress she had worn last night, +and she was crying. + +Mary said, "You haven't got to say it. I know Jenny is dead." + +The blinds were drawn in all the windows when she and Mark went into the +front garden to look for snowdrops in the border by the kitchen area. She +knew that Jenny's dead body lay on the sofa under the kitchen window +behind the blind and the white painted iron bars. She hoped that she +would not have to see it; but she was not afraid of Jenny's dead body. It +was sacred and holy. + +She wondered why Mamma sent her to Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella. From the +top-storey windows of Chadwell Grange you could look beyond Aldborough +Hatch towards Wanstead Flats and the City of London Cemetery. They were +going to bury Jenny there. She stood looking out, quiet, not crying. She +only cried at night when she thought of Jenny, sitting in the low nursery +chair, tired and patient, drawing back from her violent caresses, and of +the grey silk dress laid out on the bed in the spare room. + +She was not even afraid of the City of London Cemetery when Mark took her +to see Jenny's grave. Jenny's grave was sacred and holy. + + + + +IX + + +I. + +You had to endure hardness after you were nine. You learnt out of Mrs. +Markham's "History of England," and you were not allowed to read the +conversations between Richard and Mary and Mrs. Markham because they made +history too amusing and too easy to remember. For the same reason you +translated only the tight, dismal pages of your French Reader, and +anything that looked like an interesting story was forbidden. You were to +learn for the sake of the lesson and not for pleasure's sake. Mamma said +you had enough pleasure in play-time. She put it to your honour not to +skip on to the more exciting parts. + +When you had finished Mrs. Markham you began Dr. Smith's "History of +England." Honour was safe with Dr. Smith. He made history very hard to +read and impossible to remember. + +The Bible got harder, too. You knew all the best Psalms by heart, and the +stories about Noah's ark and Joseph and his coat of many colours, and +David, and Daniel in the lions' den. You had to go straight through the +Bible now, skipping Leviticus because it was full of things you couldn't +understand. When you had done with Moses lifting up the serpent in the +wilderness you had to read about Aaron and the sons of Levi, and the +wave-offerings, and the tabernacle, and the ark of the covenant where +they kept the five golden emerods. Mamma didn't know what emerods were, +but Mark said they were a kind of white mice. + +You learnt Old Testament history, too, out of a little book that was all +grey slabs of print and dark pictures showing the earth swallowing up +Korah, Dathan and Abiram, and Aaron and the sons of Levi with their long +beards and high hats and their petticoats, swinging incense in fits of +temper. You found out queerer and queerer things about God. God made the +earth swallow up Korah, Dathan and Abiram. He killed poor Uzzah because +he put out his hand to prevent the ark of the covenant falling out of the +cart. Even David said he didn't know how on earth he was to get the ark +along at that rate. And there were the Moabites and the Midianites and +all the animals: the bullocks and the he-goats and the little lambs and +kids. When you asked Mamma why God killed people, she said it was because +he was just as well as merciful, and (it was the old story) he hated sin. +Disobedience was sin, and Uzzah had been disobedient. + +As for the lambs and the he-goats, Jesus had done away with all that. He +was God's son, and he had propitiated God's anger and satisfied his +justice when he shed his own blood on the cross to save sinners. Without +shedding of blood there is no remission of sins. You were not to bother +about the blood. + +But you couldn't help bothering about it. You couldn't help being sorry +for Uzzah and the Midianites and the lambs and the he-goats. + +Perhaps you had to sort things out and keep them separate. Here was the +world, here were Mamma and Mark and kittens and rabbits, and all the +things you really cared about: drawing pictures, and playing the +Hungarian March and getting excited in the Easter holidays when the white +evenings came and Mark raced you from the Green Man to the Horns Tavern. +Here was the sudden, secret happiness you felt when you were by yourself +and the fields looked beautiful. It was always coming now, with a sort of +rush and flash, when you least expected it. + +And _there_ was God and religion and duty. The nicest part of religion +was music, and knowing how the world was made, and the beautiful sounding +bits of the Bible. You could like religion. But duty was doing all the +things you didn't like because you didn't like them. And you couldn't +honestly say you liked God. God had to be propitiated; your righteousness +was filthy rags; so you couldn't propitiate him. Jesus had to do it for +you. All you had to do was to believe, really believe that he had done +it. + +But supposing you hadn't got to believe it, supposing you hadn't got to +believe anything at all, it would be easier to think about. The things +you cared for belonged to each other, but God didn't belong to them. He +didn't fit in anywhere. You couldn't help feeling that if God was love, +and if he was everywhere, he ought to have fitted in. Perhaps, after all, +there were two Gods; one who made things and loved them, and one who +didn't; who looked on sulking and finding fault with what the clever kind +God had made. + +When the midsummer holidays came and brook-jumping began she left off +thinking about God. + + +II. + +"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown"-- + +The picture in the _Sunday At Home_ showed the old King in bed and Prince +Hal trying on his crown. But the words were not the _Sunday At Home_; +they were taken out of Shakespeare. Mark showed her the place. + +Mark was in the schoolroom chanting his home-lessons: + + "'Yet once more, oh ye laurels, and once more, + Ye myrtles brown with ivy never sere'"-- + +That sounded nice. "Say it again, Mark, say it again." Mark said it +again. He also said: + + "'Achilles' wrath, to Greece the direful spring + Of woes unnumbered, heavenly goddess, sing!'" + +The three books stood on the bookshelf in the schoolroom, the thin +Shakespeare in diamond print, the small brown leather Milton, the very +small fat Pope's _Iliad_ in the red cover. Mark gave them to her for her +own. + +She made Catty put her bed between the two windows, and Mark made a +bookshelf out of a piece of wood and some picture cord, and hung it +within reach. She had a happy, excited feeling when she thought of the +three books; it made her wake early. She read from five o'clock till +Catty called her at seven, and again after Catty had tucked her up and +left her, till the white light in the room was grey. + +She learnt _Lycidas_ by heart, and + + "I thought I saw my late espoused wife + Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave,"-- + +and the bits about Satan in _Paradise Lost_. The sound of the lines gave +her the same nice feeling that she had when Mrs. Propart played the March +in Scipio after Evening Service. She tried to make lines of her own that +went the same way as the lines in Milton and Shakespeare and Pope's +_Iliad_. She found out that there was nothing she liked so much as making +these lines. It was nicer even than playing the Hungarian March. She +thought it was funny that the lines like Pope's _Iliad_ came easiest, +though they had to rhyme. + +"Silent he wandered by the sounding sea," was good, but the Greek line +that Mark showed her went: "Be d'akeon para thina poluphloisboio +thalasses"; that was better. "Don't you think so, Mark?" + +"Clever Minx. Much better." + +"Mark--if God knew how happy I am writing poetry he'd make the earth open +and swallow me up." + +Mark only said, "You mustn't say that to Mamma. Play 'Violetta.'" + +Of all hateful and disgusting tunes the most disgusting and the most +hateful was "Violetta," which Mr. Sippett's sister taught her. But if +Mark would promise to make Mamma let her learn Greek she would play it to +him twenty times running. + +When Mark went to Chelmsted that autumn he left her his brown _Greek +Accidence_ and Smith's _Classical Dictionary_, besides Macaulay's _Lays +of Ancient Rome_. She taught herself Greek in the hour after breakfast +before Miss Sippett came to give her her music lesson. She was always +careful to leave the Accidence open where Miss Sippett could see it and +realise that she was not a stupid little girl. + +But whether Miss Sippett saw the Accidence or not she always behaved as +if it wasn't there. + + +III. + +When Mamma saw the Accidence open on the drawing-room table she shut it +and told you to put it in its proper place. If you talked about it her +mouth buttoned up tight, and her eyes blinked, and she began tapping with +her foot. + +There was something queer about learning Greek. Mamma did not actually +forbid it; but she said it must not be done in lesson time or sewing +time, or when people could see you doing it, lest they should think you +were showing off. You could see that she didn't believe you _could_ learn +Greek and that she wouldn't like it if you did. But when lessons were +over she let you read Shakespeare or Pope's _Iliad_ aloud to her while +she sewed. And when you could say: + + "Lars Porsena of Clusium + By the nine Gods he swore"-- + +straight through without stopping she went into London with Papa and +brought back the _Child's First History of Rome_. A Pinnock's _Catechism +of Mythology_ in a blue paper cover went with the history to tell you all +about the gods and goddesses. What Pinnock didn't tell you you found out +from Smith's _Classical Dictionary_. It had pictures in it so beautiful +that you were happy just sitting still and looking at them. There was +such a lot of gods and goddesses that at first they were rather hard to +remember. But you couldn't forget Apollo and Hermes and Aphrodite and +Pallas Athene and Diana. They were not like Jehovah. They quarrelled +sometimes, but they didn't hate each other; not as Jehovah hated all the +other gods. They fitted in somehow. They cared for all the things you +liked best: trees and animals and poetry and music and running races and +playing games. Even Zeus was nicer than Jehovah, though he reminded you +of him now and then. He liked sacrifices. But then he was honest about +it. He didn't pretend that he was good and that he _had_ to have them +because of your sins. And you hadn't got to believe in him. That was the +nicest thing of all. + + + + +X + + +I. + +Mary was ten in eighteen seventy-three. + +Aunt Charlotte was ill, and nobody was being kind to her. She had given +her Sunday bonnet to Harriet and her Sunday gown to Catty; so you knew +she was going to be married again. She said it was prophesied that she +should be married in eighteen seventy-three. + +The illness had something to do with being married and going continually +to Mr. Marriott's church and calling on Mr. Marriott and writing letters +to him about religion. You couldn't say Aunt Charlotte was not religious. +But Papa said he would believe in her religion if she went to Mr. Batty's +church or Mr. Farmer's or Mr. Propart's. They had all got wives and Mr. +Marriott hadn't. Papa had forbidden Aunt Charlotte to go any more to Mr. +Marriott's church. + +Mr. Marriott had written a nice letter to Uncle Victor, and Uncle Victor +had taken Papa to see him, and the doctor had come to see Aunt Charlotte +and she had been sent to bed. + +Aunt Charlotte's room was at the top of the tall, thin white house in the +High Street. There was whispering on the stairs. Mamma and Aunt Lavvy +stood at the turn; you could see their vexed faces. Aunt Charlotte called +to them to let Mary come to her. Mary was told she might go if she were +very quiet. + +Aunt Charlotte was all by herself sitting up in a large white bed. A +Bible propped itself open, leaves downwards, against the mound she made. +There was something startling about the lengths of white curtain and the +stretches of white pillow and counterpane, and Aunt Charlotte's very +black eyebrows and hair and the cover of the Bible, very black, and her +blue eyes glittering. + +She was writing letters. Every now and then she took up the Bible and +picked out a text and wrote it down. She wrote very fast, and as she +finished each sheet she hid it under the bed-clothes, and made a sign to +show that what she was doing was a secret. + +"Love God and you'll be happy. Love God and you'll be happy," she said. + +Her eyes pointed at you. They looked wise and solemn and excited. + +A wide flat piece of counterpane was left over from Aunt Charlotte. Mary +climbed up and sat in it with her back against the foot-rail and looked +at her. Looking at Aunt Charlotte made you think of being born. + +"Aunt Charlotte, do _you_ know what being born is?" + +Aunt Charlotte looked up under her eyebrows, and hid another sheet of +paper. "What's put that in your head all of a sudden?" + +"It's because of my babies. Catty says I couldn't have thirteen all under +three years old. But I could, couldn't I?" + +"I'm afraid I don't think you could," Aunt Charlotte said. + +"Why not? Catty _won't_ say why." + +Aunt Charlotte shook her head, but she was smiling and looking wiser and +more solemn than ever. "You mustn't ask too many questions," she said. + +"But you haven't told me what being born is. I know it's got something to +do with the Virgin Mary." + +Aunt Charlotte said, "Sh-sh-sh! You mustn't say that. Nice little girls +don't think about those things." + +Her tilted eyes had turned down and her mouth had stopped smiling. So you +knew that being born was not frightening. It had something to do with the +things you didn't talk about. + +And ye--how could it? There was the Virgin Mary. + +"Aunt Charlotte, don't you _wish_ you had a baby?" + +Aunt Charlotte looked frightened, suddenly, and began to cry. + +"You mustn't say it, Mary, you mustn't say it. Don't tell them you said +it. They'll think I've been talking about the babies. The little babies. +Don't tell them. Promise me you won't tell." + + +II. + +"Aunt Lavvy--I wish I knew what you thought about Jehovah?" + +When Aunt Lavvy stayed with you Mamma made you promise not to ask her +about her opinions. But sometimes you forgot. Aunt Lavvy looked more than +ever as if she was by herself in a quiet empty room, thinking of +something that wasn't there. You couldn't help feeling that she knew +things. Mamma said she had always been the clever one, just as Aunt +Charlotte had always been the queer one; but Aunt Bella said she was no +better than an unbeliever, because she was a Unitarian at heart. + +"Why Jehovah in particular?" Aunt Lavvy was like Uncle Victor; she +listened politely when you talked to her, as if you were saying something +interesting. + +"Because he's the one you've got to believe in. Do you really think he is +so very good?" + +"I don't think anything. I don't know anything, except that God is love." + +"Jehovah wasn't." + +"Jehovah--" Aunt Lavvy stopped herself. "I mustn't talk to you about +it--because I promised your mother I wouldn't." + +It was very queer. Aunt Lavvy's opinions had something to do with +religion, yet Mamma said you mustn't talk about them. + +"I promised, too. I shall have to confess and ask her to forgive me." + +"Then," said Aunt Lavvy, "be sure you tell her that I didn't talk to you. +Promise me you'll tell her." + +That was what Aunt Charlotte had said. Talking about religion was like +talking about being born. + + + + +XI + + +I. + +Nobody has any innate ideas. Children and savages and idiots haven't any, +so grown-up people can't have, Mr. Locke says. + +But how did he know? You might have them and forget about them, and only +remember again after you were grown up. + +She sat up in the drawing-room till nine o'clock now, because she was +eleven years old. She had taken the doll's clothes out of the old wooden +box and filled it with books: the Bible, Milton, and Pope's Homer, the +Greek Accidence, and _Plutarch's Lives_, and the Comedies from Papa's +illustrated Shakespeare in seven volumes, which he never read, and two +volumes of _Pepys' Diary_, and Locke _On the Human Understanding_. She +wished the Bible had been bound in pink calf like Pepys instead of the +shiny black leather that made you think of wet goloshes. Then it would +have looked new and exciting like the other books. + +She sat on a footstool with her box beside her in the corner behind +Mamma's chair. She had to hide there because Mamma didn't believe you +really liked reading. She thought you were only shamming and showing off. +Sometimes Mr. and Mrs. Farmer would come in, and Mr. Farmer would play +chess with Papa while Mrs. Farmer talked to Mamma about how troublesome +and independent the tradespeople were, and how hard it was to get +servants and to keep them. Mamma listened to Mrs. Farmer as if she were +saying something wonderful and exciting. Sometimes it would be the +Proparts; or Mr. Batty would come in alone. And sometimes they would all +come together with the aunts and uncles, and there would be a party. + +Mary always hoped that Uncle Victor would notice her and say, "Mary is +reading Locke _On the Human Understanding_," or that Mr. Propart would +come and turn over the books and make some interesting remark. But they +never did. + +At half-past eight Catty would bring in the tea-tray; the white and grey +and gold tea-cups would be set out round the bulging silver tea-pot that +lifted up its spout with a foolish, pompous expression, like a hen. Mamma +would move about the table in her mauve silk gown, and there would be a +scent of cream and strong tea. Every now and then the shimmering silk and +the rich scent would come between her and the grey, tight-pressed, +difficult page. + +"'The senses at first let in particular ideas and furnish the yet empty +cabinet: and the mind growing by degrees familiar with some of them, they +are lodged in the memory and names got to them.' + +"Then how--Then how?--" + +The thought she thought was coming wouldn't come, and Mamma was telling +her to get up and hand round the bread and butter. + + +II. + +"Mr. Ponsonby, do you remember your innate ideas?" + +"My _how_ much?" said Mr. Ponsonby. + +"The ideas you had before you were born?" + +Mr. Ponsonby said, "Before I was born? Well--" He really seemed to be +considering it. + +Mamma's chair, pushed further along the hearthrug, had driven her back +and back, till the box was hidden behind the curtain. + +Mr. Ponsonby was Mark's friend. Mark was at the Royal Military Academy at +Woolwich now. Every Saturday Mr. Ponsonby came home with Mark and stayed +till Sunday evening. You knew that sooner or later he would find you out +behind Mamma's chair. + +"I mean," she said, "the ideas you were born with." + +"Seems to me," said Mr. Ponsonby, "I was born with precious few. Anyhow I +can't say I remember them." + +"I was afraid you'd say that. It's what Mr. Locke says." + +"Mr. how much?" + +"Mr. Locke. You can look at him if you like." + +She thought: "He won't. He won't. They never, never do." + +But Mr. Ponsonby did. He looked at Mr. Locke, and he looked at Mary, and +he said, "By Gum!" He even read the bits about the baby and the empty +cabinet. + +"You don't mean to say you _like_ this sort of thing?" + +"I like it most awfully. Of course I don't mean as much as brook-jumping, +but almost as much." + +And Mr. Ponsonby said, "Well--I must say--of _all_--you _are_--by Gum!" + +He made it sound like the most delicious praise. + +Mr. Ponsonby was taller and older than Mark. He was nineteen. She thought +he was the nicest looking person she had ever seen. + +His face was the colour of thick white honey; his hair was very dark, and +he had long blue eyes and long black eyebrows like bars, drawn close down +on to the blue. His nose would have been hooky if it hadn't been so +straight, and his mouth was quiet and serious. When he talked to you his +mouth and eyes looked as if they liked it. + +Mark came and said, "Minky, if you stodge like that you'll get all +flabby." + +It wasn't nice of Mark to say that before Mr. Ponsonby, when he knew +perfectly well that she could jump her own height. + +"_Me_ flabby? Feel my muscle." + +It rose up hard under her soft skin. + +"Feel it, Mr. Ponsonby." + +"I say--_what_ a biceps!" + +"Yes, but," Mark said, "you should feel his." + +His was even bigger and harder than Mark's. "Mine," she said sorrowfully, +"will never be as good as his." + +Then Mamma came and told her it was bed-time, and Mr. Ponsonby said, "Oh, +Mrs. Olivier, _not_ yet." + +"Five minutes more, then." + +But the five minutes were never any good. You just sat counting them. + +And when it was all over and Mr. Ponsonby strode across the drawing-room +and opened the door for her she went laughing; she stood in the doorway +and laughed. When you were sent to bed at nine the only dignified thing +was to pretend you didn't care. + +And Mr. Ponsonby, holding the door so that Mamma couldn't see him, looked +at her and shook his head, as much as to say, "You and I know it isn't a +joke for either of us, this unrighteous banishment." + + +III. + +"What on earth are you doing?" + +She might have known that some day Mamma would come up and find her +putting the children to bed. + +She had seven. There was Isabel Batty, and Mrs. Farmer's red-haired baby, +and Mark in the blue frock in the picture when he was four, and Dank in +his white frock and blue sash, and the three very little babies you made +up out of your head. Six o'clock was their bed-time. + +"You'd no business to touch those baby-clothes," Mamma said. + +The baby-clothes were real. Every evening she took them from the drawer +in the linen cupboard; and when she had sung the children to sleep she +shook out the little frocks and petticoats and folded them in a neat pile +at the foot of the bed. + +"I thought you were in the schoolroom learning your lessons?" + +"So I was, Mamma. But--you know--six o'clock is their bed-time." + +"Oh Mary! you told me you'd given up that silly game." + +"So I did. But they won't let me. They don't want me to give them up." + +Mamma sat down, as if it was too much for her. + +"I hope," she said, "you don't talk to Catty or anybody about it." + +"No, Mamma. I couldn't. They're my secret." + +"That was all very well when you were a little thing. But a great girl of +twelve--You ought to be ashamed of yourself." + +Mamma had gone. She had taken away the baby-clothes. Mary lay face +downwards on her bed. + +Shame burned through her body like fire. Hot tears scalded her eyelids. +She thought: "How was I to know you mustn't have babies?" Still, she +couldn't give them all up. She _must_ keep Isabel and the red-haired +baby. + +But what would Mr. Ponsonby think of her if he knew? + + +IV. + +"Mr. Ponsonby. Mr. Ponsonby! Stay where you are and look!" + +From the window at the end of the top corridor the side of the house went +sheer down into the lane. Mary was at the window. Mr. Ponsonby was in the +lane. + +She climbed on to the ledge and knelt there. Grasping the bottom of the +window frame firmly with both hands and letting her knees slide from the +ledge, she lowered herself, and hung for one ecstatic moment, and drew +herself up again by her arms. + +"What did you do it for, Mary?" + +Mr. Ponsonby had rushed up the stairs and they were sitting there. He was +so tall that he hung over her when he leaned. + +"It's nothing. You ought to be able to pull up your own weight." + +"You mustn't do it from top-storey windows. It's dangerous." + +"Not if you've practised on the banisters first. Where's Mark?" + +"With your Mater. I say, supposing you and I go for a walk." + +"We must be back at six o'clock," she said. + +When you went for walks with Mark or Mr. Ponsonby they always raced you +down Ley Street and over the ford at the bottom. They both gave you the +same start to the Horn's Tavern; the only difference was that with Mr. +Ponsonby you were over the ford first. + +They turned at the ford into the field path that led to Drake's Farm and +the plantation. He jumped all the stiles and she vaulted them. She could +see that he respected her. And so they came to the big water jump into +the plantation. Mr. Ponsonby went over first and held out his arms. She +hurled herself forward and he caught her. And this time, instead of +putting her down instantly, he lifted her up in his arms and held her +tight and kissed her. Her heart thumped violently and she had a sudden +happy feeling. Neither spoke. + +Humphrey Propart had kissed her once for a forfeit. And she had boxed his +ears. Mr. Ponsonby's was a different sort of kiss. + +They tore through the plantation as if nothing had happened, clearing all +the brooks in a business-like way. Mr. Ponsonby took brook-jumping as the +serious and delightful thing it was. + +Going home across the fields they held each other's hands, like children. +"Minky," he said, "I don't like to think of you hanging out of top-storey +windows." + +"But it's so jolly to feel your body come squirming up after your arms." + +"It is. It is. All the same, promise me you won't do it any more." + +"Why?" + +"Because I'm going to India when I've passed out, and I want to find you +alive when I come back. Promise me, Minky." + +"I will, if you're really going. But you're the only person I allow to +call me Minky, except Mark." + +"Am I? I'm glad I'm the only person." + +They went on. + +"I'm afraid," she said, "my hand is getting very hot and horrid." + +He held it tighter. "I don't care how hot and horrid it gets. And I think +you might call me Jimmy." + +It was long after six o'clock. She had forgotten the children and their +bed-time. After that day she never played with them again. + + +V. + +"If I were you," Mamma said, "I should put away that box of books. You'll +be no use if you read--read--read all day long." + +"You oughtn't to say that, Mamma. I _am_ of use. You know I can make the +sewing-machine go when you can't." + +Mamma smiled. She knew it. + +"And which would you rather took you over the crossing at the Bank? Me or +Papa?" + +Mamma smiled again. She knew she was safer with Mary at a crossing, +because Papa teased her and frightened her before he dragged her over. +But Mary led her gently, holding back the noses of the horses. + +"There's that Locke on the human understanding," said Mamma. "Poor Jimmy +was frightened when he found you reading it." + +"He wasn't. He was most awfully pleased and excited." + +"He was laughing at you." + +"He wasn't. He wasn't." + +"Of course he was laughing at you. What did you think he was doing?" + +"I thought he was interested." + +"He wasn't, then. Men," Mamma said, "are _not_ interested in little +book-worms. He told me it was very bad for you." + +Shame again. Hot, burning and scalding shame. He was only laughing at +her. + +"Mark doesn't laugh at me," she said. The thought of Mark and of his love +for her healed her wound. + +"A precious deal," Mamma said, "you know about Mark." + +Mamma was safe. Oh, she was safe. She knew that Mark loved her best. + + +VI. + +On the cover of Pinnock's Catechism there was a small black picture of +the Parthenon. And under it was written: + +"Abode of gods whose shrines no longer burn." + +Supposing the candles in St. Mary's Chapel no longer burned? + +Supposing Barkingside church and Aldborough Hatch church fell to bits and +there were no more clergymen? And you only read in history books about +people like Mr. Batty and Mr. Propart and their surplices and the things +they wore round their necks? + +Supposing the Christian religion passed away? + +It excited you to think these things. But when you heard the "Magnificat" +in church, or when you thought of Christ hanging so bravely on the cross +you were sorry and you stopped thinking. + +What a pity you couldn't ever go on without having to stop. + +END OF BOOK TWO + + + + +BOOK THREE +ADOLESCENCE (1876-1879) + + +XII + + +I. + +Mary went slowly up the lane between the garden wall and the thorn hedge. + +The air, streaming towards her from the flat fields, had the tang of +cold, glittering water; the sweet, grassy smell of the green corn blades +swam on it. The young thorn leaves smelt of almonds and of their own +bitter green. + +The five trees stood up, thin and black, in an archway of golden white +fire. The green of their young leaves hung about them like an emanation. + +A skylark swung himself up, a small grey ball, spinning over the tree +tops to the arch of the sunset. His song pierced and shook, like the +golden white light. With each throb of his wings he shrank, smaller and +greyer, a moth, a midge, whirling in the luminous air. A grey ball +dropped spinning down. + +By the gate of the field her sudden, secret happiness came to her. + +She could never tell when it was coming, nor what it would come from. It +had something to do with the trees standing up in the golden white light. +It had come before with a certain sharp white light flooding the fields, +flooding the room. + +It had happened so often that she received it now with a shock of +recognition; and when it was over she wanted it to happen again. She +would go back and back to the places where it had come, looking for it, +thinking that any minute it might happen again. But it never came twice +to the same place in the same way. + +Catty was calling to her from the bottom of the lane. She stood still by +the gate, not heeding Catty, holding her happiness. When she had turned +from the quiet fields it would be gone. + + +II. + +Sometimes she had queer glimpses of the persons that were called Mary +Olivier. There was Mrs. Olivier's only daughter, proud of her power over +the sewing-machine. When she brought the pile of hemmed sheets to her +mother her heart swelled with joy in her own goodness. There was Mark +Olivier's sister, who rejoiced in the movements of her body, the strain +of the taut muscles throbbing on their own leash, the bound forwards, the +push of the wind on her knees and breast, the hard feel of the ground +under her padding feet. And there was Mary Olivier, the little girl of +thirteen whom her mother and Aunt Bella whispered about to each other +with mysterious references to her age. + +Her secret happiness had nothing to do with any of these Mary Oliviers. +It was not like any other happiness. It had nothing to do with Mamma or +Dan or Roddy, or even Mark. It had nothing to do with Jimmy. + +She had cried when Jimmy went away, and she would cry again to-night when +she thought about him. Jimmy's going away was worse than anything that +had happened yet or could happen till Mark went to India. That would be +the worst thing. + +Jimmy had not gone to India as he had said. He had had to leave Woolwich +because of something he had done, and his father had sent him to +Australia. He had gone without saying good-bye, and he was never coming +back. She would never in all her life see Jimmy again. + +Jimmy had done something dreadful. + +Nobody but Mamma and Papa and Mark knew what he had done; but from the +way they talked you could see that it was one of those things you mustn't +talk about. Only Mark said he didn't believe he really had done it. + +Last Sunday she had written a letter to him which Mark posted: + +"Dear Jimmy,--I think you might have come to say good-bye to us, even if +Papa and Mamma do think you've done something you oughtn't to. I want you +to know that Mark and I don't believe you did it, and even if you did it +won't make any difference. I shall always love you just the same, next +best to Mark. You can't expect me to love you really best, because he +will always come first as long as I live. I hope you will be very happy +in Australia. I shall keep my promise just the same, though it's +Australia and not India you've gone to. + +"With love, ever your loving + +"Minky. + +"P.S. No. 1.--I'm reading a new poet--Byron. There was a silly woman who +said she'd rather have the fame of Childe Harold than the immortality of +Don Juan. But I'd rather have the immortality, wouldn't you? + +"P.S. No. 2.--Do you think that you will keep Kangaroos? They might help +to make you happy." + + +III. + +Mary was picking French beans in the kitchen garden when Mamma and Aunt +Bella came along the path, talking together. The thick green walls of the +runners hid her. + +"Mary is getting very precocious," said Mamma. + +"That comes from being brought up with boys," said Aunt Bella. "She ought +to see more girls of her own age." + +"She doesn't like them." + +Mary shouted "Cuckoo!" to warn them, but they wouldn't stop. + +"It's high time," Aunt Bella said, "that she should learn to like them. +The Draper girls are too old. But there's that little Bertha Mitchison." + +"I haven't called on Mrs. Mitchison for two years." + +"And why haven't you, Caroline?" + +"Because I can't afford to be always hiring wagonettes to go to Woodford +Bridge." + +"Cuckoo!" + +"Caroline--do you think she could have heard?" + +"Cuckoo, Aunt Bella! Cuckoo!" + + +IV. + +On the high road the white dust had a clear, sharp, exciting smell. At +the wet edges of the ford it thickened. + +When you shut your eyes you could still see Bertha's scarlet frock on the +white bridge path and smell the wet earth at the edges of the ford. + +You were leaning over the white painted railing of the bridge when she +began. The water flowed from under the little tunnel across the road into +the field beyond. Deep brown under the tunnel, tawny in the shallow ford, +golden patches where the pebbles showed through, and the water itself, a +sheet of thin crystal, running over the colours, sliding through them, +running and sliding on and on. + +There was nothing in the world so beautiful as water, unless it was +light. But water was another sort of light. + +Bertha pushed her soft sallow face into yours. Her big black eyes bulged +out under her square fringe. Her wide red mouth curled and glistened. +There were yellowish stains about the roots of her black hair. Her mouth +and eyes teased you, mocked you, wouldn't let you alone. + +Bertha began: "I know something you don't know." + +You listened. You couldn't help listening. You simply had to know. It was +no use to say you didn't believe a word of it. Inside you, secretly, you +knew it was true. You were frightened. You trembled and went hot and cold +by turns, and somehow that was how you knew it was true; almost as if you +had known all the time. + +"Oh, shut up! I don't _want_ to hear about it." + +"Oh, don't you? You did a minute ago." + +"Of course I did, when I didn't know. Who wouldn't? I don't want to know +any more." + +"I like that. After I've told you everything. What's the good of putting +your fingers in your ears _now_?" + +There was that day; and there was the next day when she was sick of +Bertha. On the third day Bertha went back to Woodford Bridge. + + +V. + +It was dreadful and at the same time funny when you thought of Mr. Batty +and Mr. Propart with their little round hats and their black coats and +their stiff, dignified faces. And there was Uncle Edward and his +whiskers. It couldn't be true. + +Yet all true things came like that, with a queer feeling, as if you +remembered them. + +Jenny's wedding dress. It would be true even of Jenny. Mamma had said she +would rather see her in her coffin than married to Mr. Spall. That was +why. + +But--if it was true of everybody it would be true of Mamma and Papa. That +was what you hated knowing. If only you had gone on looking at the water +instead of listening to Bertha-- + +Mamma's face, solemn and tender, when you said your prayers, playing with +the gold tassel of her watch-chain. Papa's face, on your birthday, when +he gave you the toy lamb. She wouldn't like you to know about her. Mark +wouldn't like it. + +Mark: her mind stood still. Mark's image stood still in clean empty +space. When she thought of her mother and Mark she hated Bertha. + +And there was Jimmy. That was why they wouldn't talk about him. + +Jimmy. The big water-jump into the plantation. Jimmy's arms, the throb of +the hard muscles as he held you. Jimmy's hand, your own hand lying in it, +light and small. Jimmy's eyes, looking at you and smiling, as if they +said, "It's all right, Minky, it's all right." + +Perhaps when Papa was young Mamma thought about him as you thought about +Jimmy; so that it couldn't be so very dreadful, after all. + + + + +XIII + + +I. + +Mary was glad when Bertha went away to school. When the new year came and +she was fourteen she had almost forgotten Bertha. She even forgot for +long stretches of time what Bertha had told her. But not altogether. + +Because, if it was true, then the story of the Virgin Mary was not true. +Jesus couldn't have been born in the way the New Testament said he was +born. There was no such thing as the Immaculate Conception. You could +hardly be expected to believe in it once you knew why it couldn't have +happened. + +And if the Bible could deceive you about an important thing like that, it +could deceive you about the Incarnation and the Atonement. You were no +longer obliged to believe in that ugly business of a cruel, bungling God +appeased with bloodshed. You were not obliged to believe anything just +because it was in the Bible. + +But--if you didn't, you were an Infidel. + +She could hear Aunt Bella talking to Uncle Edward, and Mrs. Farmer and +Mrs. Propart whispering: "Mary is an Infidel." + +She thought: "If I _am_ I can't help it." She was even slightly elated, +as if she had set out on some happy, dangerous adventure. + + +II. + +Nobody seemed to know what Pantheism was. Mr. Propart smiled when you +asked him and said it was something you had better not meddle with. Mr. +Farmer said it was only another word for atheism; you might as well have +no God at all as be a pantheist. But if "pan" meant "all things," and +"theos" was God-- + +Perhaps it would be in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. The Encyclopaedia +told you all about Australia. There was even a good long bit about Byron, +too. + +Panceput--Panegyric--Pantheism! There you were. Pantheism is "that +speculative system which by absolutely identifying the Subject and Object +of thought, reduces all existence, mental and material, to phenomenal +modifications of one eternal, self-existent Substance which is called by +the name of God.... All things are God." + +When you had read the first sentence five or six times over and looked up +"Subject" and "Object" and "Phenomenal," you could see fairly well what +it meant. Whatever else God might be, he was not what they said, +something separate and outside things, something that made your mind +uncomfortable when you tried to think about it. + +"This universe, material and mental, is nothing but the spectacle of the +thoughts of God." + +You might have known it would be like that. The universe, going on inside +God, as your thoughts go on inside you; the universe, so close to God +that nothing could be closer. The meaning got plainer and plainer. + +There was Spinoza. ("Spinning--Spinoza.") The Encyclopaedia man said that +the Jewish priests offered him a bribe of two thousand florins to take +back what he had said about God; and when he refused to take back a word +of it, they cursed him and drove him out of their synagogue. + +Spinoza said, "There is no substance but God, nor can any other be +conceived." And the Encyclopaedia man explained it. "God, as the infinite +substance, with its infinity of attributes is the _natura naturans_. As +the infinity of modes under which his attributes are manifested, he is +the _natura naturata_." + +Nature naturing would be the cause, and Nature natured would be the +effect. God was both. + +"God is the immanent"--indwelling--"but not the transient cause of all +things" ... "Thought and Extension are attributes of the one absolute +substance which is God, evolving themselves in two parallel streams, so +to speak, of which each separate body and spirit are but the waves. Body +and Soul are apparently two, but really one and they have no independent +existence: They are parts of God.... Were our knowledge of God capable of +present completeness we might attain to perfect happiness but such is not +possible. Out of the infinity of his attributes only two, Thought and +Extension, are accessible to us while the modes of these attributes, +being essentially infinite, escape our grasp." + +So this was the truth about God. In spite of the queer words it was very +simple. Much simpler than the Trinity. God was not three incomprehensible +Persons rolled into one, not Jesus, not Jehovah, not the Father creating +the world in six days out of nothing, and muddling it, and coming down +from heaven into it as his own son to make the best of a bad job. He was +what you had felt and thought him to be as soon as you could think about +him at all. The God of Baruch Spinoza was the God you had wanted, the +only sort of God you cared to think about. Thinking about him--after the +Christian God--was like coming out of a small dark room into an immense +open space filled with happy light. + +And yet, as far back as you could remember, there had been a regular +conspiracy to keep you from knowing the truth about God. Even the +Encyclopaedia man was in it. He tried to put you off Pantheism. He got +into a temper about it and said it was monstrous and pernicious and +profoundly false and that the heart of man rose up in revolt against it. +He had begun by talking about "attempts to transgress the fixed +boundaries which One wiser than we has assigned to our intellectual +operations." Perhaps he was a clergyman. Clergymen always put you off +like that; so that you couldn't help suspecting that they didn't really +know and were afraid you would find them out. They were like poor little +frightened Mamma when she wouldn't let you look at the interesting bits +beyond the place she had marked in your French Reader. And they were +always apologising for their God, as if they felt that there was +something wrong with him and that he was not quite real. + +But to the pantheists the real God was so intensely real that, compared +with him, being alive was not quite real, it was more like dreaming. + +Another thing: the pantheists--the Hindu ones and the Greeks, and Baruch +Spinoza--were heathen, and the Christians had tried to make you believe +that the heathen went to hell because they didn't know the truth about +God. You had been told one lie on the top of another. And all the time +the truth was there, in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. + +Who would have thought that the Encyclopaedia could have been so +exciting? + +The big puce-coloured books stood in a long row in the bottom shelf +behind her father's chair. Her heart thumped when she gripped the volumes +that contained the forbidden knowledge of the universe. The rough morocco +covers went Rr-rr-rimp, as they scraped together; and there was the sharp +thud as they fell back into their place when she had done with them. +These sounds thrilled her with a secret joy. When she was away from the +books she liked to think of them standing there on the hidden shelf, +waiting for her. The pages of "Pantheism" and "Spinoza" were white and +clean, and she had noticed how they had stuck together. Nobody had opened +them. She was the first, the only one who knew and cared. + + +III. + +She wondered what Mark and her mother would say when they knew. Perhaps +Mark would say she ought not to tell her mother if it meant letting out +that the Bible said things that were not really true. His idea might be +that if Mamma wanted to believe in Jehovah and the Atonement through +Christ's blood, it would be unkind to try and stop her. But who on earth +_would_ want to believe that dreadful sort of thing if they could help +it? Papa might not mind, because as long as he knew that he and Mamma +would get into heaven all right he wouldn't worry so much about other +people. But Mamma was always worrying about them and making you give up +things to them; and she must be miserable when she thought of them +burning in hell for ever and ever, and when she tried to reconcile God's +justice with his mercy. To say nothing of the intellectual discomfort she +was living in. When you had found out the real, happy truth about God, it +didn't seem right to keep it to yourself. + +She decided that she would tell her mother. + +Mark was in the Royal Field Artillery now. He was away at Shoeburyness. +If she put it off till he came home again she might never do it. When +Mamma had Mark with her she would never listen to anything you had to +say. + +Next Sunday was Epiphany. Sunday afternoon would be a good time. + +But Aunt Lavvy came to stay from Saturday to Monday. And it rained. All +morning Mamma and Aunt Lavvy sat in the dining-room, one on each side of +the fireplace. Aunt Lavvy read James Martineau's _Endeavours After the +Christian Life_, and Mamma read "The Pulpit in the Family" out of the +_Sunday At Home_. Somehow you couldn't do it with Aunt Lavvy in the room. + +In the afternoon when she went upstairs to lie down--perhaps. + +But in the afternoon Mamma dozed over the _Sunday At Home_. She was so +innocent and pretty, nodding her head, and starting up suddenly, and +looking round with a smile that betrayed her real opinion of Sunday. You +couldn't do it while she dozed. + +Towards evening it rained again and Aunt Lavvy went off to Ilford for the +Evening Service, by herself. Everybody else stayed at home, and there was +hymn-singing instead of church. Mary and her mother were alone together. +When her mother had sung the last hymn, "Lead, Kindly Light," then she +would do it. + +Her mother was singing: + + "'Jesu, Lover of my soul, + Let me to Thy bosom fly, + While the nearer wa-a-ters roll, + While the tempest still is high'"-- + +She could see the stiff, slender muscles straining in her mother's neck. +The weak, plaintive voice tore at her heart. She knew that her mother's +voice was weak and plaintive. Its thin, sweet notes unnerved her. + + "'Other refuge ha-ave I none: + Hangs my helpless soul on Thee'"-- + +Helpless--Helpless. Mamma was helpless. It was only her love of Mark and +Jesus that was strong. Something would happen if she told her--something +awful. She could feel already the chill of an intolerable separation. She +could give up Jesus, the lover of her soul, but she could not give up her +mother. She couldn't live separated from Mamma, from the weak, plaintive +voice that tore at her. + +She couldn't do it. + + +IV. + +Catty's eyes twinkled through the banisters. She caught Mary coming +downstairs and whispered that there was cold boiled chicken and trifle +for supper, because of Aunt Lavvy. + +Through the door Mary could see her father standing at the table, and the +calm breasts of the cold chicken smoothed with white sauce and decorated +with beetroot stars. + +There was a book beside Papa's plate, the book Aunt Lavvy had been +reading. She had left it open on the drawing-room table when she went to +church. She was late for supper and they sat there waiting for her. She +came in, slowly as usual, and looking at the supper things as though they +were not there. When she caught sight of the book something went up and +flickered in her eyes--a sort of triumph. + +You couldn't help thinking that she had left it lying about on purpose, +so that Papa should see it. + +He stood waiting till she had sat down. He handed the book to her. His +eyes gleamed. + +"When you come here," he said, "you will be good enough to leave James +Martineau behind you." + +Mamma looked up, startled. "You don't mean to say you've brought that +man's books into the house?" + +"You can see for yourself, Caroline," said Aunt Lavvy. + +"I don't want to see. No, Mary, it has nothing to do with you." + +Mamma was smiling nervously. You would have supposed that she thought +James Martineau funny, but the least bit improper. + +"But look, Mamma, it's his _Endeavours After the Christian Life_." + +Her mother took up the book and put it down as if it had bitten her. + +"Christian Life, indeed! What right has James Martineau to call himself a +Christian? When he denies Christ--the Lord who bought him! And makes no +secret of it. How can you respect an infidel who uses Christ's name to +cover up his blasphemy?" + +Aunt Lavvy was smiling now. + +"I thought you said he made no secret of it?" + +Mamma said, "You know very well what I mean." + +"If you knew Dr. Martineau--" + +"You've no business to know him," Emilius said, "when your brother Victor +and I disapprove of him." + +Emilius was carving chicken. He had an air of kindly, luscious +hospitality, hesitating between the two flawless breasts. + +"Dr. Martineau is the wisest and holiest man I ever knew," said Aunt +Lavvy. + +"I daresay your sister Charlotte thinks Mr. Marriott the wisest and the +holiest man _she_ ever knew." + +He settled the larger breast on Aunt Lavvy's plate and laid on it one +perfect star of beetroot. He could do that while he insulted her. + +"Oh--Papa--you _are_ a br--" + +Aunt Lavvy shook her gentle head. + +"Lavinia dear" (Mamma's voice was gentle), "did you have a nice service?" + +"Very nice, thank you." + +"Did you go to Saint Mary's, or the Parish church?" + +Aunt Lavvy's straight, flat chin trembled slightly. Her pale eyes +lightened. "I went to neither." + +"Then---where did you go?" + +"If you insist on knowing, Caroline, I went to Mr. Robson's church." + +"You went to Mr.--to the Unitarian Chapel?" + +"To the Unitarian Chapel." + +"Emilius--" You would have thought that Aunt Lavvy had hit Mamma and hurt +her. + +Emilius took up his table napkin and wiped his moustache carefully. He +was quite horribly calm. + +"You will oblige me by not going there again," he said. + +"You forget that I went every Sunday when we were in Liverpool." + +"You forget that is the reason why you left Liverpool." + +"Only one of the reasons, I think." + +"Can you tell me what reason you have for going now? Beyond your desire +to make yourself different from other people." + +"Aren't Unitarians other people?" + +She poured out a glass of water and drank. She was giving herself time. + +"My reason," she said, "is that I have joined the Unitarian Church." + +Mamma put down her knife and fork. Her lips opened and her face turned +suddenly sharp and sallow as if she were going to faint. + +"You don't mean to say you've gone over? Then God help poor Charlotte!" + +Emilius steadied himself to speak. "Does Victor know?" he said. + +"Yes. He knows." + +"You have consulted him, and you have not consulted me?" + +"You made me promise not to talk about it. I have kept my promise." + +Mary was sure then that Aunt Lavvy had left the book open on purpose. She +had laid a trap for Emilius, and he had fallen into it. + +"If you will hold infamous opinions you must be made to keep them to +yourself." + +"I have a perfect right to my opinions." + +"You have no right to make an open profession of them." + +"The law is more tolerant than you, Emilius." + +"There is a moral law and a law of honour. You are not living by +yourself. As long as you are in Victor's house the least you can do is to +avoid giving offence. Have you no consideration for your family? You say +you came here to be near us. Have you thought of us? Have you thought of +the children? Do you expect Caroline to go to Victor's house if she's to +meet the Unitarian minister and his wife?" + +"You will be cutting yourself off completely, Lavinia," Mamma said. + +"From what?" + +"From everybody. People don't call on Nonconformists. If there were no +higher grounds--" + +"Oh--Caroline--" Aunt Lavvy breathed it on a long sigh. + +"It's all very well for you. But you might think of your sister +Charlotte," Mamma said. + +Papa's beard jerked. He drew in his breath with a savage guttural noise. +"A-ach! What's the good of talking?" + +He had gone on eating all the time. There was a great pile of chicken +bones on his plate. + +Aunt Lavvy turned. "Emilius--for thirty-three years"--her voice broke as +she quivered under her loaded anguish--"for thirty-three years you've +shouted me down. You haven't let me call my soul my own. Yet it _is_ my +own--" + +"There, please--_please_," Mamma said, "don't let us have any more of +it," just as Aunt Lavvy was beginning to get a word in edgeways. + +"Mamma, that isn't fair, you must let her speak." + +"Yes. You must let me speak." Aunt Lavvy's voice thickened in her throat. + +"I won't have any discussion of Unitarianism here," said Papa. + +"It's you who have been discussing it, not I." + +"It is, really, Papa. First you began. Then Mamma." + +Mamma said, "If you've finished your supper, Mary, you can go." + +"But I haven't. I've not had any trifle yet." + +She thought: "They don't want me to hear them; but I've a right to sit +here and eat trifle. They know they can't turn me out. I haven't done +anything." + +Aunt Lavvy went on. "I've only one thing to say, Emilius. You've asked me +to think of Victor and Charlotte, and you and Caroline and the boys and +Mary. Have you once--in thirty-three years--for a single minute--thought +of _me_?" + +"Certainly I have. It's partly for your own sake I object to your +disgracing yourself. As if your sister Charlotte wasn't disgrace enough." + +Aunt Lavvy drew herself up stiff and straight in her white shawl like a +martyr in her flame. "You might keep Charlotte out of it, I think." + +"I might. Charlotte can't help herself. You can." + +At this point Mamma burst into tears and left the room. + +"Now," he said, "I hope you're satisfied." + +Mary answered him. + +"I think _you_ ought to be, Papa, if you've been bullying Aunt Lavvy for +thirty-three years. Don't you think it's about time you stopped?" + +Emilius stared at his daughter. His face flushed slowly. "I think," he +said, "it's time you went to bed." + +"It isn't my bed-time for another hour yet." + +(A low murmur from Aunt Lavvy: "Don't, Mary, don't.") + +She went on. "It was you who made Mamma cry, not Aunt Lavvy. It always +frightens her when you shout at people. You know Aunt Lavvy's a perfect +saint, besides being lots cleverer than anybody in this house, except +Mark. You get her by herself when she's tired out with Aunt Charlotte. +You insult her religion. You say the beastliest things you can think +of--" + +Her father pushed back his chair; they rose and looked at each other. + +"You wouldn't dare to do it if Mark was here!" + +He strode to the door and opened it. His arm made a crescent gesture that +cleared space of her. + +"Go! Go upstairs. Go to bed!" + +"I don't care where I go now I've said it." + +Upstairs in her bed she still heard Aunt Lavvy's breaking voice: + +"For thirty-three years--for thirty-three years--" + +The scene rose again and swam before her and fell to pieces. +Ideas--echoes--images. Religion--the truth of God. Her father's voice +booming over the table. Aunt Lavvy's voice, breaking--breaking. A pile of +stripped chicken bones on her father's plate. + + +V. + +Aunt Lavvy was getting ready to go away. She held up her night gown to +her chin, smoothing and folding back the sleeves. You thought of her +going to bed in the ugly, yellow, flannel night gown, not caring, lying +in bed and thinking about God. + +Mary was sorry that Aunt Lavvy was going. As long as she was there +you felt that if only she would talk everything would at once become +more interesting. She thrilled you with that look of having something-- +something that she wouldn't talk about--up her sleeve. The Encyclopaedia +man said that Unitarianism was a kind of Pantheism. Perhaps that was it. +Perhaps she knew the truth about God. Aunt Lavvy would know whether she +ought to tell her mother. + +"Aunt Lavvy, if you loved somebody and you found out that their religion +wasn't true, would you tell them or wouldn't you?" + +"It would depend on whether they were happy in their religion or not." + +"Supposing you'd found out one that was more true and much more +beautiful, and you thought it would make them happier?" + +Aunt Lavvy raised her long, stubborn chin. In her face there was a cold +exaltation and a sudden hardness. + +"No religion was ever more true or more beautiful than Christianity," she +said. + +"There's Pantheism. Aren't Unitarians a kind of Pantheists?" + +Aunt Lavvy's white face flushed. "Unitarians Pantheists? Who's been +talking to you about Pantheism?" + +"Nobody. Nobody knows about it. I had to find out." + +"The less you find out about it the better." + +"Aunt Lavvy, you're talking like Mr. Propart. Supposing I honestly think +Pantheism's true?" + +"You've no right to think anything about it," Aunt Lavvy said. + +"Now you're talking like Papa. And I did so hope you wouldn't." + +"I only meant that it takes more time than you've lived to find out what +honest thinking _is_. When you're twenty years older you'll know what +this opinion of yours is worth." + +"I know what it's worth to me, now, this minute." + +"Is it worth making your mother miserable?" + +"That's what Mark would say. How did you know I was thinking of Mamma?" + +"Because that's what my brother Victor said to me." + + +VI. + +The queer thing was that none of them seemed to think the truth could +possibly matter on its own account, or that anything mattered besides +being happy or miserable. Yet everybody, except Aunt Lavvy, was +determined that everybody else should be happy in their way by believing +what they believed; and when it came to Pantheism even Aunt Lavvy +couldn't live and let live. You could see that deep down inside her it +made her more furious than Unitarianism made Papa. + +Mary saw that she was likely to be alone in her adventure. It appeared to +her more than ever as a journey into a beautiful, quiet yet exciting +country where you could go on and on. The mere pleasure of being able to +move enchanted her. But nobody would go with her. Nobody knew. Nobody +cared. + +There was Spinoza; but Spinoza had been dead for ages. Now she came to +think of it she had never heard anybody, not even Mr. Propart, speak of +Spinoza. It would be worse for her than it had ever been for Aunt Lavvy +who had actually known Dr. Martineau. Dr. Martineau was not dead; and if +he had been there were still lots of Unitarian ministers alive all over +England. And in the end Aunt Lavvy had broken loose and gone into her +Unitarian Chapel. + +She thought: "Not till after Grandmamma was dead. Till years after +Grandmamma was dead." + +She thought: "Of course I'd die rather than tell Mamma." + + +VII. + +Aunt Lavvy had gone. Mr. Parish had taken her away in his wagonette. + +At lessons Mamma complained that you were not attending. But she was not +attending herself, and when sewing time came she showed what she had been +thinking about. + +"What were you doing in Aunt Lavvy's room this morning?" + +She looked up sharply over the socks piled before her for darning. + +"Only talking." + +"Was Aunt Lavvy talking to you about her opinions?" + +"No, Mamma." + +"Has she ever talked to you?" + +"Of course not. She wouldn't if she promised not to. I don't know even +now what Unitarianism is.... What _do_ Unitarians believe in?" + +"Goodness knows," her mother said. "Nothing that's any good to them, you +may be sure." + +Mary went on darning. The coarse wool of the socks irritated her fingers. +It caught in a split nail, setting her teeth on edge. + +If you went on darning for ever--if you went on darning--Mamma would be +pleased. She had not suspected anything. + + +VIII. + + "'Full fathom five thy father lies, + Of his bones are coral made, + Those are pearls that were his eyes. + Nothing of him that doth fade + But doth suffer a sea-change + Into something rich and strange.'" + +Between the lovely lines she could hear Mamma say, "They all scamp their +work. You would require a resident carpenter and a resident glazier--" + +And Mrs. Farmer's soft drawl spinning out the theme: "And a resident +plumber. Yes, Mrs. Olivier, you really wou-ould." + +Mr. and Mrs. Farmer had called and stayed to tea. Across the room you +could see his close, hatchet nose and straggly beard. Every now and then +his small, greenish eyes lifted and looked at you. + +Impossible that you had ever enjoyed going to Mrs. Farmer's to see the +baby. It was like something that had happened to somebody else, a long +time ago. Mrs. Farmer was always having babies, and always asking you to +go and see them. She couldn't understand that as you grew older you left +off caring about babies. + + "'--We are such stuff + As dreams are made of--'" + +"The Bishop--Confirmation--opportunity." + +Even Mamma owned that Mr. Farmer never knew when it was time to go. + + "'As dreams are made of, and our little life + Is rounded with a sleep--'" + +The universe is nothing but the spectacle of the dreams of God. Or was it +the thoughts of God? + +"Confirmation--Parish Church--Bishop--" + +Confirmation. She had seen a Confirmation once, years ago. Girls in white +dresses and long white veils, like brides, shining behind the square +black windows of the broughams. Dora and Effie Draper. Effie leaned +forward. Her pretty, piercing face looked out through the black pane, not +seeing anything, trying greedily to be seen. Big boys and girls knelt +down in rows before the Bishop, and his sleeves went flapping up and down +over them like bolsters in the wind. + +Mr. Farmer was looking at her again, as if he had an idea in his head. + + +IX. + +The Church Service was open at the Thirty-Nine Articles. Mamma had pushed +Dr. Smith's "History of England" away. + +"Do you think," she said, "you could say the Catechism and the Athanasian +Creed straight through without stopping?" + +"I daresay I could if I tried. Why?" + +"Because Mr. Farmer will want to examine you." + +"Whatever for?" + +"Because," her mother said, "there's going to be a Confirmation. It's +time you were thinking about being confirmed." + +"Confirmed? _Me_?" + +"And why not you?" + +"Well--I haven't got to be, have I?" + +"You will have, sooner or later. So you may as well begin to think about +it now." + +Confirmation. She had never thought about it as a real thing that might +happen to her, that would happen, sooner or later, if she didn't do +something to stop Mr. Farmer and Mamma. + +"I _am_ thinking. I'm thinking tight." + +Tight. Tight. Her mind, in agony, pinned itself to one point: how she +could stop her mother without telling her. + +Beyond that point she couldn't see clearly. + +"You see--you see--I don't _want_ to be confirmed." + +"You don't want? You might as well say you didn't want to be a +Christian." + +"Don't worry, Mamma darling. I only want to stay as I am." + +"I must worry. I'm responsible for you as long as you're not confirmed. +You forget that I'm your godmother as well as your mother." + +She had forgotten it. And Papa and Uncle Victor were her godfathers. +"What did your godfathers and godmothers then for you?--They did promise +and vow three things in my name--" they had actually done it. "First: +that I should renounce"--renounce--renounce--"Secondly: that I should +believe all the Articles of the Christian Faith--" + +The Christian Faith--the Catholic Faith. "Which Faith except everyone do +keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly"-- + +--"And the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity and +Trinity in Unity." + +They had promised and vowed all that. In her name. What right had they? +What right had they? + +"You're not a baby any more," her mother said. + +"That's what I mean. I was a baby when you went and did it. I knew +nothing about it. You _can't_ make me responsible." + +"It's we who are responsible," her mother said. + +"I mean for your vows and promises, Mamma darling. If you'll let me off +my responsibility I'll let you off yours." + +"Now," her mother said, "you're prevaricating." + +"That means you'll never let me off. If I don't do it now I'll have to do +it next year, or the next?" + +"You may feel more seriously about it next year. Or next week," her +mother said. "Meanwhile you'll learn the Thirty-Nine Articles. Read them +through first." + +"--'Nine. Of Original or Birth-sin. Original Sin ... is the fault and +corruption of the Nature of every man ... whereby man is far gone from +original righteousness and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that +the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit; and therefore in every +person born into this world it deserveth God's wrath and damnation.'" + +"Don't look like that," her mother said, "as if your wits were +wool-gathering." + +"Wool?" She could see herself smiling at her mother, disagreeably. + +Wool-gathering. Gathering wool. The room was full of wool; wool flying +about; hanging in the air and choking you. Clogging your mind. Old grey +wool out of pew cushions that people had sat on for centuries, full of +dirt. + +Wool, spun out, wound round you, woven in a net. You were tangled and +strangled in a net of unclean wool. They caught you in it when you were a +baby a month old. Mamma, Papa and Uncle Victor. You would have to cut and +tug and kick and fight your way out. They were caught in it themselves, +they couldn't get out. They didn't want to get out. The wool stopped +their minds working. They hated it when their minds worked, when +anybody's mind worked. Aunt Lavvy's--yours. + +"'Thirteen. Of Works before Justification. Works done before the grace of +Christ, and the Inspiration of His Spirit, are not pleasant to God, +forasmuch as they spring not of faith in Jesus Christ...: yea, rather, +for that they are not done as God hath willed and commanded them to be +done, we doubt not but they have the nature of sin.'" + +"Do you really believe that, Mamma?" + +"Of course I believe it. All our righteousness is filthy rags." + +--People's goodness. People's kindness. The sweet, beautiful things they +did for each other. The brave, noble things, the things Mark did: filthy +rags. + +_This_--this religion of theirs--was filthy; ugly, like the shiny black +covers of their Bibles where their fingers left a grey, greasy smear. +Filthy and frightful; like funerals. You might as well be buried alive, +five coffins deep in a pit of yellow clay. + +Mamma couldn't really believe it. You would have to tell her it wasn't +true. Not telling her meant that you didn't think she cared about the +truth. You insulted her if you supposed she didn't care. Mark would say +you insulted her. Even if it hurt her a bit at first, you insulted her if +you thought she couldn't bear it. And afterwards she would be happy, +because she would be free. + +"It's no use, Mamma. I shan't ever want to be confirmed." + +"Want--want--want! You ought to want, then. You say you believe the +Christian Faith--" + +Now--now. A clean quick cut. No jagged ends hanging. + +"That's it. I don't believe a single word of it." + +She couldn't look at her mother. She didn't want to see her cry. + +"You've found that out, have you? You've been mighty quick about it." + +"I found it out ages ago. But I didn't mean to tell you." + +Her mother was not crying. + +"You needn't tell me now," she said. "You don't suppose I'm going to +believe it?" + +Not crying. Smiling. A sort of cunning and triumphant smile. + +"You just want an excuse for not learning those Thirty-Nine Articles." + + + + +XIV + + +I. + +Mamma was crying. + +Papa had left the dining-room. Mary sat at the foot of the table, and her +mother at the head. The space between was covered and piled with Mark's +kit: the socks, the pocket-handkerchiefs, the vests, the fine white +pyjamas. The hanging white globes of the gaselier shone on them. All day +Mary had been writing "M.E. Olivier, M.E. Olivier," in clear, hard +letters, like print. The iridescent ink was grey on the white linen and +lawn, black when you stamped with the hot iron: M.E. Olivier. Mamma was +embroidering M.E.O. in crimson silk on a black sock. + +Mark was in the Army now; in the Royal Field Artillery. He was going to +India. In two weeks, before the middle of April, he would be gone. They +had known this so long that now and then they could forget it; they could +be glad that Mark should have all those things, so many more, and more +beautiful, than he had ever had. They were appeased with their labour of +forming, over and over again, the letters, clear and perfect, of his +name. + +Then Papa had come in and said that Dan was not going to live at home any +more. He had taken rooms in Bloomsbury with young Vickers. + +Dan had not gone to Cambridge when he left Chelmsted, as Mamma had +intended. There hadn't been enough money. + +Uncle Victor had paid for Mark's last year at Woolwich and for his outfit +now. Some day Mamma would pay him back again. + +Dan had gone first into Papa's office; then into Uncle Edward's office. +He was in Uncle Victor's office now. Sometimes he didn't get home till +after midnight. Sometimes when you went into his room to call him in the +morning he wasn't there; but there were the bed-clothes turned down as +Catty had left them, with his nightshirt folded on the top. + +Her mother said: "I hope you're content now you've finished your work." + +"_My_ work?" her father said. + +"Yes, yours. You couldn't rest till you'd got the poor boy out of your +office, and now you've turned him out of the house. I suppose you thought +that with Mark going you'd better make a clean sweep. It'll be Roddy +next." + +"I didn't turn him out of the house. But it was about time he went. The +young cub's temper is getting unbearable." + +"I daresay. You ruined Dan's temper with your silly +tease--tease--tease--from morning till night. You can't see a dog without +wanting to make it snap and snarl. It was the same with all the children. +And when they turned you bullied them. Just because you couldn't break +Mark's spirit you tried to crush Dan's. It's a wonder he has any temper +left." + +Emilius stroked his beard. + +"That's right. Stroke your beard as if nothing mattered but your +pleasure. You'll be happy enough when Mark's gone." + +Emilius left off stroking his beard. + +"You say I turned him out of the office," he said. "Did he stay with +Edward?" + +"Nobody could stay with Edward. You couldn't yourself." + +"Ask Victor how long he thinks he'll keep him." + +"What do you mean, Emilius?" + +He didn't answer. He stood there, his lips pouting between his moustache +and beard, his eyes smiling wickedly, as if he had just found out he +could torment her more by not saying what he meant. + +"If Dan went to the bad," she said, "I wouldn't blame him. It would serve +you right. + +"Unless," she added, "that's what you want." + +And she began to cry. + +She cried as a child cries, with spasms of sobbing, her pretty mouth +spoiled, stretched wide, working, like india-rubber; dull red blotches +creeping up to the brown stains about her eyes. Her tears splashed on to +the fine, black silk web of the sock and sparkled there. + +Emilius had gone from the room, leaving the door open. Mary got up and +shut it. She stood, hesitating. The helpless sobbing drew her, frightened +her, stirred her to exasperation that was helpless too. Her mother had +never been more intolerably dear. + +She went to her. She put her arm round her. + +"Don't, Mamma darling. Why do you let him torture you? He didn't turn Dan +out of the office. He let him go because he can't afford to pay him +enough." + +"I know that as well as you," her mother said surprisingly. + +She drew herself from the protecting arm. + +"Well, then--But, oh, what a brute he is. _What_ a brute!" + +"For shame to talk that way of your father. _You've_ no right. You're the +one that always goes scot-free." + +And, beginning to cry again, she rose and went out, grasping Mark's sock +in her convulsive hand. + +"Mary, did you hear your mother say I bullied you?" + +Her father had come back into the room. + +"Yes," she said. + +"Have I ever bullied you?" + +She looked at him steadily. + +"No. You would have done if Mamma had loved me as much as she loves Mark. +I wish you had. I wish you'd bullied the life out of me. I shouldn't have +cared. I wish you'd hated me. Then I should have known she loved me." + +He looked at her in silence, with round, startled eyes. He understood. + + +II. + +"Ubique--" + +The gunner's motto. Mark's motto, stamped on all the letters he would +write. A blue gun on a blue gun-carriage, the muzzle pointing to the +left. The motto waving underneath: + +"UBIQUE." + +At soldiers' funerals the coffin was carried on a gun-carriage and +covered with a flag. + +"_Ubique quo fas et gloria ducunt_." All through the excitement of the +evening it went on sounding in her head. + +It was Mark's coming of age party in the week before he went. The first +time she could remember being important at a party. Her consciousness of +being important was intense, exquisite. She was Sub-Lieutenant Mark +Olivier's sister. His only one. + +And, besides, she looked nice. + +Last year's white muslin, ironed out, looked as good as new. The blue +sash really was new; and Mamma had lent her one of her necklets, a +turquoise heart on a thin gold chain. In the looking-glass she could see +her eyes shining under her square brown fringe: spots of gold darting +through brown crystal. Her brown hair shone red on the top and gold +underneath. The side pieces, rolled above her ears and plaited behind, +made a fillet for her back hair. Her back hair was too short. She tried +to make it reach to her waist by pulling the curled tips straight; but +they only sprang back to her shoulder-blades again. It was unfortunate. + +Catty, securing the wonderful fillet with a blue ribbon told her not to +be unhappy. She would "do." + +Mamma was beautiful in her lavender-grey silk and her black jet cross +with the diamond star. They all had to stand together, a little behind +her, near the door, and shake hands with the people as they came in. Mary +was surprised that they should shake hands with her before they shook +hands with Mark; it didn't seem right, somehow, when it was his birthday. + +Everybody had come except Aunt Charlotte; even Mr. Marriott, though he +was supposed to be afraid of parties. (You couldn't ask Aunt Charlotte +because of Mr. Marriott.) There were the two Manistys, looking taller and +leaner than ever. And there was Mrs. Draper with Dora and Effie. Mrs. +Draper, black hawk's eyes in purple rings; white powder over crushed +carmines; a black wing of hair folded over grey down. Effie's pretty, +piercing face; small head poised to strike. Dora, a young likeness of +Mrs. Draper, an old likeness of Effie, pretty when Effie wasn't there. + +When they looked at you you saw that your muslin was not as good as new. +When they looked at Mamma you saw that her lavender silk was +old-fashioned and that nobody wore black jet crosses now. You were frilly +and floppy when everybody else was tight and straight in Princess +dresses. + +Mamma was more beautiful than Mrs. Draper; and her hair, anyhow, was in +the fashion, parted at the side, a soft brown wing folded over her left +ear. + +But that made her look small and pathetic--a wounded bird. She ought not +to have been made to look like that. + +You could hear Dora and Effie being kind to Mamma. "Dear Mrs. +Olivier"--Indulgence--Condescension. As if to an unfortunate and rather +foolish person. Mark could see that. He was smiling: a hard, angry smile. + +Mrs. Draper was Mamma's dearest friend. They could sit and talk to each +other about nothing for hours together. In the holidays Mrs. Draper used +to be always coming over to talk to Mamma, always bringing Dora and Effie +with her, always asking Mark and Dan and Roddy to her house, always +wondering why Mark never went. + +Dan went. Dan seemed as if he couldn't keep away. + +This year Mrs. Draper had left off asking Mark and Dan and Roddy. She had +left off bringing Dora and Effie with her. + +Mary wondered why she had brought them now, and why her mother had asked +them. + +The Manistys. She had brought them for the Manistys. She wanted Mamma to +see what she had brought them for. And Mamma had asked them because she +didn't care, and wanted them to see that she didn't care, and that Mark +didn't care either. + +If they only knew how Mark detested them with their "_Dear_ Mrs. +Olivier"! + +Something was going on. She heard Uncle Victor saying to Aunt Lavvy, +"Mark's party is a bit rough on Dan." + +Dan was trying to get to Effie through a gap in the group formed by the +Manistys and two young subalterns, Mark's friends. Each time he did it +Mrs. Draper stopped him by moving somehow so as to fill the gap. He gave +it up at last, to sit by himself at the bottom of the room, jammed into a +corner between the chimney-piece and the rosewood cabinet, where he +stared at Effie with hot, unhappy eyes. + +Supper. Mamma was worried about the supper. She would have liked to have +given them a nicer one, but there wasn't enough money; besides, she was +afraid of what Uncle Victor would think if they were extravagant. That +was the worst of borrowing, Mark said; you couldn't spend so much +afterwards. Still, there was enough wine yet in the cellar for fifty +parties. You could see, now, some advantage in Papa's habit of never +drinking any but the best wine and laying in a large stock of it while he +could. + +Mary noticed that Papa and Dan drank the most. Perhaps Dan drank more +than Papa. The smell of wine was over all the supper, spoiling it, +sending through her nerves a reminiscent shiver of disgust. + +Mark brought her back into the dining-room for the ice she hadn't had. +Dan was there, by himself, sitting in the place Effie had just left. +Effie's glass had still some wine in it. You could see him look for the +wet side of the rim and suck the drops that had touched her mouth. +Something small and white was on the floor beside him. Effie's +pocket-handkerchief. He stooped for it. You could hear him breathing up +the scent on it with big, sighing sobs. + +They slunk back into the drawing-room. + +Mark asked her to play something. + +"Make a noise, Minky. Perhaps they'll go." + +"The Hungarian March." She could play it better than Mamma. Mamma never +could see that the bass might be even more important than the treble. She +was glad that she could play it better than Mamma, and she hated herself +for being glad. + +Mark stood by the piano and looked at her as she played. They talked +under cover of the "Droom--Droom--Droom-era-room." + +"Mark, am I looking too awful?" + +"No. Pretty Minx. Very pretty Minx." + +"We mustn't, Mark. They'll hear us. They'll think us idiots." + +"I don't care if they do. Don't you wish they'd go? Clever Minx. Clever +paws." + +Mamma passed and looked at them. Her face shrank and sharpened under the +dropped wing of her hair. She must have heard what Mark said. She hated +it when Mark talked and looked like that. She hated it when you played +_her_ music. + +Beethoven, then. The "Sonata Eroica" was bound up with "Violetta," the +"Guards" and "Mabel" Waltzes and the "Pluie des Perles." + +"_Ubique quo fas et gloria ducunt_." That was the meaning of the noble, +serious, passionate music. + +Roddy called out, "Oh, _not that_ dull old thing." + +No. Not that. There was the Funeral March in it: _sulle morte d'un eroe_. +Mark was going away. + +"Waldteufel," then. _One_--two--three. _One_--two--three. Sustained thrum +in the bass. One--two--three. Thursday--Friday--_One_--two--three. +Saturday--Sunday. Beat of her thoughts, beat of the music in a sort of +syncopated time. _One_--two--three, Monday. + +On Tuesday Mark would be gone. + +His eyes made her break off to look round. Dan had come back into the +room, to his place between the cabinet and the chimney-piece. He stooped +forward, his head hanging as if some weight dragged it. His eyes, turned +up, staring at Effie, showed half circles of blood-shot white. His face +was flushed. A queer, leaden grey flush. + +Aunt Lavvy sat beside him. She had her hand on his arm, to keep him quiet +there in his corner. + +"Mark--what's the matter with Dan?" + +_One_--two--three. _One_--two--three. Something bumped against the glass +door of the cabinet. A light tinkling crash of a broken pane. She could +see slantwise as she went on playing. Dan was standing up. He swayed, +feeling for the ledge of the cabinet. Then he started to come down the +room, his head lowered, thrust forward, his eyes heavy with some earnest, +sombre purpose. + +He seemed to be hours coming down the room by himself. Hours standing in +the middle of the room, holding on to the parrot chair. + +"Mark!" + +"Go on playing." + +He went to him. Roddy sprang up from somewhere. Hours while they were +getting Dan away from the parrot chair to the door beside the piano. +Hours between the opening and sudden slamming of the door. + +But she had not played a dozen bars. She went on playing. + +"Wait a minute, Effie." + +Effie was standing beside her with her hand on the door. + +"I've lost my pocket-handkerchief. I must have left it in the dining-room. +I _know_ I left it in the dining-room," she said, fussing. + +Mary got up. "All right. I'll fetch it." + +She opened the door and shut it again quickly. + +"I can't go--yet." + + +III. + +Friday, Saturday and Sunday passed, each with a separate, hurrying pace +that quickened towards bed-time. + +Mark's last night. She had left her door open so that she could hear him +come upstairs. He came and sat on her bed as he used to do years ago when +she was afraid of the ghost in the passage. + +"I shan't be away for ever, Minky. Only five years." + +"Yes, but you'll be twenty-six then, and I shall be nineteen. We shan't +be ourselves." + +"I shall be my self. Five years isn't really long." + +"You--you'll like it, Mark. There'll be jungles with bisons and tigers." + +"Yes. Jungles." + +"And polo." + +"Shan't be able to go in for polo." + +"Why not?" + +"Ponies. Too expensive." + +They sat silent. + +"What I _don't_ like," Mark said in a sleepy voice, "is leaving Papa." + +"Papa?" + +He really meant it. "Wish I'd been decenter to him," he said. + +And then: "Minky--you'll be kind to little Mamma." + +"Oh, Mark--aren't I?" + +"Not always. Not when you say funny things about the Bible." + +"You say funny things yourself." + +"Yes; but she thinks I don't mean them, so it doesn't matter." + +"She thinks I don't mean them, either." + +"Well--let her go on thinking it. Do what she wants--even when it's +beastly." + +"It's all very well for you. She doesn't want _you_ to learn the +Thirty-Nine Articles. What would you do if she did?" + +"Learn them, of course. Lie about them, if that would please her." + +She thought: "Mamma didn't want him to be a soldier." + +As if he knew what she was thinking, he said, "She doesn't really mind my +going into the Army. I knew she wouldn't. Besides, I had to." + +"Yes." + +"I'll make it up to her," he said. "I won't do any other thing she +wouldn't like. I won't marry. I won't play polo. I'll live on my pay and +give poor Victor back his money. And there's one good thing about it. +Papa'll be happier when I'm not here." + + +IV. + +"Mark!" + +"Minky!" + +"He had said good-night and gone to his room and come back again to hold +her still tighter in his arms. + +"What?" + +"Nothing," he said. "Only--good-night." + +To-morrow no lingering and no words. Mark's feet quick in the passage. A +door shut to, a short, crushing embrace before he turned from her to her +mother. + +Her mother and she alone together in the emptied room, turning from each +other, without a word. + + +V. + +The wallflowers had grown up under the south side of the garden wall; a +hedge of butterfly-brown and saffron. They gave out a hot, velvet smell, +like roses and violets laced with mignonette. + +Mamma stood looking at the wallflowers, smiling at them, happy, as if +Mark had never gone. + +As if Mark had never gone. + + + + +XV + + +I. + +Mamma whispered to Mrs. Draper, and Aunt Bella whispered to Mamma: +"Fourteen." They always made a mystery about being fourteen. They ought +to have told her. + +Her thoughts about her mother went up and down. Mamma was not helpless. +She was not gentle. She was not really like a wounded bird. She was +powerful and rather cruel. You could only appease her with piles of +hemmed sheets and darned stockings. If you didn't take care she would get +hold of you and never rest till she had broken you, or turned and twisted +you to her own will. She would say it was God's will. She would think it +was God's will. + +They might at least have told you about the pain. The knives of pain. You +had to clench your fists till the fingernails bit into the palms. Over +the ear of the sofa cushions she could feel her hot eyes looking at her +mother with resentment. + +She thought: "You had no business to have me. You had no business to have +me." + +Somebody else's eyes. Somebody else's thoughts. Not yours. Not yours. + +Mamma got up and leaned over you and covered you with the rug. Her white +face quivered above you in the dusk. Her mouth pushed out to yours, +making a small sound like a moan. You heard yourself cry: "Mamma, Mamma, +you are adorable!" + +That was you. + + +II. + +And as if Mark had never gone, as if that awful thing had never happened +to Dan, as if she had never had those thoughts about her mother, her +hidden happiness came back to her. Unhappiness only pushed it to a longer +rhythm. Nothing could take it away. Anything might bring it: the smell of +the white dust on the road; the wind when it came up out of nowhere and +brushed the young wheat blades, beat the green flats into slopes where +the white light rippled and ran like water, set the green field shaking +and tossing like a green sea; the five elm trees, stiff, ecstatic +dancers, holding out the broken-ladder pattern of their skirts; haunting +rhymes, sudden cadences; the grave "_Ubique_" sounding through the +Beethoven Sonata. + +Its thrill of reminiscence passed into the thrill of premonition, of +something about to happen to her. + + + + +XVI + + +I. + +Poems made of the white dust, of the wind in the green corn, of the five +trees--they would be the most beautiful poems in the world. + +Sometimes the images of these things would begin to move before her with +persistence, as if they were going to make a pattern; she could hear a +thin cling-clang, a moving white pattern of sound that, when she tried to +catch it, broke up and flowed away. The image pattern and the sound +pattern belonged to each other, but when she tried to bring them together +they fell apart. + +That came of reading too much Byron. + +How was it that patterns of sound had power to haunt and excite you? Like +the "potnia, potnia nux" that she found in the discarded Longfellow, +stuck before his "Voices of the Night." + +Potnia, potnia nux, hypnodoteira ton polyponon broton, erebothen ithi, +mole, mole katapteros ton Agamemnonion epi domon. + +She wished she knew Greek; the patterns the sounds made were so hard and +still. + +And there were bits of patterns, snapt off, throbbing wounds of sound +that couldn't heal. Lines out of Mark's Homer. + +Mark's Greek books had been taken from her five years ago, when Rodney +went to Chelmsted. And they had come back with Rodney this Easter. They +stood on the shelf in Mark's bedroom, above his writing-table. + +One day she found her mother there, dusting and arranging the books. +Besides the little shabby Oxford Homers there were an Aeschylus, a +Sophocles, two volumes of Aristophanes, clean and new, three volumes of +Euripides and a Greek Testament. On the table a well-preserved Greek +Anthology, bound in green, with the owner's name, J.C. Ponsonby, stamped +on it in gilt letters. She remembered Jimmy giving it to Mark. + +She took the _Iliad_ from its place and turned over the torn, discoloured +pages. + +Her mother looked up, annoyed and uneasy, like a child disturbed in the +possession of its toys. + +"Mark's books are to be kept where Mark put them," she said. + +"But, Mamma, I want them." + +Never in her life had she wanted anything so much as those books. + +"When will you learn not to want what isn't yours?" + +"Mark doesn't want them, or he'd have taken them. He'd give them me if he +was here." + +"He isn't here. I won't have them touched till he comes back." + +"But, Mamma darling, I may be dead. I've had to wait five years as it +is." + +"Wait? What for, I should like to know?" + +"To learn Greek, of course." + +Her mother's face shivered with repugnance. It was incredible that +anybody should hate a poor dead language so. + +"Just because Mark learnt Greek, you think _you_ must try. I thought +you'd grown out of all that tiresome affectation. It was funny when you +were a little thing, but it isn't funny now." + +Her mother sat down to show how tired she was of it. + +"It's just silly vanity." + +Mary's heart made a queer and startling movement, as if it turned over +and dashed itself against her ribs. There was a sudden swelling and +aching in her throat. Her head swam slightly. The room, Mark's room, with +Mark's white bed in one corner and Dan's white bed in the other, had +changed; it looked like a room she had never been in before. She had +never seen that mahogany washstand and the greyish blue flowers on the +jug and basin. The person sitting on the yellow-painted bedroom chair was +a stranger who wore, unaccountably, a brown dress and a gold watch-chain +with a gold tassel that she remembered. She had an odd feeling that this +person had no right to wear her mother's dress and her chain. + +The flash of queerness was accompanied by a sense of irreparable +disaster. Everything had changed; she heard herself speaking, speaking +steadily, with the voice of a changed and unfamiliar person. + +"Mark doesn't think it's vanity. You only think it is because you want +to." + +The mind of this unfamiliar self had a remorseless lucidity that seemed +to her more shocking than anything she could imagine. It went on as if +urged by some supreme necessity. "You're afraid. Afraid." + +It seemed to her that her mother really was afraid. + +"Afraid? And what of?" her mother said. + +The flash went out, leaving her mind dark suddenly and defeated. + +"I don't know what _of_. I only know you're afraid." + +"That's an awful thing for any child to say to any mother. Just because I +won't let you have your own way in everything. Until your will is +resigned to God's will I may well be afraid." + +"How do you know God doesn't want me to know Greek? He may want it as +much as I do." + +"And if you did know it, what good would it do you?" + +She stood staring at her mother, not answering. She knew the sound +patterns were beautiful, and that was all she knew. Beauty. Beauty could +be hurt and frightened away from you. If she talked about it now she +would expose it to outrage. Though she knew that she must appear to her +mother to be stubborn and stupid, even sinful, she put her stubbornness, +her stupidity, her sinfulness, between it and her mother to defend it. + +"I can't tell you," she said. + +"No. I don't suppose you can." + +Her mother followed up the advantage given her. "You just go about +dreaming and mooning as if there was nothing else in the wide world for +you to do. I can't think what's come over you. You used to be content to +sit still and sew by the hour together. You were more help to me when you +were ten than you are now. The other day when I asked you to darn a hole +in your own stocking you looked as if I'd told you to go to your funeral. + +"It's time you began to take an interest in looking after the house. +There's enough to keep you busy most of your time if you only did the +half of it." + +"Is that what you want me to be, Mamma? A servant, like Catty?" + +"Poor Catty. If you were more like Catty," her mother said, "you'd be +happier than you are now, I can tell you. Catty is never disagreeable or +disobedient or discontented." + +"No. But perhaps Catty's mother thinks she is." + +She thought: She _is_ afraid. + +"Do you suppose," her mother said, "it's any pleasure to me to find fault +with my only daughter? If you weren't my only daughter, perhaps I +shouldn't find fault." + +Her new self answered again, implacable in its lucidity. "You mean, if +you'd had a girl you could do what you liked with you'd have let me +alone? You'd have let me alone if you could have done what you liked with +Mark?" + +She noticed, as if it had a separate and significant existence, her +mother's hand lying on the green cover of the Greek Anthology. + +"If you were like Mark--if you were only like him!" + +"If I only were!" + +"Mark never hurt me. Mark never gave me a minute's trouble in his life." + +"He went into the Army." + +"He had a perfect right to go into the Army." + +Silence. "Minky--you'll be kind to little Mamma." A hard, light sound; +the vexed fingers tap-tapping on the book. Her mother rose suddenly, +pushing the book from her. + +"There--take Mark's books. Take everything. Go your own way. You always +have done; you always will. Some day you'll be sorry for it." + +She was sorry for it now, miserable, utterly beaten. Her new self seemed +to her a devil that possessed her. She hated it. She hated the books. She +hated everything that separated her and made her different from her +mother and from Mark. + +Her mother went past her to the door. + +"Mamma--I didn't mean it--Mamma--" + +Before she could reach the door it shut between them. + + +II. + +The library at Five Elms was very small. Emilius used it as a +smoking-room; but it was lined with books. Where the rows of shelves met +the shutter cases a fold of window-curtain overlapped their ends. + +On the fifth shelf, covered by the curtain, she found the four volumes of +Shelley's _Poetical Works_, half-bound in marble-paper and black leather. +She had passed them scores of times in her hunt for something to read. +Percy Bysshe Shelley. Percy Bysshe--what a silly name. She had thought +of him as she thought of Allison's _History of Europe_ in seventeen +volumes, and the poems of Cornwall and Leigh Hunt. Books you wouldn't +read if you were on a desert island. + +There was something about Shelley in Byron's _Life and Letters_. +Something she had read and forgotten, that persisted, struggled to make +itself remembered. + +Shelley's Pantheism. + +The pages of Shelley were very clean; they stuck together lightly at the +edges, like the pages of the Encyclopaedia at "Pantheism" and "Spinoza." +Whatever their secret was, you would have to find it for yourself. + +Table of Contents--Poems written in 1816--"Hymn to Intellectual Beauty." +She read that first. + + "Sudden thy shadow fell on me:-- + I shrieked, and clasped my hands in ecstasy!" + +It had happened to Shelley, too. He knew how you felt when it happened. +(Only you didn't shriek.) It was a real thing, then, that did happen to +people. + +She read the "Ode to a Skylark," the "Ode to the West Wind" and +"Adonais." + +All her secret happiness was there. Shelley knew about the queerness of +the sharp white light, and the sudden stillness, when the grey of the +fields turns to violet: the clear, hard stillness that covers the excited +throb-throbbing of the light. + + "Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, + Stains the white radiance of eternity"-- + +Colours were more beautiful than white radiance. But that was because of +the light. The more light there was in them the more beautiful they were; +it was their real life. + +One afternoon Mr. Propart called. He came into the library to borrow a +book. + +"And what are _you_ so deep in?" he said. + +"Shelley." + +"Shelley? Shelley?" He looked at her. A kind, considering look. She liked +his grey face with its tired keenness. She thought he was going to say +something interesting about Shelley; but he only smiled his thin, +drooping smile; and presently he went away with his book. + +Next morning the Shelleys were not in their place behind the curtain. +Somebody had moved them to the top shelf. Catty brought the step-ladder. + +In the evening they were gone. Mr. Propart must have borrowed them. + + +III. + +"To this, then, comes our whole argument respecting the fourth kind of +madness, on account of which anyone, who, on seeing the beauty in this +lower world, being reminded of the true, begins to recover his wings, +and, having recovered them, longs to soar aloft, but, being unable to do +it, looks upwards like a bird, and despising things below, is deemed to +be affected with madness." + +Beauty in itself. In itself--Beauty in beautiful things. She had never +thought about it that way before. It would be like the white light in the +colours. + +Plato, discovered in looking for the lost Shelleys, thus consoled her. +The Plato of Bohn's Library. Cary's English for Plato's Greek. Slab upon +slab. No hard, still sound-patterns. Grey slabs of print, shining with an +inner light--Plato's thought. + +Her happiness was there, too. + + + + +XVII + + +I. + +The French nephew was listening. He had been listening for quite a long +time, ten minutes perhaps; ever since they had turned off the railway +bridge into Ley Street. + +They had known each other for exactly four hours and seventeen minutes. +She had gone to the Drapers for tea. Rodney had left her on their +doorstep and he had found her there and had brought her into the +dining-room. That, he declared, was at five o'clock, and it was now +seventeen minutes past nine by his watch which he showed her. + +It had begun at tea-time. When he listened he turned round, excitedly, in +his chair; he stooped, bringing his eyes level with yours. When he talked +he tossed back his head and stuck out his sharp-bearded chin. She was not +sure that she liked his eyes. Hot black. Smoky blurs like breath on +glass. Old, tired eyelids. Or his funny, sallowish face, narrowing to the +black chin-beard. Ugly one minute, nice the next. + +It moved too much. He could say all sorts of things with it and with his +shoulders and his hands. Mrs. Draper said that was because he was half +French. + +He was showing her how French verse should be read when Rodney came for +her, and Dr. Draper sent Rodney away and kept her for dinner. + +The French nephew was taking her home now. They had passed the crook of +the road. + +"And all this time," she said, "I don't know your name." + +"Maurice. Maurice Jourdain. I know yours--Mary Olivier. I like it." + +"You wouldn't if you were me and your father kept on saying, 'Mary, Mary, +quite contrary,' and 'Mary had a little lamb.'" + +"Fathers will do these cruel things. It's a way they have." + +"Papa isn't cruel. Only he's so awfully fond of Mamma that he can't think +about _us_. He doesn't mind me so much." + +"Oh--he doesn't mind you so much?" + +"No. It's Mark he can't stand." + +"Who is Mark?" + +"My brother. Mark is a soldier--Royal Artillery." + +"Lucky Mark. I was to have been a soldier." + +"Why weren't you?" + +"My mother wouldn't have liked it. So I had to give it up." + +"How you must have loved her. Mark loves my mother more than anything; +but he couldn't have done that." + +"Perhaps Mark hasn't got to provide for his mother and his sisters. I +had. And I had to go into a disgusting business to do it." + +"Oh-h--" + +He was beautiful inside. He did beautiful things. She was charmed, +suddenly, by his inner, his immaterial beauty. She thought: "He must be +ever so old." + +"But it's made them love you awfully, hasn't it?" she said. + +His shoulders and eyebrows lifted; he made a queer movement with his +hands, palms outwards. He stood still in the path, turned to her, +straight and tall. He looked down at her; his lips jerked; the hard, +sharp smile bared narrow teeth. + +"The more you do for people the less they love you," he said. + +"Your people must be very funny." + +"No. No. They're simply pious, orthodox Christians, and I don't believe +in Christianity. I'm an atheist. I don't believe their God exists. I hope +he doesn't. They wouldn't mind so much if I were a villain, too, but +it's awkward for them when they find an infidel practising any of the +Christian virtues. My eldest sister, Ruth, would tell you that I _am_ a +villain." + +"She doesn't really think it." + +"Doesn't she! My dear child, she's got to think it, or give up her +belief." + +She could see the gable end of Five Elms now. It would soon be over. When +they got to the garden gate. + +It _was_ over. + +"I suppose," he said, "I must shut the prison door." + +They looked at each other through the bars and laughed. + +"When shall I see you again?" he said. + + +II. + +She had seen him again. She could count the times on the fingers of one +hand. Once, when he came to dinner with Dr. and Mrs. Draper; once at +Sunday supper with the Drapers after Church; once on a Saturday when Mrs. +Draper asked her to tea again; and once when he called to take her for a +walk in the fields. + +Mamma had lifted her eyebrows and Mrs. Draper said, "Nonsense. He's old +enough to be her father." + +The green corn stood above her ankles then. This was the fifth time. The +corn rose to her waist. The ears were whitening. + +"You're the only person besides Mark who listens. There was Jimmy. But +that was different. He didn't know things. He's a darling, but he doesn't +know things." + +"Who is Jimmy?" + +"Mark's friend and mine." + +"_Where_ is he?" + +"In Australia. He can't ever come back, so I shall never see him again." + +"I'm glad to hear it." + +A sudden, dreadful doubt. She turned to him in the narrow path. + +"You aren't laughing at me, are you? You don't think I'm shamming and +showing off?" + +"I? I? Laughing at you? My poor child--No--" + +"They don't understand that you can really love words--beautiful sounds. +And thoughts. Love them awfully, as if they were alive. As if they were +people." + +"They are alive. They're better than people. You know the best of your +Shelley and Plato and Spinoza. Instead of the worst." + +"I should have liked to have known them, too. Sometimes I pretend that I +do know them. That they're alive. That they're here. Saying things and +listening. They're kind. They never misunderstand. They never lose their +tempers." + +"You mustn't do that," he said sharply. + +"Why not?" + +"It isn't good for you. Talk to me. I'm alive. I'm here, I'll listen. +I'll never misunderstand. I'll never lose my temper." + +"You aren't always here." + +He smiled, secretly, with straight lips, under the funny, frizzy, French +moustache. And when he spoke again he looked old and wise, like an uncle. + +"Wait," he said. "Wait a bit. Wait three years." + +"Three years?" she said. "Three years before we can go for another walk?" + +He shouted laughter and drew it back with a groan. + +She couldn't tell him that she pretended he was there when he was not +there; that she created situations. + +He was ill, and she nursed him. She could feel the weight of his head +against her arm, and his forehead--hot--hot under her hand. She had felt +her hands to see whether they would be nice enough to put on Mr. +Jourdain's forehead. They were rather nice; cool and smooth; the palms +brushed together with a soft, swishing sound like fine silk. + +He was poor and she worked for him. + +He was in danger and she saved him. From a runaway horse; from a furious +dog; from a burning house; from a lunatic with a revolver. + +It made her sad to think how unlikely it was that any of these things +would ever happen. + + +III. + +"Mr. Jourdain, I am going to school." + +The corn was reaped and carried. The five elms stood high above the +shallow stubble. + +"My poor Mary, is it possible?" + +"Yes. Mamma says she's been thinking of it for a long time." + +"Don't be too hard on your mother till you're quite sure it wasn't my +aunt." + +"It may have been both of them. Anyhow, it's awful. Just--just when I was +so happy." + +"Just when I was so happy," he said. "But that's the sort of thing they +do." + +"I knew you'd be sorry for me." + + + + +XVIII + + +I. + +She was shut up with Papa, tight, in the narrow cab that smelt of the +mews. Papa, sitting slantways, nearly filled the cab. He was quiet and +sad, almost as if he were sorry she was going. + +His sadness and quietness fascinated her. He had a mysterious, wonderful, +secret life going on in him. Funny you should think of it for the first +time in the cab. Supposing you stroked his hand. Better not. He mightn't +like it. + +Not forty minutes from Liverpool Street to Victoria. If only cabs didn't +smell so. + + +II. + +The small, ugly houses streamed past, backs turned to the train, stuck +together, rushing, rushing in from the country. + +Grey streets, trying to cut across the stream, getting nowhere, carried +past sideways on. + +Don't look at the houses. Shut your eyes and remember. + +Her father's hand on her shoulder. His face, at the carriage window, +looking for her. A girl moving back, pushing her to it. "Papa!" + +Why hadn't she loved him all the time? Why hadn't she liked his beard? +His nice, brown, silky beard. His poor beard. + +Mamma's face, in the hall, breaking up suddenly. Her tears in your mouth. +Her arms, crushing you. Mamma's face at the dining-room window. Tears, +pricking, cutting your eyelids. Blink them back before the girls see +them. Don't think of Mamma. + +The Thames. Barking Creek goes into the Thames and the Roding goes into +Barking Creek. Yesterday, the last walk with Roddy, across Barking Flats +to the river, over the dry, sallow grass, the wind blowing in their +faces. Roddy's face, beautiful, like Mamma's, his mouth, white at the +edges. Roddy gasping in the wind, trying to laugh, his heart thumping. +Roddy was excited when he saw the tall masts of the ships. He had wanted +to be a sailor. + +Dan's face, when he said good-bye; his hurt, unhappy eyes; the little +dark, furry moustache trying to come. Tibby's eyes. Dank wanted to marry +Effie. Mark was the only one who got what he wanted. + +Better not think of Dank. + +She looked shyly at her companions. The stout lady in brown, sitting +beside her; kind, thin mouth, pursed to look important; dull kind eyes +trying to be wise and sharp behind spectacles, between curtains of dead +hair. A grand manner, excessively polite, on the platform, to Papa--Miss +Lambert. + +The three girls, all facing them. Pam Quin; flaxen pigtail; grown up +nose; polite mouth, buttoned, little flaxen and pink old lady, Pam Quin, +talking about her thirteenth birthday. + +Lucy Elliott, red pig-tail, suddenly sad in her corner, innocent +white-face, grey eyes blinking to swallow her tears. Frances Elliott, hay +coloured pig-tail, very upright, sitting forward and talking fast to hide +her sister's shame. + +Mamma's face--Don't think of it. + +Green fields and trees rushing past now. Stop a tree and you'll change +and feel the train moving. Plato. You can't trust your senses. The +cave-dwellers didn't see the things that really moved, only the shadows +of the images of the things. Is the world in your mind or your mind in +the world? Which really moves? Perhaps the world stands still and you +move on and on like the train. If both moved together that would feel +like standing still. + +Grass banks. Telegraph wires dipping and rising like sea-waves. At Dover +there would be the sea. + +Mamma's face--Think. Think harder. The world was going on before your +mind started. Supposing you lived before, would that settle it? No. A +white chalk cutting flashed by. God's mind is what both go on in. That +settles it. + +The train dashed into a tunnel. A long tunnel. She couldn't remember what +she was thinking of the second before they went in. Something that +settled it. Settled what? She couldn't think any more. + +Dover. The girls standing up, and laughing. They said she had gone to +sleep in the train. + + +III. + +There was no sea; only the Maison Dieu Road and the big square house in +the walled garden. Brown wire blinds half way up the schoolroom windows. +An old lady with grey hair and a kind, blunt face, like Jenny; she +unpacked your box in the large, light bedroom, folding and unfolding your +things with little gentle, tender hands. Miss Haynes. She hoped you would +be happy with them, hoped you wouldn't mind sleeping alone the first +night, thought you must be hungry and took you down to tea in the long +dining-room. + +More girls, pretending not to look at you; talking politely to Miss +Lambert. + +After tea they paired off, glad to see each other. She sat in the corner +of the schoolroom reading the new green Shakespeare that Roddy had given +her. Two girls glanced at her, looked at each other. "Is she doing it for +fun?" "Cheek, more likely." + +Night. A strange white bed. Two empty beds, strange and white, in the +large, light room. She wondered what sort of girls would be sleeping +there to-morrow night. A big white curtain: you could draw it across the +room and shut them out. + +She lay awake, thinking of her mother, crying now and then; thinking of +Roddy and Dan. Mysterious, measured sounds came through the open window. +That was the sea. She got up and looked out. The deep-walled garden lay +under the window, black and clear like a well. Calais was over there. And +Paris. Mr. Jourdain had written to say he was going to Paris. She had his +letter. + +In bed she felt for the sharp edge of the envelope sticking out under the +pillow. She threw back the hot blankets. The wind flowed to her, running +cold like water over the thin sheet. + +A light moved across the ceiling. Somebody had waked her. Somebody was +putting the blankets back again, pressing a large, kind hand to her +forehead. Miss Lambert. + + +IV. + +"Mais--mais--de grâce! ça ne finira jamais--jamais, s'il faut répondre à +tes sottises, Marie. Recommençons." + +Mademoiselle, golden top-knot shining and shaking, blue eyes rolling +between black lashes. + + "De ta tige détachée, + Pauvre feuille dessechée"-- + +Détachée--desséchée. They didn't rhyme. Their not rhyming irritated her +distress. + +She hated the schoolroom: the ochreish wall-paper, the light soiled by +the brown wire gauze; the cramped classes, the faint odour of girl's +skin; girl's talk in the bedroom when you undressed. + +The queer she-things had a wonderful, mysterious life you couldn't touch. + +Clara, when she walked with you, smiling with her black-treacle eyes and +bad teeth, glad to be talked to. Clara in bed. You bathed her forehead +with eau-de-cologne, and she lay there, happy, glad of her headache that +made them sorry for her. Clara, waiting for you at the foot of the +stairs, looking with dog's eyes, imploring. "Will you walk with me?" "I +can't. I'm going with Lucy." She turned her wounded dog's eyes and slunk +away, beaten, humble, to walk with the little ones. + +Lucy Elliott in the bathing machine, slipping from the cloak of the +towel, slender and straight; sea water gluing red weeds of hair to her +white skin. Sweet eyes looking towards you in the evening at sewing-time. + +"Will you sit with me at sewing?" + +"I'm sitting with Rose Godwin." + +Sudden sweetness; sudden trouble; grey eyes dark and angry behind sudden +tears. She wouldn't look at you; wouldn't tell you what you had done. + +Rose Godwin, strong and clever; fourteen; head of the school. Honey-white +Roman face; brown-black hair that smelt like Brazilian nuts. Rose Godwin +walking with you in the garden. + +"You must behave like other people if you expect them to like you." + +"I don't expect them. How do I behave?" + +"It isn't exactly behaving. It's more the way you talk and look at +people. As if you saw slap through them. Or else as if you didn't see +them at all. That's worse. People don't like it." + +"Anything else?" + +"Yes. It was cheeky of you to tell Mademoiselle that those French verses +didn't rhyme." + +"But they didn't." + +"Who cares?" + +"I care. I care frightfully." + +"There you go. That's exactly what I mean," Rose said. "Who cares if you +care? And there's another thing. You're worrying Miss Lambert. This +school of hers has got a name for sound religious teaching. You may not +like sound religious teaching, but she's got fifteen of us to look after +besides you. If you want to be an atheist, go and be it by yourself." + +"I'm not an atheist." + +"Well, whatever silly thing you are. You mustn't talk about it to the +girls. It isn't fair," Rose said. + +"All right. I won't." + +"On your honour?" + +"On my honour." + + +V. + +A three-cornered note on her dressing-table at bed-time: + +Sept. 20th, 1878. Maison Dieu Lodge. + +"My dear Mary: Our talk was not satisfactory. Unless you can assure me by +to-morrow morning that you believe in the Blessed Trinity and all the +other truths of our most holy religion, I fear that, _much as we love +you_, we dare not keep you with us, for your school-fellows' sake. + +"Think it over, my dear child, and let me know. Pray to God _to-night_ to +change your heart and mind and give you His Holy Spirit. + +"Affectionately yours, + +"Henrietta Lambert." + +The Trinity. A three-cornered note. + +"My dear Miss Lambert: I am very sorry; but it really isn't any good, and +if it was it couldn't be done in the time. You wouldn't like it if I told +you lies, would you? That's why I can't join in the prayers and say the +Creed and bow; in Church or anywhere. Rose made me promise not to talk +about it, and I won't. + +"If you must send me away to-morrow morning, you must. But I'm glad you +love me. I was afraid you didn't. + +"With love, your very affectionate + +"Mary Olivier." + +"P.S.--I've folded my clothes all ready for packing." + +To-morrow the clothes were put back again in their drawers. She wasn't +going. Miss Lambert said something about Rose and Lucy and "kindness to +poor Clara." + + +VI. + +Rose Godwin told her that home-sickness wore off. It didn't. It came +beating up and up, like madness, out of nothing. The French verbs, grey, +slender as little verses on the page, the French verbs swam together and +sank under the clear-floating images of home-sickness. Mamma's face, +Roddy's, Dan's face. Tall trees, the Essex fields, flat as water, falling +away behind them. Little feathery trees, flying low on the sky-line. +Outside the hallucination the soiled light shut you in. + +The soiled light; odours from the warm roots of girl's hair; and Sunday. +Sunday; stale odours of churches. You wrote out the sermon you had not +listened to and had not heard. Somebody told you the text, and you amused +yourself by seeing how near you could get to what you would have heard if +you had listened. After tea, hymns; then church again. Your heart +laboured with the strain of kneeling, arms lifted up to the high pew +ledge. You breathed pew dust. Your brain swayed like a bladder, brittle, +swollen with hot gas-fumes. After supper, prayers again. Sunday was over. + +On Monday, the tenth day, she ran away to Dover Harbour. She had thought +she could get to London with two weeks' pocket-money and what was left of +Uncle Victor's tip after she had paid for the eau-de-cologne; but the +ticket man said it would only take her as far as Canterbury. She had +frightened Miss Lambert and made her tremble: all for nothing, except the +sight of the Harbour. It was dreadful to see her tremble. Even the +Harbour wasn't worth it. + +A miracle would have to happen. + +Two weeks passed and three weeks. And on the first evening of the fourth +week the miracle happened. Rose Godwin came to her and whispered: "You're +wanted in the dining-room." + +Her mother's letter lay open on the table. A tear had made a glazed +snail's track down Miss Lambert's cheek; and Mary thought that one of +them was dead--Roddy--Dan--Papa. + +"My dear, my dear--don't cry. You're going home." + +"Why? Why am I going?" + +She could see the dull, kind eyes trying to look clever. + +"Because your mother has sent for you. She wants you back again." + +"Mamma? What does she want me for?" + +Miss Lambert's eyes turned aside slantways. She swallowed something in +her throat, making a funny noise: qualk-qualk. + +"It isn't _you_? You aren't sending me away?" + +"No; we're not sending you. But we think it's best for you to go. We +can't bear to see your dear, unhappy little face going about the +passages." + +"Does it mean that Mamma isn't happy without me?" + +"Well--she _would_ miss her only daughter, wouldn't she?" + +The miracle. The shining, lovely miracle. + +"Mary Olivier is going! Mary Olivier is going!" + +Actually the girls were sorry. Too sorry. The compassion in Rose Godwin's +face stirred a doubt. Doubt of the miracle. + +She carried her books to the white curtained room where Miss Haynes knelt +by her trunk, packing her clothes with little gentle, tender hands. + +"Miss Haynes" (suddenly), "I'm not expelled, am I?" + +"Expelled? My dear child, who's talking about expulsion?" + +As if she said, When miracles are worked for you, accept them. + +She lay awake, thinking what she should say to her mother when she got +home. She would have to tell her that just at first she very nearly _was_ +expelled. Then her mother would believe in her unbelief and not think she +was shamming. + +And she would have to explain about her unbelief. And about Pantheism. + + +VII. + +She wondered how she would set about it. It wouldn't do to start suddenly +by saying you didn't believe in Jesus or the God of the Old Testament or +Hell. That would hurt her horribly. The only decent thing would be to let +her see how beautiful Spinoza's God was and leave it to her to make the +comparison. + +You would have to make it quite clear to yourself first. It was like +this. There were the five elm trees, and there was the happy white light +on the fields. God was the trees. He was the happy light and he was your +happiness. There was Catty singing in the kitchen. God was Catty. + +Oh--and there was Papa and Papa's temper. God would have to be Papa too. + +Spinoza couldn't have meant it that way. + +He meant that though God was all Papa, Papa was not all God. He was only +a bit of him. He meant that if God was the only reality, Papa wouldn't be +quite real. + +But if Papa wasn't quite real then Mamma and Mark were not quite real +either. + +If Spinoza had meant that-- + +But perhaps he hadn't. Perhaps he meant that parts of Papa, the parts you +saw most of--his beard, for instance, and his temper--were not quite +real, but that some other part of him, the part you couldn't see, might +be real in the same way that God was. That would be Papa himself, and it +would be God too. And if God could be Papa, he would have no difficulty +at all in being Mamma and Mark. + +Surely Mamma would see that, if you had to have a God, Spinoza's was by +far the nicest God, besides being the easiest to believe in. Surely it +would please her to think like that about Papa, to know that his temper +was not quite real, and that your sin, when you sinned, was not quite +real, so that not even your sin could separate you from God. All your +life Mamma had dinned into you the agony of separation from God, and the +necessity of the Atonement. She would feel much more comfortable if she +knew that there never had been any separation, and that there needn't be +any Atonement. + +Of course she might not like the idea of sin being somehow inside God. +She might say it looked bad. But if it wasn't inside God, it would have +to be outside him, supporting itself and causing itself, and then where +were you? You would have to say that God was not the cause of all things, +and that would be much worse. + +Surely if you put it to her like that--? But somehow she couldn't hear +herself saying all that to her mother. Supposing Mamma wouldn't listen? + +And she couldn't hear herself talking about her happiness, the sudden, +secret happiness that more than anything was like God. When she thought +of it she was hot and cold by turns and she had no words for it. She +remembered the first time it had come to her, and how she had found her +mother in the drawing-room and had knelt down at her knees and kissed her +hands with the idea of drawing her into her happiness. And she remembered +her mother's face. It made her ashamed, even now, as if she had been +silly. She thought: I shall never be able to talk about it to Mamma. + +Yet--perhaps--now that the miracle had happened-- + + +VIII. + +In the morning Miss Lambert took her up to London. She had a sort of idea +that the kind lady talked to her a great deal, about God and the +Christian religion. But she couldn't listen; she couldn't talk; she +couldn't think now. + +For three hours, in the train, in the waiting-room at Victoria, while +Miss Lambert talked to Papa outside, in the cab, alone with Papa--Miss +Lambert must have said something nice about her, for he looked pleased, +as if he wouldn't mind if you did stroke his hand--in Mr. Parish's +wagonette, she sat happy and still, contemplating the shining, lovely +miracle. + + +IX. + +She saw Catty open the front door and run away. Her mother was coming +slowly down the narrow hall. + +She ran up the flagged path. + +"Mamma!" She flung herself to the embrace. + +Her mother swerved from her, staggering back and putting out her hands +between them. Aware of Mr. Parish shouldering the trunk, she turned into +the open dining-room. Mary followed her and shut the door. + +Her mother sat down, helplessly. Mary saw that she was crying; she had +been crying a long time. Her soaked eyelashes were parted by her tears +and gathered into points. + +"Mamma--what is it?" + +"What is it? You've disgraced yourself. Everlastingly. You've disgraced +your father, and you've disgraced me. That's what it is." + +"I haven't done anything of the sort, Mamma." + +"You don't think it's a disgrace, then, to be expelled? For infidelity." + +"But I'm not expelled." + +"You are expelled. And you know it." + +"No. They said I wasn't. They didn't want me to go. They told me you +wanted me back again." + +"Is it likely I should want you when you hadn't been gone three weeks?" + +She could hear herself gasp, see herself standing there, open-mouthed, +idiotic. + +Nothing could shake her mother in her belief that she had been expelled. + +"Of course, if it makes you happier to believe it," she said at last, +"do. Will you let me see Miss Lambert's letter?" + +"No," her mother said. "I will not." + +Suddenly she felt hard and strong, grown-up in her sad wisdom. Her mother +didn't love her. She never had loved her. Nothing she could ever do would +make her love her. Miracles didn't happen. + +She thought: "I wonder why she won't let me see Miss Lambert's letter?" + +She went upstairs to her room. She leaned on the sill of the open window, +looking out, drinking in the sweet air of the autumn fields. The five +elms raised golden heads to a blue sky. + +Her childhood had died with a little gasp. + +Catty came in to unpack her box. Catty, with wet cheeks, kissed a dead +child. + + + + +XIX + + +I. + +In the train from Bristol to Paddington for the last time: July, +eighteen-eighty. + +She would never see any of them again: Ada and Geraldine; Mabel and +Florrie and little Lena and Kate; Miss Wray with her pale face and angry +eyes; never hear her sudden, cold, delicious praise. Never see the bare, +oblong schoolroom with the brown desks, seven rows across for the lower +school, one long form along the wall for Class One where she and Ada and +Geraldine sat apart. Never look through the bay windows over the lea to +the Channel, at sunset, Lundy Island flattened out, floating, gold on +gold in the offing. Never see magenta valerian growing in hot white grey +walls. + +Never hear Louie Prichard straining the little music room with Chopin's +_Fontana_ Polonaise. Never breathe in its floor-dust with the _Adagio_ of +the "Pathetic Sonata." + +She was glad she had seen it through to the end when the clergymen's and +squires' daughters went and the daughters of Bristol drapers and +publicans and lodging-house keepers came. + +("What do you think! Bessie Parson's brother marked all her +underclothing. In the shop!") + +But they taught you quite a lot of things: Zoology, Physiology, Paley's +Evidences, British Law, Political Economy. It had been a wonderful school +when Mrs. Propart's nieces went to it. And they kept all that up when the +smash came and the butter gave out, and you ate cheap bread that tasted +of alum, and potatoes that were fibrous skeletons in a green pulp. +Oh--she had seen it through. A whole year and a half of it. + +Why? Because you promised Mamma you'd stick to the Clevehead School +whatever it was like? Because they taught you German and let you learn +Greek by yourself with the old arithmetic master? (Ada Clark said it was +a mean trick to get more marks.) Because of the Beethoven and Schumann +and Chopin, and Lundy Island, and the valerian? Because nothing mattered, +not even going hungry? + +She was glad she hadn't told about that, nor why she asked for the "room +to herself" that turned out to be a servants' garret on a deserted floor. +You could wake at five o'clock in the light mornings and read Plato, or +snatch twenty minutes from undressing before Miss Payne came for your +candle. The tall sycamore swayed in the moonlight, tapping on the window +pane; its shadow moved softly in the room like a ghost. + + +II. + +She would like to see the valerian again, though. Mamma said it didn't +grow in Yorkshire. + +Funny to be going back to Ilford after Roddy and Papa and Mamma had left +it. Funny to be staying at Five Elms with Uncle Victor. Nice Uncle +Victor, buying the house from Papa and making Dan live with them. That +was to keep him from drinking. Uncle Victor was hurt because Papa and +Mamma would go to Morfe when he wanted you all to live with him. But you +couldn't imagine Emilius and Victor living together or Mamma and Aunt +Lavvy. + +Bristol to Paddington. This time next week it would be King's Cross to +Reyburn for Morfe. + +She wondered what it would be like. Aunt Bella said it was a +dead-and-alive place. Morfe--Morfe. It did sound rather as if people died +in it. Aunt Bella was angry with Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin for making +Mamma go there. But Aunt Bella had never liked Mrs. Waugh and Miss +Frewin. That was because they had been Mamma's friends at school and not +Aunt Bella's. + +She wondered what they would be like, and whether they would disapprove +of her. They would if they believed she had been expelled from Dover and +had broken Mamma's heart. All Mamma's friends thought that. + +She didn't mind going to Morfe so much. The awful thing was leaving +Ilford. Ilford was part of Mark, part of her, part of her and Mark +together. There were things they had done that never in all their lives +they could do again. Waldteufel Waltzes played on the old Cramer piano, +standing in its place by the door, waltzes that would never sound the +same in any other place in any other room. And there was the sumach tree. +It would die if you transplanted it. + + +III. + +The little thin, sallow old man, coming towards her on the platform at +Paddington, turned out to be Uncle Victor. She had not seen him since +Christmas, for at Easter he had been away somewhere on business. + +He came slowly, showing a smile of jerked muscles, under cold fixed eyes. +He was not really glad to see her. That was because he disapproved of +her. They all believed she had been expelled from the Dover school, and +they didn't seem able to forget it. Going down from Liverpool Street to +Ilford he sat bowed and dejected in his corner, not looking at her unless +he could help it. + +"How's Aunt Charlotte?" She thought he would be pleased to think that she +had remembered Aunt Charlotte; but he winced as if she had hit him. + +"She is--not so well." And then: "How have you been getting on?" + +"Oh, all right. I've got the Literature prize again, and the French prize +and the German prize; and I might have got the Good Conduct prize too." + +"And why didn't you get it?" + +"Because I gave it up. Somebody else had to have a prize, and Miss Wray +said she knew it was the one I could best bear to part with." + +Uncle Victor frowned as if he were displeased. + +"You don't seem to consider that I gave it up," she said. But he had +turned his eyes away. He wasn't listening any more, as he used to listen. + +The train was passing the City of London Cemetery. She thought: "I must +go and see Jenny's grave before I leave. I wish I hadn't teased her so to +love me." She thought: "If I die I shall be put in the grass plot beside +Grandpapa and Grandmamma Olivier. Papa will bring me in a coffin all the +way from Morfe in the train." Little birch bushes were beginning to grow +among the graves. She wondered how she could ever have been afraid of +those graves and of their dead. + +Uncle Victor was looking at the graves too; queerly, with a sombre, +passionate interest. When the train had passed them he sighed and shut +his eyes, as if he wanted to keep on seeing them--to keep on. + +As Mr. Parish's wagonette drove up Ley Street he pointed to a field where +a street of little houses had begun. + +"Some day they'll run a street over Five Elms. But I shan't know anything +about it," he said. + +"No. It won't be for ages." + +He smiled queerly. + +They drew up at the gate. "You must be prepared for more changes," he +said. + +Aunt Lavvy was at the gate. She was sweet as if she loved you, and sad as +if she still remembered your disgrace. + +"No. Not that door," she said. + +The dining-room and drawing-room had changed places, and both were filled +with the large mahogany furniture that had belonged to Grandpapa. + +"Why, you've turned it back to front." + +Strips of Mamma's garden shone between the dull maroon red curtains. +Inside the happy light was dead. + +There seemed to her something sinister about this change. Only the two +spare rooms still looked to the front. They had put her in one of them +instead of her old room on the top floor; Dan had the other instead of +his. It was very queer. + +Aunt Lavvy sat in Mamma's place at the head of the tea-table. A tall, +iron-grey woman in an iron-grey gown stood at her elbow holding a little +tray. She looked curiously at Mary, as if her appearance there surprised +and interested her. Aunt Lavvy put a cup of tea on the tray. + +"Where's Aunt Charlotte?" + +"Aunt Charlotte is upstairs. She isn't very well." + +The maid was saying, "Miss Charlotte asked for a large piece of plum +cake, ma'am," and Aunt Lavvy added a large piece of plum cake to the +plate of thin bread and butter. + +Mary thought: "There can't be much the matter with her if she can eat all +that." + +"Can I see her?" she said. + +She heard the woman whisper, "Better not." She was glad when she left the +room. + +"Has old Louisa gone, then?" + +"No," Aunt Lavvy said. She added presently, "That is Aunt Charlotte's +maid." + + +IV. + +Aunt Charlotte looked out through the bars of the old nursery window. She +nodded to Mary and called to her to come up. + +Aunt Lavvy said it did her good to see people. + +There was a door at the head of the stairs, in a matchboard partition +that walled the well of the staircase. You rang a bell. The corridor was +very dark. Another partition with a door in it shut off the servants' +rooms and the back staircase. They had put the big yellow linen cupboard +before the tall window, the one she used to hang out of. + +Some of the old things had been left in the nursery schoolroom, so that +it looked much the same. Britton, the maid, sat in Jenny's low chair by +the fireguard. Aunt Charlotte sat in an armchair by the window. + +Her face was thin and small; the pencil lines had deepened; the long +black curls hung from a puff of grey hair rolled back above her ears. Her +eyes pointed at you--pointed. They had more than ever their look of +wisdom and excitement. She was twisting and untwisting a string of white +tulle round a sprig of privet flower. + +"Don't you believe a word of it," she said. "Your father hasn't gone. +He's here in this house. He's in when Victor's out. + +"He says he's sold the house to Victor. That's a lie. He doesn't want it +known that he's hidden me here to prevent my getting married." + +"I'm sure he hasn't," Mary said. Across the room Britton looked at her +and shook her head. + +"It's all part of a plan," Aunt Charlotte said. "To put me away, my dear. +Dr. Draper's in it with Victor and Emilius. + +"They may say what they like. It isn't the piano-tuner. It isn't the man +who does the clocks. They know who it is. It isn't that Marriott man. +I've found out something about _him_ they don't know. He's got a false +stomach. It goes by clockwork. + +"As if I'd look at a clock-tuner or a piano-winder. I wouldn't, would I, +Britton?" + +She meditated, smiling softly. "They make them so beautifully now, you +can't tell the difference. + +"He's been to see me nine times in one week. Nine times. But your Uncle +Victor got him away before he could speak. But he came again and again. +He wouldn't take 'No' for an answer. Britton, how many times did Mr. +Jourdain come?" + +Britton said, "I'm sure I couldn't say, Miss Charlotte." She made a sign +to Mary to go. + +Aunt Lavvy was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs. She took her +into her bedroom, Mamma's old room, and asked her what Aunt Charlotte had +said. Mary told her. + +"Poor Mary--I oughtn't to have let you see her." + +Aunt Lavvy's chin trembled. "I'm afraid," she said, "the removal's upset +her. I said it would. But Emilius would have it. He could always make +Victor do what he wanted." + +"It might have been something you don't know about." + +Grown-up and strong, she wanted to comfort Aunt Lavvy and protect her. + +"No," Aunt Lavvy said. "It's the house. I knew it would be. She's been +trying to get away. She never did that before." + +(The doors and the partitions, the nursery and its bars, the big cupboard +across the window, to keep her from getting away.) + +"Aunt Lavvy, did Mr. Jourdain really call?" + +Aunt Lavvy hesitated. "Yes. He called." + +"Did he see Aunt Charlotte?" + +"She was in the room when he came in, but your uncle took him out at +once." + +"She didn't talk to him? Did he hear her talking?" + +"No, my dear, I'm sure he didn't." + +"Are you sure he didn't see her?" + +Aunt Lavvy smiled. "He didn't look. I don't think he saw any of us very +clearly." + +"How many times did he come?" + +"Three or four times, I believe." + +"Did he ask to see me?" + +"No. He asked to see your Uncle Victor." + +"I didn't know he knew Uncle Victor." + +"Well," Aunt Lavvy said, "he knows him now." + +"Did he leave any message for me?" + +"No. None." + +"You don't like him, Aunt Lavvy." + +"No, Mary, I do not. And I don't know anybody who does." + +"I like him," Mary said. + +Aunt Lavvy looked as if she hadn't heard. "I oughtn't to have let you see +Aunt Charlotte." + + +V. + +Mary woke up suddenly. It was her third night in the spare room at Five +Elms. + +She had dreamed that she saw Aunt Charlotte standing at the foot of the +basement stairs, by the cat's cupboard where the kittens were born, +taking her clothes off and hiding them. She had seen that before. When +she was six years old. She didn't know whether she had been dreaming +about something that had really happened, or about a dream. Only, this +time, she saw Aunt Charlotte open her mouth and scream. The scream woke +her. + +She remembered her mother and Aunt Bertha in the drawing-room, talking, +their faces together. That wasn't a dream. + +There was a sound of feet overhead. Uncle Victor's room. A sound of a +door opening and shutting. And then a scream, muffled by the shut door. +Her heart checked; turned sickeningly. She hadn't dreamed that. + +Uncle Victor shouted down the stair to Dan. She could hear Dan's feet in +the next room and his door opening. + +The screaming began again: "I-ihh! I-ihh! I-ihh!" Up and up, tearing your +brain. Then: "Aah-a-o-oh!" Tearing your heart out. "Aa-h-a-o-oh!" and +"Ahh-ahh!" Short and sharp. + +She threw off the bed-clothes, and went out to the foot of the stairs. +The cries had stopped. There was a sound of feet staggering and +shuffling. Somebody being carried. + +Dan came back down the stair. His trousers were drawn up over his +night-shirt, the braces hanging. He was sucking the back of his hand and +spitting the blood out on to his sleeve. + +"Dan--was that Aunt Charlotte?" + +"Yes." + +"Was it pain?" + +"No." He was out of breath. She could see his night-shirt shake with the +beating of his heart. + +"Have you hurt your hand?" + +"No." + +"Can I do anything?" + +"No. Go back to bed. She's all right now." + +She went back. Presently she heard him leave his room and go upstairs +again. The bolt of the front door squeaked; then the hinge of the gate. +Somebody going out. She fell asleep. + +The sound of hoofs and wheels woke her. The room was light. She got up +and went to the open window. Dr. Draper's black brougham stood at the +gate. + +The sun blazed, tree-high, on the flat mangold field across the road. The +green leaves had the cold glitter of wet, pointed metal. To the +north-east a dead smear of dawn. The brougham didn't look like itself, +standing still in that unearthly light. As if it were taking part in a +funeral, the funeral of some dreadful death. She put on her dressing-gown +and waited, looking out. She _had_ to look. Downstairs the hall clock +struck a half-hour. + +The front door opened. Britton came out first. Then Aunt Charlotte, +between Uncle Victor and Dr. Draper. They were holding her up by her +arm-pits, half leading, half pushing her before them. Her feet made a +brushing noise on the flagstones. + +They lifted her into the brougham and placed themselves one on each side +of her. Then Britton got in, and they drove off. + +A string of white tulle lay on the garden path. + +END OF BOOK THREE + + + + +BOOK FOUR +MATURITY (1879-1900) + + +XX + + +I. + +The scent of hay came through the open window of her room. Clearer and +finer than the hay smell of the Essex fields. + +She shut her eyes to live purely in that one sweet sense; and opened them +to look at the hill, the great hill heaved up against the east. + +You had to lean far out of the window to see it all. It came on from the +hidden north, its top straight as a wall against the sky. Then the long +shoulder, falling and falling. Then the thick trees. A further hill cut +the trees off from the sky. + +Roddy was saying something. Sprawling out from the corner of the +window-seat, he stared with sulky, unseeing eyes into the little room. + +"Roddy, what did you say that hill was?" + +"Greffington Edge. You aren't listening." + +His voice made a jagged tear in the soft, quiet evening. + +"And the one beyond it?" + +"Sarrack. Why can't you listen?" + +Greffington Edge. Sarrack. Sarrack. + +Green fields coming on from the north, going up and up, netted in with +the strong net of the low grey walls that held them together, that kept +them safe. Above them thin grass, a green bloom on the grey face of the +hill. Above the thin grass a rampart of grey cliffs. + +Roddy wouldn't look at the hill. + +"I tell you," he said, "you'll loathe the place when you've lived a week +in it." + +The thick, rich trees were trying to climb the Edge, but they couldn't +get higher than the netted fields. + +The lean, ragged firs had succeeded. No. Not quite. They stood out +against the sky, adventurous mountaineers, roped together, leaning +forward with the effort. + +"It's Mamma's fault," Roddy was saying. "Papa would have gone anywhere, +but she _would_ come to this damned Morfe." + +"Don't. Don't--" Her mind beat him off, defending her happiness. He would +kill it if she let him. Coming up from Reyburn on the front seat of the +Morfe bus, he had sulked. He smiled disagreeable smiles while the driver +pointed with his whip and told her the names of the places. Renton Moor. +Renton Church. Morfe, the grey village, stuck up on its green platform +under the high, purple mound of Karva Hill. + +Garthdale in front of it, Rathdale at its side, meeting in the fields +below its bridge. + +Morfe was beautiful. She loved it with love at first sight, faithless to +Ilford. + +Straight, naked houses. Grey walls of houses, enclosing the wide oblong +Green. Dark grey stone roofs, close-clipped lest the wind should lift +them. On the Green two grey stone pillar fountains; a few wooden benches; +telegraph poles. Under her window a white road curling up to the +platform. Straight, naked houses, zigzagging up beside it. Down below, +where the white road came from, the long grey raking bridge, guarded by a +tall ash-tree. + +Roddy's jabbing voice went on and on: + +"I used to think Mamma was holy and unselfish. I don't think so any more. +She says she wants to do what Papa wants and what we want; but she always +ends by doing what she wants herself. It's all very well for her. As long +as she's got a garden to poke about in she doesn't care how awful it is +for us." + +She hated Roddy when he said things like that about Mamma. + +"I don't suppose the little lamb thought about it at all. Or if she did +she thought we'd like it." + +She didn't want to listen to Roddy's grumbling. She wanted to look and +look, to sniff up the clear, sweet, exciting smell of the fields. + +The roofs went criss-crossing up the road--straight--slant--straight. +They threw delicate violet-green shadows on to the sage-green field +below. That long violet-green pillar was the shadow of the ash-tree by +the bridge. + +The light came from somewhere behind the village, from a sunset you +couldn't see. It made the smooth hill fields shine like thin velvet, +stretched out, clinging to the hills. + +"Oh, Roddy, the light's different. Different from Ilford. Look--" + +"I've been looking for five weeks," Roddy said. "You haven't, that's all. +_I_ was excited at first." + +He got up. He stared out of the window, not seeing anything. + +"I didn't mean what I said about Mamma. Morfe _makes_ you say things. +Soon it'll make you mean them. You wait." + +She was glad when he had left her. + +The cliffs of Greffington Edge were violet now. + + +II. + +At night, when she lay in bed in the strange room, the Essex fields began +to haunt her; the five trees, the little flying trees, low down, low +down; the straight, narrow paths through the corn, where she walked with +Mark, with Jimmy, with Mr. Jourdain; Mr. Jourdain, standing in the path +and saying: "Talk to me. I'm alive. I'm here. I'll listen." + +Mark and Mamma planting the sumach tree by the front door; Papa saying it +wouldn't grow. It had grown up to the dining-room window-sill. + +Aunt Bella and Uncle Edward; the Proparts and the Farmers and Mr. Batty, +all stiff and disapproving; not nearly so nice to you as they used to be +and making you believe it was your fault. + +The old, beautiful drawing-room. The piano by the door. + +Dan staggering down the room at Mark's party. Mark holding her there, in +his arms. + +Dawn, and Dr. Draper's carriage waiting in the road beside the mangold +fields. And Aunt Charlotte carried out, her feet brushing the flagstones. + +She mustn't tell them. Mamma couldn't bear it. Roddy couldn't bear it. +Aunt Charlotte was Papa's sister. He must never know. + +The sound of the brushing feet made her heart ache. + +She was glad to wake in the small, strange room. It had taken a snip off +Mamma's and Papa's room on one side of the window, and a snip off the +spare room on the other. That made it a funny T shape. She slept in the +tail of the T, in a narrow bed pushed against the wall. When you sat up +you saw the fat trees trying to get up the hill between the washstand and +the chest of drawers. + +This room would never be taken from her, because she was the only one who +was small enough to fit the bed. + +She would be safe there with her hill. + + +III. + +The strange houses fascinated her. They had the simplicity and the +precision of houses in a very old engraving. On the west side of the +Green they made a long straight wall. Morfe High Row. An open space of +cobblestones stretched in front of it. The market-place. + +Sharp morning light picked out the small black panes of the windows in +the white criss-cross of their frames, and the long narrow signs of the +King's Head and the Farmer's Arms, black on grey. The plaster joints of +the walls and the dark net of earth between the cobbles showed thick and +clear as in a very old engraving. The west side had the sky behind it and +the east side had the hill. + +Grey-white cart roads slanted across the Green, cutting it into vivid +triangular grass-plots. You went in and out of Morfe through the open +corners of its Green. Her father's house stood at the south-west corner, +by itself. A projecting wing at that end of the High Row screened it from +the market-place. + +The strange houses excited her. + +Wonderful, unknown people lived in them. You would see them and know what +they were like: the people in the tall house with the rusty stones, in +the bright green ivy house with the white doors, in the small grey, +humble houses, in the big, important house set at the top of the Green, +with the three long rows of windows, the front garden and the iron gate. + +People you didn't know. You would be strange and exciting to them as they +were strange and exciting to you. They might say interesting things. +There might be somebody who cared about Plato and Spinoza. + +Things would happen that you didn't know. Anything might happen any +minute. + +If you knew what was happening in the houses _now_--some of them had +hard, frightening faces. Dreadful things might have happened in them. Her +father's house had a good, simple face. You could trust it. + +Five windows in the rough grey wall, one on each side of the white door, +three above. A garden at the side, an orchard at the back. In front a +cobbled square marked off by a line of thin stones set in edgeways. + +A strange house, innocent of unhappy memories. + +Catty stood at the door, looking for her. She called to her to come in to +breakfast. + + +IV. + +Papa was moving restlessly about the house. His loose slippers shuffled +on the stone flags of the passages. + +Catty stopped gathering up the breakfast cups to listen. + +Catty was not what she used to be. Her plump cheeks were sunk and +flattened. Some day she would look like Jenny. + +Papa stood in the doorway. He looked round the small dining-room as if he +were still puzzled by its strangeness. Papa was not what he used to be. A +streak of grey hair showed above each ear. Grey patches in his brown +beard. Scarlet smears in the veined sallow of his eyes. His bursting, +violent life had gone. He went stooping and shuffling. The house was too +small for Papa. He turned in it as a dog turns in his kennel, feeling for +a place to stretch himself. + +He said, "Where's your mother? I want her." + +Mary went to find her. + +She knew the house: the flagged passage from the front door. The +dining-room on the right. The drawing-room on the left. In there the +chairs and tables drew together to complain of Morfe. View of the +blacksmith's house and yard from the front window. From the side window +Mamma's garden. Green grass-plot. Trees at the far end. Flowers in the +borders: red roses, cream roses, Canterbury bells, white and purple, +under the high walls. In a corner an elder bush frothing greenish white +on green. + +Behind the dining-room Papa's tight den. Stairs where the passage turned +to the left behind the drawing-room. Glass door at the end, holding the +green of the garden, splashed with purple, white and red. The kitchen +here in a back wing like a rough barn run out into the orchard. + +Upstairs Catty's and Cook's room in the wing; Papa's dressing-room above +the side passage; Roddy's room above Papa's den. Then the three rooms in +front. The one above the drawing-room was nearly filled with the yellow +birch-wood wardrobe and bed. The emerald green of the damask was fading +into the grey. + +Her mother was there, sitting in the window-seat, reading the fourteenth +chapter of St. John. + +"Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. +In my Father's house are many mansions--" + +Mamma was different, too, as if she had shrunk through living in the +cramped rooms. She raised her head. The head of a wounded bird, very +gentle. + +"Why are you sitting up here all alone?" + +"Because sometimes I want to be alone." + +"Shall I spoil the aloneness?" + +"Not if you're a good girl and keep quiet." + +Mary sat on the bed and waited till the chapter should be ended. + +She thought: "She talks to me still as though I were a child. What would +she say if I told her about Aunt Charlotte? She wouldn't know what it was +really like. She wasn't there. + +"I shall never tell her." + +She was thrilled at the thought of her grown-up hardness, her grown-up +silence, keeping her mother safe. + +Mamma looked up and smiled; the chapter was ended; they went downstairs. + +Papa stood in the doorway of his den and called to Mamma in a queer low +voice. + +The letters-- + +She went into the dining-room and waited--ten minutes--twenty. + +Her mother came to her there. She sat down in her armchair by the +window-seat where the old work-basket stood piled with socks ready for +darning. She took a sock and drew it over her hand, stretching it to find +the worn places. Mary took its fellow and began to darn it. The coarse +wool, scraping her finger-tips, sent through her a little light, +creeping, disagreeable shock. + +She was afraid to look at her mother's face. + +"Well, Mary--poor Aunt Charlotte might have been carried away in her +coffin, and we shouldn't have known if it had been left to you to tell +us." + +"I didn't because I thought it would frighten you." + +Mamma was not frightened. They couldn't have told her what it was really +like. + +Papa's slippers shuffled in the passage. Mamma left off darning to listen +as Catty had listened. + + +V. + +On Greffington Edge. + +Roddy was looking like Mark, with his eyes very steady and his mouth firm +and proud. His face was red as if he were angry. That was when he saw the +tall man coming towards them down the hill road. + +Roddy walked slowly, trying not to meet him at the cattle-gate. The tall +man walked faster, and they met. Roddy opened the gate. + +The tall man thanked him, said "Good day," looked at her as he passed +through, then stopped. + +"My sister--Mr. Sutcliffe." + +Mr. Sutcliffe, handsome with his boney, high-jointed nose and narrow jaw, +thrust out, incongruously fierce, under his calm, clean upper lip, shaved +to show how beautiful it was. His black blue eyes were set as carefully +in their lids as a woman's. He wore his hair rather long. One lock had +got loose and hung before his ear like a high whisker. + +He was asking Roddy when he was coming to play tennis, and whether his +sister played. They might turn up tomorrow. + +The light played on his curling, handsome smile. He hoped she liked +Rathdale. + +"She only came yesterday," Roddy said. + +"Well--come along to-morrow. About four o'clock. I'll tell my wife." + +And Roddy said, "Thanks," as if it choked him. + +Mr. Sutcliffe went on down the hill. + +"We can't go," Roddy said. + +"Why not?" + +"Well--" + +"Let's. He looked so nice, and he sounded as if he really wanted us." + +"He doesn't. He can't. You don't know what's happened." + +"_Has_ anything happened?" + +"Yes. I don't want to tell you, but you'll have to know. It happened at +the Sutcliffes'." + +"Who _are_ the Sutcliffes?" + +"Greffington Hall. The people who own the whole ghastly place. We were +dining there. And Papa was funny." + +"Funny? Funny what way?" + +"Oh, I don't know.--Like Dan was at Mark's party.' + +"Oh Roddy--" She was listening now. + +"Not quite so awful; but that sort of thing. We had to come away." + +"I didn't know he did." + +"No more did I. Mamma always said it wasn't that. But it was this time. +And he chose that evening." + +"Does Mamma mind frightfully?" she said. + +"Yes. But she's angry with the Sutcliffes." + +"Why?" + +"Because they've _seen_ him." + +"How many Sutcliffes are there?" + +"Only him and Mrs. Sutcliffe. The son's in India. + +"They'll never ask him again, and Mamma won't go without him. She says we +can go if we like, but you can see she'll think us skunks if we do." + +"Well--then we can't." + +She had wanted something to happen, and something had happened, something +that would bring unhappiness. Unhappiness. Her will rose up, hard and +stubborn, pushing it off. + +"Will it matter so very much? Do the Sutcliffes matter?" + +"They matter this much, that there won't be anything to do. They've got +all the shooting and fishing and the only decent tennis court in the +place. You little know what you're in for." + +"I don't care, Roddy. I don't care a bit as long as I have you." + +"Me? Me?" + +He had stopped on the steep of the road; her feet had been lagging to +keep pace with him. He breathed hard through white-edged lips. She had +seen him look like that before. The day they had walked to the Thames, to +look at the ships, over the windy Flats. + +He looked at her. A look she hadn't seen before. A look of passionate +unbelief. + +"I didn't think you cared about me. I thought it was Mark you cared +about. Like Mamma." + +"Can't you care about more than one person?" + +"Mamma can't--" + +"Oh Roddy--" + +"What's the good of saying 'Oh Roddy' when you know it?" + +They were sitting on a ledge of stone and turf. Roddy had ceased to +struggle with the hill. + +"We're all the same," he said. "I'd give you and Dan up any day for Mark. +Dan would give up you and me. Mark would give up all of us for Mamma. And +Mamma would give up all of us for Mark." + +Roddy had never said anything like that before. + +"I'll stick to you, anyhow," she said. + +"It's no use your sticking. I shan't be here. I shall have to clear out +and do something," he said. + +On his face there was a look of fear. + + +VI. + +She was excited because they were going to the ivy house for tea. It +looked so pretty and so happy with its green face shining in the sun. +Nothing could take from her her belief in happiness hiding behind certain +unknown doors. It hid behind the white doors of the ivy house. When you +went in something wonderful would happen. + +The ivy house belonged to Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin. + +The photographs in Mamma's old album showed how they looked when they and +Mamma were young. Modest pose of dropped arms, holding mushroom hats in +front of them as a protection, the narrow ribbons dangling innocently. +Ellen Frewin, small and upright, slender back curved in to the set of +shawl and crinoline, prim head fixed in the composure of gentle disdain, +small mouth saying always "Oh," Meta, the younger sister, very tall, head +bent in tranquil meditation, her mantle slanting out from the fall of the +thin shoulders. + +They rose up in the small, green lighted drawing-room. Their heads bent +forward to kiss. + +Ellen Waugh: the photographed face still keeping its lifted posture of +gentle disdain, the skin stretched like a pale tight glove, a slight +downward swelling of the prim oval, like the last bulge of a sucked +peppermint ball, the faded mouth still making its small "oh." She was the +widow of a clergyman. + +Meta, a beautiful nose leaping out at you in a high curve; narrow, +delicate cheeks thinned away so that they seemed part of the nose; sweet +rodent mouth smiling up under its tip; blurred violet eyes arching +vaguely. + +Princess gowns stiffened their shawl and crinoline gestures. + +"So this is Mary. She's not like her mother, Caroline. Meta, can you see +any likeness?" + +Miss Frewin arched her eyes and smiled, without looking at you. + +"I can't say I do." + +Their heads made little nodding bows as they talked. Miss Frewin's bow +was sidelong and slow, Mrs. Waugh's straight and decisive. + +"She's not like Rodney," Mrs. Waugh said. "And she's not like Emilius. +Who is she like?" + +Mary answered. "I'm rather like Dan and a good bit like Mark. But I'm +most of all like myself." + +Mrs. Waugh said "Oh." Her mouth went on saying it while she looked at +you. + +"She is not in the least like Mark," Mamma said. + +They settled down, one on each side of Mamma, smiling at her with their +small, faded mouths as you smile at people you love and are happy with. +You could see that Mamma was happy, too, sitting between them, safe. + +Mrs. Waugh said, "I see you've got Blenkiron in again?" + +"Well, he's left his ladder in the yard. I suppose that means he'll mend +the kitchen chimney some time before winter." + +"The Yorkshire workmen are very independent," Mrs. Waugh said. + +"They scamp their work like the rest. You'd need a resident carpenter, +and a resident glazier, and a resident plumber--" + +"Yes, Caroline, you would indeed." + +Gentle voices saying things you had heard before in the drawing-room at +Five Elms. + +Miss Frewin had opened a black silk bag that hung on her arm, and taken +out a minute pair of scissors and a long strip of white stuff with a +stitched pattern on it. She nicked out the pattern into little holes +outlined by the stitches. Mary watched her, fascinated by the delicate +movements of the thin fingers and the slanted, drooping postures of the +head. + +"Do you _like_ doing it?" + +"Yes." + +She thought: "What a fool she must think me. As if she'd do it if she +didn't like it." + +The arching eyes and twitching mouth smiled at your foolishness. + +Mrs. Waugh's voice went on. It came smoothly, hardly moving her small, +round mouth. That was her natural voice. Then suddenly it rose, like a +voice that calls to you to get up in the morning. + +"Well, Mary--so you've left school. Come home to be a help to your +mother." + +A high, false cheerfulness, covering disapproval and reproach. + +Their gentleness was cold to her and secretly inimical. They had asked +her because of Mamma. They didn't really want her. + +Half-past six. It was all over. They were going home across the Green. + +"Mary, I wish you could learn to talk without affectation. Telling Mrs. +Waugh you 'looked like yourself'! If you could only manage to forget +yourself." + +Your self? Your self? Why should you forget it? You had to remember. They +would kill it if you let them. + +What had it done? What _was_ it that they should hate it so? It had been +happy and excited about _them_, wondering what they would be like. And +quiet, looking on and listening, in the strange, green-lighted, +green-dark room, crushed by the gentle, hostile voices. + +Would it always have to stoop and cringe before people, hushing its own +voice, hiding its own gesture? + +It crouched now, stung and beaten, hiding in her body that walked beside +her mother with proud feet, and small lifted head. + + +VII. + +Her mother turned at her bedroom door and signed to her to come in. + +She sat down in her low chair at the head of the curtained bed. Mary sat +in the window-seat. + +"There's something I want to say to you." + +"Yes, Mamma." + +Mamma was annoyed. She tap-tapped with her foot on the floor. + +"Have you given up those absurd ideas of yours?" + +"What absurd ideas?" + +"You know what I mean. Calling yourself an unbeliever." + +"I _can't_ say I believe things I don't believe." + +"Have you tried?" + +"Tried?" + +"Have you ever asked God to help your unbelief?" + +"No. I could only do that if I didn't believe in my unbelief." + +"You mean if you didn't glory in it. Then it's simply your self-will and +your pride. Self-will has been your besetting sin ever since you were a +little baby crying for something you couldn't have. You kicked before you +could talk. + +"Goodness knows I've done everything I could to break you of it." + +"Yes, Mamma darling." + +She remembered. The faded green and grey curtains and the yellow +birchwood furniture remembered. Mamma sat on the little chair at the foot +of the big yellow bed. You knelt in her lap and played with the gold +tassel while Mamma asked you to give up your will. + +"I brought you up to care for God and for the truth." + +"You did. And I care so awfully for both of them that I won't believe +things about God that aren't true." + +"And how do you know what's true and what isn't? You set up your little +judgment against all the wise and learned people who believe as you were +taught to believe. I wonder how you dare." + +"It's the risk we're all taking. We may every single one of us be wrong. +Still, if some things are true other things can't be. Don't look so +unhappy, Mamma." + +"How can I be anything else? When I think of you living without God in +the world, and of what will happen to you when you die." + +"It's your belief that makes you unhappy, not me." + +"That's the cruellest thing you've said yet." + +"You know I'd rather die than hurt you." + +"Die, indeed! When you hurt me every minute of the day. If it had been +anything but unbelief. If I even saw you humble and sorry about it. But +you seem to be positively enjoying yourself." + +"I can't help it if the things I think of make me happy. And you don't +know how nice it feels to be free." + +"Precious freedom!--to do what you like and think what you like, without +caring." + +"There's a part of me that doesn't care and there's a part that cares +frightfully." + +The part that cared was not free. Not free. Prisoned in her mother's +bedroom with the yellow furniture that remembered. Her mother's face that +remembered. Always the same vexed, disapproving, remembering face. And +her own heart, sinking at each beat, dragging remembrance. A dead child, +remembering and returning. + +"I can't think where you got it from," her mother was saying. "Unless +it's those books you're always reading. Or was it that man?" + +"What man?" + +"Maurice Jourdain." + +"No. It wasn't. What made you think of him?" + +"Never you mind." + +Actually her mother was smiling and trying not to smile, as if she were +thinking of something funny and improper. + +"There's one thing I must beg of you," she said, "that whatever you +choose to think, you'll hold your tongue about it." + +"All my life? Like Aunt Lavvy?" + +"There was a reason why then; and there's a reason why now. Your father +has been very unfortunate. We're here in a new place, and the less we +make ourselves conspicuous the better." + +"I see." + +She thought: "Because Papa drinks Mamma and Roddy go proud and angry; but +I must stoop and hide. It isn't fair." + +"You surely don't want," her mother said, "to make it harder for me than +it is." + +Tears. She was beaten. + +"I don't want to make it hard for you at all." + +"Then promise me you won't talk about religion." + +"I won't talk about it to Mrs. Waugh." + +"Not to anybody." + +"Not to anybody who wouldn't like it. Unless they make me. Will that do?" + +"I suppose it'll have to." + +Mamma held her face up, like a child, to be kissed. + + +VIII. + +The Sutcliffes' house hid in the thick trees at the foot of Greffington +Edge. You couldn't see it. You could pretend it wasn't there. You could +pretend that Mr. Sutcliffe and Mrs. Sutcliffe were not there. You could +pretend that nothing had happened. + +There were other houses. + + +IX. + +The long house at the top of the Green was gay with rows of pink and +white sun-blinds stuck out like attic roofs. The poplars in the garden +played their play of falling rain. + +You waited in the porch, impatient for the opening of the door. + +"Mamma--what _will_ it be like?" + +Mamma smiled a naughty, pretty smile. She knew what it would be like. + +There was a stuffed salmon in a long glass case in the hall. He swam, +over a brown plaster river bed, glued to a milk-blue plaster stream. + +You waited in the drawing-room. Drab and dying amber and the dapple of +walnut wood. Chairs dressed in pallid chintz, holding out their skirts +with an air of anxiety. Stuffed love-birds on a branch under a tall glass +shade. On the chimney-piece sand-white pampas grass in clear blood-red +vases, and a white marble clock supporting a gilt Cupid astride over a +gilt ball. + +Above the Cupid, in an oval frame, the tinted crayon portrait of a young +girl. A pink and blond young girl with a soft nuzzling mouth and nose. +She was dressed in a spencer and a wide straw hat, and carried a basket +of flowers on her arm. She looked happy, smiling up at the ceiling. + +Across the passage a door opening. Voices in the passage, a smell like +rotten apples, a tray that clattered. + +Miss Kendal rustled in; tall elegant stiffness girded in black silk. + +"How good of you to come, Mrs. Olivier. And to bring Miss Mary." + +Her sharp-jointed body was like the high-backed chair it sat on. Yet you +saw that she had once been the young girl in the spencer; head carried +high with the remembered tilt of the girl's head; jaw pushed out at the +chin as if it hung lightly from the edge of the upper lip; the nuzzling +mouth composed to prudence and propriety. A lace cap with pink ribbons +perched on her smooth, ashy blond hair. + +Miss Kendal talked to Mamma about weather and gardens; she asked after +the kitchen chimney as if she really cared for it. Every now and then she +looked at you and gave you a nod and a smile to show that she remembered +you were there. + +When she smiled her eyes were happy like the eyes of the young girl. + +The garden-gate clicked and fell to with a clang. A bell clamoured +suddenly through the quiet house. + +Miss Kendal nodded. "The Doctor has come to tea. To see Miss Mary." + +She put her arm in yours and led you into the dining-room, gaily, gaily, +as if she had known you for a long time, as if she were taking you with +her to some brilliant, happy feast. + +The smell of rotten apples came towards you through the open door of the +dining-room. You saw the shining of pure white damask, the flashing of +silver, a flower-bed of blue willow pattern cups, an enormous pink and +white cake. You thought it was a party. + +Three old men were there. + +Old Dr. Kendal, six feet of leanness doubled up in an arm-chair. Old +Wellington face, shrunk, cheeks burning in a senile raddle. Glassy blue +eyes weeping from red rims. + +Dr. Charles Kendal, his son; a hard, blond giant; high cheeks, raw +ruddied; high bleak nose jutting out with a steep fall to the long upper +lip; savage mouth under a straight blond fringe, a shark's keen tooth +pointing at the dropped jaw. Arched forehead drooping to the spread ears, +blond eyebrows drooping over slack lids. + +And Mr. James. + +Mr. James was the only short one. He stood apart, his eyes edging off +from his limp hand-shaking. Mr. James had a red face and high bleak nose +like his brother; he was clean-shaved except for short auburn whiskers +brushed forward in flat curls. His thin Wellington lips went out and in, +pressed together, trying hard not to laugh at you. + +He held his arms bowed out stiffly, as if the arm-holes of his coat were +too tight for him. + +The room was light at the far end, where the two windows were, and dark +at the door-end where the mahogany sideboard was. The bright, loaded +table stretched between. + +Old Dr. Kendal sat behind it by the corner of the fireplace. Though it +was August the windows were shut and a fire burned in the grate. Two +tabby cats sat up by the fender, blinking and nodding with sleep. + +"Here's Father," Miss Kendal said. "And here's Johnnie and Minnie." + +He had dropped off into a doze. She woke him. + +"You know Mrs. Olivier, Father. And this is Miss Olivier." + +"Ay. Eh." From a red and yellow pocket-handkerchief he disentangled a +stringy claw-like hand and held it up with an effort. + +"Ye've come to see the old man, have ye? Ay. Eh." + +"He's the oldest in the Dale," Miss Kendal said. "Except Mr. Peacock of +Sarrack." + +"Don't you forget Mr. Peacock of Sarrack, or he'll be so set-up there'll +be no bearing him," Dr. Charles said. + +"Miss Mary, will you sit by Father?" + +"No, she won't. Miss Mary will sit over here by me." + +Though Dr. Charles was not in his own house he gave orders. He took Mr. +James's place at the foot of the table. He made her sit at his left hand +and Mamma at his right; and he slanted Mamma's chair and fixed a basket +screen on its back so that she was shielded both from the fire and from +the presence of the old man. + +Dr. Charles talked. + +"Where did you get that thin face, Miss Mary? Not in Rathdale, I'll be +bound." + +He looked at you with small grey eyes blinking under weak lids and bared +the shark's tooth, smiling. A kind, hungry shark. + +"They must have starved you at your school. No? Then they made you study +too hard. Kate--what d'you think Bill Acroyd's done now? Turned this +year's heifers out along of last year's with the ringworm. And asks me +how I think they get it. This child doesn't eat enough to keep a mouse, +Mrs. Olivier." + +He would leave off talking now and then to eat, and in the silence +remarkable noises would come from the armchair. When that happened Miss +Kendal would look under the table and pretend that Minnie and Johnnie +were fighting. "Oh, those bad pussies," she would say. + +When her face kept quiet it looked dead beside the ruddy faces of the +three old men; dead and very quietly, very softly decomposing into +bleached purple and sallow white. Then her gaiety would come popping up +again and jerk it back into life. + +Mr. James sat at her corner, beside Mary. He didn't talk, but his +Wellington mouth moved perpetually in and out, and his small reddish eyes +twinkled, twinkled, with a shrewd, secret mirth. You thought every minute +he would burst out laughing, and you wondered what you were doing to +amuse him so. + +Every now and then Miss Kendal would tell you something about him. + +"What do you think Mr. James did to-day? He walked all the way to Garth +and back again. Over nine miles!" + +And Mr. James would look gratified. + +Tea was over with the sacrifice of the pink and white cake. Miss Kendal +took your arm again and led you, gaily, gaily back to the old man. + +"Here's Miss Mary come to talk to you, Father." + +She set a chair for you beside him. He turned his head slowly to you, +waking out of his doze. + +"What did she say your name was, my dear?" + +"Olivier. Mary Olivier." + +"I don't call to mind anybody of that name in the Dale. But I suppose I +brought you into the world same as the rest of 'em." + +Miss Kendal gave a little bound in her chair. "Does anybody know where +Pussy is?" + +The claw hand stirred in the red and yellow pocket-handkerchief. + +"Ye've come to see the old man, have ye? Ay. Eh." + +When he talked he coughed. A dreadful sound, as if he dragged up out of +himself a long, rattling chain. + +It hurt you to look at him. Pity hurt you. + +Once he had been young, like Roddy. Then he had been middle-aged, with +hanging jaw and weak eyelids, like Dr. Charles. Now he was old, old; he +sat doubled up, coughing and weeping, in a chair. But you could see that +Miss Kendal was proud of him. She thought him wonderful because he kept +on living. + +Supposing he was _your_ father and you had to sit with him, all your +life, in a room smelling of rotten apples, could you bear it? Could you +bear it for a fortnight? Wouldn't you wish--wouldn't you wish--supposing +Papa--all your life. + +But if you couldn't bear it that would mean-- + +No. No. She put her hand on the arm of his chair, to protect him, to +protect him from her thoughts. + +The claw fingers scrabbled, groping for her hand. + +"Would ye like to be an old man's bed-fellow?" + +"Pussy says it isn't her bed-time yet, Father." + +When you went away Miss Kendal stood on the doorstep looking after you. +The last you saw of her was a soft grimace of innocent gaiety. + + +X. + +The Vicar of Renton. He wanted to see her. + +Mamma had left her in the room with him, going out with an air of +self-conscious connivance. + +Mr. Spencer Rollitt. Hard and handsome. Large face, square-cut, +clean-shaved, bare of any accent except its eyebrows, its mouth a thin +straight line hardly visible in its sunburn. Small blue eyes standing +still in the sunburn, hard and cold. + +When Mr. Rollitt wanted to express heartiness he had to fall back on +gesture, on the sudden flash of white teeth; he drew in his breath, +sharply, between the straight, close lips, with a sound: "Fivv-vv!" + +She watched him. Under his small handsome nose his mouth and chin +together made one steep, straight line. This lower face, flat and naked, +without lips, stretched like another forehead. At the top of the real +forehead, where his hat had saved his skin, a straight band, white, like +a scar. Yet Mr. Spencer Rollitt's hair curled and clustered out at the +back of his head in perfect innocence. + +He was smiling his muscular smile, while his little hard cold eyes held +her in their tight stare. + +"Don't you think you would like to take a class in my Sunday School?" + +"I'm afraid I wouldn't like it at all." + +"Nothing to be afraid of. I should give you the infants' school." + +For a long time he sat there, explaining that there was nothing to be +afraid of, and that he would give her the infants' school. You felt him +filling the room, crushing you back and back, forcing his will on you. +There was too much of his will, too much of his face. Her will rose up +against his will and against his face, and its false, muscular smile. + +"I'm sure my mother didn't say I'd like to teach in a Sunday School." + +"She said she'd be very glad if I could persuade you." + +"She'd say _that_. But she knows perfectly well I wouldn't really do it." + +"It was not Mrs. Olivier's idea." + +He got up. When he stood his eyes stared at nothing away over your head. +He wouldn't lower them to look at you. + +"It was Mrs. Sutcliffe's." + +"How funny of Mrs. Sutcliffe. She doesn't know me, either." + +"My dear young lady, you were at school when your father and mother dined +at Greffington Hall." + +He was looking down at her now, and she could feel herself blushing; hot, +red waves of shame, rushing up, tingling in the roots of her hair. + +"Mrs. Sutcliffe," he said, "is very kind." + +She saw it now. He had been at the Sutcliffes that evening. He had seen +Papa. He was trying to say, "Your father was drunk at Greffington Hall. +He will never be asked there again. He will not be particularly welcome +at the Vicarage. But you are very young. We do not wish you to suffer. +This is our kindness to you. Take it. You are not in a position to +refuse." + +"And what am I to say to Mrs. Sutcliffe?" + +"Oh, anything you like that wouldn't sound too rude." + +"Shall I say that you're a very independent young lady, and that she had +better not ask you to join her sewing-class? Would that sound too rude?" + +"Not a bit. If you put it nicely. But you would, wouldn't you?" + +He looked down at her again. His thick eyes had thawed slightly; they let +out a twinkle. But he was holding his lips so tight that they had +disappeared. A loud, surprising laugh forced them open. + +He held out his hand with a gesture, drawing back his laugh in a +tremendous "Fiv-v-v-v." + +When he had gone she opened the piano and played, and played. Through the +window of the room Chopin's Fontana Polonaise went out after him, joyous, +triumphant and defiant, driving him before it. She exulted in her power +over the Polonaise. Nothing could touch you, nothing could hurt you while +you played. If only you could go on playing for ever-- + +Her mother came in from the garden. + +"Mary," she said, "if you _will_ play, you must play gently." + +"But Mamma--I can't. It goes like that." + +"Then," said her mother, "don't play it. You can be heard all over the +village." + +"Bother the village. I don't care. I don't care if I'm heard all over +everywhere!" + +She went on playing. + +But it was no use. She struck a wrong note. Her hands trembled and lost +their grip. They stiffened, dropped from the keys. She sat and stared +idiotically at the white page, at the black dots nodding on their stems, +at the black bars swaying. + +She had forgotten how to play Chopin's Fontana Polonaise. + + +XI. + +Stone walls. A wild country, caught in the net of the stone walls. + +Stone walls following the planes of the land, running straight along the +valleys, switchbacking up and down the slopes. Humped-up, grey spines of +the green mounds. + +Stone walls, piled loosely, with the brute skill of earth-men, building +centuries ago. They bulged, they toppled, yet they stood firm, holding +the wild country in their mesh, knitting the grey villages to the grey +farms, and the farms to the grey byres. Where you thought the net had +ended it flung out a grey rope over the purple back of Renton, the green +shoulder of Greffington. + +Outside the village, the schoolhouse lane, a green trench sunk between +stone walls, went up and up, turning three times. At the top of the last +turn a gate. + +When you had got through the gate you were free. + +It led on to the wide, flat half-ring of moor that lay under Karva. The +moor and the high mound of the hill were free; they had slipped from the +net of the walls. + +Broad sheep-drives cut through the moor. Inlets of green grass forked +into purple heather. Green streamed through purple, lapped against +purple, lay on purple in pools and splashes. + +Burnt patches. Tongues of heather, twisted and pointed, picked clean by +fire, flickering grey over black earth. Towards evening the black and +grey ran together like ink and water, stilled into purple, the black +purple of grapes. + +If you shut your eyes you could see the flat Essex country spread in a +thin film over Karva. Thinner and thinner. But you could remember what it +had been like. Low, tilled fields, thin trees; sharp, queer, uncertain +beauty. Sharp, queer, uncertain happiness, coming again and again, never +twice to the same place in the same way. It hurt you when you remembered +it. + +The beauty of the hills was not like that. It stayed. It waited for you, +keeping faith. Day after day, night after night, it was there. + +Happiness was there. You were sure of it every time. Roddy's uneasy eyes, +Papa's feet, shuffling in the passage, Mamma's disapproving, remembering +face, the Kendals' house, smelling of rotten apples, the old man, +coughing and weeping in his chair, they couldn't kill it; they couldn't +take it away. + +The mountain sheep waited for you. They stood back as you passed, staring +at you with their look of wonder and sadness. + +Grouse shot up from your feet with a "Rek-ek-ek-kek!" in sudden, +explosive flight. + +Plovers rose, wheeling round and round you with sharper and sharper cries +of agitation. "_Pee_-vit--_pee_-vit--_pee_-vit! Pee-_vitt_!" They +swooped, suddenly close, close to your eyes; you heard the drumming +vibration of their wings. + +Away in front a line of sheep went slowly up and up Karva. The hill made +their bleating mournful and musical. + +You slipped back into the house. In the lamp-lighted drawing-room the +others sat, bored and tired, waiting for prayer-time. They hadn't noticed +how long you had been gone. + + +XII. + +"Roddy, I wish you'd go and see where your father is." + +Roddy looked up from his sketch-book. He had filled it with pictures of +cavalry on plunging chargers, trains of artillery rushing into battle, +sailing ships in heavy seas. + +Roddy's mind was possessed by images of danger and adventure. + +He flourished off the last wave of battle-smoke, and shut the sketch-book +with a snap. + +Mamma knew perfectly well where Papa was. Roddy knew. Catty and Maggie +the cook knew. Everybody in the village knew. Regularly, about six +o'clock in the evening, he shuffled out of the house and along the High +Row to the Buck Hotel, and towards dinner-time Roddy had to go and bring +him back. Everybody knew what he went for. + +He would have to hold Papa tight by the arm and lead him over the +cobblestones. They would pass the long bench at the corner under the +Kendals' wall; and Mr. Oldshaw, the banker, and Mr. Horn, the grocer, and +Mr. Acroyd, the shoemaker, would be sitting there talking to Mr. Belk, +who was justice of the peace. And they would see Papa. The young men +squatting on the flagstones outside the "Farmer's Arms" and the "King's +Head" would see him. And Papa would stiffen and draw himself up, trying +to look dignified and sober. + +When he was very bad Mamma would cry, quietly, all through dinner-time. +But she would never admit that he went to the Buck Hotel. He had just +gone off nobody knew where and Roddy had got to find him. + +August, September and October passed. + + +XIII. + +"Didn't I tell you to wait? You know them all now. You see what they're +like." + +In Roddy's voice there was a sort of tired, bitter triumph. + +She knew them all now: Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin, and the Kendals; Mr. +Spencer Rollitt, and Miss Louisa Wright who had had a disappointment; and +old Mrs. Heron. They were all old. + +Oh, and there was Dorsy Heron, Mrs. Heron's niece. But Dorsy was old too, +twenty-seven. She was no good; she couldn't talk to Roddy; she could only +look at him with bright, shy eyes, like a hare. + +Roddy and Mary were going up the Garthdale road. At the first turn they +saw Mrs. Waugh and her son coming towards them. (She had forgotten Norman +Waugh.) + +Rodney groaned. "_He's_ here again. I say, let's go back." + +"We can't. They've seen us." + +"Everybody sees us," Roddy said. + +He began to walk with a queer, defiant, self-conscious jerk. + +Mrs. Waugh came on, buoyantly, as if the hoop of a crinoline still held +her up. + +"Well, Mary, going for another walk?" + +She stopped, in a gracious mood to show off her son. When she looked at +Roddy her raised eyebrows said, "Still here, doing nothing?" + +"Norman's going back to work on Monday," she said. + +The son stood aside, uninterested, impatient, staring past them, beating +the road with his stick. He was thickset and square. He had the stooping +head and heavy eyes of a bull. Black hair and eyebrows grew bushily from +his dull-white Frewin skin. + +He would be an engineer. Mr. Belk's brother had taken him into his works +at Durlingham. He wasn't seventeen, yet he knew how to make engines. He +had a strong, lumbering body. His heart would go on thump-thumping with +regular strokes, like a stupid piston, not like Roddy's heart, excited, +quivering, hurrying, suddenly checking. His eyes drew his mother away. +You were glad when they were gone. + +"You can see what they think," Roddy said. "Everybody thinks it." + +"Everybody thinks what?" + +"That I'm a cad to be sticking here, doing nothing, living on Mamma's +money." + +"It doesn't matter. They've no business to think." + +"No. But Mamma thinks it. She says I ought to get something to do. She +talks about Mark and Dan. She can't see--" He stopped, biting his lip. + +"If I were like Mark--if I could do things. That beast Norman Waugh can +do things. He doesn't live on his mother's money. She sees that.... + +"She doesn't know what's the matter with me. She thinks it's only my +heart. And it isn't. It's me. I'm an idiot. I can't even do office work +like Dan.... She thinks I'll be all right if I go away far enough, where +she won't see me. Mind you, I _should_ be all right if I'd gone into the +Navy. She knows if I hadn't had that beastly rheumatic fever I'd have +been in the Navy or the Merchant Service now. It's all rot not passing +you. As if walking about on a ship's deck was worse for your heart than +digging in a garden. It certainly couldn't be worse than farming in +Canada." + +"Farming? In Canada?" + +"That's her idea. It'll kill me to do what _I_ want. It won't kill me to +do what _she_ wants." + +He brooded. + +"Mark did what he wanted. He went away and left her. Brute as I am, I +wouldn't have done that. She doesn't know that's why I'm sticking here. I +_can't_ leave her. I'd rather die." + +Roddy too. He had always seemed to go his own way without caring, living +his secret life, running, jumping, grinning at you. And he, too, was +compelled to adore Mark and yet to cling helplessly, hopelessly, to +Mamma. When he said things about her he was struggling against her, +trying to free himself. He flung himself off and came back, to cling +harder. And he was nineteen. + +"After all," he said, "why shouldn't I stay? It's not as if I didn't dig +in the garden and look after Papa. If I went she'd have to get somebody." + +"I thought you wanted to go?" she said. + +"So I did. So I do, for some things. But when it comes to the point--" + +"When it comes to the point?" + +"I funk it." + +"Because of Mamma?" + +"Because of me. That idiocy. Supposing I _had_ to do something I couldn't +do?... That's why I shall have to go away somewhere where it won't +matter, where she won't know anything about it." + +The frightened look was in his eyes again. + +In her heart a choking, breathless voice talked of unhappiness, coming, +coming. Unhappiness that no beauty could assuage. Her will hardened to +shut it out. + +When the road turned again they met Mr. James. He walked with queer, +jerky steps, his arms bowed out stiffly. + +As he passed he edged away from you. His mouth moved as if he were trying +not to laugh. + +They knew about Mr. James now. His mind hadn't grown since he was five +years old. He could do nothing but walk. Martha, the old servant, dressed +and undressed him. + +"I shall have to go," Roddy said. "If I stay here I shall look like Mr. +James. I shall walk with my arms bowed out, Catty'll dress and undress +me." + + + + +XXI + + +I. + +They hated the piano. They had pushed it away against the dark outside +wall. Its strings were stiff with cold, and when the rain came its wooden +hammers swelled so that two notes struck together in the bass. + +The piano-tuner made them move it to the inner wall in the large, bright +place that belonged to the cabinet. Mamma was annoyed because Mary had +taken the piano-tuner's part. + +Mamma loved the cabinet. She couldn't bear to see it standing in the +piano's dark corner where the green Chinese bowls hardly showed behind +the black glimmer of the panes. The light fell full on the ragged, faded +silk of the piano, and on the long scar across its lid. It was like a +poor, shabby relation. + +It stood there in the quiet room, with its lid shut, patient, reproachful, +waiting for you to come and play on it. + +When Mary thought of the piano her heart beat faster, her fingers +twitched, the full, sensitive tips tingled and ached to play. When she +couldn't play she lay awake at night thinking of the music. + +She was trying to learn the Sonato _Appassionata_, going through it bar +by bar, slowly and softly, so that nobody outside the room should hear +it. That was better than not playing it at all. But sometimes you would +forget, and as soon as you struck the loud chords in the first movement +Papa would come in and stop you. And the Sonata would go on sounding +inside you, trying to make you play it, giving you no peace. + +Towards six o'clock she listened for his feet in the flagged passage. +When the front door slammed behind him she rushed to the piano. There +might be a whole hour before Roddy fetched him from the Buck Hotel. If +you could only reach the last movement, the two thundering chords, and +then--the _Presto_. + +The music beat on the thick stone walls of the room and was beaten back, +its fine, live throbbing blunted by overtones of discord. You longed to +open all the doors and windows of the house, to push back the stone walls +and let it out. + +Terrible minutes to six when Mamma's face watched and listened, when she +knew what you were thinking. You kept on looking at the clock, you +wondered whether this time Papa would really go. You hoped-- + +Mamma's eyes hurt you. They said, "She doesn't care what becomes of him +so long as she can play." + + +II. + +Sometimes the wounded, mutilated _Allegro_ would cry inside you all day, +imploring you to finish it, to let it pour out its life in joy. + +When it left off the white sound patterns of poems came instead. They +floated down through the dark as she lay on her back in her hard, narrow +bed. Out of doors, her feet, muffled in wet moor grass, went to a beat, a +clang. + +She would never play well. At any minute her father's voice or her +mother's eyes would stiffen her fingers and stop them. She knew what she +would do; she had always known. She would make poems. They couldn't hear +you making poems. They couldn't see your thoughts falling into sound +patterns. + +Only part of the pattern would appear at once while the rest of it went +on sounding from somewhere a long way off. When all the parts came +together the poem was made. You felt as if you had made it long ago, and +had forgotten it and remembered. + + +III. + +The room held her close, cold and white, a nun's cell. If you counted the +window-place it was shaped like a cross. The door at the foot, the window +at the head, bookshelves at the end of each arm. A kitchen lamp with a +tin reflector, on a table, stood in the breast of the cross. Its flame +was so small that she had to turn it on to her work like a lantern. + +"Dumpetty, dumpetty dum. Tell them that Bion is dead; he is dead, young +Bion, the shepherd. And with him music is dead and Dorian poetry +perished--" + +She had the conceited, exciting thought: "I am translating Moschus, the +Funeral Song for Bion." + +Moschus was Bion's friend. She wondered whether he had been happy or +unhappy, making his funeral song. + +If you could translate it all: if you could only make patterns out of +English sounds that had the hardness and stillness of the Greek. + + "'Archet', Sikelikai, to pentheos, archet' Moisai, + adones hai pukinoisin oduramenai poti phullois.'" + +The wind picked at the pane. Through her thick tweed coat she could feel +the air of the room soak like cold water to her skin. She curved her +aching hands over the hot globe of the lamp. + +--Oduromenai. Mourning? No. You thought of black crape, bunched up +weepers, red faces. + +The wick spluttered; the flame leaned from the burner, gave a skip and +went out. + +Oduromenai--Grieving; perhaps. + +Suddenly she thought of Maurice Jourdain. + +She saw him standing in the field path. She heard him say "Talk to _me_. +I'm alive. I'm here. I'll listen. I'll never misunderstand." She saw his +worn eyelids; his narrow, yellowish teeth. + +Supposing he was dead-- + +She would forget about him for months together; then suddenly she would +remember him like that. Being happy and excited made you remember. She +tried not to see his eyelids and his teeth. They didn't matter. + + +IV. + +The season of ungovernable laughter had begun. + +"Roddy, they'll hear us. We m-m-mustn't." + +"I'm not. I'm blowing my nose." + +"I wish _I_ could make it sound like that." + +They stood on the Kendals' doorstep, in the dark, under the snow. Snow +powdered the flagstone path swept ready for the New Year's party. + +"Think," she said, "their poor party. It would be awful of us." + +Roddy rang. As they waited they began to laugh again. Helpless, ruinous, +agonising laughter. + +"Oh--oh--I can hear Martha coming. _Do_ something. You might be +unbuckling my snow-shoes." + +The party was waiting for them in the drawing-room. Dr. Charles. Miss +Louisa Wright, stiff fragility. A child's face blurred and delicately +weathered; features in innocent, low relief. Pale hair rolled into an +insubstantial puff above each ear. Speedwell eyes, fading milkily. Hurt +eyes, disappointed eyes. Dr. Charles had disappointed her. + +Dorsy Heron, tall and straight. Shy hare's face trying to look austere. + +Norman Waugh, sulky and superior, in a corner. + +As Roddy came in everybody but Norman Waugh turned round and stared at +him with sudden, happy smiles. He was so beautiful that it made people +happy to look at him. His very name, Rodney Olivier, sounded more +beautiful than other people's names. + +Dorsy Heron's shy hare's eyes tried to look away and couldn't. Her little +high, red nose got redder. + +And every now and then Dr. Charles looked at Rodney, a grave, considering +look, as if he knew something about him that Rodney didn't know. + + +V. + +"She shall play what she likes," Mr. Sutcliffe said. He had come in late, +without his wife. + +She was going to play to them. They always asked you to play. + +She thought: "It'll be all right. They won't listen; they'll go on +talking. I'll play something so soft and slow that they won't hear it. I +shall be alone, listening to myself." + +She played the first movement of the Moonlight Sonata. A beating heart, a +grieving voice; beautiful, quiet grief; it couldn't disturb them. + +Suddenly they all left off talking. They were listening. Each note +sounded pure and sweet, as if it went out into an empty room. They came +close up, one by one, on tiptoe, with slight creakings and rustlings, +Miss Kendal, Louisa Wright, Dorsy Heron. Their eyes were soft and quiet +like the music. + +Mr. Sutcliffe sat where he could see her. He was far away from the place +where she heard herself playing, but she could feel his face turned on +her like a light. + +The first movement died on its two chords. Somebody was saying "How +beautifully she plays." Life and warmth flowed into her. Exquisite, +tingling life and warmth. "Go on. Go on." Mr. Sutcliffe's voice sounded +miles away beyond the music. + +She went on into the lovely _Allegretto_. She could see their hushed +faces leaning nearer. You could make them happy by playing to them. They +loved you because you made them happy. + +Mr. Sutcliffe had got up; he had come closer. + +She was playing the _Presto agitato_. It flowed smoothly under her +fingers, at an incredible pace, with an incredible certainty. + +Something seemed to be happening over there, outside the place where she +heard the music. Martha came in and whispered to the Doctor. The Doctor +whispered to Roddy. Roddy started up and they went out together. + +She thought: "Papa again." But she was too happy to care. Nothing +mattered so long as she could listen to herself playing the Moonlight +Sonata. + +Under the music she was aware of Miss Kendal stooping over her, pressing +her shoulder, saying something. She stood up. Everybody was standing up, +looking frightened. + +Outside, in the hall, she saw Catty, crying. She went past her over the +open threshold where the snow lay like a light. She couldn't stay to find +her snow-shoes and her coat. + +The track across the Green struck hard and cold under her slippers. The +tickling and trickling of the snow felt like the play of cold light +fingers on her skin. Her fear was a body inside her body; it ached and +dragged, stone cold and still. + + +VI. + +The basin kept on slipping from the bed. She could see its +pattern--reddish flowers and green leaves and curlykews--under the +splashings of mustard and water. She felt as if it must slip from her +fingers and be broken. When she pressed it tighter to the edge of the +mattress the rim struck against Papa's breast. + +He lay stretched out on the big yellow birchwood bed. The curtains were +drawn back, holding the sour smell of sickness in their fluted folds. + +Papa's body made an enormous mound under the green eiderdown. It didn't +move. A little fluff of down that had pricked its way through the cover +still lay where it had settled; Papa's head still lay where it had +dropped; the forefinger still pointed at the fluff of down. + +Papa's head was thrown stiffly back on the high pillows; it sank in, +weighted with the blood that flushed his face. Around it on the white +linen there was a spatter and splash of mustard and water. His beard +clung to his chin, soaked in the yellowish stain. He breathed with a +loud, grating and groaning noise. + +Her ears were so tired with listening to this noise that sometimes they +would go to sleep for a minute or two. Then it would wake them suddenly +and she would begin to cry again. + +You could stop crying if you looked steadily at the little fluff of down. +At each groaning breath it quivered and sank and quivered. + +Roddy sat by the dressing-table. He stared, now at his clenched hands, +now at his face in the glass, as if he hated it, as if he hated himself. + +Mamma was still dressed. She had got up on the bed beside Papa and +crouched on the bolster. She had left off crying. Every now and then she +stroked his hair with tender, desperate fingers. It struck out between +the white ears of the pillow-slip in a thin, pointed crest. + +Papa's hair. His poor hair. These alterations of the familiar person, the +blood-red flush, the wet, clinging beard, the pointed hair, stirred in +her a rising hysteria of pity. + +Mamma had given him the mustard and water. She could see the dregs in the +tumbler on the night-table, and the brown hen's feather they had tickled +his throat with. + +They oughtn't to have done it. Dr. Charles would not have let them do it +if he had been there. They should have waited. They might have known the +choking and the retching would kill him. Catty ought to have known. +Somewhere behind his eyes his life was leaking away through the torn net +of the blood vessels, bleeding away over his brain, under his hair, under +the tender, desperate fingers. + +She fixed her eyes on the pattern of the wall-paper. A purplish rose-bud +in a white oval on a lavender ground. She clung to it as to some firm, +safe centre of being. + + +VII. + +The first day. The first evening. + +She went on hushed feet down the passage to let Dan in. The squeak of the +latch picked at her taut nerves. + +She was glad of the cold air that rushed into the shut-up, soundless +house, the sweet, cold air that hung about Dan's face and tingled in the +curling frieze of his overcoat. + +She took him into the lighted dining-room where Roddy and Mamma waited +for him. The callous fire crackled and spurted brightness. The table was +set for Dan's supper. + +Dan knew that Papa was dead. He betrayed his knowledge by the cramped +stare of his heavy, gentle eyes and by the shamed, furtive movements of +his hands towards the fire. But that was all. His senses were still +uncontaminated by _their_ knowledge. He had not seen Papa. He had not +heard him. + +"What was it?" + +"Apoplexy." + +His eyes widened. Innocent, vague eyes that didn't see. + +Their minds fastened on Dan, to get immunity for themselves out of his +unconsciousness. As long as they could keep him downstairs, in his +innocence, their misery receded from them a little way. + +But Mamma would not have it so. She looked at Dan. Her eyes were dull and +had no more thought in them. Her mouth quivered. They knew that she was +going to say something. Their thread of safety tightened. In another +minute it would snap. + +"Would you like to see him?" she said. + +They waited for Dan to come down from the room. He would not be the same +Dan. He would have seen the white sheet raised by the high mound of the +body and by the stiff, upturned feet, and he would have lifted the +handkerchief from the face. He would be like them, and his consciousness +would put a sharper edge on theirs. He would be afraid to look at them, +as they were afraid to look at each other, because of what he had seen. + + +VIII. + +She lay beside her mother in the strange spare room. + +She had got into bed straight from her undressing. On the other side of +the mattress she had seen her mother's kneeling body like a dwarfed thing +trailed there from the floor, and her hands propped up on the edge of the +eiderdown, ivory-white against the red and yellow pattern, and her +darling bird's head bowed to her finger-tips. + +The wet eyelids had lifted and the drowned eyes had come to life again in +a brief glance of horror. Mamma had expected her to kneel down and pray. +In bed they had turned their backs on each other, and she had the feeling +that her mother shrank from her as from somebody unclean who had omitted +to wash herself with prayer. She wanted to take her mother in her arms +and hold her tight. But she couldn't. She couldn't. + +Suddenly her throat began to jerk with a hysterical spasm. She thought: +"I wish I had died instead of Papa." + +She forced back the jerk of her hysteria and lay still, listening to her +mother's sad, obstructed breathing and her soft, secret blowing of her +nose. + +Presently these sounds became a meaningless rhythm and ceased. She was a +child, dreaming. She stood on the nursery staircase at Five Elms; the +coffin came round the turn and crushed her against the banisters; only +this time she was not afraid of it; she made herself wake because of +something that would happen next. The flagstones of the passage were hard +and cold to her naked feet; that was how you could tell you were awake. +The door of the Morfe drawing-room opened into Mamma's old bedroom at +Five Elms, and when she came to the foot of the bed she saw her father +standing there. He looked at her with a mocking, ironic animosity, so +that she knew he was alive. She thought: + +"It's all right. I only dreamed he was dead. I shall tell Mamma." + +When she really woke, two entities, two different and discordant +memories, came together with a shock. + +Her mother was up and dressed. She leaned over her, tucking the blankets +round her shoulders and saying, "Lie still and go to sleep again, there's +a good girl." + +Her memory cleared and settled, filtering, as the light filtered through +the drawn blinds. Mamma and she had slept together because Papa was dead. + + +IX. + +"Mary, do you know why you're crying?" + +Roddy's face was fixed in a look of anger and resentment, and of anxiety +as if he were afraid that at any minute he would be asked to do something +that he couldn't do. + +They had come down together from the locked room, and gone into the +drawing-room where the yellow blinds let in the same repulsive, greyish, +ochreish light. + +Her tears did not fall. They covered her eyes each with a shaking lens; +the chairs and tables floated up to her as if she stood in an aquarium of +thick, greyish, ochreish light. + +"You think it's because you care," he said. "But it's because you don't +care.... You're not as bad as I am. I don't care a bit." + +"Yes, you do, or you wouldn't think you didn't." + +"No. None of us really cares. Except Mamma. And even she doesn't as much +as she thinks she does. If we cared we'd be glad to sit in there, doing +nothing, thinking about him.... That's why we keep on going upstairs to +look at him, to make ourselves feel as if we cared." + +She wondered. Was that really why they did it? She thought it was because +they couldn't bear to leave him there, four days and four nights, alone. +She said so. But Roddy went on in his hard, flat voice, beating out his +truth. + +"We never did anything to make him happy." + +"He _was_ happy," she said. "When Mark went. He had Mamma." + +"Yes, but he must have known about us. He must have known about us all +the time." + +"What did he know about us?" + +"That we didn't care. + +"Don't you remember," he said, "the things we used to say about him?" + +She remembered. She could see Dan in the nursery at Five Elms, scowling +and swearing he would kill Papa. She could see Roddy, and Mark with his +red tight face, laughing at him. She could see herself, a baby, kicking +and screaming when he took her in his arms. For months she hadn't thought +about him except to wish he wasn't there so that she could go on playing. +When he was in the fit she had been playing on the Kendals' piano, +conceited and happy, not caring. + +Supposing all the time, deep down, in his secret mysterious life, _he_ +had cared? + +"We must leave off thinking about him," Roddy said. "If we keep on +thinking we shall go off our heads." + +"We _are_ off our heads," she said. + +Their hatred of themselves was a biting, aching madness. She hated the +conceited, happy self that hadn't cared. The piano, gleaming sombrely in +the hushed light, reminded her of it. + +She hated the piano. + +They dragged themselves back into the dining-room where Mamma and Dan sat +doing nothing, hiding their faces from each other. The afternoon went on. +Utter callousness, utter weariness came over them. + +Their mother kept looking at the clock. "Uncle Victor will have got to +Durlingham," she said. An hour ago she had said, "Uncle Victor will have +got to York." Their minds clung to Uncle Victor as they had clung, four +days ago, to Dan, because of his unconsciousness. + + +X. + +Uncle Victor had put his arm on her shoulder. He was leaning rather +heavily. + +He saw what she saw: the immense coffin set up on trestles at the foot of +the bed; the sheeted body packed tight in the padded white lining, the +hands, curling a little, smooth and stiff, the hands of a wax figure; the +firm, sallowish white face; the brown stains, like iodine, about the +nostrils; the pale under lip pushed out, proudly. + +A cold, thick smell, like earth damped with stagnant water, came up to +them, mixed with the sharp, piercing smell of the coffin. The vigilant, +upright coffin-lid leaned with its sloping shoulders against the +chimney-piece, ready. + +In spite of his heavy hand she was aware that Uncle Victor's +consciousness of these things was different from hers. He did not appear +to be in the least sorry for Papa. On his face, wistful, absorbed, there +was a faint, incongruous smile. He might have been watching a child +playing some mysterious game. + +He sighed. His eyes turned from the coffin to the coffin-lid. He stared +at the black letters on the shining brass plate. + + Emilius Olivier. + Born November 13th, 1827. + Died January 2nd, 1881. + +The grip on her shoulder tightened. + +"He was faithful, Mary." + +He said it as if he were telling her something she couldn't possibly have +known. + + +XI. + +The funeral woke her. A line of light slid through the chink of the door, +crooked itself and staggered across the ceiling, a blond triangle +throwing the shadows askew. That was Catty, carrying the lamp for the +bearers. + +It came again. There was a shuffling of feet in the passage, a secret +muttering at the head of the stairs, the crack of a banister, a thud as +the shoulder of the coffin butted against the wall at the turn. Then the +grinding scream of the brakes on the hill, the long "Shr-issh" of the +checked wheels ploughing through the snow. + +She could see her mother's face on the pillow, glimmering, with shut +eyes. At each sound she could hear her draw a shaking, sobbing breath. +She turned to her and took her in her arms. The small, stiff body yielded +to her, helpless, like a child's. + +"Oh Mary, what shall I do? To send him away like that--in a train--all +the way.... Your Grandmamma Olivier tried to keep him from me, and now +he's gone back to her." + +"You've got Mark." + +"What's that you say?" + +"Mark. Mark. Nobody can keep Mark from you. He'll never want anybody but +you. He said so." + +How small she was. You could feel her little shoulder-blades, weak and +fine under your fingers, like a child's; you could break them. To be +happy with her either you or she had to be broken, to be helpless and +little like a child. It was a sort of happiness to lie there, holding +her, hiding her from the dreadful funeral dawn. + +Five o'clock. + +The funeral would last till three, going along the road to Reyburn +Station, going in the train from Reyburn to Durlingham, from Durlingham +to King's Cross. She wondered whether Dan and Roddy would keep on feeling +the funeral all the time. The train was part of it. Not the worst part. +Not so bad as going through the East End to the City of London Cemetery. + +When it came to the City of London Cemetery her mind stopped with a jerk +and refused to follow the funeral any further. + +Ten o'clock. Eleven. + +They had shut themselves up in the dining-room, in the yellow-ochreish +light. Mamma sat in her arm-chair, tired and patient, holding her Bible +and her Church Service on her knees, ready. Every now and then she dozed. +When this happened Mary took the Bible from her and read where it opened: +"And he made the candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work made he the +candlestick; his shaft, and his branch, his bowls, his knops, and his +flowers, were of the same.... And in the candlestick were four bowls made +like almonds, his knops and his flowers: And a knop under two branches of +the same, and a knop under two branches of the same, and a knop under two +branches of the same, according to the six branches going out of it. +Their knops and their branches were of the same: all of it was one beaten +work of pure gold." + +At two o'clock the bell of Renton Church began to toll. Her mother sat up +in a stiff, self-conscious attitude and opened the Church Service. The +bell went on tolling. For Papa. + +It stopped. Her mother was saying something. + +"Mary--I can't see with the blind down. Do you think you could read it to +me?" + + * * * * * + +"'I am the Resurrection and the Life--'" + +A queer, jarring voice burst out violently in the dark quiet of the room. +It carried each sentence with a rush, making itself steady and hard. + +"'...He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.... + +"'I said, I will take heed to my ways: that I offend not with my +tongue--'" + +"Not that one," her mother said. + +"'O Lord, Thou hast been our refuge; from one generation to another. + +"'Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the +world were made--'" + +(Too fast. Much too fast. You were supposed to be following Mr. Propart; +but if you kept up that pace you would have finished the Service before +he had got through the Psalm.) + +"'Lord God most holy--'" + +"I can't _hear_ you, Mary." + +"I'm sorry. 'O Lord most mighty, O holy and most merciful Saviour, +deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death. + +"'Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts: shut not Thy merciful +ears to our prayers: but spare us, Lord most holy, O God most Mighty, O +holy and merciful Saviour--'" + +(Prayers, abject prayers for themselves. None for him. Not one word. They +were cowards, afraid for themselves, afraid of death; their funk had made +them forget him. It was as if they didn't believe that he was there. And, +after all, it was _his_ funeral.) + +"'Suffer us not, at our last hour--'" + +The hard voice staggered and dropped, picked itself and continued on a +note of defiance. + +"'...For on pains of death, to fall from Thee....'" + +(They would have come to the grave now, by the black pointed cypresses. +There would be a long pit of yellow clay instead of the green grass and +the white curb. Dan and Roddy would be standing by it.) + +"'Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of His mercy to take unto +Himself the soul of our dear brother--'" + +The queer, violent voice stopped. + +"I can't--I can't." + +Mamma seemed gratified by her inability to finish the Order for the +Burial of the Dead. + + +XII. + +"You can say _that_, with your poor father lying in this grave--" + +It was the third evening after the funeral. A minute ago they were at +perfect peace, and now the everlasting dispute about religion had begun +again. There had been no Prayers since Papa died, because Mamma couldn't +trust herself to read them without breaking down. At the same time, it +was inconceivable to her that there should be no Prayers. + +"I should have thought, if you could read the Burial Service--" + +"I only did it because you asked me to." + +"Then you might do this because I ask you." + +"It isn't the same thing. You haven't got to believe in the Burial +Service. But either you believe in Prayers or you don't believe in them. +If you don't you oughtn't to read them. You oughtn't to be asked to read +them." + +"How are we going on, I should like to know? Supposing I was to be laid +aside, are there to be no Prayers, ever, in this house because you've set +yourself up in your silly self-conceit against the truth?" + +The truth. The truth about God. As if anybody really knew it; as if it +mattered; as if anything mattered except Mamma. + +Yet it did matter. It mattered more than anything in the whole world, the +truth about God, the truth about anything; just the truth. Papa's death +had nothing to do with it. It wasn't fair of Mamma to talk as if it had; +to bring it up against you like that. + +"Let's go to bed," she said. + +Her mother took no notice of the suggestion. She sat bolt upright in her +chair; her face had lost its look of bored, weary patience; it flushed +and flickered with resentment. + +"I shall send for Aunt Bella," she said. + +"Why Aunt Bella?" + +"Because I must have someone. Someone of my own." + + +XIII. + +It was three weeks now since the funeral. + +Mamma and Aunt Bella sat in the dining-room, one on each side of the +fireplace. Mamma looked strange and sunken and rather yellow in a widow's +cap and a black knitted shawl, but Aunt Bella had turned herself into a +large, comfortable sheep by means of a fleece of white shawl and an +ice-wool hood peaked over her cap. + +There was a sweet, inky smell of black things dyed at Pullar's. Mary +picked out the white threads and pretended to listen while Aunt Bella +talked to Mamma in a woolly voice about Aunt Lavvy's friendship with the +Unitarian minister, and Uncle Edward's lumbago, and the unreasonableness +of the working classes. + +She thought how clever it was of Aunt Bella to be able to keep it up like +that. "I couldn't do it to save my life. As long as I live I shall never +be any good to Mamma." + +The dining-room looked like Mr. Metcalfe, the undertaker. Funereal +hypocrisy. She wondered whether Roddy would see the likeness. + +She thought of Roddy's nervous laugh when Catty brought in the first +Yorkshire cakes. His eyes had stared at her steadily as he bit into his +piece. They had said: "You don't care. You don't care. If you really +cared you couldn't eat." + +There were no more threads to pick. + +She wondered whether she would be thought unfeeling if she were to take a +book and read. + +Aunt Bella began to talk about Roddy. Uncle Edward said Roddy ought to go +away and get something to do. + +If Roddy went away there would be no one. No one. + +She got up suddenly and left them. + + +XIV. + +The air of the drawing-room braced her like the rigour of a cold bath. +Her heartache loosened and lost itself in the long shiver of chilled +flesh. + +The stone walls were clammy with the sweat of the thaw; they gave out a +sour, sickly smell. Grey smears of damp dulled the polished lid of the +piano. + +They hadn't used the drawing-room since Papa died. It was so bright, so +heartlessly cheerful compared with the other rooms, you could see that +Mamma would think you unfeeling if you wanted to sit in it when Papa was +dead. She had told Catty not to light the fire and to keep the door shut, +for fear you should be tempted to sit in it and forget. + +The piano. Under the lid the keys were stiffening with the damp. The +hammers were swelling, sticking together. She tried not to think of the +piano. + +She turned her back on it and stood by the side window that looked out on +to the garden. Mamma's garden. It mouldered between the high walls +blackened by the thaw. On the grass-plot the snow had sunk to a thin +crust, black-pitted. The earth was a black ooze through ulcers of grey +snow. + +She had a sudden terrifying sense of desolation. + +Her mind clutched at this feeling and referred it to her father. It sent +out towards him, wherever he might be, a convulsive emotional cry. + +"You were wrong. I do care. Can't you see that I can never be happy +again? Yet, if you could come back I would be happy. I wouldn't mind +your--your little funny ways." + +It wasn't true. She _would_ mind them. If he were really there he would +know it wasn't true. + +She turned and looked again at the piano. She went to it. She opened the +lid and sat down before it. Her fingers crept along the keyboard; they +flickered over the notes of the Sonata _Appassionata_, a ghostly, furtive +playing, without pressure, without sound. + +And she was ashamed as if the piano were tempting her to some cruel, +abominable sin. + + + + +XXII + + +I. + +The consultation had lasted more than an hour. + +From the cobbled square outside you could see them through the window, +Mamma, Uncle Edward, Uncle Victor and Farmer Alderson, sitting round the +dining-room table and talking, talking, talking about Roddy. + +It was awful to think that things--things that concerned you--could go on +and be settled over your head without your knowing anything about it. She +only knew that Papa had made Uncle Victor and Uncle Edward the trustees +and guardians of his children who should be under age at his death (she +and Roddy were under age), and that Mamma had put the idea of farming in +Canada into Uncle Edward's head, and that Uncle Victor had said he +wouldn't hear of letting Roddy go out by himself, and that the landlord +of the Buck Hotel had told Victor that Farmer Alderson's brother Ben had +a big farm somewhere near Montreal and young Jem Alderson was going out +to him in March and they might come to some arrangement. + +They were coming to it now. + +Roddy and she, crouching beside each other on the hearthrug in the +drawing-room, waited till it should be over. Through the shut doors they +could still distinguish Uncle Edward's smooth, fat voice from Uncle +Victor's thin one. The booming and baying were the noises made by Farmer +Alderson. + +"I can't think what they want to drag _him_ in for," Roddy said. "It'll +only make it more unpleasant for them." + +Roddy's eyes had lost their fear; they were fixed in a wise, mournful +stare. He stared at his fate. + +"They don't know yet quite _how_ imbecile I am. If I could have gone out +quietly by myself they never need have known. Now they'll _have_ to. +Alderson'll tell them. He'll tell everybody.... I don't care. It's their +own look-out. They'll soon see I was right." + +"Listen," she said. + +The dining-room door had opened. Uncle Edward's voice came out first, +sounding with a sort of complacent finality. They must have settled it. +You could hear Farmer Alderson stumping his way to the front door. His +voice boomed from the step. + +"Ah doan't saay, look ye, 'e'll mak mooch out of en t' farst ye-ear--" + +"Damn him, you can hear his beastly voice all over the place." + +"Ef yore yoong mon's dead set to larn fa-armin', an' ef 'e've got a head +on 'is shoulders our Jem can larn 'en. Ef 'e '_aven't_, ah tall yo +stra-aight, Mr. Ollyveer, ye med joost's well tak yore mooney and trow it +in t' mistal." + +Roddy laughed. "_I_ could have told them that," he said. + +"Money?" + +"Rather. They can't do it under two hundred pounds. I suppose Victor'll +stump up as usual." + +"Poor Victor." + +"Victor won't mind. He'll do anything for Mamma. They can call it a +premium if it makes them any happier, but it simply means that they're +paying Alderson to get rid of me." + +"No. They've got it into their heads that it's bad for you sticking here +doing nothing." + +"So it is. But being made to do what I can't do's worse.... I'm not +likely to do it any better with that young beast Alderson looking at me +all the time and thinking what a bloody fool I am.... They ought to have +left it to me. It would have come a lot cheaper. I was going anyhow. I +only stayed because of Papa. But I can't tell _them_ that. After all, I +was the only one who looked after him. If I'd gone you'd have had to." + +"Yes." + +"It would even come cheaper," he said, "if I stayed. I can prove it." + +He produced his pocket sketch-book. The leaves were scribbled over with +sums, sums desperately begun and left unfinished, sums that were not +quite sure of themselves, sums scratched out and begun again. He crossed +them all out and started on a fresh page. + +"Premium, two hundred. Passage, twenty. Outfit, say thirty. Two hundred +and fifty. + +"Land cheap, lumber cheap. Labour expensive. Still, Alderson would be so +pleased he might do the job himself for a nominal sum and only charge you +for the wood. Funeral expenses, say ten dollars. + +"How much does it cost to keep me here?" + +"I haven't an idea." + +"No, but think." + +"I can't think." + +"Well, say I eat ten shillings' worth of food per week, that's twenty-six +pounds a year. Say thirty. Clothes, five. Thirty-five. Sundries, perhaps +five. Forty. But I do the garden. What's a gardener's wages? Twenty? +Fifteen? + +"Say fifteen. Fifteen from forty, fifteen from forty--twenty-five. How +much did Papa's funeral come to?" + +"Oh--Roddy--I don't know." + +"Say thirty. Twenty-five from two hundred and fifty, two hundred and +twenty-five. Deduct funeral. One hundred and ninety-five. + +"There you are. One hundred and ninety-five pounds for carting me to +Canada." + +"If you feel like that about it you ought to tell them. They can't make +you go if you don't want to." + +"They're not making me go. I'm going. I couldn't possibly stay after the +beastly things they've said." + +"What sort of things?" + +"About my keep and my being no good and making work in the house." + +"They didn't--they couldn't." + +"Edward did. He said if it wasn't for me Mamma wouldn't have to have +Maggie. Catty could do all the work. And when Victor sat on him and said +Mamma was to have Maggie whatever happened, he jawed back and said she +couldn't afford both Maggie and me." + +"Catty could do Maggie's work and I could do Catty's, if you'd stop. It +would be only cleaning things. That's nothing. I'd rather clean the whole +house and _have_ you." + +"You wouldn't. You only think you would." + +"I would, really. I'll tell them." + +"It's no use," he said. "They won't let you." + +"I'll make them. I'll go and tell Edward and Victor now." + +She had shot up from the floor with sudden energy, and stood looking down +at Roddy as he still crouched there. Her heart ached for him. He didn't +want to go to Canada; he wanted to stay with Mamma, and Mamma was driving +him away from her, for no reason except that Uncle Edward said he ought +to go. + +She could hear the dining-room door open and shut again. They were +coming. + +Roddy rose from the floor. He drew himself up, stretching out his arms in +a crucified attitude, and grinned at her. + +"Do you suppose," he said, "I'd let you?" + +He grinned at Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor as they came in. + +"Uncle Victor," she said, "Why should Roddy go away? If it's Maggie, we +don't really want her. I'll do Catty's work and he'll do the garden. So +he can stay, can't he?" + +"He _can_, Mary, but I don't think he will." + +"Of course I won't. If you hadn't waited to mix me up with Alderson I +could have cleared out and got there by this time. You don't suppose I +was going to sponge on my mother for ever, do you?" + +He stood there, defying Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor, defying their +thoughts of him. She wondered whether he had forgotten the two hundred +pounds and whether they were thinking of it. They didn't answer, and +Roddy, after fixing on them a look they couldn't meet, strode out of the +room. + +She thought: How like Mark he is, with his tight, squared shoulders, +holding his head high. His hair was like Mark's hair, golden brown, close +clipped to the nape of his neck. When he had gone it would be like Mark's +going. + +"It's better he should go," Uncle Victor said. "For his own sake." + +Uncle Edward said, "Of course it is." + +His little blue eyes glanced up from the side of his nose, twinkling. His +mouth stretched from white whisker to white whisker in a smile of +righteous benevolence. But Uncle Victor's eyes slunk away as if he were +ashamed of himself. + +It was Uncle Victor who had paid the two hundred pounds. + + +II. + +"Supposing there's something the matter with him, will he still have to +go?" + +"I don't see why you should suppose there's anything the matter with +him," her mother said. "Is it likely your Uncle Victor would be paying +all that money to send him out if he wasn't fit to go?" + +It didn't seem likely that Victor would have done anything of the sort; +any more than Uncle Edward would have let Aunt Bella give him an overcoat +lined with black jennet. + +They were waiting for Roddy to come back from the doctor's. Before Uncle +Victor left Morfe he had made Roddy promise that for Mamma's satisfaction +he would go and be overhauled. And it was as if he had said "You'll see +then how much need there is to worry." + +You might have kept on hoping that something would happen to prevent +Roddy's going but for the size and solidity and expensiveness of the +preparations. You might forget that his passage was booked for the first +Saturday in March, that to-day was the first Wednesday, that Victor's two +hundred pounds had been paid to Jem Alderson's account at the bank in +Montreal, and still the black jennet lining of the overcoat shouted at +you that nothing _could_ stop Roddy's going now. Uncle Victor might be +reckless, but Uncle Edward and Aunt Bella took no risks. + +Unless, after all, Dr. Kendal stopped it--if he said Roddy mustn't go. + +She could hear Roddy's feet coming back. They sounded like Mark's feet on +the flagged path outside. + +He came into the room quickly. His eyes shone, he looked pleased and +excited. + +Mamma stirred in her chair. + +"That's a bright face. We needn't ask if you've got your passport," she +said. + +He looked at her, a light, unresting look. + +"How right you are," he said. "And wise." + +"Well, I didn't suppose there was much the matter with you." + +"There isn't." + +He went to the bookshelf where he kept his drawing-blocks. + +"I wouldn't sit down and draw if I were you. There isn't time." + +"There'll be less after Saturday." + +He sat down and began to draw. He was as absorbed and happy as if none of +them had ever heard of Canada. + +He chanted: + + "'Cannon to right of them, + Cannon to left of them, + Cannon in front of them + Volleyed and thundered.'" + +The pencil moved excitedly. Volumes of smoke curled and rolled and +writhed on the left-hand side of the sheet. The guns of Balaclava. + + "'Into the jaws of Death, + Into the mouth of Hell, + Rode the six hundred.'" + +A rush of hoofs and heads and lifted blades on the right hand. The horses +and swords of the Light Brigade. + + "'Theirs not to make reply, + Theirs not to reason why, + Theirs but to do and die'"-- + +"You ought to be a soldier, Roddy, like Mark, not a farmer." + +"Oh wise! Oh right! + + "'Forward, the Light Brigade! + Was there a man dismayed? + Not though the soldier knew + Someone had blundered.'" + + +III. + +She was going up the schoolhouse lane towards Karva, because Roddy and +she had gone that way together on Friday, his last evening. + +It was Sunday now; six o'clock: the time he used to bring Papa home. His +ship would have left Queenstown, it would be steering to the west. + +She wondered how much he had really minded going. Perhaps he had only +been afraid he wouldn't be strong enough; for after he had seen the +doctor he had been different. Pleased and excited. Perhaps he didn't +mind so very much. + +If she could only remember how he had looked and what he had said. He had +talked about the big Atlantic liner, and the Canadian forests. With luck +the voyage might last eleven or twelve clear days. You could shoot moose +and wapiti. Wapiti and elk. Elk. With his eyes shining. He was not quite +sure about the elk. He wished he had written to the High Commissioner for +Canada about the elk. That was what the Commissioner was there for, to +answer questions, to encourage you to go to his beastly country. + +She could hear Roddy's voice saying these things as they walked over +Karva. He was turning it all into an adventure, his imagination playing +round and round it. And on Saturday morning he had been sick and couldn't +eat his breakfast. Mamma had been sorry, and at the same time vexed and +irritable as if she were afraid that the arrangements might, after all, +be upset. But in the end he had gone off, pleased and excited, with Jem +Alderson in the train. + +She could see Jem's wide shoulders pushing through the carriage door +after Roddy. He had a gentle, reddish face and long, hanging moustaches +like a dying Gladiator. Little eyes that screwed up to look at you. He +would be good to Roddy. + +It would be all right. + +She stood still in the dark lane. A disturbing memory gnawed its way +through her thoughts that covered it: the way Roddy had looked at Mamma, +that Wednesday, the way he had spoken to her. "Oh wise. Oh right!" + +That was because he believed she wanted him to go away. He couldn't +believe that she really cared for him; that Mamma really cared for +anybody but Mark; he couldn't believe that anybody cared for him. + + "'Into the jaws of Death, + Into the mouth of Hell, + Rode the six hundred.'" + +Roddy's chant pursued her up the lane. + +The gate at the top fell to behind her. Moor grass showed grey among +black heather. She half saw, half felt her way along the sheep tracks. +There, where the edge of the round pit broke away, was the place where +Roddy had stopped suddenly in front of her. + +"I wouldn't mind a bit if I hadn't been such a brute to little Mamma. Why +_are_ we such brutes to her?" He had turned in the narrow moor-track and +faced her with his question: "Why?" + + "'Forward, the Light Brigade! + Was there a man dismayed? + Not though the soldier knew + Someone had blundered'"-- + +Hunderd--blundered. Did Tennyson really call hundred hunderd? + +The grey curve of the high road glimmered alongside the moor. From the +point where her track joined it she could see three lights, two moving, +one still. The still light at the turn came from the Aldersons' house. +The moving lights went with the klomp-klomp of hoofs on the road. + +Down in the darkness beyond the fields Garthdale lay like a ditch under +the immense wall of Greffington Edge. Roddy hated Greffington Edge. He +hated Morfe. He _wanted_ to get away. + +It would be all right. + +The klomp-klomping sounded close behind her. Two shafts of light shot out +in front, white on the grey road. Dr. Kendal drove past in his dog-cart. +He leaned out over the side, peering. She heard him say something to +himself. + +The wheels slowed down with a grating noise. The lights stood still. He +had pulled up. He was waiting for her. + +She turned suddenly and went back up the moor by the way she had come. +She didn't want to see Dr. Kendal. She was afraid he would say something +about Roddy. + + + + +XXIII + + +I. + +The books stood piled on the table by her window, the books Miss Wray of +Clevehead had procured for her, had given and lent her. Now Roddy had +gone she had time enough to read them: Hume's _Essays_, the fat maroon +Schwegler, the two volumes of Kant in the hedgesparrow-green paper +covers. + +"_Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Kritik der reinen Vernunft_." She said it +over and over to herself. It sounded nicer than "_The Critique of Pure +Reason_." At the sight of the thick black letters on the +hedgesparrow-green ground her heart jumped up and down with excitement. +Lucky it was in German, so that Mamma couldn't find out what Kant was +driving at. The secret was hidden behind the thick black bars of the +letters. + +In Schwegler, as you went on you went deeper. You saw thought folding and +unfolding, thought moving on and on, thought drawing the universe to +itself, pushing the universe away from itself to draw it back again, +closer than close. + +Space and Time were forms of thought. They were infinite. So thought was +infinite; it went on and on for ever, carrying Space, carrying Time. + +If only you knew what the Thing-in-itself was. + + +II. + +"Mamma--" + +The letter lay between them on the hall table by the study door. Her +mother put her hand over it, quick. A black, long-tailed M showed between +her forefinger and her thumb. + +They looked at each other, and her mother's mouth began to pout and smile +as it used to when Papa said something improper. She took the letter and +went, with soft feet and swinging haunches like a cat carrying a mouse, +into the study. Mary stared at the shut door. + +Maurice Jourdain. Maurice Jourdain. What on earth was he writing to Mamma +for? + +Five minutes ago she had been quiet and happy, reading Kant's _Critique +of Pure Reason_. Now her heart beat like a hammer, staggering with its +own blows. The blood raced in her brain. + + +III. + +"Mamma, if you don't tell me I shall write and ask him." Her mother +looked up, frightened. + +"You wouldn't do that, Mary?" + +"Oh, wouldn't I though! I'd do it like a shot." + +She wondered why she hadn't thought of it an hour ago. + +"Well--If there's no other way to stop you--" + +Her mother gave her the letter, picking it up by one corner, as though it +had been a dirty pocket-handkerchief. + +"It'll show you," she said, "the sort of man he is." + +Mary held the letter in both her hands, gently. Her heart beat gently now +with a quiet feeling of happiness and satisfaction. She looked a long +time at the characters, the long-tailed M's, the close, sharp v's, the +t's crossed with a savage, downward stab. She was quiet as long as she +only looked. When she read the blood in her brain raced faster and +confused her. She stopped at the bottom of the first page. + +"I can't think what he means." + +"It's pretty plain what he means," her mother said. + +"About all those letters. What letters?" + +"Letters he's been writing to your father and me and your Uncle Victor." + +"When?" + +"Ever since you left school. You were sent to school to keep you out of +his way; and you weren't back before he began his persecuting. If you +want to know why we left Ilford, _that's_ why. He persecuted your poor +father. He persecuted your Uncle Victor. And now he's persecuting me." + +"Persecuting?" + +"What is it but persecuting? Threatening that he won't answer for the +consequences if he doesn't get what he wants. He's mistaken if he thinks +that's the way to get it." + +"What--_does_ he want?" + +"I suppose," her mother said, "he thinks he wants to marry you." + +"Me? He doesn't say that. He only says he wants to come and see me. Why +shouldn't he?" + +"Because your father didn't wish it, and your uncle and I don't wish it." + +"You don't like him." + +"Do _you_?" + +"I--love him." + +"Nonsense. You don't know what you're talking about. You'd have forgotten +all about him if you hadn't seen that letter." + +"I thought he'd forgotten me. You ought to have told me. It was cruel not +to tell me. He must have loved me all the time. He said I was to wait +three years and I didn't know what he meant. He must have loved me then +and I didn't know it." + +The sound of her voice surprised her. It came from her whole body; it +vibrated like a violin. + +"How could he love you? You were a child then." + +"I'm not a child now. You'll have to let him marry me." + +"I'd rather see you in your coffin. I'd rather see you married to poor +Norman Waugh. And goodness knows I wouldn't like that." + +"Your mother didn't like your marrying Papa." + +"You surely don't compare Maurice Jourdain with your father?" + +"He's faithful. Papa was faithful. I'm faithful too." + +"Faithful! To a horrid man like that!" + +"He isn't horrid. He's kind and clever and good. He's brave, like Mark. +He'd have been a soldier if he hadn't had to help his mother. And he's +honourable. He said he wouldn't see me or write to me unless you let him. +And he hasn't seen me and he hasn't written. You can't say he isn't +honourable." + +"I suppose," her mother said, "he's honourable enough." + +"You'll have to let him come. If you don't, I _shall go to him_." + +"I declare if you're not as bad as your Aunt Charlotte." + + +IV. + +Incredible; impossible; but it had happened. + +And it was as if she had known it--all the time, known that she would +come downstairs that morning and see Maurice Jourdain's letter lying on +the table. She always had known that something, some wonderful, +beautiful, tremendous thing would happen to her. This was it. + +It had been hidden in all her happiness. Her happiness was it. Maurice +Jourdain. + +When she said "Maurice Jourdain" she could feel her voice throb in her +body like the string of a violin. When she thought of Maurice Jourdain +the stir renewed itself in a vague, exquisite vibration. The edges of her +mouth curled out with faint throbbing movements, suddenly sensitive, like +eyelids, like finger-tips. + +Odd memories darted out at her. The plantation at Ilford. Jimmy's mouth +crushing her face. Jimmy's arms crushing her chest. A scarlet frock. The +white bridge-rail by the ford. Bertha Mitchison, saying things, things +you wouldn't think of if you could help it. But she was mainly aware of a +surpassing tenderness and a desire to immolate herself, in some +remarkable and noble fashion, for Maurice Jourdain. If only she could see +him, for ten minutes, five minutes, and tell him that she hadn't +forgotten him. He belonged to her real life. Her self had a secret place +where people couldn't get at it, where its real life went on. He was the +only person she could think of as having a real life at all like her own. +She had thought of him as mixed up for ever with her real life, so that +whether she saw him or not, whether she remembered him or not, he would +be there. He was in the songs she made, he was in the Sonata +_Appassionata_; he was in the solemn beauty of Karva under the moon. In +the _Critique of Pure Reason_ she caught the bright passing of his mind. + +Perhaps she had forgotten a little what he looked like. Smoky black eyes. +Tired eyelids. A crystal mind, shining and flashing. A mind like a big +room, filled from end to end with light. Maurice Jourdain. + + +V. + +"I don't think I should have known you, Mary." + +Maurice Jourdain had come. In the end Uncle Victor had let him. He was +sitting there, all by himself, on the sofa in the middle of the room. + +It was his third evening. She had thought it was going to pass exactly +like the other two, and then her mother had got up, with an incredible +suddenness, and left them. + +Through the open window you could hear the rain falling in the garden; +you could see the garden grey and wet with rain. + +She sat on the edge of the fender, and without looking up she knew that +he was watching her from under half-shut eyelids. + +His eyelids were so old, so tired, so very tired and old. + +"What did you cut it all off for?" + +"Oh, just for fun." + +Without looking at him she knew that he had moved, that his chin had +dropped to his chest; there would be a sort of puffiness in his cheeks +and about his jaw under the black, close-clipped beard. When she saw it +she felt a little creeping chill at her heart. + +But that was unfaithfulness, that was cruelty. If he knew it--poor +thing--how it would hurt him! But he never would know. She would behave +as though she hadn't seen any difference in him at all. + +If only she could set his mind moving; turn the crystal about; make it +flash and shine. + +"What have they been doing to you?" he said. "You used to be clever. I +wonder if you're clever still." + +"I don't think I am, very." + +She thought: "I'm stupid. I'm as stupid as an owl. I never felt so stupid +in all my life. If only I could _think_ of something to say to him." + +"Did they tell you what I've come for?" + +"Yes." + +"Are you glad?" + +"Very glad." + +"Why do you sit on the fender?" + +"I'm cold." + +"Cold and glad." + +A long pause. + +"Do you know why your mother hates me, Mary?" + +"She doesn't. She only thought you'd killed Papa." + +"I didn't kill him. It wasn't my fault if he couldn't control his +temper.... That isn't what she hates me for.... Do you know why you were +sent to school--the school my aunt found for you?" + +"Well--to keep me from seeing you." + +"Yes. And because I asked your father to let me educate you, since he +wasn't doing it himself. I wanted to send you to a school in Paris for +two years." + +"I didn't know. They never told me. What made you want to do all that for +me?" + +"It wasn't for you. It was for the little girl who used to go for walks +with me.... She was the nicest little girl. She said the jolliest things +in the dearest little voice. 'How can a man like _you_ care to talk to a +child like _me_?'" + +"Did I say that? I don't remember." + +"_She_ said it." + +"It sounds rather silly of her." + +"She wasn't silly. She was clever as they make them. And she was pretty +too. She had lots of hair, hanging down her back. Curling.... And they +take her away from me and I wait three years for her. She knew I was +waiting. And when I come back to her she won't look at me. She sits on +the fender and stares at the fire. She wears horrible black clothes." + +"Because Papa's dead." + +"She goes and cuts her hair all off. That isn't because your father's +dead." + +"It'll grow again." + +"Not for another three years. And I believe I hear your mother coming +back." + +His chin dropped to his chest again. He brooded morosely. Presently Catty +came in with the coffee. + +The next day he was gone. + + +VI. + +"It seems to me," her mother said, "you only care for him when he isn't +there." + +He had come again, twice, in July, in August. Each time her mother had +said, "Are you sure you want him to come again? You know you weren't very +happy the last time." And she had answered, "I know I'm going to be this +time." + +"You see," she said, "when he _isn't_ there you remember, and when he +_is_ there he makes you forget." + +"Forget what?" + +"What it used to feel like." + +Mamma had smiled a funny, contented smile. Mamma was different. Her face +had left off being reproachful and disapproving. It had got back the +tender, adorable look it used to have when you were little. She hated +Maurice Jourdain, yet you felt that in some queer way she loved you +because of him. You loved her more because of Maurice Jourdain. + +The engagement happened suddenly at the end of August. You knew it would +happen some day; but you thought of it as happening to-morrow or the day +after rather than to-day. At three o'clock you started for a walk, never +knowing how you might come back, and at five you found yourself sitting +at tea in the orchard, safe. He would slouch along beside you, for miles, +morosely. You thought of his mind swinging off by itself, shining where +you couldn't see it. You broke loose from him to run tearing along the +road, to jump water-courses, to climb trees and grin down at him through +the branches. Then he would wake up from his sulking. Sometimes he would +be pleased and sometimes he wouldn't. The engagement happened just after +he had not been pleased at all. + +She could still hear his voice saying "What do you _do_ it for?" and her +own answering. + +"You must do _something_." + +"You needn't dance jigs on the parapets of bridges." + +They slid through the gap into the fields. In the narrow path he stopped +suddenly and turned. + +"How can a child like _you_ care for a man like _me_?" Mocking her +sing-song. + +He stooped and kissed her. She shut her eyes so as not to see the +puffiness. + +"Will you marry me, Mary?" + + +VII. + +After the engagement, the quarrel. It lasted all the way up the +schoolhouse lane. + +"I _do_ care for you, I do, really." + +"You don't know what you're talking about. You may care for me as a child +cares. You don't care as a woman does. No woman who cared for a man would +write the letters you do. I ask you to tell me about yourself--what +you're feeling and thinking--and you send me some ghastly screed about +Spinoza or Kant. Do you suppose any man wants to hear what his sweetheart +thinks about Space and Time and the Ding-an-sich?" + +"You used to like it." + +"I don't like it now. No woman would wear those horrible clothes if she +cared for a man and wanted him to care for her. She wouldn't cut her hair +off." + +"How was I to know you'd mind so awfully? And how do you know what women +do or don't do?" + +"Has it never occurred to you that I might know more women than you know +men? That I might have women friends?" + +"I don't think I've thought about it very much." + +"Haven't you? Men don't live to be thirty-seven without getting to know +women; they can't go about the world without meeting them.... There's a +little girl down in Sussex. A dear little girl. She's everything a man +wants a woman to be." + +"Lots of hair?" + +"Lots of hair. Stacks of it. And she's clever. She can cook and sew and +make her own clothes and her sisters'. She's kept her father's house +since she was fifteen. Without a servant." + +"How awful for her. And you like her?" + +"Yes, Mary." + +"I'm glad you like her. Who else?" + +"A Frenchwoman in Paris. And a German woman in Hamburg. And an +Englishwoman in London; the cleverest woman I know. She's unhappy, Mary. +Her husband behaves to her like a perfect brute." + +"Poor thing. I hope you're nice to her." + +"She thinks I am." + +Silence. He peered into her face. + +"Are you jealous of her, Mary?" + +"I'm not jealous of any of them. You can marry them all if you want to." + +"I was going to marry one of them." + +"Then why didn't you?" + +"Because the little girl in Essex wouldn't let me." + +"Little beast!" + +"So you're jealous of _her_, are you? You needn't be. She's gone. She +tried to swallow the _Kritik der reinen Vernunft_ and it disagreed with +her and she died. + + "'Nur einmal doch mächt' ich dich sehen, + Und sinken vor dir auf's Knie, + Und sterbend zu dir sprechen, + Madam, ich liebe Sie!'" + +"What's that? Oh, what's that?" + +"_That_--Madam--is Heine." + + +VIII. + +"My dearest Maurice--" + +It was her turn for writing. She wondered whether he would like to hear +about the tennis party at the Vicarage. Mr. Spencer Rollitt's nephew, +Harry Craven, had been there, and the two Acroyd girls from Renton Lodge, +and Norman Waugh. + +Harry Craven's fawn face with pointed chin; dust-white face with black +accents. Small fawn's mouth lifting upwards. Narrow nostrils slanting +upwards. Two lobes of white forehead. Half-moons of parted, brushed-back +hair. + +He smiled: a blunt V opening suddenly on white teeth, black eyes +fluttering. He laughed: all his features made sudden, upward movements +like raised wings. + +The Acroyds. Plump girls with pink, blown cheeks and sulky mouths. You +thought of sullen, milk-fed babies, of trumpeting cherubs disgusted with +their trumpets. They were showing their racquets to Harry Craven, bending +their heads. You could see the backs of their privet-white necks, fat, +with no groove in the nape, where their hair curled in springy wires, +Minna's dark, Sophy's golden. They turned their backs when you spoke and +pretended not to hear you. + +She thought she would like Maurice to know that Harry Craven and she had +beaten Minna Ackroyd and Norman Waugh. A love set. + +Afterwards--Harry Craven playing hide-and-seek in the dark. The tennis +net, coiled like a grey snake on the black lawn. "Let's hide together." +Harry Craven, hiding, crouching beside you under the currant bushes. The +scramble together up the water-butt and along the scullery roof. The last +rush across the lawn. + +"I say, you run like the wind." + +He took your hand. You ran faster and faster. You stood together, under +the ash tree, panting, and laughing, safe. He still held your hand. + +Funny that you should remember it when you hadn't noticed it at the time. +Hands were funny things. His hand had felt like Mark's hand, or Roddy's. +You didn't think of it as belonging to him. It made you want to have Mark +and Roddy back again. To play with them. + +Perhaps, after all, it wouldn't be kind to tell Maurice about the tennis +party. He couldn't have played like that. He couldn't have scrambled up +the water-butt and run with you along the scullery roof. + +"My dearest Maurice: Nothing has happened since you left, except that +there was a tennis party at the Vicarage yesterday. You know what tennis +parties are like. You'll be shocked to hear that I wore my old black +jersey--the one you hated so--" + + +IX. + +"'Mein Kind, wir waren Kinder.'" + +She shut her eyes. She wanted nothing but his voice. His voice was alive. +It remembered. It hadn't grown old and tired. "My child, we once were +children, two children happy and small; we crept in the little hen-house +and hid ourselves under the straw." + + "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten + Es wäre Hahnen geschrei." + +"...It's all very well, Mary, I can't go on reading Heine to you for +ever. And--_après_?" + +He had taken her on his knees. That happened sometimes. She kept one foot +on the floor so as not to press on him with her whole weight. And she +played with his watch chain. She liked to touch the things he wore. It +made her feel that she cared for him; it staved off the creeping, +sickening fear that came when their hands and faces touched. + +"Do you know," he said, "what it will be like--afterwards?" + +She began, slowly, to count the buttons of his waistcoat. + +"Have you ever tried to think what it will be like?" + +"Yes." + +Last night, lying awake in the dark, she had tried to think. She had +thought of shoulders heaving over her, of arms holding her, of a face +looking into hers, a honey-white, beardless face, blue eyes, black +eyebrows drawn close down on to the blue. Jimmy's face, not Maurice +Jourdain's. + +That was in September. October passed. She began to wonder when he would +come again. + +He came on the last day of November. + + +X. + +"Maurice, you're keeping something from me. Something's happened. +Something's made you unhappy." + +"Yes. Something's made me unhappy." + +The Garthdale road. Before them, on the rise, the white highway showed +like a sickle curving into the moor. At the horn of the sickle a tall ash +tree in the wall of the Aldersons' farm. Where the road dipped they +turned. + +He slouched slowly, his head hung forward, loosening the fold of flesh +about his jaw. His eyes blinked in the soft November sunshine. His +eyelids were tight as though they had been tied with string. + +"Supposing I asked you to release me from our engagement?" + +"For always?" + +"Perhaps for always. Perhaps only for a short time. Till I've settled +something. Till I've found out something I want to know. Would you, +Mary?" + +"Of course I would. Like a shot." + +"And supposing--I never settled it?" + +"That would be all right. I can go on being engaged to you; but you +needn't be engaged to me." + +"You dear little thing.... I'm afraid, I'm afraid that wouldn't do." + +"It would do beautifully. Unless you're really keeping something back +from me." + +"I am keeping something back from you.... I've no right to worry you with +my unpleasant affairs. I was fairly well off when I asked you to marry +me, but, the fact is, it looks as if my business was going to bits. I may +be able to pull it together again. I may not--" + +"Is _that_ all? I'm glad you've told me. If you'd told me before it would +have saved a lot of bother." + +"What sort of bother?" + +"Well, you see, I wasn't quite sure whether I really wanted to marry +you--just yet. Sometimes I thought I did, sometimes I thought I didn't. +And now I know I do." + +"That's it. I may not be in a position to marry you. I can't ask you to +share my poverty." + +"I shan't mind that. I'm used to it." + +"I may not be able to keep a wife at all." + +"Of course you will. You're keeping a housekeeper now. And a cook and a +housemaid." + +"I may have to send two of them away." + +"Send them all away. I'll work for you all my life. I shall never want to +do anything else. It's what I always wanted. When I was a child I used to +imagine myself doing it for you. It was a sort of game I played." + +"It's a sort of game you're playing now, my poor Mary.... No. No. It +won't do." + +"What do you think I'm made of? No woman who cared for a man could give +him up for a thing like that." + +"There are other things. Complications.... I think I'd better write to +your mother. Or your brother." + +"Write to them--write to them. They won't care a rap about your business. +We're not like that, Maurice." + + +XI. + +"You'd better let me see what he says, Mamma." + +Her mother had called to her to come into the study. She had Maurice +Jourdain's letter in her hand. She looked sad and at the same time happy. + +"My darling, he doesn't want you to see it." + +"Is it as bad as all that?" + +"Yes. If I'd had my way you should never have had anything to do with +him. I'd have forbidden him the house if your Uncle Victor hadn't said +that was the way to make you mad about him. He seemed to think that +seeing him would cure you. And so it ought to have done.... + +"He says you know he wants to break off the engagement, but he doesn't +think he has made you understand why." + +"Oh, yes, he did. It's because of his business." + +"He doesn't say a word about his business. I'm to break it to you that he +doesn't care for you as he thought he cared. As if he wasn't old enough +to know what he wanted. He might have made up his mind before he drove +your father into his grave." + +"Tell me what he says." + +"He just says that. He says he's in an awful position, and whatever he +does he must behave dishonourably.... I admit he's sorry enough. And he's +doing the only honourable thing." + +"He _would_ do that." + +She fixed her mind on his honour. You could love that. You could love +that always. + +"He _says_ he asked you to release him. Did he?" + +"Yes." + +"Then why on earth didn't you?" + +"I did. But I couldn't release myself." + +"But that's what you ought to have done. Instead of leaving him to do +it." + +"Oh, no. That would have been dishonourable to myself." + +"You'd rather be jilted?" + +"Much rather. It's more honourable to be jilted than to jilt." + +"That's not the world's idea of honour." + +"It's my idea of it.... And, after all, he _was_ Maurice Jourdain." + + +XII. + +The pain hung on to the left side of her head, clawing. When she left off +reading she could feel it beat like a hammer, driving in a warm nail. + +Aunt Lavvy sat on the parrot chair, with her feet on the fender. Her +fingers had left off embroidering brown birds on drab linen. + +In the dying light of the room things showed fuzzy, headachy outlines. It +made you feel sick to look at them. + +Mamma had left her alone with Aunt Lavvy. + +"I suppose you think that nobody was ever so unhappy as you are," Aunt +Lavvy said. + +"I hope nobody is. I hope nobody ever will be." + +"Should you say _I_ was unhappy?" + +"You don't look it. I hope you're not." + +"Thirty-three years ago I was miserable, because I couldn't have my own +way. I couldn't marry the man I cared for." + +"Oh--_that_. Why didn't you?" + +"My mother and your father and your Uncle Victor wouldn't let me." + +"I suppose he was a Unitarian?" + +"Yes. He was a Unitarian. But whatever he'd been I couldn't have married +him. I couldn't do anything I liked. I couldn't go where I liked or stay +where I liked. I wanted to be a teacher, but I had to give it up." + +"_Why_?" + +"Because your Uncle Victor and I had to look after your Aunt Charlotte." + +"You could have got somebody else to look after Aunt Charlotte. Somebody +else has to look after her now." + +"Your Grandmamma made us promise never to send her away as long as it was +possible to keep her. That's why your Uncle Victor never married." + +"And all the time Aunt Charlotte would have been better and happier with +Dr. Draper. Aunt Lavvy--t's too horrible." + +"It wasn't as bad as you think. Your Uncle Victor couldn't have married +in any case." + +"Didn't he love anybody?" + +"Yes, Mary; he loved your mother." + +"I see. And she didn't love him." + +"He wouldn't have married her if she had loved him. He was afraid." + +"Afraid?" + +"Afraid of going like your Aunt Charlotte. Afraid of what he might hand +on to his children." + +"Papa wasn't afraid. He grabbed. It was poor little Victor and you who +got nothing." + +"Victor has got a great deal." + +"And you--you?" + +"I've got all I want. I've got all there is. When everything's taken +away, then God's there." + +"If he's there, he's there anyhow." + +"Until everything's taken away there isn't room to _see_ that he's +there." + +When Catty came in with the lamp Aunt Lavvy went out quickly. + +Mary got up and stretched herself. The pain had left off hammering. She +could think. + +Aunt Lavvy--to live like that for thirty-three years and to be happy at +the end. She wondered what happiness there could be in that dull +surrender and acquiescence, that cold, meek love of God. + + "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten + Es wäre Hahnen geschrei." + + + + +XXIV + + +I. + +Everybody in the village knew you had been jilted. Mrs. Waugh and Miss +Frewin knew it, and Mr. Horn, the grocer, and Mr. Oldshaw at the bank. +And Mr. Belk, the Justice of the Peace--little pink and flaxen gentleman, +carrying himself with an air of pompous levity--eyes slewing round as you +passed; and Mrs. Belk--hard, tight rotundity, little iron-grey eyes +twinkling busily in a snub face, putty-skinned with a bilious gleam; +curious eyes, busy eyes saying, "I'd like to know what she did to be +jilted." + +Minna and Sophy Acroyd, with their blown faces and small, disgusted +mouths: you could see them look at each other; they were saying, "Here's +that awful girl again." They were glad you were jilted. + +Mr. Spencer Rollitt looked at you with his hard, blue eyes. His mouth +closed tight with a snap when he saw you coming. He had disapproved of +you ever since you played hide-and-seek in his garden with his nephew. He +thought it served you right to be jilted. + +And there was Dr. Charles's kind look under his savage, shaggy eyebrows, +and Miss Kendal's squeeze of your hand when you left her, and the sudden +start in Dorsy Heron's black hare's eyes. They were sorry for you because +you had been jilted. + +Miss Louisa Wright was sorry for you. She would ask you to tea in her +little green-dark drawing-room; she lived in the ivy house next door to +Mrs. Waugh; the piano would be open, the yellow keys shining; from the +white title page enormous black letters would call to you across the +room: "Cleansing Fires." That was the song she sang when she was thinking +about Dr. Charles. First you played for her the Moonlight Sonata, and +then she sang for you with a feverish exaltation: + + "For as gold is refined in the _fi_-yer, + So a heart is tried by pain." + +She sang it to comfort you. + +Her head quivered slightly as she shook the notes out of her throat in +ecstasy. + +She was sorry for you; but she was like Aunt Lavvy; she thought it was a +good thing to be jilted; for then you were purified; your soul was set +free; it went up, writhing and aspiring, in a white flame to God. + + +II. + +"Mary, why are you always admiring yourself in the glass?" + +"I'm not admiring myself. I only wanted to see if I was better-looking +than last time." + +"Why are you worrying about it? You never used to." + +"Because I used to think I was pretty." + +Her mother smiled. "You were pretty." And took back her smile. "You'd be +pretty always if you were happy, and you'd be happy if you were good. +There's no happiness for any of us without Christ." + +She ignored the dexterous application. + +"Do you mean I'm not, then, really, so very ugly?" + +"Nobody said you were ugly." + +"Maurice Jourdain did." + +"You don't mean to say you're still thinking of that man?" + +"Not thinking exactly. Only wondering. Wondering what it was he hated +so." + +"You wouldn't wonder if you knew the sort of man he is. A man who could +threaten you with his infidelity." + +"He never threatened me." + +"I suppose it was me he threatened, then." + +"What did he say?" + +"He said that if his wife didn't take care to please him there were other +women who would." + +"He ought to have said that to me. It was horrible of him to say it to +you." + +She didn't know why she felt that it was horrible. + +"I can tell you _one_ thing," said her mother, as if she had not told her +anything. "It was those books you read. That everlasting philosophy. He +said it was answerable for the whole thing." + +"Then it was the--_the whole thing_ he hated." + +"I suppose so," her mother said, dismissing a matter of small interest. +"You'd better change that skirt if you're going with me to Mrs. Waugh's." + +"Do you mind if I go for a walk instead?" + +"Not if it makes you any more contented." + +"It might. Are you sure you don't mind?" + +"Oh, go along with you!" + +Her mother was pleased. She was always pleased when she scored a point +against philosophy. + + +III. + +Mr. and Mrs. Belk were coming along High Row. She avoided them by turning +down the narrow passage into Mr. Horn's yard and the Back Lane. From the +Back Lane you could get up through the fields to the school-house lane +without seeing people. + +She hated seeing them. They all thought the same thing: that you wanted +Maurice Jourdain and that you were unhappy because you hadn't got him. +They thought it was awful of you. Mamma thought it was awful, like--like +Aunt Charlotte wanting to marry the piano-tuner, or poor Jenny wanting to +marry Mr. Spall. + +Maurice Jourdain knew better than that. He knew you didn't want to marry +him any more than he wanted to marry you. He nagged at you about your +hair, about philosophy--she could hear his voice nag-nagging now as she +went up the lane--he could nag worse than a woman, but he knew. _She_ +knew. As far as she could see through the working of his dark mind, first +he had cared for her, cared violently. Then he had not cared. + +That would be because he cared for some other woman. There were two +of them. The girl and the married woman. She felt no jealousy and no +interest in them beyond wondering which of them it would be and what +they would be like. There had been two Mary Oliviers; long-haired-- +short-haired, and she had been jealous of the long-haired one. Jealous +of herself. + +There had been two Maurice Jourdains, the one who said, "I'll understand. +I'll never lose my temper"; the one with the crystal mind, shining and +flashing, the mind like a big room filled from end to end with light. But +he had never existed. + +Maurice Jourdain was only a name. A name for intellectual beauty. You +could love that. Love was "the cle-eansing _fi_-yer!" There was the love +of the body and the love of the soul. Perhaps she had loved Maurice +Jourdain with her soul and not with her body. No. She had _not_ loved him +with her soul, either. Body and soul; soul and body. Spinoza said they +were two aspects of the same thing. _What_ thing? Perhaps it was silly to +ask what thing; it would be just body _and_ soul. Somebody talked about a +soul dragging a corpse. Her body wasn't a corpse; it was strong and +active; it could play games and jump; it could pick Dan up and carry him +round the table; it could run a mile straight on end. It could excite +itself with its own activity and strength. It dragged a corpse-like soul, +dull and heavy; a soul that would never be excited again, never lift +itself up again in any ecstasy. + +If only he had let her alone. If only she could go back to her real life. +But she couldn't. She couldn't feel any more her sudden, secret +happiness. Maurice Jourdain had driven it away. It had nothing to do with +Maurice Jourdain. He ought not to have been able to take it from you. + +She might go up to Karva Hill to look for it; but it would not be there. +She couldn't even remember what it had been like. + + +IV. + +New Year's night. She was lying awake in her white cell. + +She hated Maurice Jourdain. His wearily searching eyes made her restless. +His man's voice made her restless with its questions. "Do you know what +it will be like--afterwards?" "Do you really want me?" + +She didn't want him. But she wanted Somebody. Somebody. Somebody. He had +left her with this ungovernable want. + +Somebody. If you lay very still and shut your eyes he would come to you. +You would see him. You knew what he was like. He had Jimmy's body and +Jimmy's face, and Mark's ways. He had the soul of Shelley and the mind of +Spinoza and Immanuel Kant. + +They talked to each other. Her reverie ran first into long, fascinating +conversations about Space and Time and the Thing-in-itself, and the +Transcendental Ego. He could tell you whether you were right or wrong; +whether Substance and the Thing-in-itself were the same thing or +different. + +"Die--If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek." He wrote that. +He wrote all Shelley's poems except the bad ones. He wrote Swinburne's +_Atalanta in Calydon_. He could understand your wanting to know what the +Thing-in-itself was. If by dying to-morrow, to-night, this minute, you +could know what it was, you would be glad to die. Wouldn't you? + +The world was built up in Space and Time. Time and Space were forms of +thought--ways of thinking. If there was thinking there would be a +thinker. Supposing--supposing the Transcendental Ego was the +Thing-in-itself? + +That was _his_ idea. She was content to let him have the best ones. You +could keep him going for quite a long time that way before you got tired. + +The nicest way of all, though, was not to be yourself, but to be him; to +live his exciting, adventurous, dangerous life. Then you could raise an +army and free Ireland from the English, and Armenia from the Turks. You +could go away to beautiful golden cities, melting in sunshine. You could +sail in the China Sea; you could get into Central Africa among savage +people with queer, bloody gods. You could find out all sorts of things. + +You were he, and at the same time you were yourself, going about with +him. You loved him with a passionate, self-immolating love. There wasn't +room for both of you on the raft, you sat cramped up, huddled together. +Not enough hard tack. While he was sleeping you slipped off. A shark got +you. It had a face like Dr. Charles. The lunatic was running after him +like mad, with a revolver. You ran like mad. Morfe Bridge. When he raised +his arm you jerked it up and the revolver went off into the air. The fire +was between his bed and the door. It curled and broke along the floor +like surf. You waded through it. You picked him up and carried him out as +Sister Dora carried the corpses with the small-pox. A screw loose +somewhere. A tap turned on. Your mind dribbled imbecilities. + +She kicked. "I won't think. I won't think about it any more!" + +Restlessness. It ached. It gnawed, stopping a minute, beginning again, +only to be appeased by reverie, by the running tap. + +Restlessness. That was desire. It must be. + +Desire: imeros. Eros. There was the chorus in the Antigone: + + "Eros anikate machan, + Eros os en ktaemasi pipteis." + +There was Swinburne: + + "...swift and subtle and blind as a flame of fire, + Before thee the laughter, behind thee the tears of desire." + +There was the song Minna Acroyd sang at the Sutcliffes' party. "Sigh-ing +and sad for des-ire of the bee." How could anybody sing such a silly +song? + +Through the wide open window she could smell the frost; she could hear it +tingle. She put up her mouth above the bedclothes and drank down the +clear, cold air. She thought with pleasure of the ice in her bath in the +morning. It would break under her feet, splintering and tinkling like +glass. If you kept on thinking about it you would sleep. + + +V. + +Passion Week. + +Her mother was reading the Lessons for the Day. Mary waited till she had +finished. + +"Mamma--what was the matter with Aunt Charlotte?" + +"I'm sure I don't know. Except that she was always thinking about getting +married. Whatever put Aunt Charlotte in your head?" + +Her mother looked up from the Prayer Book as she closed it. Sweet and +pretty; sweet and pretty; young almost, as she used to look, and +tranquil. + +"It's my belief," she said, "there wouldn't have been anything the matter +with her if your Grandmamma Olivier hadn't spoiled her. Charlotte was as +vain as a little peacock, and your Grandmamma was always petting and +praising her and letting her have her own way." + +"If she'd had her own way she'd have been married, and then perhaps she +wouldn't have gone mad." + +"She might have gone madder," said her mother. "It was a good thing for +you, my dear, you didn't get your way. I'd rather have seen you in your +coffin than married to Maurice Jourdain." + +"Whoever it had been, you'd have said that." + +"Perhaps I should. I don't want my only daughter to go away and leave me. +It would be different if there were six or seven of you." + +Her mother's complacence and tranquillity annoyed her. She hated her +mother. She adored her and hated her. Mamma had married for her own +pleasure, for her passion. She had brought you into the world, without +asking your leave, for her own pleasure. She had brought you into the +world to be unhappy. She had planned for you to do the things that she +did. She cared for you only as long as you were doing them. When you left +off and did other things she left off caring. + +"I shall never go away and leave you," she said. + +She hated her mother and she adored her. + +An hour later, when she found her in the garden kneeling by the violet +bed, weeding it, she knelt down beside her, and weeded too. + + +VI. + +April, May, June. + +One afternoon before post-time her mother called her into the study to +show her Mrs. Draper's letter. + +Mrs. Draper wrote about Dora's engagement and Effie's wedding. Dora was +engaged to Hubert Manisty who would have Vinings. Effie had broken off +her engagement to young Tom Manisty; she was married last week to Mr. +Stuart-Gore, the banker. Mrs. Draper thought Effie had been very wise to +give up young Manisty for Mr. Stuart-Gore. She wrote in a postscript: +"Maurice Jourdain has just called to ask if I have any news of Mary. I +think he would like to know that that wretched affair has not made her +unhappy." + +Mamma was smiling in a nervous way. "What am I to say to Mrs. Draper?" + +"Tell her that Mr. Jourdain was right and that I am not at all unhappy." + +She was glad to take the letter to the post and set his mind at rest. + +It was in June last year that Maurice Jourdain had come to her: June the +twenty-fourth. To-day was the twenty-fifth. He must have remembered. + +The hayfields shone, ready for mowing. Under the wind the shimmering hay +grass moved like waves of hot air, up and up the hill. + +She slipped through the gap by Morfe Bridge and went up the fields to the +road on Greffington Edge. She lay down among the bracken in the place +where Roddy and she had sat two years ago when they had met Mr. Sutcliffe +coming down the road. + +The bracken hid her. It made a green sunshade above her head. She shut +her eyes. + + "Kikeriküh! sie glaubten + Es wäre Hahnen geschrei." + +That was all nonsense. Maurice Jourdain would never have crept in the +little hen-house and hidden himself under the straw. He would never have +crowed like a cock. Mark and Roddy would. And Harry Craven and Jimmy. +Jimmy would certainly have hidden himself under the straw. + +Supposing Jimmy had had a crystal mind. Shining and flashing. Supposing +he had never done that awful thing they said he did. Supposing he had had +Mark's ways, had been noble and honourable like Mark-- + +The interminable reverie began. He was there beside her in the bracken. +She didn't know what his name would be. It couldn't be Jimmy or Harry or +any of those names. Not Mark. Mark's name was sacred. + +Cecil, perhaps. + +_Why_ Cecil? _Cecil_?--You ape! You drivelling, dribbling idiot! That was +the sort of thing Aunt Charlotte would have thought of. + +She got up with a jump and stretched herself. She would have to run if +she was to be home in time for tea. + +From the top hayfield she could see the Sutcliffes' tennis court; an +emerald green space set in thick grey walls. She drew her left hand +slowly down her right forearm. The muscle was hardening and thickening. + +Mamma didn't like it when you went by yourself to play singles with Mr. +Sutcliffe. But if Mr. Sutcliffe asked you you would simply have to go. +You would have to play a great many singles against Mr. Sutcliffe if you +were to be in good form next year when Mark came home. + + +VII. + +She was always going to the Sutcliffes' now. Her mother shook her head +when she saw her in her short white skirt and white jersey, slashing at +nothing with her racquet, ready. Mamma didn't like the Sutcliffes. She +said they hadn't been nice to poor Papa. They had never asked him again. +You could see she thought you a beast to like them. + +"But, Mamma darling, I can't help liking them." + +And Mamma would look disgusted and go back to her pansy bed and dig her +trowel in with little savage thrusts, and say she supposed you would +always have your own way. + +You would go down to Greffington Hall and find Mr. Sutcliffe sitting +under the beech tree on the lawn, in white flannels, looking rather tired +and bored. And Mrs. Sutcliffe, a long-faced, delicate-nosed Beauty of +Victorian Albums, growing stout, wearing full skirts and white cashmere +shawls and wide mushroomy hats when nobody else did. She had an air of +doing it on purpose, to be different, like royalty. She would take your +hand and press it gently and smile her downward, dragging smile, and she +would say, "How is your mother? Does she mind the hot weather? She must +come and see me when it's cooler." That was the nice way she had, so that +you mightn't think it was Mamma's fault, or Papa's, if they didn't see +each other often. And she would look down at her shawl and gather it +about her, as if in spirit she had got up and gone away. + +And Mr. Sutcliffe would be standing in front of you, looking suddenly +years younger, with his eyes shining and clean as though he had just +washed them. + +And after tea you would play singles furiously. For two hours you would +try to beat him. When you jumped the net Mrs. Sutcliffe would wave her +hand and nod to you and smile. You had done something that pleased her. + +To-day, when it was all over, Mr. Sutcliffe took her back into the house, +and there on the hall table were the books he had got for her from the +London Library: The Heine, the Goethe's _Faust_, the Sappho, the Darwin's +_Origin of Species_, the Schopenhauer, _Die Welt als Wille und +Vorstellung_. + +"Five? All at once?" + +"I get fifteen. As long as we're here you shall have your five." + +He walked home with her, carrying the books. Five. Five. And when you had +finished them there would be five more. It was unbelievable. + +"Why are you so nice to me? Why? _Why_?" + +"I think it must be because I like you, Mary." + +Utterly unbelievable. + +"Do--you--_really_--like me?" + +"I liked you the first day I saw you. With your brother. On Greffington +Edge." + +"I wonder why." She wondered what he was thinking, what, deep down inside +him, he was really thinking. + +"Perhaps it was because you wanted something I could give you.... +Tennis.... You wanted it so badly. Everything you want you want so +badly." + +"And I never knew we were going to be such friends." + +"No more did I. And I don't know now how long it's going to last." + +"Why shouldn't it last?" + +"Because next year 'Mark' will have come home and you'll have nothing to +say to me." + +"Mark won't make a scrap of difference." + +"Well--if it isn't 'Mark' ... You'll grow up, Mary, and it won't amuse +you to talk to me any more. I shan't know you. You'll wear long skirts +and long hair done in the fashion." + +"I shall always want to talk to you. I shall never do up my hair. I cut +it off because I couldn't be bothered with it. But I was sold. I thought +it would curl all over my head, and it didn't curl." + +"It curls at the tips," Mr. Sutcliffe said. "I like it. Makes you look +like a jolly boy, instead of a dreadful, unapproachable young lady. A +little San Giovanni. A little San Giovanni." + +That was his trick: caressing his own words as if he liked them. + +She wondered what, deep down inside him, he was really like. + +"Mr. Sutcliffe--if you'd known a girl when she was only fourteen, and you +liked her and you never saw her again till she was seventeen, and then +you found that she'd gone and cut her hair all off, would it give you an +awful shock?" + +"Depends on how much I liked her." + +"If you'd liked her awfully--would it make you leave off liking her?" + +"I think my friendship could stand the strain." + +"If it wasn't just friendship? Supposing it was Mrs. Sutcliffe?" + +"I shouldn't like my wife to cut her hair off. It wouldn't be at all +becoming to her." + +"No. But when she was young?" + +"Ah--when she was young--" + +"Would it have made any difference?" + +"No. No. It wouldn't have made any difference at all." + +"You'd have married her just the same?" + +"Just the same, Mary. Why?" + +"Oh, nothing. I thought you'd be like that. I just wanted to make sure." + +He smiled to himself. He had funny, secret thoughts that you would never +know. + +"Well," she said, "I didn't beat you." + +"Form not good enough yet--quite." + +He promised her it should be perfect by the time Mark came home. + + +VIII. + +"The pale pearl-purple evening--" The words rushed together. She couldn't +tell whether they were her own or somebody else's. + +There was the queer shock of recognition that came with your own real +things. It wasn't remembering though it felt like it. + +Shelley--"The pale purple even." Not pearl-purple. Pearl-purple was what +you saw. The sky to the east after sunset above Greffington Edge. Take +out "pale," and "pearl-purple evening" was your own. + +The poem was coming by bits at a time. She could feel the rest throbbing +behind it, an unreleased, impatient energy. + +Her mother looked in at the door. "What are you doing it for, Mary?" + +"Oh--for nothing." + +"Then for pity's sake come down into the warm room and do it there. +You'll catch cold." + +She hated the warm room. + +The poem would be made up of many poems. It would last a long time, +through the winter and on into the spring. As long as it lasted she would +be happy. She would be free from the restlessness and the endless idiotic +reverie of desire. + + +IX. + +"From all blindness of heart; from pride, vain-glory and hypocrisy; from +envy, hatred, and malice, and all uncharitableness, + + "_Good Lord, deliver us_." + +Mary was kneeling beside her mother in church. + +"From fornication, and all other deadly sin--" + +Happiness, the happiness that came from writing poems; happiness that +other people couldn't have, that you couldn't give to them; happiness +that was no good to Mamma, no good to anybody but you, secret and +selfish; that was your happiness. It was deadly sin. + +She felt an immense, intolerable compassion for everybody who was +unhappy. A litany of compassion went on inside her: For old Dr. Kendal, +sloughing and rotting in his chair; for Miss Kendal; for all women +labouring of child; for old Mrs. Heron; for Dorsy Heron; for all +prisoners and captives; for Miss Louisa Wright; for all that were +desolate and oppressed; for Maggie's sister, dying of cancer; and for +Mamma, kneeling there, praying. + +Sunday after Sunday. + +And she would work in the garden every morning, digging in leaf mould and +carrying the big stones for the rockery; she would go to Mrs. Sutcliffe's +sewing parties; she would sit for hours with Maggie's sister, trying not +to look as if she minded the smell of the cancer. You were no good unless +you could do little things like that. You were no good unless you could +keep on doing them. + +She tried to keep on. + +Some people kept on all day, all their lives. Still, it was not you so +much as the world that was wrong. It wasn't fair and right that Maggie's +sister should have cancer while you had nothing the matter with you. Or +even that Maggie had to cook and scrub while you made poems. + +Not fair and right. + + +X. + +"Mamma, what is it? Why are you in the dark?" + +By the firelight she could see her mother sitting with her eyes shut, and +her hands folded in her lap. + +"I can't use my eyes. I think there must be something the matter with +them." + +"Your eyes? ... Do they hurt?" + +(You might have known--you might have known that something would happen. +While you were upstairs, writing, not thinking of her. You might have +known.) + +"_Something_ hurts. Just there. When I try to read. I must be going +blind." + +"Are you sure it isn't your glasses?" + +"How can it be my glasses? They never hurt me before." + +But the oculist in Durlingham said it _was_ her glasses. She wasn't going +blind. It wasn't likely that she ever would go blind. + +For a week before the new glasses came Mamma sat, patient and gentle, in +her chair, with her eyes shut and her hands folded in her lap. And you +read aloud to her: the Bible and _The Times_ in the morning, and Dickens +in the afternoon. And in the evening you played draughts and Mamma beat +you. + +Mamma said, "I shall be quite sorry when the new glasses come." + +Mary was sorry too. They had been so happy. + + +XI. + +April. Mark's ship had left Port Said nine days ago. + +Mamma had come in with the letter. + +"I've got news for you. Guess." + +"Mark's coming to-day." + +"No.... Mr. Jourdain was married yesterday." + +"Who--to?" + +"Some girl he used to see in Sussex." + +(That one. She was glad it was the little girl, the poor one. Nice of +Maurice to marry her.) + +"Do you mind, Mary?" + +"No, not a bit. I hope they'll be happy. I want them to be happy.... Now, +you see--that was why he didn't want to marry me." + +Her mother sat down on the bed. There was something she was going to say. + +"Well--thank goodness that's the last of it." + +"Does Mark know?" + +"No, he does not. You surely don't imagine anybody would tell him a thing +like that about his sister?" + +"Like what?" + +"Well--he wouldn't think it very nice of you." + +"You talk as if I was Aunt Charlotte.... Do you think I'm like her?" + +"I never said you were like her...." + +"You think--you think and won't say." + +"Well, if you don't want to be thought like your Aunt Charlotte you +should try and behave a little more like other people. For pity's sake, +do while Mark's here, or he won't like it, I can tell you." + +"I don't do anything Mark wouldn't like." + +"You do very queer things sometimes, though you mayn't think so.... I'm +not the only one that notices. If you really want to know, that was what +Mr. Jourdain was afraid of--the queer things you say and do. You told me +yourself you'd have gone to him if he hadn't come to you." + +She remembered. Yes, she had said that. + +"Did he know about Aunt Charlotte?" + +"You may be sure he did." + +Mamma didn't know. She never would know what it had been like, that +night. But there were things you didn't know, either. + +"What did Aunt Charlotte _do_?" + +"Nothing. She just fell in love with every man she met. If she'd only +seen him for five minutes she was off after him. Ordering her trousseau +and dressing herself up. She was no more mad than I am except just on +that one point." + +"Aunt Lavvy said that was why Uncle Victor never married. He was afraid +of something--something happening to his children. What do you think he +thought would happen?" + +Her mother's foot tapped on the floor. + +"I'm sure I can't tell you what he thought. And I don't know what there +was to be afraid of. I wish you wouldn't throw your stockings all about +the room." + +Mamma picked up the stockings and went away. You could see that she was +annoyed. Annoyed with Uncle Victor for having been afraid to marry. + +A dreadful thought came to her. "Does Mamma really think I'm like Aunt +Charlotte? I won't be like her. I won't.... I'm not. There was Jimmy and +there was Maurice Jourdain. But I didn't fall in love with the Proparts +or the Manistys, or Norman Waugh, or Harry Craven, or Dr. Charles. Or Mr. +Sutcliffe.... She _said_ I was as bad as Aunt Charlotte. Because I said +I'd go to Maurice.... I meant, just to see him. What did she think I +meant?... Oh, not _that_.... Would I really have gone? Got into the train +and gone? _Would_ I?" + +She would never know. + +"I wish I knew what Uncle Victor was afraid of." + +Wondering what he had been afraid of, she felt afraid. + + + + +XXV + + +I. + +She waited. + +Mamma and Mark had turned their backs to her as they clung together. But +there was his sparrow-brown hair, clipped close into the nape of his +red-brown neck. If only Mamma wouldn't cry like that-- + +"Mark--" + +"Is that Minky?" + +They held each other and let go in one tick of the clock, but she had +stood a long time seeing his eyes arrested in their rush of recognition. +Disappointed. + +The square dinner-table stretched itself into an immense white space +between her and Mark. It made itself small again for Mark and Mamma. +Across the white space she heard him saying things: about Dan meeting him +at Tilbury, and poor Victor coming to Liverpool Street, and Cox's. Last +night he had stayed at Ilford, he had seen Bella and Edward and Pidgeon +and Mrs. Fisher and the Proparts. "Do you remember poor Edward and his +sheep? And Mary's lamb!" + +Mark hadn't changed, except that he was firmer and squarer, and thinner, +because he had had fever. And his eyes--He was staring at her with his +disappointed eyes. + +She called to him. "You don't know me a bit, Mark." + +He laughed. "I thought I'd see somebody grown up. Victor said Mary was +dreadfully mature. What did he mean?" + +Mamma said she was sure she didn't know. + +"What do you do with yourself all day, Minky?" + +"Nothing much. Read--work--play tennis with Mr. Sutcliffe." + +"Mr.--Sutcliffe?" + +"Never mind Mr. Sutcliffe. Mark doesn't want to hear about him." + +"Is there a _Mrs._ Sutcliffe?" + +"Yes." + +"Does _she_ play?" + +"No. She's too old. Much older than he is." + +"That'll do, Mary." + +Mamma's eyes blinked. Her forehead was pinched with vexation. Her foot +tapped on the floor. + +Mark's eyes kept up their puzzled stare. + +"What's been happening?" he said. "What's the matter? Everywhere I go +there's a mystery. There was a mystery at Ilford. About Dan. And about +poor Charlotte. I come down here and there's a mystery about some people +called Sutcliffe. And a mystery about Mary." He laughed again. "Minky +seems to be in disgrace, as if she'd done something.... It's awfully +queer. Mamma's the only person something hasn't happened to." + +"I should have thought everything had happened to me," said Mamma. + +"That makes it queerer." + +Mamma went up with Mark into his room. Papa's room. You could hear her +feet going up and down in it, and the squeaking wail of the wardrobe door +as she opened and shut it. + +She waited, listening. When she heard her mother come downstairs she went +to him. + +Mark didn't know that the room had been Papa's room. He didn't know that +she shivered when she saw him sitting on the bed. She had stood just +there where Mark's feet were and watched Papa die. She could feel the +basin slipping, slipping from the edge of the bed. + +Mark wasn't happy. There was something he missed, something he wanted. +She had meant to say, "It's all right. Nothing's happened. I haven't done +anything," but she couldn't think about it when she saw him sitting +there. + +"Mark--what is it?" + +"I don't know, Minky." + +"_I_ know. You've come back, and it isn't like what you thought it would +be." + +"No," he said, "it isn't.... I didn't think it would be so awful without +Papa." + + +II. + +The big package in the hall had been opened. The tiger's skin lay on the +drawing-room carpet. + +Mark was sorry for the tiger. + +"He was only a young cat. You'd have loved him, Minky, if you'd seen him, +with his shoulders down--very big cat--shaking his haunches at you, and +his eyes shining and playing; cat's eyes, sort of swimming and shaking +with his fun." + +"How did you feel?" + +"Beastly mean to go and shoot him when he was happy and excited." + +"Five years without any fighting.... Anything else happen?" + +"No. No polo. No fighting. Only a mutiny in the battery once." + +"What was it like?" + +"Oh, it just tumbled into the office and yelled and waved jabby things +and made faces at you till you nearly burst with laughing." + +"You laughed?" Mamma said. "At a mutiny?" + +"Anybody would. Minky'd have laughed if she'd been there. It frightened +them horribly because they didn't expect it. The poor things never know +when they're being funny." + +"What happened," said Mary, "to the mutiny?" + +"That." + +"Oh--Mark--" She adored him. + +She went to bed, happy, thinking of the tiger and the mutiny. When Catty +called her in the morning she jumped out of bed, quickly, to begin +another happy day. Everything was going to be interesting, to be +exciting. + +At any minute anything might happen, now that Mark had come home. + + +III. + +"Mark, are you coming?" + +She was tired of waiting on the flagstones, swinging her stick. She +called through the house for him to come. She looked through the rooms, +and found him in the study with Mamma. When they saw her they stopped +talking suddenly, and Mamma drew herself up and blinked. + +Mark shook his head. After all, he couldn't come. + +Mamma wanted him. Mamma had him. As long as they lived she would have +him. Mamma and Mark were happy together; their happiness tingled, you +could feel it tingling, like the happiness of lovers. They didn't want +anybody but each other. You existed for them as an object in some +unintelligible time and in a space outside their space. The only +difference was that Mark knew you were there and Mamma didn't. + +She chose the Garthdale road. Yesterday she had gone that way with Mamma +and Mark. She had not talked to him, for when she talked the pinched, +vexed look came into Mamma's face though she pretended she hadn't heard +you. Every now and then Mark had looked at her over his shoulder and +said, "Poor Minx." It was as if he said, "I'm sorry, but you see how it +is. I can't help it." + +And just here, where the moor track touched the road, she had left them, +clearing the water-courses, and had gone up towards Karva. + +She had looked back and seen them going slowly towards the white sickle +of the road, Mark very upright, taut muscles held in to his shortened +stride; Mamma pathetic and fragile, in her shawl, moving with a stiff, +self-hypnotised air. + +Her love for them was a savage pang that cut her eyes and drew her throat +tight. + +Then suddenly she had heard Mark whooping, and she had run back, whooping +and leaping, down the hill to walk with them again. + +She turned back now, at the sickle. Perhaps Mark would come to meet her. + +He didn't come. She found them sitting close on the drawing-room sofa; +the tea-table was pushed aside; they were looking at Mark's photographs. +She came and stood by them to see. + +Mark didn't look up or say anything. He went on giving the photographs to +Mamma, telling her the names. "Dicky Carter. Man called St. John. Man +called Bibby--Jonas Bibby. Allingham. Peters. Gunning, Stobart Hamilton. +Sir George Limond, Colonel Robertson." + +Photographs of women. Mamma's fingers twitched as she took them, one by +one. Women with smooth hair and correct, distinguished faces. She looked +at each face a long time; her mouth half-smiled, half-pouted at them. She +didn't hand on the photographs to you, but laid them down on the sofa, +one by one, as if you were not there. + +A youngish woman in a black silk gown; Mrs. Robertson, the Colonel's +wife. A girl in a white frock; Mrs. Dicky Carter, she had nursed Mark +through his fever. A tall woman in a riding habit and a solar topee, +standing very straight, looking very straight at you, under the shadow of +the topee. Mamma didn't mind the others so much, but she was afraid of +this one. There was danger under the shadow of the topee. + +"Lady Limond." Mark had stayed with them at Simla. + +"Oh. Very handsome face." + +"Very handsome." + +You could see by Mark's face that he didn't care about Lady Limond. + +Mamma had turned again to the girl in the white frock who had nursed him. + +"Are those all, Mark?" + +"Those are all." + +She took off her glasses and closed her eyes. Her face was smooth now: +her hands were quiet. She had him. She would always have him. + +But when he went away for a fortnight to stay with the man called St. +John, she was miserable till he had come back, safe. + + +IV. + +Whit Sunday morning. She would walk home with Mark after church while +Mamma stayed behind for the Sacrament. + +But it didn't happen. Mark scowled as he turned out into the aisle to +make way for her. He went back into the pew and sat there, looking stiff +and stubborn. He would go up with Mamma to the altar rails. He would eat +the bread and drink the wine. + +That afternoon she took her book into the garden. Mark came to her there. +Mamma, tired with the long service, dozed in the drawing-room. + +Mark read over her shoulder: "'Wir haben in der Transcendentalen +Aesthetik hinreichend bewiesen.' Do it in English." + +"'In the Transcendental Aesthetic we have sufficiently proved that all +that is perceived in space or time, and with it all objects of any +experience possible to us are mere Vorstellungen--Vorstellungen-- +ideas--presentations, which, so far as they are presented, whether as +extended things or series of changes, have no existence grounded in +themselves outside our thoughts--'" + +"Why have you taken to that dreadful stodge?" + +"I'm driven to it. It's like drink; once you begin you've got to go on." + +"What on earth made you begin?" + +"I wanted to know things--to know what's real and what isn't, and what's +at the back of everything, and whether there _is_ anything there or not. +And whether you can know it or not. And how you can know anything at all, +anyhow. I'd give anything ... Are you listening?" + +"Yes, Minky, you'd give anything--" + +"I'd give everything--everything I possess--to know what the +Thing-in-itself is." + +"I'd rather know Arabic. Or how to make a gun that would find its own +range and feed itself with bullets sixty to the minute." + +"That would be only knowing a few; more things. I want _the_ thing. +Reality, Substance, the Thing-in-itself. Spinoza calls it God. Kant +doesn't; but he seems to think it's all the God you'll ever get, and +that, even then, you can't know it. Transcendental Idealism is just +another sell." + +"Supposing," Mark said, "there isn't any God at all." + +"Then I'd rather know _that_ than go on thinking there was one when there +wasn't." + +"But you'd feel sold?" + +"Sort of sold. But it's the risk--the risk that makes it so exciting ... +Why? Do _you_ think there isn't any God?" + +"I'm afraid I think there mayn't be." + +"Oh, Mark--and you went to the Sacrament. You ate it and drank it." + +"Why shouldn't I?" + +"You don't believe in it any more than I do." + +"I never said anything about believing in it." + +"_You ate and drank it_." + +"Poor Jesus said he wanted you to do that and remember him. I did it and +remembered Jesus." + +"I don't care. It was awful of you." + +"Much more awful to spoil Mamma's pleasure in God and Jesus. I did it to +make her happy. Somebody had to go with her. You wouldn't, so I did ... +It doesn't matter, Minky. Nothing matters except Mamma." + +"Truth matters. You'd die rather than lie or do anything dishonourable. +Yet that was dishonourable." + +"I'd die rather than hurt Mamma ... If you make her unhappy, Minky, I +shall hate you." + + +V. + +"You can't go in that thing." + +They were going to the Sutcliffes' dance. Mamma hadn't told Mark she +didn't like them. She wanted Mark to go to the dance. He had said Morfe +was an awful hole and it wasn't good for you to live in it. + +The frock was black muslin, ironed out. Mamma's black net Indian scarf, +dotted with little green and scarlet flowers, was drawn tight over her +hips to hide the place that Catty had scorched with the iron. The heavy, +brilliant, silk-embroidered ends, green and scarlet, hung down behind. +She felt exquisitely light and slender. + +Mamma was shaking her head at Mark as he stared at you. + +"If you knew," he said, "what you look like ... That's the way the funny +ladies dress in the bazaars--If you'd only take that awful thing off." + +"She can't take it off," Mamma said. "He's only teasing you." + +Funny ladies in the bazaars--Funny ladies in the bazaars. Bazaars were +Indian shops ... Shop-girls ... Mark didn't mean shop-girls, though. You +could tell that by his face and by Mamma's ... Was that what you really +looked like? Or was he teasing? Perhaps you would tell by Mrs. +Sutcliffe's face. Or by Mr. Sutcliffe's. + +Their faces were nicer than ever. You couldn't tell. They would never let +you know if anything was wrong. + +Mrs. Sutcliffe said, "What a beautiful scarf you've got on, my dear." + +"It's Mamma's. She gave it me." She wanted Mrs. Sutcliffe to know that +Mamma had beautiful things and that she would give them. The scarf was +beautiful. Nothing could take from her the feeling of lightness and +slenderness she had in it. + +Her programme stood: Nobody. Nobody. Norman Waugh. Dr. Charles. Mr. +Sutcliffe. Mr. Sutcliffe. Nobody. Nobody again, all the way down to Mr. +Sutcliffe, Mr. Sutcliffe, Mr. Sutcliffe. Then Mark. Mr. Sutcliffe had +wanted the last dance, the polka; but she couldn't give it him. She +didn't want to dance with anybody after Mark. + +The big, long dining-room was cleared; the floor waxed. People had come +from Reyburn and Durlingham. A hollow square of faces. Faces round the +walls. Painted faces hanging above them: Mr. Sutcliffe's ancestors +looking at you. + +The awful thing was she didn't know how to dance. Mark said you didn't +have to know. It would be all right. Perhaps it would come, suddenly, +when you heard the music. Supposing it came like skating, only after you +had slithered a lot and tumbled down? + +The feeling of lightness and slenderness had gone. Her feet stuck to the +waxed floor as if they were glued there. She was frightened. + +It had begun. Norman Waugh was dragging her round the room. Once. Twice. +She hated the feeling of his short, thick body moving a little way in +front of her. She hated his sullen bull's face, his mouth close to hers, +half open, puffing. From the walls Mr. Sutcliffe's ancestors looked at +you as you shambled round, tied tight in your Indian scarf, like a funny +lady in the bazaars. Raised eyebrows. Quiet, disdainful faces. She was +glad when Norman Waugh left her on the window-seat. + +Dr. Charles next. He was kind. You trod on his feet and he pretended he +had trodden on yours. + +"My dancing days are over." + +"And mine haven't begun." + +They sat out and she watched Mark. He didn't dance very well: he danced +tightly and stiffly as if he didn't like it; but he danced: with Miss +Frewin and Miss Louisa Wright, because nobody else would; with the +Acroyds because Mrs. Sutcliffe made him; five dances with Dorsy Heron, +because he liked her, because he was sorry for her, because he found her +looking sad and shy in a corner. You could see Dorsy's eyes turn and +turn, restlessly, to look at Mark, and her nose getting redder as he came +to her. + +Dr. Charles watched them. You knew what he was thinking. "She's in love +with him. She can't take her eyes off him." + +Supposing you told her the truth? "He won't marry you. He won't care for +you. He won't care for anybody but Mamma. Can't you see, by the way he +looks at you, the way he holds you? It's no use your caring for him. +It'll only make your little nose redder." + +He wouldn't mind her red nose; her little proud, high-bridged nose. He +liked her small face, trying to look austere with shy hare's eyes; her +vague mouth, pointed at the corners in a sort of sharp tenderness; her +smooth, otter-brown hair brushed back and twisted in a tight coil at the +nape of her neck. Dorsy was sweet and gentle and unselfish. He might have +cared for Dorsy if it hadn't been for Mamma. Anyhow, for one evening in +her life Dorsy was happy, dancing round and round, with her wild black +hare's eyes shining. + +Mr. Sutcliffe. She stood up. She would have to tell him. + +"I can't dance." + +"Nonsense. You can run and you can jump. Of course you can dance." + +"I don't know how to." + +"The sooner you learn the better. I'll teach you in two minutes." + +He steered her into the sheltered bay behind the piano. They practised. + +"Mark's looking at us." + +"Is he? What has he done to you, Mary? We'll go where he can't look at +us." + +They went out into the hall. + +"That's it; your feet between mine. In and out. Don't throw your +shoulders back. Don't keep your elbows in. It's not a hurdle race." + +"I wish it was." + +"You won't in a minute. Don't count your steps. Listen for the beat. It's +the beat that does it." + +She began to feel light and slender again. + +"Now you're off. You're all right." + +Off. Turning and turning. You steered through the open door; in and out +among the other dancers; you skimmed; you swam, whirling, to the steady +tump-tump of the piano, and the queer, exciting squeak of the fiddles-- + +Whirling together, you and Mr. Sutcliffe and the piano and the two +fiddles. One animal, one light, slender animal, whirling and playing. +Every now and then his arm tightened round your waist with a sort of +impatience. When it slackened you were one light, slender animal again, +four feet and four arms whirling together, the piano was its heart, going +tump-tump, and the fiddles-- + +"Why did I think I couldn't do it?" + +"Funk. Pure funk. You wanted to dance--you wanted to so badly that it +frightened you." + +His arm tightened. + +As they passed she could see Mrs. Sutcliffe sitting in an arm-chair +pushed back out of the dancers' way. She looked tired and bored and a +little anxious. + +When the last three dances were over he took her back to Mark. + +Mark scowled after Mr. Sutcliffe. + +"What does he look at you like that for?" + +"Perhaps he thinks I'm--a funny lady in a bazaar." + +"_That's_ the sort of thing you oughtn't to say." + +"_You_ said it." + +"All the more reason why you shouldn't." + +He put his arm round her and they danced. They danced. + +"You can do it all right now," he said. + +"I've learnt. He taught me. He took me outside and taught me. I'm not +frightened any more." + +Mark was dancing better now. Better and better. His eyes shone down into +yours. He whispered. + +"Minky--Poor Minky--Pretty Minky." + +He swung you. He lifted you off your feet. He danced like mad, carrying +you on the taut muscle of his arm. + +Somebody said, "That chap's waked up at last. Who's the girl?" + +Somebody said, "His sister." + +Mark laughed out loud. You could have sworn he was enjoying himself. + +But when he got home he said he hadn't enjoyed himself at all. And he had +a headache the next day. It turned out that he hadn't wanted to go. He +hated dancing. Mamma said he had only gone because he thought you'd like +it and because he thought it would be good for you to dance like other +people. + + +VI. + +"Why are you always going to the Sutcliffes'?" Mark said suddenly. + +"Because I like them." + +They were coming down the fields from Greffington Edge in sight of the +tennis court. + +"You oughtn't to like them when they weren't nice to poor Papa. If Mamma +doesn't want to know them you oughtn't to." + +Mark, too. Mark saying what Mamma said. Her heart swelled and tightened. +She didn't answer him. + +"Anyhow," he said, "you oughtn't to go about all over the place with old +Sutcliffe." When he said "old Sutcliffe" his eyes were merry and insolent +as they used to be. "What do you do it for?" + +"Because I like him. And because there's nobody else who wants to go +about with me." + +"There's Miss Heron." + +"Dorsy isn't quite the same thing." + +"Whether she is or isn't you've got to chuck it." + +"Why?" + +"Because Mamma doesn't like it and I don't like it. That ought to be +enough." (Like Papa.) + +"It isn't enough." + +"Minky--why are you such a brute to little Mamma?" + +"Because I can't help it ... It's all very well for you--" + +Mark turned in the path and looked at her; his tight, firm face tighter +and firmer. She thought: "He doesn't know. He's like Mamma. He won't see +what he doesn't want to see. It would be kinder not to tell him. But I +can't be kind. He's joined with Mamma against me. They're two to one. +Mamma must have said something to make him hate me." ...Perhaps she +hadn't. Perhaps he had only seen her disapproving, reproachful face ... +"If he says another word--if he looks like that again, I shall tell him." + +"It's different for you," she said. "Ever since I began to grow up I felt +there was something about Mamma that would kill me if I let it. I've had +to fight for every single thing I've ever wanted. It's awful fighting +her, when she's so sweet and gentle. But it's either that or go under." + +"Minky--you talk as if she hated you." + +"She does hate me." + +"You lie." He said it gently, without rancour. + +"No. I found that out years ago. She doesn't _know_ she hates me. She +never knows that awful sort of thing. And of course she loved me when I +was little. She'd love me now if I stayed little, so that she could do +what she liked with me; if I'd sit in a corner and think as she thinks, +and feel as she feels and do what she does." + +"If you did you'd be a much nicer Minx." + +"Yes. Except that I _should_ be lying then, the whole time. Hiding my +real self and crushing it. It's your _real_ self she hates--the thing she +can't see and touch and get at--the thing that makes you different. Even +when I was little she hated it and tried to crush it. I remember +things--" + +"You don't love her. You wouldn't talk like that about her if you loved +her." + +"It's _because_ I love her. Her self. _Her_ real self. When she's working +in the garden, planting flowers with her blessed little hands, doing what +she likes, and when she's reading the Bible and thinking about God and +Jesus, and when she's with _you_, Mark, happy. That's her real self. I +adore it. Selves are sacred. You ought to adore them. Anybody's self. +Catty's.... I used to wonder what the sin against the Holy Ghost was. +They told you nobody knew what it was. _I_ know. It's that. Not adoring +the self in people. Hating it. Trying to crush it." + +"I see. Mamma's committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, has she?" + +"Yes." + +He laughed. "You mustn't go about saying those things. People will think +you mad." + +"Let them. I don't care--I don't care if _you_ think I'm mad. I only +think it's beastly of you to say so." + +"You're not madder than I am. We're all mad. Mad as hatters. You and me +and Dank and Roddy and Uncle Victor. Poor Charlotte's the sanest of the +lot, and she's the only one that's got shut up." + +"Why do you say she's the sanest?" + +"Because she knew what she wanted." + +"Yes. She knew what she wanted. She spent her whole life trying to get +it. She went straight for that one thing. Didn't care a hang what anybody +thought of her." + +"So they said poor Charlotte was mad." + +"She was only mad because she didn't get it." + +"Yes, Minx.... Would poor Minky like to be married?" + +"No. I'm not thinking about that. I'd like to write poems. And to get +away sometimes and see places. To get away from Mamma." + +"You little beast." + +"Not more beast than you. You got away. Altogether. I believe you knew." + +"Knew what?" + +Mark's face was stiff and red. He was angry now. + +"That if you stayed you'd be crushed. Like Roddy. Like me." + +"I knew nothing of the sort." + +"Deep down inside you you knew. You were afraid. That's why you wanted to +be a soldier. So as not to be afraid. So as to get away altogether." + +"You little devil. You're lying. Lying." + +He threw his words at you softly, so as not to hurt you. "Lying. Because +you're a beast to Mamma you'd like to think I'm a beast, too." + +"No--no." She could feel herself making it out more and more. Flash after +flash. Till she knew him. She knew Mark. + +"You _had_ to. To get away from her, to get away from her sweetness and +gentleness so that you could be yourself; so that you could be a man." + +She had a tremendous flash. + +"You haven't got away altogether. Half of you still sticks. It'll never +get away.... You'll never love anybody. You'll never marry." + +"No, I won't. You're right there." + +"Yes. Papa never got away. That was why he was so beastly to us." + +"He wasn't beastly to us." + +"He was. You know he was. You're only saying that because it's what Mamma +would like you to say.... He couldn't help being beastly. He couldn't +care for us. He couldn't care for anybody but Mamma." + +"That's why I care for _him_," Mark said. + +"I know.... None of it would have mattered if we'd been brought up right. +But we were brought up all wrong. Taught that our selves were beastly, +that our wills were beastly and that everything we liked was bad. Taught +to sit on our wills, to be afraid of our selves and not trust them for a +single minute.... Mamma was glad when I was jilted, because that was one +for _me_." + +"Were you jilted?" + +"Yes. She thought it would make me humble. I always was. I am. I'm afraid +of my self _now_. I can't trust it. I keep on asking people what they +think when _I_ ought to _know_.... But I'm going to stop all that. I'm +going to fight." + +"Fight little Mamma?" + +"No. Myself. The bit of me that claws on to her and can't get away. My +body'll stay here and take care of her all her life, but my _self_ will +have got away. It'll get away from all of them. It's got bits of them +sticking to it, bits of Mamma, bits of Papa, bits of Roddy, bits of Aunt +Charlotte. Bits of you, Mark. I don't _want_ to get away from you, but I +shall have to. You'd kick me down and stamp on me if you thought it would +please Mamma. There mayn't be much left when I'm done, but at least it'll +be me." + +"Mad. Quite mad, Minx. You ought to be married." + +"And leave little Mamma? ... I'll race you from the bridge to the top +of the hill." + +He raced her. He wasn't really angry. Deep down inside him he knew. + + +VII. + +November, and Mark's last morning. He had got promotion. He was going +back to India with a new battery. He would be stationed at Poona, a place +he hated. Nothing ever happened as he wanted it to happen. + +She was in Papa's room, helping him to pack. The wardrobe door gave out +its squeaking wail again and again as he opened it and threw his things +on to the bed. Her mother had gone away because she couldn't bear to see +them, his poor things. + +They were all folded now and pressed down into the boxes and +portmanteaus. She sat on the bed with Mark's sword across her knees, +rubbing vaseline on the blade. Mark came and stood before her, looking +down at her. + +"Minky, I don't like going away and leaving Mamma with you.... When I +went before you promised you'd be kind to her." + +"What do I do?" + +There was a groove down the middle of the blade for the blood to run in. + +"Do? You do nothing. Nothing. You don't talk to her. You don't want to +talk to her. You behave as if she wasn't there." + +The blade was blunt. It would have to be sharpened before Mark took it +into a battle. Mark's eyes hurt her. She tried to fix her attention on +the blade. + +"What makes you?" + +"I don't know," she said. "Whatever it is it was done long ago." + +"She hasn't got anybody," he said. "Roddy's gone. Dan's no good to her. +She won't have anybody but you." + +"I know, Mark. I shall never go away and leave her." + +"Don't talk about going away and leaving her!" + + * * * * * + +He didn't want her to see him off at the train. He wanted to go away +alone, after he had said good-bye to Mamma. He didn't want Mamma to be +left by herself after he had gone. + +They stood together by the shut door of the drawing-room. She and her +mother stood between Mark and the door. She had said good-bye a minute +ago, alone with him in Papa's room. But there was something they had +missed-- + +She thought: "We must get it now, this minute. He'll say good-bye to +Mamma last. He'll kiss her last. But I must kiss him again, first." + +She came to him, holding up her face. He didn't see her; but when his arm +felt her hand it jerked up and pushed her out of his way, as he would +have pushed anything that stood there between him and Mamma. + + + + + +XXVI + + +I. + +Old Mr. Peacock of Sarrack was dead, and Dr. Kendal was the oldest man in +the Dale. He was not afraid of death; he was only afraid of dying before +Mr. Peacock died. Mamma had finished building the rockery in the garden. +You had carried all the stones. There were no more stones to carry. That +was all that had happened in the year and nine months since Mark had +gone. + +To you nothing happened. Nothing ever would happen. At twenty-one and a +half you were old too, and very wise. You had given up expecting things +to happen. You put 1883 on your letters to Mark and Dan and Roddy, +instead of 1882. Then 1884. You measured time by the poems you wrote and +by the books you read and by the Sutcliffes' going abroad in January and +coming back in March. + +You had advanced from the Critique of Pure Reason to the Critique of +Practical Reason, and the Critique of Judgment and the Prolegomena. And +in the end you were cheated. You would never know the only thing worth +knowing. Reality. For all you knew there was no Reality, no God, no +freedom, no immortality. Only doing your duty. "You can because you +ought." Kant, when you got to the bottom of him, was no more exciting +than Mamma. "_Du kannst, weil du sollst_." + +Why not "You can because you shall"? It would never do to let Mamma know +what Kant thought. She would say "Your Bible could have told you that." + +There was Schopenhauer, though. _He_ didn't cheat you. There was "_reine +Anschauung_," pure perception; it happened when you looked at beautiful +things. Beautiful things were crystal; you looked through them and saw +Reality. You saw God. While the crystal flash lasted "_Wille und +Vorstellung_," the Will and the Idea, were not divided as they are in +life; they were one. That was why beautiful things made you happy. + +And there was Mamma's disapproving, reproachful face. Sometimes you felt +that you couldn't stand it for another minute. You wanted to get away +from it, to the other end of the world, out of the world, to die. When +you were dead perhaps you would know. Or perhaps you wouldn't. Perhaps +death would cheat you, too. + + +II. + +"Oh--have I come too soon?" + +She had found Mr. Sutcliffe at his writing-table in the library, a pile +of papers before him. He turned in his chair and looked at her above the +fine, lean hand that passed over his face as if it brushed cobwebs. + +"They didn't tell me you were busy." + +"I'm not. I ought to be, but I'm not." + +"You _are_. I'll go and talk to Mrs. Sutcliffe till you've finished." + +"No. You'll stay here and talk to me. Mrs. Sutcliffe really _is_ busy." + +"Sewing-party?" + +"Sewing-party." + +She could see them sitting round the dining-room: Mrs. Waugh and Miss +Frewin, Mrs. Belk with her busy eyes, and Miss Kendal and Miss Louisa, +Mrs. Oldshaw and Dorsy; and Mrs. Horn, the grocer's wife, very stiff in a +corner by herself, sewing unbleached calico and hot red flannel, hot +sunlight soaking into them. The library was dim, and leathery and +tobaccoey and cool. + +The last time she came on a Wednesday Mrs. Sutcliffe had popped out of +the dining-room and made them go round to the tennis court by the back, +so that they might not be seen from the windows. She wondered why Mrs. +Sutcliffe was so afraid of them being seen, and why she had not looked +quite pleased. + +And to-day--there was something about Mr. Sutcliffe. + +"You don't want to play?" + +"After tea. When it's cooler. We'll have it in here. By ourselves." He +got up and rang the bell. + +The tea-table between them, and she, pouring out the tea. She was grown +up. Her hair was grown up. It lay like a wreath, plaited on the top of +her head. + +He was smoothing out the wrinkles of one hand with the other, and +smiling. "Everybody busy except you and me, Mary.... How are you getting +on with Kant?" + +"I've done with him. It's taken me four years. You see, either the +German's hard or I'm awfully stupid." + +"German hard, I should imagine. Do you _like_ Kant?" + +"I like him awfully when he says exciting things about Space and Time. I +don't like him when he goes maundering on about his old Categorical +Imperative. You can because you ought--putting you off, like a +clergyman." + +"Kant said that, did he? That shows what an old humbug he was.... And it +isn't true, Mary, it isn't true." + +"If it was it wouldn't prove anything. That's what bothers me." + +"What bothers me is that it isn't true. If I did what I ought I'd be the +busiest man in England. I wouldn't be sitting here. If I even did what I +want--Do you know what I should like to do? To farm my own land instead +of letting it out to these fellows here. I don't suppose you think me +clever, but I've got ideas." + +"What sort of ideas?" + +"Practical ideas. Ideas that can be carried out. That ought to be carried +out because they can. Ideas about cattle-breeding, cattle-feeding, +chemical manuring, housing, labour, wages, everything that has to do with +farming." + +Two years ago you talked and he listened. Now that you were grown up he +talked to you and you listened. He had said it would make a difference. +That was the difference it made. + +"Here I am, a landowner who can't do anything with his land. And I can't +do anything for my labourers, Mary. If I keep a dry roof over their heads +and a dry floor under their feet I'm supposed to have done my duty.... +People will tell you that Mr. Sootcliffe's the great man of the place, +but half of them look down on him because he doesn't farm his own land, +and the other half kow-tow to him because he doesn't, because he's the +landlord. And they all think I'm a dangerous man. They don't like ideas. +They're afraid of 'em.... I'd like to sell every acre I've got here and +buy land--miles and miles of it--that hasn't been farmed before. I'd show +them what farming is if you bring brains to it." + +"I see. You _could_ do that." + +"Could I? The land's entailed. I can't sell it away from my son. And +_he_'ll never do anything with it." + +"Aren't there other things you could have done?" + +"I suppose I could have got the farmers out. Turned them off the land +they've sweated their lives into. Or I could have sold my town house +instead of letting it and bought land." + +"Of course you could. Oh--why didn't you?" + +"Why didn't I? Ah--now you've got me. Because I'm a lazy old humbug, +Mary. All my farming's in my head when it isn't on my conscience." + +"You don't really like farming: you only think you ought to. What do you +really like?" + +"Going away. Getting out of this confounded country into the South of +France. I'm not really happy, Mary, till I'm pottering about my garden at +Agaye." + +She looked where he was looking. Two drawings above the chimney-piece. A +chain of red hills swung out into a blue sea. The Estérel. A pink and +white house on the terrace of a hill. House and hill blazing out +sunshine. + +Agaye. Agaye. Pottering about his garden at Agaye. He was happy there. + +"Well, you can get away. To Agaye." + +"Not as much as I should like. My wife can't stand more than six weeks of +it." + +"So that you aren't really happy at Agaye.... I thought I was the only +person who felt like that. Miserable because I've been doing my own +things instead of sewing, or reading to Mamma." + +"That's the way conscience makes cowards of us all." + +"If it was even _my_ conscience. But it's Mamma's. And her conscience was +Grandmamma's. And Grandmamma's--" + +"And mine?" + +"Isn't yours a sort of landlord's conscience? Your father's?" + +"No. No. It's mine all right. My youth had a conscience." + +"Are you sure it wasn't put off with somebody else's?" + +"Perhaps. At Oxford we were all social reformers. The collective +conscience of the group, perhaps. I wasn't strong enough to rise to it. +Wasn't strong enough to resist it...." + +Don't you do that, my child. Find out what you want, and when you see +your chance coming, take it. Don't funk it." + +"I don't see _any_ chance of getting away." + +"Where do you want to get away to?" + +"There. Agaye." + +He leaned forward. His eyes glittered. "You'd like that?" + +"I'd like it more than anything on earth." + +"Then," he said, "some day you'll go there." + +"No. Don't let's talk about it. I shall never go." + +"I don't see why not. I don't really see why not." + +She shook her head. "No. That sort of thing doesn't happen." + + +III. + +She stitched and stitched, making new underclothing. It was going to +happen. Summer and Christmas and the New Year had gone. In another week +it would happen. She would be sitting with the Sutcliffes in the +Paris-Lyons-Mediterranée express, going with them to Agaye. She had to +have new underclothing. They would be two days in Paris. They would pass, +in the train, through Dijon, Avignon, Toulon and Cannes, then back to +Agaye. She had no idea what it would be like. Only the sounds, Agaye, +rose up out of the other sounds, like a song, a slender foreign song, +bright and clear, that you could sing without knowing what it meant. She +would stay there with the Sutcliffes, for weeks and weeks, in the pink +and white house on the terrace. Perhaps they would go on into Italy. + +Mr. Sutcliffe was going to send to Cook's for the tickets to-morrow. +Expensive, well-fitting clothes had come from Durlingham, so that nothing +could prevent it happening. + +Mr. Sutcliffe was paying for her ticket. Uncle Victor had paid for the +clothes. He had kept on writing to Mamma and telling her that she really +ought to let you go. Aunt Bella and Uncle Edward had written, and Mrs. +Draper, and in the end Mamma had given in. + +At first she had said, "I won't hear of your going abroad with the +Sutcliffes," and, "The Sutcliffes seem to think they've a right to take +you away from me. They've only to say 'Come' and you'll go." Then, "I +suppose you'll have to go," and, "I don't know what your Uncle Victor +thinks they'll do for you, but he shan't say I've stood in your way." And +suddenly her face left off disapproving and reproaching and behaved as it +did on Christmas Days and birthdays. + +She smiled now as she sat still and sewed, as she watched you sitting +still and sewing, making new underclothes. + +Aunt Bella would come and stay with Mamma, then Aunt Lavvy, then Mrs. +Draper, so that she would not be left alone. + +Stitch--stitch. She wondered: Supposing they weren't coming? Could +she have left her mother alone, or would she have given up going and +stayed? No. She couldn't have given it up. She had never wanted anything +in her life as she wanted to go to Agaye with the Sutcliffes. With Mr. +Sutcliffe. Mrs. Sutcliffe didn't count; she wouldn't do anything at +Agaye, she would just trail about in the background, kind and smiling, +in a shawl. She might almost as well not be there. + +The happiness was too great. She could not possibly have given it up. + +She went on stitching. Mamma went on stitching. Catty brought the lamp +in. + +Then Roddy's telegram came. From Queenstown. + +"Been ill. Coming home. Expect me to-morrow. Rodney." + +She knew then that she would not go to Agaye. + + +IV. + +But not all at once. + +When she thought of Roddy it was easy to say quietly to herself, "I +shall have to give it up." When she thought of Mr. Sutcliffe and the +Paris-Lyons-Mediterranée train and the shining, gold-white, unknown +towns, it seemed to her that it was impossible to give up going to Agaye. +You simply could not do it. + +She shut her eyes. She could feel Mr. Sutcliffe beside her in the train +and the carriage rocking. Dijon, Avignon, Cannes. She could hear his +voice telling her the names. She would stand beside him at the window, +and look out. And Mrs. Sutcliffe would sit in her corner, and smile at +them kindly, glad because they were so happy. + +"Roddy doesn't say he _is_ ill," her mother said. "I wonder what he's +coming home for." + +Supposing you had really gone? Supposing you were at Agaye when Roddy-- + +The thought of Roddy gave her a pain in her heart. The thought of not +going to Agaye dragged at her waist and made her feel weak, suddenly, as +if she were trying to stand after an illness. + +She went up to her room. The shoulder line of Greffington Edge was fixed +across the open window, immovable, immutable. Her knees felt tired. She +lay down on her bed, staring at the immovable, immutable white walls. She +tried to think of Substance, of the Reality behind appearances. She could +feel her mind battering at the walls of her body, the walls of her room, +the walls of the world. She could hear it crying out. + +She was kneeling now beside her bed. She could see her arms stretched out +before her on the counterpane, and her hands, the finger-tips together. +She pressed her weak, dragging waist tighter against the bed. + +"If Anything's there--if Anything's there--make me give up going. Make +me think about Roddy. Not about myself. About Roddy. _Roddy_. Make me not +want to go to Agaye." + +She didn't really believe that anything would happen. + +Her mind left off crying. Outside, the clock on the Congregational Chapel +was striking six. She was aware of a sudden checking and letting go, of a +black stillness coming on and on, hushing sound and sight and the touch +of her arms on the rough counterpane, and her breathing and the beating +of her heart. There was a sort of rhythm in the blackness that caught you +and took you into its peace. When the thing stopped you could almost hear +the click. + +She stood up. Her white room was grey. Across the window the shoulder of +the hill had darkened. Out there the night crouched, breathing like an +immense, quiet animal. She had a sense of exquisite security and clarity +and joy. She was not going to Agaye. She didn't want to go. + +She thought: "I shall have to tell the Sutcliffes. Now, this evening. And +Mamma. They'll be sorry and Mamma will be glad." + +But Mamma was not glad. Mamma hated it when you upset arrangements. She +said, "I declare I never saw anybody like you in my life. After all the +trouble and expense." + +But you could see it was Roddy she was thinking about. She didn't want to +believe there was anything the matter with him. If you went that would +look as though he was all right. + +"What do you suppose the Sutcliffes will think? And your Uncle Victor? +With all those new clothes and that new trunk?" + +"He'll understand." + +"_Will_ he!" + +"Mr. Sutcliffe, I mean." + + +V. + +She went down to Greffington Hall that night and told him. He understood. + +But not quite so well as Mrs. Sutcliffe. She gave you a long look, +sighed, and smiled. Almost you would have thought she was glad. _He_ +didn't look at you. He looked down at his own lean fine hands hanging in +front of him. You could see them trembling slightly. And when you were +going he took you into the library and shut the door. + +"Is this necessary, Mary?" he said. + +"Yes. We don't quite know what's wrong with Roddy." + +"Then why not wait and see?" + +"Because I _do_ know. And Mamma doesn't. There's something, or he +wouldn't have come home." + +A long pause. She noticed little things about him. The proud, handsome +corners of his mouth had loosened; his eyelids didn't fit nicely as they +used to do; they hung slack from the eyebone. + +"You care more for Roddy than you do for Mark," he said. + +"I don't care for him half so much. But I'm sorry for him. You can't be +sorry for Mark.... Roddy wants me and Mark doesn't. He wants nobody but +Mamma." + +"He knows what he wants.... Well. It's my fault. I should have known what +I wanted. I should have taken you a year ago." + +"If you had," she said, "it would have been all over now." + +"I wonder, would it?" + +For the life of her she couldn't imagine what he meant. + +When she got home she found her mother folding up the work in the +work-basket. + +"Well, anyhow," Mamma said, "you've laid in a good stock of +underclothing." + + +VI. + +She was sitting in the big leather chair in the consulting-room. The +small grey-white window panes and the black crooked bough of the apple +tree across them made a pattern in her brain. Dr. Charles stood before +her on the hearthrug. She saw his shark's tooth, hanging sharp in the +snap of his jaws. He was powerful, savage and benevolent. + +He had told her what was wrong with Roddy. + +"What--does--it--mean?" + +The savage light went out of his eyes. They were dull and kind under his +red shaggy eyebrows. + +"It means that you won't have him with you very long, Mary." + +That Roddy would die. That Roddy would die. _Roddy_. That was what he had +come home for. + +"He ought never to have gone out with his heart in that state. It beats +me how he's pulled through those five years. Five weeks of it were enough +to kill him.... Jem Alderson must have taken mighty good care of him." + +Jem Alderson. She remembered. The big shoulders, the little screwed up +eyes, the long moustaches, the good, gladiator face. Jem Alderson had +taken care of him. Jem Alderson had cared. + +"I don't know what your mother could have been thinking of to let him +go." + +"Mamma doesn't think of things. It wasn't her fault. She didn't know. +Uncle Edward and Uncle Victor made him." + +"They ought to be hung for it." + +"They didn't know, either. It was my fault. _I_ knew." + +It seemed to her that she had known, that she had known all the time, +that she remembered knowing. + +"Did he tell you?" + +"He didn't tell anybody.... Did he know?" + +"Yes, Mary. He came to me to be overhauled. I told him he wasn't fit to +go." + +"I did _try_ to stop him." + +"Why?" + +He looked at her sharply, as if he were trying to find out something, to +fix responsibility. + +"Because I _knew_." + +"You couldn't have known if nobody told you." + +"I did know. If he dies I shall have killed him. I ought to have stopped +him. I was the only one who knew." + +"You couldn't have stopped him. You were only a child yourself when it +happened. If anybody was to blame it was his mother." + +"It wasn't. She didn't know. Mamma never knows anything she doesn't want +to know. She can't see that he's ill now. She talks as if he ought to do +something. She can't stand men who don't do things like Mark and Dan." + +"What on earth does she suppose he could do? He's no more fit to do +anything than my brother James.... You'll have to take care of him, +Mary." + +A sharp and tender pang went through her. It was like desire; like the +feeling you had when you thought of babies: painful and at the same time +delicious. + +"Could you?" said Dr. Charles. + +"Of course I can." + +"If he's taken care of he might live--" + +She stood up and faced him. "How long?" + +"I don't know. Perhaps--" He went with her to the door. "Perhaps," he +said, "quite a long time." + +(But if he didn't live she would have killed him. She had known all the +time, and she had let him go.) + +Through the dining-room window she could see Roddy as he crouched over +the hearth, holding out his hands to the fire. + +He was hers, not Mamma's, to take care of. Sharp, delicious pain! + + +VII. + +"Oh, Roddy--look! Little, little grouse, making nice noises." + +The nestlings went flapping and stumbling through the roots of the +heather. Roddy gazed at them with his fixed and mournful eyes. He +couldn't share your excitement. He drew back his shoulders, bracing +himself to bear it; his lips tightened in a hard, bleak grin. He grinned +at the absurdity of your supposing that he could be interested in +anything any more. + +Roddy's beautiful face was bleached and sharpened; the sallow, +mauve-tinted skin stretched close over the bone; but below the edge of +his cap you could see the fine spring of his head from his neck, like the +spring of Mark's head. + +They were in April now. He was getting better. He could walk up the lower +slopes of Karva without panting. + +"Why are we ever out?" he said. "Supposing we went home?" + +"All right. Let's." + +He was like that. When he was in the house he wanted to be on the moor; +when he was on the moor he wanted to be back in the house. They started +to go home, and he turned again towards Karva. They went on till they +came to the round pit sunk below the track. They rested there, sitting on +the stones at the bottom of the pit. + +"Mary," he said, "I can't stay here. I shall have to go back. To Canada, +I mean." + +"You shall never go back to Canada," she said. + +"I must. Not to the Aldersons. I can't go there again, because--I can't +tell you why. But if I could I wouldn't. I was no good there. They let +you know it." + +"Jem?" + +"No. _He_ was all right. That beastly woman." + +"What woman?" + +"His aunt. She didn't want me there. I wasn't fit for anything but +driving cattle and cleaning out their stinking pigsties.... She used to +look at me when I was eating. You could see she was thinking 'He isn't +worth his keep.' ... Her mouth had black teeth in it, with horrible gummy +gaps between. The women were like that. I wanted to hit her on the mouth +and smash her teeth.... But of course I couldn't." + +"It's all over. You mustn't think about it." + +"I'm not. I'm thinking about the other thing.... The thing I did. And the +dog, Mary; the dog." + +She knew what was coming. + +"You can't imagine what that place was like. Their sheep-run was miles +from the farm. Miles from anything. You had to take it in turns to sleep +there a month at a time, in a beastly hut. You couldn't sleep because of +that dog. Jem _would_ give him me. He yapped. You had to put him in the +shed to keep him from straying. He yapped all night. The yapping was the +only sound there was. It tore pieces out of your brain.... I didn't think +I could hate a dog.... But I did hate him. I simply couldn't stand the +yapping. And one night I got up and hung him. I hung him." + +"You didn't, Roddy. You know you didn't. The first time you told me that +story you said you found him hanging. Don't you remember? He was a bad +dog. He bit the sheep. Jem's uncle hung him." + +"No. It was me. Do you know what he did? He licked my hands when I was +tying the rope round his neck. He played with my hands. He was a yellow +dog with a white breast and white paws.... And that isn't the worst. That +isn't It." + +"It?" + +"The other thing. What I did.... I haven't told you that. You couldn't +stand me if you knew. It was why I had to go. Somebody must have known. +Jem must have known." + +"I don't believe you did anything. Anything at all." + +"I tell you I did." + +"No, Roddy. You only think you did. You only think you hung the dog." + +They got up out of the pit. They took the track to the schoolhouse lane. +A sheep staggered from its bed and stalked away, bleating, with head +thrown back and shaking buttocks. Plovers got up, wheeling round, +sweeping close. "_Pee_-vit--_Pee_-vit. Pee-_vitt_!" + +"This damned place is full of noises," Roddy said. + + +VIII. + +"The mind can bring it about, that all bodily modifications or images of +things may be referred to the idea of God." + +The book stood open before her on the kitchen table, propped against the +scales. As long as you were only stripping the strings from the French +beans you could read. + +The mind can bring it about. The mind can bring it about. "He who clearly +and distinctly understands himself and his emotions loves God, and so +much the more in proportion as he more understands himself and his +emotions." + +Fine slices of French beans fell from the knife, one by one, into the +bowl of clear water. Spinoza's thought beat its way out through the smell +of steel, the clean green smell of the cut beans, the crusty, spicy smell +of the apple pie you had made. "He who loves God cannot endeavour that +God should love him in return." + +"'Shall we gather at the river--'" Catty sang as she went to and fro +between the kitchen and the scullery. Catty was happy now that Maggie had +gone and she had only you and Jesus with her in the kitchen. Through the +open door you could hear the clack of the hatchet and the thud on the +stone flags as Roddy, with slow, sorrowful strokes, chopped wood in the +backyard. + +"Miss Mary--" Catty's thick, loving voice and the jerk of her black eyes +warned her. + +Mamma looked in at the door. + +"Put that book away," she said. She hated the two brown volumes of +Elwes's Spinoza you had bought for your birthday. "The dinner will be +ruined if you read." + +"It'll be ruined if I don't read." + +For then your mind raged over the saucepans and the fragrant, floury +pasteboard, hungry and unfed. It couldn't bring anything about. It +snatched at the minutes left over from Roddy and the house and Mamma and +the piano. You knew what every day would be like. You would get up early +to practise. When the cooking and the housework was done Roddy would want +you. You would play tennis together with Mr. Sutcliffe and Dorsy Heron. +Or you would go up on to the moors and comfort Roddy while he talked +about the "things" he had done in Canada and about getting away and about +the dog. You would say over and over again, "You know you didn't hang +him. It was Jem's uncle. He was a bad dog. He bit the sheep." In the +winter evenings you would sew or play or read aloud to Mamma and Roddy, +and Roddy would crouch over the fender, with his hands stretched out to +the fire, not listening. + +But Roddy was better. The wind whipped red blood into his cheeks. He said +he would be well if it wasn't for the bleating of the sheep, and the +crying of the peewits and the shouting of the damned villagers. And +people staring at him. He would be well if he could get away. + +Then--he would be well if he could marry Dorsy. + +So the first year passed. And the second. And the third year. She was +five and twenty. She thought: "I shall die before I'm fifty. I've lived +half my life and done nothing." + + +IX. + +Old Dr. Kendal was dead. He had had nothing more to live for. He had +beaten Mr. Peacock of Sarrack. Miss Kendal was wearing black ribbons in +her cap instead of pink. And Maggie's sister was dead of her cancer. + +The wall at the bottom of the garden had fallen down and Roddy had built +it up again. + +He had heaved up the big stones and packed them in mortar; he had laid +them true by the plumb-line; Blenkiron's brother, the stonemason, +couldn't have built a better wall. + +It had all happened in the week when she was ill and went to stay with +Aunt Lavvy at Scarborough. Yesterday evening, when she got home, Roddy +had come in out of the garden to meet her. He was in his shirt sleeves; +glass beads of sweat stood out on his forehead, his face was white with +excitement. He had just put the last dab of mortar to the last stone. + +In the blue and white morning Mary and her mother stood in the garden, +looking at the wall. In its setting of clean white cement, Roddy's bit +showed like the map of South Africa. They were waiting for him to come +down to breakfast. + +"I must say," Mamma said, "he's earned his extra half-hour in bed." + +She was pleased because Roddy had built the wall up and because he was +well again. + +They had turned. They were walking on the flagged path by the +flower-border under the house. Mamma walked slowly, with meditative +pauses, and bright, sidelong glances for her flowers. + +"If only," she said, "he could work without trampling the flowers down." + +The sun was shining on the flagged path. Mamma was stooping over the bed; +she had lifted the stalk of the daffodil up out of the sunk print of +Roddy's boot. Catty was coming down the house passage to the side door. +Her mouth was open. Her eyes stared above her high, sallow cheeks. She +stood on the doorstep, saying something in a husky voice. + +"Miss Mary--will you go upstairs to Master Roddy? I think there's +something the matter with him. I think--" + +Upstairs, in his narrow iron bed, Roddy lay on his back, his lips parted, +his eyes--white slits under half-open lids--turned up to the ceiling. His +arms were squared stiffly above his chest as they had pushed back the +bedclothes. The hands had been clenched and unclenched; the fingers still +curled in towards the palms. His face had a look of innocence and +candour. + +Catty's thick, wet voice soaked through his mother's crying. "Miss +Mary--he went in his first sleep. His hair's as smooth as smooth." + + +X. + +She was alone with Dan in the funeral carriage. + +Her heart heaved and dragged with the grinding of the brakes on the hill; +the brake of the hearse going in front; the brake of their carriage; the +brake of the one that followed with Dr. Charles in it. + +When they left off she could hear Dan crying. He had begun as soon as he +got into the carriage. + +She tried to think of Dr. Charles, sitting all by himself in the back +carriage, calm and comfortable among the wreaths. But she couldn't. She +couldn't think of anything but Dan and the black hearse in front of them. +She could see it when the road turned to the right; when she shut her +eyes she could see the yellow coffin inside it, heaped with white +flowers; and Roddy lying deep down in the coffin. The sides were made +high to cover his arms, squared over his chest as if he had been beating +something off. She could see Roddy's arms beating off his thoughts, and +under the fine hair Roddy's face, innocent and candid. + +Dr. Charles said it wasn't that. He had just raised them in surprise. A +sort of surprise. He hadn't suffered. + +Dan's dark head was bowed forward, just above the level of her knees. His +deep, hot eyes were inflamed with grief; they kept on blinking, gushing +out tears over red lids. He cried like a child, with loud sobs and +hiccoughs that shook him. _Her_ eyes were dry; burning dry; the lids +choked with something that felt like hot sand, and hurt. + +(If only the carriage didn't smell of brandy. That was the driver. He +must have sat in it while he waited.) + +Dan left off crying and sat up suddenly. + +"What's that hat doing there?" + +He had taken off his tall hat as he was getting into the carriage and +laid it on the empty seat. He pointed at the hat. + +"That isn't my hat," he said. + +"Yes, Dank. You put it there yourself." + +"I didn't. My hat hasn't got a beastly black band on it." + +He rose violently, knocking his head against the carriage roof. + +"Here--I must get out of this." + +He tugged at the window-strap, hanging on to it and swaying as he tugged. +She dragged him back into his seat. + +"Sit down and keep quiet." + +She put her hand on his wrist and held it. Down the road the bell of +Renton Church began tolling. He turned and looked at her unsteadily, his +dark eyes showing bloodshot as they swerved. + +"Mary--is Roddy really dead?" + +A warm steam of brandy came and went with his breathing. + +"Yes. That's why you must keep quiet." + +Mr. Rollitt was standing at the open gate of the churchyard. He was +saying something that she didn't hear. Then he swung round solemnly. She +saw the flash of his scarlet hood. Then the coffin. + +She began to walk behind it, between two rows of villagers, between Dorsy +Heron and Mr. Sutcliffe. She went, holding Dan tight, pulling him closer +when he lurched, and carrying his tall hat in her hand. + +Close before her face the head of Roddy's coffin swayed and swung as the +bearers staggered. + + +XI. + +"Roddy ought never to have gone to Canada." + +Her mother had turned again, shaking the big bed. They would sleep +together for three nights; then Aunt Bella would come, as she came when +Papa died. + +"But your Uncle Victor would have his own way." + +"He didn't know." + +She thought: "But _I_ knew. I knew and I let him go. Why did I?" + +It seemed to her that it was because, deep down inside her, she had +wanted him to go. Deep down inside her she had been afraid of the +unhappiness that would come through Roddy. + +"And I don't think," her mother said presently, "it _could_ have been +very good for him, building that wall." + +"You didn't know." + +She thought: "I'd have known. If I'd been here it wouldn't have happened. +I wouldn't have let him. I'd no business to go away and leave him. I +might have known." + +"Lord, if Thou hadst been here our brother had not died." + +The yellow coffin swayed before her eyes, heaped with the white flowers. +Yellow and white. Roddy's dog. His yellow dog with a white breast and +white paws. And a rope round his neck. Roddy thought he had hanged him. + +At seven she got up and dressed and dusted the drawing-room. She dusted +everything very carefully, especially the piano. She would never want to +play on it again. + +The side door stood open. She went out. In the bed by the flagged path +she saw the sunk print of Roddy's foot and the dead daffodil stalk lying +in it. Mamma had been angry. + +She had forgotten that. She had forgotten everything that happened in the +minutes before Catty had come down the passage. + +She filled in the footprint and stroked the earth smooth above it, lest +Mamma should see it and remember. + + + + +XXVII + + +I. + +Potnia, Potnia Nux-- + + _Lady, our Lady, + Night, + You who give sleep to men, to men labouring and suffering-- + Out of the darkness, come, + Come with your wings, come down + On the house of Agamemnon._ + +Time stretched out behind and before you, time to read, to make music, to +make poems in, to translate Euripides, while Mamma looked after her +flowers in the garden; Mamma, sowing and planting and weeding with a +fixed, vehement passion. You could hear Catty and little Alice, Maggie's +niece, singing against each other in the kitchen as Alice helped Catty +with her work. You needn't have been afraid. You would never have +anything more to do in the house. Roddy wasn't there. + +Agamemnon--that was where you broke off two years ago. He didn't keep you +waiting long to finish. You needn't have been afraid. + +Uncle Victor's letter came on the day when the gentians flowered. One +minute Mamma had been happy, the next she was crying. When you saw her +with the letter you knew. Uncle Victor was sending Dan home. Dan was no +good at the office; he had been drinking since Roddy died. Three months. + +Mamma was saying something as she cried. "I suppose he'll be here, then, +all his life, doing nothing." + + +II. + +Mamma had given Papa's smoking-room to Dan. She kept on going in and out +of it to see if he was there. + +"When you've posted the letters you might go and see what Dan's doing." + +Everybody in the village knew about Dan. The postmistress looked up from +stamping the letters to say, "Your brother was here a minute ago." Mr. +Horn, the grocer, called to you from the bench at the fork of the roads, +"Ef yo're lookin' for yore broother, he's joost gawn oop daale." + +If Mr. Horn had looked the other way when he saw you coming you would +have known that Dan was in the Buck Hotel. + +The white sickle of the road; a light at the top of the sickle; the +Aldersons' house. + +A man was crossing from the moor-track to the road. He carried a stack of +heather on his shoulder: Jem's brother, Ned. He stopped and stared. He +was thicker and slower than Jem; darker haired; fuller and redder in the +face; he looked at you with the same little, kind, screwed-up eyes. + +"Ef yo're lookin' for yore broother, 'e's in t' oose long o' us. Wull yo +coom in? T' missus med gev yo a coop o' tea." + +She went in. There was dusk in the kitchen, with a grey light in the +square of the window and a red light in the oblong of the grate. A small +boy with a toasting-fork knelt by the hearth. You disentangled a smell of +stewed tea and browning toast from thick, deep smells of peat smoke and +the sweat drying on Ned's shirt. When Farmer Alderson got up you saw the +round table, the coarse blue-grey teacups and the brown glazed teapot on +a brown glazed cloth. + +Dan sat by the table. Dumpling, Ned's three-year-old daughter, sat on +Dan's knee; you could see her scarlet cheeks and yellow hair above the +grey frieze of his coat-sleeve. His mournful black-and-white face stooped +to her in earnest, respectful attention. He was taking a piece of +butterscotch out of the silver paper. Dumpling opened her wet, red mouth. + +Rachel, Ned's wife, watched them, her lips twisted in a fond, wise smile, +as she pressed the big loaf to her breast and cut thick slices of +bread-and-jam. She had made a place for you beside her. + +"She sengs ersen to slape wid a li'l' song she maakes," Rachel said. +"Tha'll seng that li'l' song for Mester Dan, wuntha?" + +Dumpling hid her face and sang. You had to stoop to hear the cheeping +that came out of Dan's shoulder. + + "Aw, dinny, dinny dy-Doomplin', + Dy-Doomplin', dy-Doomplin', + Dinny, dinny dy-Doomplin', + Dy-Doomplin' daay." + +"Ef tha'll seng for Mester Dan," Farmer Alderson said, "tha'llt seng for +tha faather, wuntha, Doomplin'?" + +"Naw." + +"For Graffer then?" + +"Naw." + +Dumpling put her head on one side, butting under Dan's chin like a cat. +Dan's arm drew her closer. He was happy there, in the Aldersons' kitchen, +holding Dumpling on his knee. There was something in his happiness that +hurt you as Roddy's unhappiness had hurt. All your life you had never +really known Dan, the queer, scowling boy who didn't notice you, didn't +play with you as Roddy played or care for you as Mark had cared. And +suddenly you knew him; better even than Roddy, better than Mark. + + +III. + +The grey byre was warm with the bodies of the cows and their grassy, +milky breath. Dan, in his clean white shirt sleeves, crouched on Ned's +milking stool, his head pressed to the cow's curly red and white flank. +His fingers worked rhythmically down the teat and the milk squirted and +hissed and pinged against the pail. Sometimes the cow swung round her +white face and looked at Dan, sometimes she lashed him gently with her +tail. Ned leaned against the stall post and watched. + +"Thot's t' road, thot's t' road. Yo're the foorst straanger she a' let +milk 'er. She's a narvous cow. 'Er teats is tander." + +When the milking was done Dan put on his well-fitting coat and they went +home over Karva to the schoolhouse lane. + +Dan loved the things that Roddy hated: the crying of the peewits, the +bleating of the sheep, the shouts of the village children when they saw +him and came running to his coat pockets for sweets. He liked to tramp +over the moors with the shepherds; he helped them with the dipping and +shearing and the lambing. + +"Dan, you ought to be a farmer." + +"I know," he said, "that's why they stuck me in an office." + + +IV. + +"If the killer thinks that he kills, if the killed thinks that he is +killed, they do not understand; for this one does not kill, nor is that +one killed." + +Passion Week, two years after Roddy's death; Roddy's death the measure +you measured time by still. + +Mamma looked up from her Bible; she looked over her glasses with eyes +tired of their everlasting reproach. + +"What have you got there, Mary?" + +"The Upanishads from the Sacred Book of the East." + +"Tchtt! It was that Buddhism the other day." + +"Religion." + +"Any religion except your own. Or else it's philosophy. You're destroying +your soul, Mary. I shall write to your Uncle Victor and tell him to ask +Mr. Sutcliffe not to send you any more books from that library." + +"I'm seven and twenty, Mamma ducky." + +"The more shame for you then," her mother said. + +The clock on the Congregational Chapel struck six. They put down their +books and looked at each other. + +"Dan not back?" Mamma knew perfectly well he wasn't back. + +"He went to Reyburn." + +"T't!" Mamma's chin nodded in queer, vexed resignation. She folded her +hands on her knees and waited, listening. + +Sounds of wheels and of hoofs scraping up the hill. The Morfe bus, back +from Reyburn. Catty's feet, running along the passage. The front door +opening, then shutting. Dan hadn't come with the bus. + +"Perhaps," Mamma said, "Ned Anderson'll bring him." + +"Perhaps.... ('There is one eternal thinker, thinking non-eternal +thoughts, who, though one, fulfils the desires of many....') Mamma--why +won't you let him go to Canada?" + +"It was Canada that killed poor Roddy." + +"It won't kill Dan. He's different." + +"And what good would he be there? If your Uncle Victor can't keep him, +who will, I should like to know?" + +"Jem Alderson would. He'd take him for nothing. He told Ned he would. To +make up for Roddy." + +"Make up! He thinks that's the way to make up! I won't have Dan's death +at my door. I'd rather keep him for the rest of my life." + +"How about Dan?" + +"Dan's safe here." + +"He's safe on the moor with Alderson looking after the sheep, and he's +safe in the cowshed milking the cows; but he isn't safe when Ned drives +into Reyburn market." + +"Would it be safer in Canada?" + +"Yes. He'd be thirty miles from the nearest pub. He'd be safer here if +you didn't give him money." + +"The boy has to have money to buy clothes." + +"I could buy them." + +"I daresay! You can't treat a man of thirty as if he was a baby of +three." + +She thought. "No. You can only treat a woman.... 'There is one eternal +thinker'--" + +A knock on the door. + +"There," her mother said, "that's Dan." + +Mary went to the door. Ned Alderson stood outside; he stood slantways, +not looking at her. + +"Ah tried to maake yore broother coom back long o' us, but 'e would na." + +"Hadn't I better go and meet him?" + +"Naw. Ah would na. Ah wouldn' woorry; there's shepherds on t' road wi' t' +sheep. Mebbe 'e'll toorn oop long o' they. Dawn' woorry ef tes laate +like." + +He went away. + +They waited, listening while the clock struck the hours, seven; eight; +nine. At ten her mother and the servants went to bed. She sat up, and +waited, reading. + +"...My son, that subtle essence which you do not perceive there, of +that very essence this great Nyagrodha tree exists.... That which is the +subtile essence, in it all that exists has its self. It is the True. It +is the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it." + +Substance, the Thing-in-itself--You were It. Dan was It. You could think +away your body, Dan's body. One eternal thinker, thinking non-eternal +thoughts. Dreaming horrible dreams. Dan's drunkenness. Why? + +Eleven. A soft scuffle. The scurry of sheep's feet on the Green. A dog +barking. The shepherds were back from Reyburn. + +Feet shuffled on the flagstone. She went to the door. Dan leaned against +the doorpost, bent forward heavily; his chin dropped to his chest. +Something slimy gleamed on his shoulder and hip. Wet mud of the ditch he +had fallen in. She stiffened her muscles to his weight, to the pull and +push of his reeling body. + +Roddy's room. With one lurch he reached Roddy's white bed in the corner. + +She looked at the dressing-table. A strip of steel flashed under the +candlestick. The blue end of a matchbox stuck up out of the saucer. There +would be more matches in Dan's coat pocket. She took away the matches and +the razor. + +Her mother stood waiting in the doorway of her room, small and piteous in +her nightgown. Her eyes glanced off the razor, and blinked. + +"Is Dan all right?" + +"Yes. He came back with the sheep." + + +V. + +The Hegels had come: The _Logik_. Three volumes. The bristling Gothic +text an ambush of secret, exciting, formidable things. The titles flamed; +flags of strange battles; signals of strange ships; challenging, enticing +to the dangerous adventure. + +After the first enchantment, the Buddhist Suttas and the Upanishads were +no good. Nor yet the Vedânta. You couldn't keep on saying, "This is +That," and "Thou art It," or that the Self is the dark blue bee and the +green parrot with red eyes and the thunder-cloud, the seasons and the +seas. It was too easy, too sleepy, like lying on a sofa and dropping +laudanum, slowly, into a rotten, aching tooth. Your teeth were sound and +strong, they had to have something hard to bite on. You wanted to think, +to keep on thinking. Your mind wasn't really like a tooth; it was like a +robust, energetic body, happy when it was doing difficult and dangerous +things, balancing itself on heights, lifting great weights of thought, +following the long march into thick, smoky battles. + +"Being and Not-Being are the same": ironic and superb defiance. And then +commotion; as if the infinite stillness, the immovable Substance, had got +up and begun moving--Rhythm of eternity: the same for ever: for ever +different: for ever the same. + +Thought _was_ the Thing-in-itself. + +This man was saying, over and over and all the time what you had wanted +Kant to say, what he wouldn't say, what you couldn't squeeze out of him, +however you turned and twisted him. + +You jumped to where the name "Spinoza" glittered like a jewel on the +large grey page. + +Something wanting. You knew it, and you were afraid. You loved him. You +didn't want him to be found out and exposed, like Kant. He had given you +the first incomparable thrill. + +Hegel. Spinoza. She thought of Spinoza's murky, mysterious face. It said, +"I live in you, still, as he will never live. You will never love that +old German man. He ran away from the cholera. He bolstered up the Trinity +with his Triple Dialectic, to keep his chair at Berlin. _I_ refused their +bribes. They excommunicated me. You remember? Cursed be Baruch Spinoza in +his going out and his coming in." + +You had tried to turn and twist Spinoza, too; and always he had refused +to come within your meaning. His Substance, his God stood still, in +eternity. He, too; before the noisy, rich, exciting Hegel, he drew back +into its stillness; pure and cold, a little sinister, a little ironic. +And you felt a pang of misgiving, as if, after all, he might have been +right. So powerful had been his hold. + +Dan looked up. "What are you reading, Mary?" + +"Hegel." + +"Haeckel--that's the chap Vickers talks about." + +Vickers--she remembered. Dan lived with Vickers when he left Papa. + +"He's clever," Dan said, "but he's an awful ass." + +"Who? Haeckel?" + +"No. Vickers." + +"You mean he's an awful ass, but he's clever." + + +VI. + +One Friday evening an unusual smell of roast chicken came through the +kitchen door. Mary put on the slender, long-tailed white gown she wore +when she dined at the Sutcliffes'. + +Dan's friend, Lindley Vickers, was sitting on the sofa, talking to Mamma. +When she came in he left off talking and looked at her with sudden happy +eyes. She remembered Maurice Jourdain's disappointed eyes, and Mark's. +Dan became suddenly very polite and attentive. + +All through dinner Mr. Vickers kept on turning his eyes away from Mamma +and looking at her; every time she looked she caught him looking. His +dark hair sprang in two ridges from the parting. His short, high-bridged +nose seemed to be looking at you, too, with its wide nostrils, alert. His +face did all sorts of vivid, interesting things; you wondered every +minute whether this time it would be straight and serious or crooked and +gay, whether his eyes would stay as they were, black crystals, or move +and show grey rings, green speckled. + +He was alive, running over with life; no, not running over, vibrating +with it, holding it in; he looked as if he expected something delightful +to happen, and waited, excited, ready. + +He began talking, about Hegel. "'Plus ça change, plus c'est la même +chose.'" + +She heard herself saying something. Dan turned and looked at her with a +sombre, thoughtful stare. Mamma smiled, and nodded her chin as much as to +say "Did you ever hear such nonsense?" She knew that was the way to stop +you. + +Mr. Vickers's eyes were large and attentive. When you stopped his mouth +gave such a sidelong leap of surprise and amusement that you laughed. +Then he laughed. + +Dan said, "What's the joke?" And Mr. Vickers replied that it wasn't a +joke. + +In the drawing-room Mamma said, "I won't have any of those asides between +you and Mr. Vickers, do you hear?" + +Mary thought that so funny that she laughed. She knew what Mamma was +thinking, but she was too happy to care. Her intelligence had found its +mate. + +You played, and at the first sound of the piano he came in and stood by +you and listened. + +You had only to play and you could make him come to you. He would get up +and leave Dan in the smoking-room; he would leave Mamma in the garden. +When you played the soft Schubert _Impromptu_ he would sit near you, very +quiet; when you played the _Appassionata_ he would get up and stand close +beside you. When you played the loud, joyful Chopin _Polonaise_ he would +walk up and down; up and down the room. + +Saturday evening. Sunday evening. (He was going on Monday very early.) + +He sang, + + "'Es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath + Das man vom liebsten was man hat + Muss scheiden.'" + +Dan called out from his corner, "Translate. Let's know what it's all +about." + +He pounded out the accompaniment louder. "We won't, will we?" He jumped +up suddenly. "Play the _Appassionata_." + +She played and he talked. + +"I can't play if you talk." + +"Yes, you can. I wish I hadn't got to go to-morrow." + +"Have you" (false note) "got to go?" + +"I suppose so." + +"If Dan asked you, would you stop?" + +"Yes." + +He slept in Papa's room. When she heard his door shut she went to Dan. + +"Dan, why don't you ask him to stay longer?" + +"Because I don't want him to." + +"I thought he was your friend." + +"He is my friend. The only one I've got." + +'Then--why--?" + +"That's why." He shut the door on her. + +She got up early. Dan was alone in the dining-room. + +He said, "What have you come down for?" + +"To give you your breakfasts." + +"Don't be a little fool. Go back to your room." + +Mr. Vickers had come in. He stood by the doorway, looking at her and +smiling. "Why this harsh treatment?" he said. He had heard Dan. + +Now and then he smiled again at Dan, who sat sulking over his breakfast. + +Dan went with him to Durlingham. He was away all night. + +Next day, at dinner-time, they appeared again together. Mr. Vickers had +brought Dan back. He was going to stay for another week. At the Buck +Hotel. + + +VII. + +"Es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath." He had no business to sing it, to sing +it like that, so that you couldn't get the thing out of your head. That +wouldn't have mattered if you could have got his voice out of your heart. +It hung there, clawing, hurting. She resented this pain. + +"Das man vom liebsten was man hat," the dearest that we have, "muss +schei-ei-eden, muss schei-ei-eden." + +Her fingers pressed and crept over the keys, in guilty, shamed silence; +it would be awful if he heard you playing it, if Dan heard you or Mamma. + +You had only to play and you could make him come. + +Supposing you played the Schubert _Impromptu_--She found herself playing +it. + +He didn't come. He wasn't coming. He was going into Reyburn with Dan. And +on Monday he would be gone. This time he would really go. + +When you left off playing you could still hear him singing in your head. +"Das man vom liebsten was man hat." "Es ist bestimmt--" But if you felt +like that about it, then-- + +Her hands dropped from the keys. + +It wasn't possible. He only came on Friday evening last week. This was +Saturday morning. Seven days. It couldn't happen in seven days. He would +be gone on Monday morning. Not ten days. + +"I can't--I don't." + +Something crossing the window pane made her start and turn. Nannie +Learoyd's face, looking in. Naughty Nannie. You could see her big pink +cheeks and her scarlet mouth and her eyes sliding and peering. Poor +pretty, naughty Nannie. Nannie smiled when she met you on the Green, as +if she trusted you not to tell how you saw her after dark slinking about +the Back Lane waiting for young Horn to come out to her. + +The door opened. Nannie slid away. It was only Mamma. + +"Mary," she said, "I wish you would remember that Mr. Vickers has come to +see Dan, and that he has only got two days more." + +"It's all right. He's going into Reyburn with him." + +"I'm sure," her mother said, "I wish he'd stay here." + +She pottered about the room, taking things up and putting them down +again. Presently Catty came for her and she went out. + +Mary began to play the Sonata _Appassionata_. She thought: "I don't care +if he doesn't come. I want to play it, and I shall." + +He came. He stood close beside her and listened. Once he put his hand on +her arm. "Oh no," he said. "_Not_ like that." + +She stood up and faced him. "Tell me the truth, shall I ever be any good? +Shall I ever play?" + +"Do you really want the truth?" + +"Of course I do." + +Her mind fastened itself on her playing. It hid and sheltered itself +behind her playing. + +"Let's look at your hands." + +She gave him her hands. He lifted them; he felt the small bones sliding +under the skin, he bent back the padded tips, the joints of the fingers. + +"There's no reason why you shouldn't have played magnificently," he said. + +"Only I don't. I never have." + +"No, you never have." + +He came closer; she didn't know whether he drew her to him or whether he +came closer. A queer, delicious feeling, a new feeling, thrilled through +her body to her mouth, to her finger-tips. Her head swam slightly. She +kept her eyes open by an effort. + +He gave her back her hands. She remembered. They had been talking about +her playing. + +"I knew," she said, "it was bad in places." + +"I don't care whether it's bad or good. It's you. The only part of you +that can get out. You're very bad in places, but you do something to me +all the same." + +"What do I do?" + +"You know what you do." + +"I don't. I don't really. Tell me." + +"If you don't know, I can't tell you--dear--" + +He said it so thickly that she was not sure at the time whether he had +really said it. She remembered afterwards. + +"There's Dan," she whispered. + +He swung himself off from her and made himself a rigid figure at the +window. Dan stood in the doorway. He was trying to took as if she wasn't +there. + +"I say, aren't you coming to Reyburn?" + +"No, I'm not." + +"Why not?" + +"I've got a headache." + +"_What_?" + +"Headache." + +Outside on the flagstones she saw Nannie pass again and look in. + + +VIII. + +An hour later she was sitting on the slope under the hill road of +Greffington Edge. He lay on his back beside her in the bracken. Lindley +Vickers. + +Suddenly he pulled himself up into a sitting posture like her own. She +was then aware that Mr. Sutcliffe had gone up the road behind them; he +had lifted his hat and passed her without speaking. + +"What does Sutcliffe talk to you about?" + +"Farming." + +"And what do you do?" + +"Listen." + +Below them, across the dale, they could see the square of Morfe on its +platform. + +"How long have you lived in that place?" + +"Ten years. No; eleven." + +"Women," he said, "are wonderful. I can't think where you come from. I +knew your father, I know Dan and your mother, and Victor Olivier and your +aunt--" + +"Which aunt?" + +"The Unitarian lady; and I knew Mark--and Rodney. They don't account for +you." + +"Does anybody account for anybody else?" + +"Yes. You believe in heredity?" + +"I don't know enough about it." + +"You should read Haeckel--_The History of Evolution_, and Herbert Spencer +and Ribot's _Heredity_. It would interest you.... No, it wouldn't. It +wouldn't interest you a bit." + +"It sounds as if it would rather." + +"It wouldn't.... Look here, promise me you won't think about it, you'll +let it alone. Promise me." + +He was like Jimmy making you promise not to hang out of top-storey +windows. + +"No good making promises." + +"Well," he said, "there's nothing in it.... I wish I hadn't said that +about your playing. I only wanted to see whether you'd mind or not." + +"I don't mind. What does it matter? When I'm making music I think there's +nothing but music in all the world; when I'm doing philosophy I think +there's nothing but philosophy in all the world; when I'm writing verses +I think there's nothing but writing in all the world; and when I'm +playing tennis I think there's nothing but tennis in all the world." + +"I see. And when you suffer you think there's nothing but suffering in +all the world." + +"Yes." + +"And when--and when--" + +His face was straight and serious and quiet. His eyes covered her; first +her face, then her breasts; she knew he could see her bodice quiver with +the beating of her heart. She felt afraid. + +"Then," he said, "you'll not think; you'll know." + +She thought: "He didn't say it. He won't. He can't. It isn't possible." + +"Hadn't we better go?" + +He sprang to his feet. + +"Much better," he said. + + +IX. + +She would not see him again that day. Dan was going to dine with him at +the Buck Hotel. + +When Dan came back from Reyburn he said he wouldn't go. He had a +headache. If Vickers could have a headache, so could he. He sulked all +evening in the smoking-room by himself; but towards nine o'clock he +thought better of it and went round, he said, to look Vickers up. + +Her mother yawned over her book; and the yawns made her impatient; she +wanted to be out of doors, walking, instead of sitting there listening to +Mamma. + +At nine o'clock Mamma gave one supreme yawn and dragged herself to bed. + +She went out through the orchard into the Back Lane. She could see Nannie +Learoyd sitting on the stone stairs of Horn's granary, waiting for young +Horn to come round the corner of his yard. Perhaps they would go up into +the granary and hide under the straw. She turned into the field track to +the schoolhouse and the highway. In the dark bottom the river lay like a +broad, white, glittering road. + +She stopped by the schoolhouse, considering whether she would go up to +the moor by the high fields and come back down the lane, or go up the +lane and come back down the fields. + +"Too dark to find the gaps if I come back by the fields." She had +forgotten the hidden moon. + +There was a breaking twilight when she reached the lane. She came down at +a swinging stride. Her feet went on the grass borders without a sound. + +At the last crook of the lane she came suddenly on a man and woman +standing in her path by the stone wall. It would be Nannie Learoyd and +young Horn. They were fixed in one block, their faces tilted backwards, +their bodies motionless. The woman's arms were round the man's neck, his +arms round her waist. There was something about the queer back-tilted +faces--queer and ugly. + +As she came on she saw them break loose from each other and swing apart: +Nannie Learoyd and Lindley Vickers. + + +X. + +She lay awake all night. Her brain, incapable of thought, kept turning +round and round, showing her on an endless rolling screen the images of +Lindley and Nannie Learoyd, clinging together, loosening, swinging apart, +clinging together. When she came down on Sunday morning breakfast was +over. + +Sunday--Sunday. She remembered. Last night was Saturday night. Lindley +Vickers was coming to Sunday dinner and Sunday supper. She would have to +get away somewhere, to Dorsy or the Sutcliffes. She didn't want to see +him again. She wanted to forget that she ever had seen him. + +Her mother and Dan had shut themselves up in the smoking-room; she found +them there, talking. As she came in they stopped abruptly and looked at +each other. Her mother began picking at the pleats in her gown with +nervous, agitated fingers. Dan got up and left the room. + +"Well, Mary, you'll not see Mr. Vickers again. He's just told Dan he +isn't coming." + +Then he knew that she had seen him in the lane with Nannie. + +"I don't want to see him," she said. + +"It's a pity you didn't think of that before you put us in such a +position." + +She understood Lindley; but she wasn't even trying to understand her +mother. The vexed face and picking fingers meant nothing to her. She was +saying to herself, "I can't tell Mamma I saw him with Nannie in the lane. +I oughtn't to have seen him. He didn't know anybody was there. He didn't +want me to see him. I'd be a perfect beast to tell her." + +Her mother went on: "I don't know what to do with you, Mary. One would +have thought my only daughter would have been a comfort to me, but I +declare you've given me more trouble than any of my children." + +"More than Dan?" + +"Dan hadn't a chance. He'd have been different if your poor father hadn't +driven him out of the house. He'd be different now if your Uncle Victor +had kept him.... It's hard for poor Dan if he can't bring his friends to +the house any more because of you." + +"Because of me?" + +"Because of your folly." + +She understood. Her mother believed that she had frightened Lindley away. +She was thinking of Aunt Charlotte. + +It would have been all right if she could have told her about Nannie; +then Mamma would have seen why Lindley couldn't come. + +"I don't care," she thought. "She may think what she likes. I can't tell +her." + + +XI. + +Lindley Vickers had gone. Nothing was left of him but Mamma's silence and +Dan's, and Nannie's flush as she slunk by and her obscene smirk of +satisfaction. + +Then Nannie forgot him. As if nothing had happened she hung about Horn's +yard and the Back Lane, waiting for young Horn. She smiled her trusting +smile again. As long as you lived in Morfe you would remember. + +Mary didn't blame her mother and Dan for their awful attitude. She +couldn't blink the fact that she had begun to care for a man who was no +better than young Horn, who had shown her that he didn't care for her by +going to Nannie. If he could go to Nannie he was no better than young +Horn. + +She thought of Lindley's communion with Nannie as a part of him, +essential, enduring. Beside it, her own communion with him was not quite +real. She remembered his singing; she remembered playing to him and +sitting beside him on the bracken as you remember things that have +happened to you a long time ago (if they had really happened). She +remembered phrases broken from their context (if they had ever had a +context): "Das man vom liebsten was man hat...." "If you don't know I +can't tell you--Dear." ... "And when--when--Then you won't think, you'll +_know_." + +She said to herself, "I must have been mad. It couldn't have happened. I +must have made it up." + +But, if you made up things like that you _were_ mad. It was what Aunt +Charlotte had done. She had lived all her life in a dream of loving and +being loved, a dream that began with clergymen and ended with the +piano-tuner and the man who did the clocks. Mamma and Dan knew it. Uncle +Victor knew it and he had been afraid. Maurice Jourdain knew it and he +had been afraid. Perhaps Lindley Vickers knew it, too. + +There must be something in heredity. She thought: "If there is I'd rather +face it. It's cowardly not to." + +Lindley Vickers had told her what to read. Herbert Spencer she knew. +Haeckel and Ribot were in the London Library Catalogue at Greffington +Hall. And Maudsley: she had seen the name somewhere. It was perhaps lucky +that Mr. Sutcliffe had gone abroad early this year; for he had begun to +follow her through Balzac and Flaubert and Maupassant, since when he had +sometimes interfered with her selection. + +The books came down in two days: Herbert Spencer's _First Principles_, +the _Principles of Biology_, the _Principles of Psychology_; Haeckel's +_History of Evolution_; Maudsley's _Body and Mind, Physiology and +Pathology of Mind, Responsibility in Mental Disease_; and Ribot's +_Heredity_. Your instinct told you to read them in that order, +controlling personal curiosity. + +For the first time in her life she understood what Spinoza meant by "the +intellectual love of God." She saw how all things work together for good +to those who, in Spinoza's sense, love God. If it hadn't been for Aunt +Charlotte and Lindley Vickers she might have died without knowing +anything about the exquisite movements and connections of the live world. +She had spent most of her time in the passionate pursuit of things under +the form of eternity, regardless of their actual behaviour in time. She +had kept on for fifteen years trying to find out the reality--if there +was any reality--that hid behind appearances, piggishly obtuse to the +interest of appearances themselves. She had cared for nothing in them but +their beauty, and its exciting play on her emotions. When life brought +ugly things before her she faced them with a show of courage, but +inwardly she was sick with fear. + +For the first time she saw the ugliest facts take on enchantment, a +secret and terrible enchantment. Dr. Mitchell's ape-faced idiot; Dr. +Browne's girl with the goose-face and goose-neck, billing her shoulders +like a bird. + +There was something in Heredity. But the sheer interest of it made you +forget about Papa and Mamma and Aunt Charlotte; it kept you from thinking +about yourself. You could see why Ribot was so excited about his laws of +Heredity: "They it is that are real...." "To know a fact thoroughly is to +know the quality and quantity of the laws that compose it ... facts are +but appearances, laws the reality." + +There was Darwin's Origin of Species. According to Darwin, it didn't seem +likely that anything so useless as insanity could be inherited at all; +according to Maudsley and Ribot, it seemed even less likely that sanity +could survive. To be sure, after many generations, insanity was stamped +out; but not before it had run its course through imbecility to idiocy, +infecting more generations as it went. + +Maudsley was solemn and exalted in his desire that there should be no +mistake about it. "There is a destiny made for a man by his ancestors, +and no one can elude, were he able to attempt it, the tyranny of his +organisation." + +You had been wrong all the time. You had thought of your family, Papa and +Mamma, perhaps Grandpapa and Grandmamma, as powerful, but independent and +separate entities, in themselves sacred and inviolable, working against +you from the outside: either with open or secret and inscrutable +hostility, hindering, thwarting, crushing you down. But always from the +outside. You had thought of yourself as a somewhat less powerful, but +still independent and separate entity, a sacred, inviolable self, +struggling against them for completer freedom and detachment. Crushed +down, but always getting up and going on again; fighting a more and more +successful battle for your own; beating them in the end. But it was not +so. There were no independent, separate entities, no sacred, inviolable +selves. They were one immense organism and you were part of it; you were +nothing that they had not been before you. It was no good struggling. You +were caught in the net; you couldn't get out. + +And so were they. Mamma and Papa were no more independent and separate +than you were. Dan had gone like Papa, but Papa had gone like Grandpapa +and Grandmamma Olivier. Nobody ever said anything about Grandpapa +Olivier; so perhaps there had been something queer about him. Anyhow, +Papa couldn't help drinking any more than Mamma could help being sweet +and gentle; they hadn't had a choice or a chance. + +How senseless you had been with your old angers and resentments. Now that +you understood, you could never feel anger or resentment any more. As +long as you lived you could never feel anything but love for them and +compassion. Mamma, Papa and Aunt Charlotte, Dan and Roddy, they were +caught in the net. They couldn't get out. + +Dan and Roddy--But Mark had got out. Why not you? + +They were not all alike. Papa and Uncle Victor were different; and Aunt +Charlotte and Aunt Lavvy. Papa had married and handed it on; he hadn't +cared. Uncle Victor hadn't married; he had cared too much; he had been +afraid. + +And Maurice Jourdain and Lindley Vickers had been afraid; everybody who +knew about Aunt Charlotte would be afraid, and if they didn't know you +would have to tell them, supposing-- + +You would be like Aunt Lavvy. You would live in Morfe with Mamma for years +and years as Aunt Lavvy had lived with Grandmamma. First you would be +like Dorsy Heron; then like Louisa Wright; then like Aunt Lavvy. + +No; when you were forty-five you would go like Aunt Charlotte. + + +XII. + +Anyhow, she had filled in the time between October and March when the +Sutcliffes came back. + +If she could talk to somebody about it--But you couldn't talk to Mamma; +she would only pretend that she hadn't been thinking about Aunt Charlotte +at all. If Mark had been there--But Mark wasn't there, and Dan would only +call you a little fool. Aunt Lavvy? She would tell you to love God. Even +Aunt Charlotte could tell you that. + +She could see Aunt Charlotte sitting up in the big white bed and saying +"Love God and you'll be happy," as she scribbled letters to Mr. Marriott +and hid them under the bedclothes. + +Uncle Victor? Uncle Victor was afraid himself. + +Dr. Charles--He looked at you as he used to look at Roddy. Perhaps he +knew about Aunt Charlotte and wondered whether you would go like her. Or, +if he didn't wonder, he would only give you the iron pills and arsenic he +gave to Dorsy. + +Mrs. Sutcliffe? You couldn't tell a thing like that to Mrs. Sutcliffe. +She wouldn't know what you were talking about; or if she did know she +would gather herself up, spiritually, in her shawl, and trail away. + +Mr. Sutcliffe--He would know. If you could tell him. You might take back +Maudsley and Ribot and ask him if he knew anything about heredity, and +what he thought of it. + +She went to him one Wednesday afternoon. He was always at home on +Wednesday afternoons. She knew how it would be. Mrs. Sutcliffe would be +shut up in the dining-room with the sewing-party. You would go in. You +would knock at the library door. He would be there by himself, in the big +arm-chair, smoking and reading; the small armchair would be waiting for +you on the other side of the fireplace. He would be looking rather old +and tired, and when he saw you he would jump up and pull himself together +and be young again. + +The library door closed softly. She was in the room before he saw her. + +He was older and more tired than you could have believed. He stooped in +his chair; his long hands rested on his knees, slackly, as they had +dropped there. Grey streaks in the curly lock of hair that _would_ fall +forward and be a whisker. + +His mouth had tightened and hardened. It held out; it refused to become +old and tired. + +"It's Mary," she said. + +"My dear--" + +He dragged himself to his feet, making his body very straight and stiff. +His eyes glistened; but they didn't smile. Only his eyelids and his mouth +smiled. His eyes were different, their blue was shrunk and flattened and +drawn back behind the lense. + +When he moved, pushing forward the small arm-chair, she saw how lean and +stiff he was. + +"I've been ill," he said. + +"Oh--!" + +"I'm all right now." + +"No. You oughtn't to have come back from Agaye." + +"I never do what I ought, Mary." + +She remembered how beautiful and strong he used to be, when he danced and +when he played tennis, and when he walked up and down the hills. His +beauty and his strength had never moved her to anything but a happy, +tranquil admiration. She remembered how she had seen Maurice Jourdain +tired and old (at thirty-three), and how she had been afraid to look at +him. She wondered, "Was that my fault, or his? If I'd cared should I have +minded? If I cared for Mr. Sutcliffe I wouldn't mind his growing tired +and old. The tireder and older he was the more I'd care." + +Somehow you couldn't imagine Lindley Vickers growing old and tired. + +She gave him back the books: Ribot's _Heredity_ and Maudsley's +_Physiology and Pathology of Mind_. He held them in his long, thin hands, +reading the titles. His strange eyes looked at her over the tops of the +bindings. He smiled. + +"When did you order these, Mary?" + +"In October." + +"That's the sort of thing you do when I'm away, is it?" + +"Yes--I'm afraid you won't care for them very much." + +He still stood up, examining the books. He was dipping into Maudsley now +and reading him. + +"You don't mean to say you've _read_ this horrible stuff?" + +"Every word of it. I _had_ to." + +"You had to?" + +"I wanted to know about heredity." + +"And insanity?" + +"That's part of it. I wanted to see if there was anything in it. +Heredity, I mean. Do you think there is?" + +She kept her eyes on him. He was still smiling. + +"My dear child, you know as much as I do. Why are you worrying your poor +little head about madness?" + +"Because I can't help thinking I may go mad." + +"I should think the same if I read Maudsley. I shouldn't be quite sure +whether I was a general paralytic or an epileptic homicide." + +"You see--I'm not afraid because I've been reading him; I've been reading +him because I was afraid. Not even afraid, exactly. As a matter of fact +while you're reading about it you're so interested that you forget about +yourself. It's only when you've finished that you wonder." + +"What makes you wonder?" + +He threw Maudsley aside and sat down in the big armchair. + +"That's just what I don't think I can tell you." + +"You used to tell me things, Mary. I remember a little girl with short +hair who asked me whether cutting off her hair would make me stop caring +for her." + +"Not _you_ caring for _me_." + +"Precisely. So, if you can't tell me who _can_ you tell?" + +"Nobody." + +"Come, then.... Is it because of your father? Or Dan?" + +She thought: "After all, I can tell him." + +"No. Not exactly. But it's somebody. One of Papa's sisters--Aunt +Charlotte. You see. Mamma seems to think I'm rather like her." + +"Does Aunt Charlotte read Kant and Hegel and Schopenhauer, to find out +whether the Thing-in-itself is mind or matter? Does she read Maudsley and +Ribot to find out what's the matter with her mind?" + +"I don't think she ever read anything." + +"What _did_ she do?" + +"Well--she doesn't seem to have done much but fall in love with people." + +"She'd have been a very abnormal lady if she'd never fallen in love at +all, Mary." + +"Yes; but then she used to think people were in love with her when they +weren't." + +"How old is Aunt Charlotte?" + +"She must be ages over fifty now." + +"Well, my dear, you're just twenty-eight, and I don't think you've been +in love yet." + +"That's it. I have." + +"No. You've only thought you were. Once? Twice, perhaps? You may have +been very near it--for ten minutes. But a man might be in love with you +for ten years, and you wouldn't be a bit the wiser, if he held his tongue +about it.... No. People don't go off their heads because their aunts do, +or we should all of us be mad. There's hardly a family that hasn't got +somebody with a tile loose." + +"Then you don't think there's anything in it?" + +"I don't think there's anything in it in your case. Anything at all." + +"I'm glad I told you." + +She thought: "It isn't so bad. Whatever happens he'll be here." + + +XIII. + +The sewing-party had broken up. She could see them going before her on +the road, by the garden wall, by the row of nine ash-trees in the field, +round the curve and over Morfe Bridge. + +Bobbing shoulders, craning necks, stiff, nodding heads in funny hats, +turning to each other. + +When she got home she found Mrs. Waugh, and Miss Frewin in the +drawing-room with Mamma. They had brought her the news. + +The Sutcliffes were going. They were trying to let Greffington Hall. The +agent, Mr. Oldshaw, had told Mr. Horn. Mr. Frank, the Major, would be +back from India in April. He was going to be married. He would live in +the London house and Mr. and Mrs. Sutcliffe would live abroad. + +Mamma said, "If their son's coming back they've chosen a queer time to go +away." + + +XIV. + +It couldn't be true. + +You knew it when you dined with them, when you saw the tranquil Regency +faces looking at you from above the long row of Sheraton chairs, the +pretty Gainsborough lady smiling from her place above the sideboard. + +As you sat drinking coffee out of the dark blue coffee cups with gold +linings you knew it couldn't be true. You were reassured by the pattern +of the chintzes--pink roses and green leaves on a pearl-grey ground--by +the crystal chains and pendants of the chandelier, by the round black +mirror sunk deep in the bowl of its gilt frame. + +They couldn't go; for if they went, the quiet, gentle life of these +things would be gone. The room had no soul apart from the two utterly +beloved figures that sat there, each in its own chintz-covered chair. + +"It isn't true," she said, "that you're going?" + +She was sitting on the polar bear hearthrug at Mrs. Sutcliffe's feet. + +"Yes, Mary." + +The delicate, wrinkled hand came out from under the cashmere shawl to +stroke her arm. It kept on stroking, a long, loving, slow caress. It made +her queerly aware of her arm--white and slender under the big puff of the +sleeve--lying across Mrs. Sutcliffe's lap. + +"He'll be happier in his garden at Agaye." + +She heard herself assenting. "_He_'ll be happier." And breaking out. "But +I shall never be happy again." + +"You mustn't say that, my dear." + +The hand went on stroking. + +"There's no place on earth," she said, "where I'm so happy as I am here." + +Suddenly the hand stopped; it stiffened; it drew back under the cashmere +shawl. + +She turned her head towards Mr. Sutcliffe in his chair on the other side +of the hearthrug. + +His face had a queer, strained look. His eyes were fixed, fixed on the +white, slender arm that lay across his wife's lap. + +And Mrs. Sutcliffe's eyes were fixed on the queer, strained face. + + +XV. + +Uncle Victor's letter was almost a relief. + +She had not yet allowed herself to imagine what Morfe would be like +without the Sutcliffes. And, after all, they wouldn't have to live in it. +If Dan accepted Uncle Victor's offer, and if Mamma accepted his +conditions. + +Uncle Victor left no doubt as to his conditions. He wouldn't take Dan +back unless Mamma left Morfe and made a home for him in London. He wanted +them all to live together at Five Elms. + +The discussion had lasted from a quarter-past nine till half-past ten. +Mamma still sat at the breakfast-table, crumpling and uncrumpling the +letter. + +"I wish I knew what to do," she said. + +"Better do what you want," Dan said. "Stay here if you want to. Go back +to Five Elms if you want to. But for God's sake don't say you're doing it +on my account." + +He got up and went out of the room. + +"Goodness knows I don't want to go back to Five Elms. But I won't stand +in Dan's way. If your Uncle Victor thinks I ought to make the sacrifice, +I shall make it." + +"And Dan," Mary said, "will make the sacrifice of going back to Victor's +office. It would be simpler if he went to Canada." + +"Your uncle can't help him to go to Canada. He won't hear of it.... I +suppose we shall have to go." + +They were going. You could hear Mrs. Belk buzzing round the village with +the news. "The Oliviers are going." + +One day Mrs. Belk came towards her, busily, across the Green. + +She stopped to speak, while her little iron-grey eyes glanced off +sideways, as if they saw something important to be done. + +The Sutcliffes were not going, after all. + + +XVI. + +When it was all settled and she thought that Dan had gone into Reyburn a +fortnight ago to give notice to the landlord's solicitors, one evening, +as she was coming home from the Aldersons' he told her that he hadn't +been to the solicitors at all. + +He had arranged yesterday for his transport on a cattle ship sailing next +week for Montreal. + +He said he had always meant to go out to Jem Alderson when he had learnt +enough from Ned. + +"Then why," she said, "did you let Mamma tell poor Victor--" + +"I wanted her to have the credit of the sacrifice," he said. + +And then: "I don't like leaving you here--" + +An awful thought came to her. + +"Are you sure you aren't going because of me?" + +"You? What on earth are you thinking of?" + +"That time--when you wouldn't ask Lindley Vickers to stop on." + +"Oh ... I didn't ask him because I knew he wanted to stop altogether. And +I don't approve of him." + +She turned and stared at him. "Then it wasn't that you didn't approve of +_me_?" + +"What put that in your head?" + +"Mamma. She told me you couldn't ask anybody again because of me. She +said I'd frightened Lindley Vickers away. Like Aunt Charlotte." + +Dan smiled, a sombre, reminiscent smile. + +"You don't mean to say you still take Mamma seriously? _I_ never did." + +"But--Mark--" + +"Or him either." + +It hurt her like some abominable blasphemy. + + + + +XVII + +Nothing would ever happen. She would stay on in Morfe, she and Mamma: +without Mark, without Dan, without the Sutcliffes.... + +They were going.... + +They were gone. + + + + +XXVIII + + +I. + +She lay out on the moor, under the August sun. Her hands were pressed +like a bandage over her eyes. When she lifted them she caught the faint +pink glow of their flesh. The light throbbed and nickered as she pressed +it out, and let it in. + +The sheep couched, panting, in the shade of the stone covers. She lay so +still that the peewits had stopped their cry. + +Something bothered her.... + +_And in the east one pure, prophetic star_--one pure prophetic +star--_Trembles between the darkness and the dawn_. + +What you wrote last year. No reason why you shouldn't write modern plays +in blank verse if you wanted to. Only people didn't say those things. You +couldn't do it that way. + +Let the thing go. Tear it to bits and burn them in the kitchen fire. + +If you lay still, perfectly still, and stopped thinking the other thing +would come back. + + _In dreams He has made you wise, + With the wisdom of silence and prayer, + God, who has blinded your eyes, + With the dusk of your hair_. + +The Mother. The Mother. Mother and Son. + + _You and he are near akin. + Would you slay your brother-in-sin? + What he does yourself shall do_-- + +That was the Son's hereditary destiny. + +Lying on her back under Karva, she dreamed her "Dream-Play"; saying the +unfinished verses over and over again, so as to remember them when she +got home. She was unutterably happy. + +She thought: "I don't care what happens so long as I can go on." + +She jumped up to her feet. "I must go and see what Mamma's doing." + +Her mother was sewing in the drawing-room and waiting for her to come to +tea. She looked up and smiled. + +"What are you so pleased about?" she said. + +"Oh, nothing." + +Mamma was adorable, sitting there like a dove on its nest, dressed in a +dove's dress, grey on grey, turning dove's eyes to you in soft, crinkly +lids. She held her head on one side, smiling at some secret that she +kept. Mamma was happy, too. + +"What are you looking such an angel for?" + +Mamma lifted up her work, showing an envelope that lay on her lap, the +crested flap upwards, a blue gun-carriage on a white ground, and the +motto: "_Ubique_." + +Catty had been into Reyburn to shop and had called for the letters. Mark +was coming home in April. + +"Oh--Mamma--" + +"There's a letter for you, Mary." + +(Not from Mark.) + +"If he gets that appointment he won't go back." She thought: "She'll +never be unhappy again. She'll never be afraid he'll get cholera." + +For a minute their souls met and burned together in the joy they shared. + +Then broke apart. + +"Aren't you going to show me Mr. Sutcliffe's letter?" + +"Why should I?" + +"You don't mean to say there's anything in it I can't see?" + +"You can see it if you like. There's nothing in it." + +That was why she hadn't wanted her to see it. For anything there was in +it you might never have known him. But Mrs. Sutcliffe had sent her love. + +Mamma looked up sharply. + +"Did you write to him, Mary?" + +"Of course I did." + +"You'll not write again. He's let you know pretty plainly he isn't going +to be bothered." + +(It wasn't that. It couldn't be that.) + +"Did they say anything more about your going there?" + +"No." + +"That ought to show you then.... But as long as you live you'll give +yourself away to people who don't want you." + +"I'd rather you didn't talk about them." + +"I should like to know what I _can_ talk about," said Mamma. + +She folded up her work and laid it in the basket. + +Her voice dropped from the sharp note of resentment. + +"I wish you'd go and see if those asters have come." + + +II. + +The asters had come. She had carried out the long, shallow boxes into the +garden. She had left her mother kneeling beside them, looking with +adoration into the large, round, innocent faces, white and purple, mauve +and magenta and amethyst and pink. If the asters had not come the memory +of the awful things they had said to each other would have remained with +them till bed-time; but Mamma would be happy with the asters like a child +with its toys, planning where they were to go and planting them. + +She went up to her room. After thirteen years she had still the same +childish pleasure in the thought that it was hers and couldn't be taken +from her, because nobody else wanted it. + +The bookshelves stretched into three long rows on the white wall above +her bed to hold the books Mr. Sutcliffe had given her; a light blue row +for the Thomas Hardys; a dark blue for the George Merediths; royal blue +and gold for the Rudyard Kiplings. And in the narrow upright bookcase in +the arm of the T facing her writing-table, Mark's books: the Homers and +the Greek dramatists. Their backs had faded from puce colour to drab. + +Mark's books.--When she looked at them she could still feel her old, +childish lust for possession, her childish sense of insecurity, of +defeat. And something else. The beginning of thinking things about Mamma. +She could see herself standing in Mark's bedroom at Five Elms and Mamma +with her hands on Mark's books. She could hear herself saying, "You're +afraid." + +"What did I think Mamma was afraid of?" + +Mamma was happy out there with the asters. + +There would be three hours before dinner. + +She began setting down the fragments of the "Dream-Play" that had come to +her: then the outlines. She saw very clearly and precisely how it would +have to be. She was intensely happy. + + * * * * * + +She was still thinking of it as she went across the Green to the post +office, instead of wondering why the postmistress had sent for her, and +why Miss Horn waited for her by the house door at the side, or why she +looked at her like that, with a sort of yearning pity and fear. She +followed her into the parlour behind the post office. + +Suddenly she was awake to the existence of this parlour and its yellow +cane-bottomed chairs and round table with the maroon cloth and the white +alabaster lamp that smelt. The orange envelope lay on the maroon cloth. +Miss Horn covered it with her hand. + +"It's for Mr. Dan," she said. "I daren't send it to the house lest your +mother should get it." + +She gave it up with a slow, unwilling gesture. + +"It's bad news, Miss Mary." + + "_Your Brother Died This Evening_." + +Her heart stopped, staggered and went on again. _"Poona"_--Mark-- + + "_Your Brother Died This Evening_.--SYMONDS." + +"This evening" was yesterday. Mark had died yesterday. + +Her heart stopped again. She had a sudden feeling of suffocation and +sickness. + +Her mind left off following the sprawl of the thick grey-black letters on +the livid pink form. + +It woke again to the extraordinary existence of Miss Horn's parlour. It +went back to Mark, slowly, by the way it had come, by the smell of the +lamp, by the orange envelope on the maroon cloth. + +Mark. And something else. + +Mamma--Mamma. She would have to know. + +Miss Horn still faced her, supporting herself by her spread hands pressed +down on to the table. Her eyes had a look of gentle, helpless +interrogation, as if she said, "What are you going to do about it?" + +She did all the necessary things; asked for a telegram form, filled it +in: "_Send Details_, MARY OLIVIER"; and addressed it to Symonds of "E" +Company. And all the time, while her hand moved over the paper, she was +thinking, "I shall have to tell Mamma." + + +III. + +The five windows of the house stared out at her across the Green. She +avoided them by cutting through Horn's yard and round by the Back Lane +into the orchard. She was afraid that her mother would see her before she +had thought how she would tell her that Mark was dead. She shut herself +into her room to think. + +She couldn't think. + +She dragged herself from the window seat to the chair by the +writing-table and from the chair to the bed. + +She could still feel her heart staggering and stopping. Once she thought +it was going to stop altogether. She had a sudden pang of joy. "If it +would stop altogether--I should go to Mark. Nothing would matter. I +shouldn't have to tell Mamma that he's dead." But it always went on +again. + +She thought of Mark now without any feeling at all except that bodily +distress. Her mind was fixed in one centre of burning, lucid agony. +Mamma. + +"I can't tell her. I can't. It'll kill her.... I don't see how she's to +live if Mark's dead.... I shall send for Aunt Bella. She can do it. Or I +might ask Mrs. Waugh. Or Mr. Rollitt." + +She knew she wouldn't do any of these things. She would have to tell her. + +She heard the clock strike the half hour. Half-past five. Not yet. "When +it strikes seven I shall go and tell Mamma." + +She lay down on her bed and listened for the strokes of the clock. She +felt nothing but an immense fatigue, an appalling heaviness. Her back and +arms were loaded with weights that held her body down on to the bed. + +"I shall never be able to get up and tell her." + +Six. Half-past. At seven she got up and went downstairs. Through the open +side door she saw her mother working in the garden. + +She would have to get her into the house. + +"Mamma--darling." + +But Mamma wouldn't come in. She was planting the last aster in the row. +She went on scooping out the hole for it, slowly and deliberately, with +her trowel, and patting the earth about it with wilful hands. There was a +little smudge of grey earth above the crinkles in her soft, sallow-white +forehead. + +"You wait," she said. + +She smiled like a child pleased with itself for taking its own way. + +Mary waited. + +She thought: "Three hours ago I was angry with her. I was angry with her. +And Mark was dead then. And when she read his letter. He was dead +yesterday." + + +IV. + +Time was not good to you. Time was cruel. Time made you see. + +Yet somehow they had gone through time. Nights of August and September +when you got up before daybreak to listen at her door. Days when you did +nothing. Mamma sat upright in her chair with her hands folded on her lap. +She kept her back to the window: you saw her face darkening in the dusk. +When the lamp came she raised her arm and the black shawl hung from it +and hid her face. Nights of insane fear when you _had_ to open her door +and look in to see whether she were alive or dead. Days when you were +afraid to speak, afraid to look at each other. Nights when you couldn't +sleep for wondering how Mark had died. They might have told you. They +might have told you in one word. They didn't, because they couldn't; +because the word was too awful. They would never say how Mark died. Mamma +thought he had died of cholera. + +You started at sounds, at the hiss of the flame in the grate, the fall of +the ashes on the hearth, the tinkling of the front door bell. + +You heard Catty slide back the bolt. People muttered on the doorstep. You +saw them go back past the window, quietly, their heads turned away. They +were ashamed. + +You began to go out. You walked slowly, weighted more than ever by your +immense, inexplicable fatigue. When you saw people coming you tried to go +quicker; when you spoke to them you panted and felt absurd. A coldness +came over you when you saw Mrs. Waugh and Miss Frewin with their heads on +one side and their shocked, grieved faces. You smiled at them as you +panted, but they wouldn't smile back. Their grief was too great. They +would never get over it. + +You began to watch for the Indian mail. + +One day the letter came. You read blunt, jerky sentences that told you +Mark had died suddenly, in the mess room, of heart failure. Captain +Symonds said he thought you would want to know exactly how it +happened.... "Well, we were 'cock-fighting,' if you know what that is, +after dinner. Peters is the heaviest man in our battery, and Major +Olivier was carrying him on his back. We oughtn't to have let him do it. +But we didn't know there was anything wrong with his heart. He didn't +know it himself. We thought he was fooling when he dropped on the +floor.... Everything was done that could be done.... He couldn't have +suffered.... He was happy up to the last minute of his life--shouting +with laughter." + +She saw the long lighted room. She saw it with yellow walls and yellow +lights, with a long, white table and clear, empty wine-glasses. Men in +straw-coloured bamboo armchairs turning round to look. She couldn't see +their faces. She saw Mark's face. She heard Mark's voice, shouting with +laughter. She saw Mark lying dead on the floor. The men stood up +suddenly. Somebody without a face knelt down and bent over him. + +It was as if she had never known before that Mark was dead and knew it +now. She cried for the first time since his death, not because he was +dead, but because he had died like that--playing. + +He should have died fighting. Why couldn't he? There was the Boer War and +the Khyber Pass and Chitral and the Soudan. He had missed them all. He +had never had what he had wanted. + +And Mamma who had cried so much had left off crying. + +"The poor man couldn't have liked writing that letter, Mary. You needn't +be angry with him." + +"I'm not angry with him. I'm angry because Mark died like that." + +"Heigh-h--" The sound in her mother's throat was like a sigh and a sob +and a laugh jerking out contempt. + +"You don't know what you're talking about. He's gone, Mary. If you were +his mother it wouldn't matter to you how he died so long as he didn't +suffer. So long as he didn't die of cholera." + +"If he could have got what he wanted--" + +"What's that you say?" + +"If he could have got what he wanted." + +"None of us ever get what we want in this world," said Mamma. + +She thought: "It was her son--_her_ son she loved, not Mark's real, +secret self. He's got away from her at last--altogether." + + +V. + +She sewed. + +Every day she went to the linen cupboard and gathered up all the old +towels and sheets that wanted mending, and she sewed. + +Her mother had a book in her lap. She noticed that if she left off sewing +Mamma would take up the book and read, and when she began again she would +put it down. + +Her thoughts went from Mamma to Mark, from Mark to Mamma. She used to +be pleased when she saw you sewing. "Nothing will ever please her now. +She'll never be happy again.... I ought to have died instead of Mark.... +That's Anthony Trollope she's reading." + +The long sheet kept slipping. It dragged on her arm. Her arms felt +swollen, and heavy like bars of lead. She let them drop to her knees.... +Little Mamma. + +She picked up the sheet again. + +"Why are you sewing, Mary?" + +"I must do _something_." + +"Why don't you take a book and read?" + +"I can't read." + +"Well--why don't you go out for a walk?" + +"Too tired." + +"You'd better go and lie down in your room." + +She hated her room. Everything in it reminded her of the day after Mark +died. The rows of new books reminded her; and Mark's books in the narrow +bookcase. They were hers. She would never be asked to give them back +again. Yesterday she had taken out the Aeschylus and looked at it, and she +had forgotten that Mark was dead and had felt glad because it was hers. +To-day she had been afraid to see its shabby drab back lest it should +remind her of that, too. + +Her mother sighed and put her book away. She sat with her hands before +her, waiting. + +Her face had its old look of reproach and disapproval, the drawn, +irritated look you saw when you came between her and Mark. As if your +grief for Mark came between her and her grief, as if, deep down inside +her, she hated your grief as she had hated your love for him, without +knowing that she hated it. + +Suddenly she turned on you her blurred, wounded eyes. + +"Mary, when you look at me like that I feel as if you knew everything I'm +thinking." + +"I don't. I shall never know." + +Supposing all the time she knew what you were thinking? Supposing Mark +knew? Supposing the dead knew? + +She was glad of the aching of her heart that dragged her thought down and +numbed it. + +The January twilight crept between them. She put down her sewing. At the +stroke of the clock her mother stirred in her chair. + +"What day of the month is it?" she said. + +"The twenty-fifth." + +"Then--yesterday was your birthday.... Poor Mary. I forgot.... I sit +here, thinking. My own thoughts. They make me forget.... Come here." + +She went to her, drawn by a passion stronger than her passion for Mark, +her hard, proud passion for Mark. + +Her mother put up her face. She stooped down and kissed her passionately, +on her mouth, her wet cheeks, her dove's eyes, her dove's eyelids. She +crouched on the floor beside her, leaning her head against her lap. +Mamma's hand held it there. + +"Are you twenty-nine or thirty?" + +"Thirty." + +"You don't look it. You've always been such a little thing.... You +remember the silly question you used to ask me? 'Mamma--would you love +me better if I was two?'" + +She remembered. Long ago. When she came teasing for kisses. The silly +question. + +"You remember _that_?" + +"Yes. I remember." + +Deep down inside her there was something you would never know. + + + + +XXIX + + +I. + +Mamma was planting another row of asters in the garden in the place of +those that had died last September. + +The outline of the map of South Africa had gone from the wall at the +bottom. Roddy's bit was indistinguishable from the rest. + +And always you knew what would happen. Outside, on the Green, the +movements of the village repeated themselves like the play of a +clock-work toy. Always the same figures on the same painted stand, marked +with the same pattern of slanting roads and three-cornered grass-plots. +Half-way through prayers the Morfe bus would break loose from High Row +with a clatter, and the brakes would grind on the hill. An hour after +tea-time it would come back with a mournful tapping and scraping of +hoofs. + +She had left off watching for the old red mail-cart to come round the +corner at the bottom. Sometimes, at long intervals, there would be a +letter for her from Aunt Lavvy or Dan or Mrs. Sutcliffe. She couldn't +tell when it would come, but she knew on what days the long trolleys +would stop by Mr. Horn's yard loaded with powdery sacks of flour, and on +what days the brewer's van would draw up to the King's Head and the +Farmers' Arms. When she looked out across the Green she caught the hard +stare of the Belks' house, the tall, lean, grey house blotched with iron +stains. It stood on the sheer edge where the platform dropped to the turn +of the road. Every morning at ten o'clock its little door would open and +Mr. Belk would come out and watch for his London paper. Every evening at +ten minutes past ten the shadow of Mr. Belk would move across the yellow +blind of the drawing-room window on the right; the light would go out, +and presently a blond blur would appear behind the blind of the bedroom +window on the left. + +Every morning at twelve Mrs. Belk would hurry along, waddling and +shaking, to leave the paper with her aunt, old Mrs. Heron, in the dark +cottage that crouched at the top of the Green. Every afternoon at three +Dorsy would bring it back again. + +When Mary came in from the village Mamma would look up and say "Well?" as +if she expected her to have something interesting to tell. She wished +that something would happen so that she might tell Mamma about it. She +tried to think of something, something to say that would interest Mamma. + +"I met Mr. James on the Garthdale Road. Walking like anything." + +"Did you?" Mamma was not interested in Mr. James. + +She wondered, "Why can't I think of things like other people?" She had a +sense of defeat, of mournful incapacity. + +One day Catty came bustling in with the tea-things, looking important. +She had brought news from the village. + +Mrs. Heron had broken her thigh. She had slipped on the landing. Mrs. +Belk was with her and wouldn't go away. + +Catty tried to look sorry, but you could see she was pleased because she +had something to tell you. + +They talked about it all through tea-time. They were sorry for Mrs. +Heron. They wondered what poor Dorsy would do if anything should happen +to her. And through all their sorrow there ran a delicate, secret thrill +of satisfaction. Something had happened. Something that interested Mamma. + +Two days later Dorsy came in with her tale; her nose was redder, her +hare's eyes were frightened. + +"Mrs. Belk's there still," she said. "She wants to take Aunt to live with +her. She wants her to send me away. She says it wouldn't have happened if +I'd looked after her properly. And so it wouldn't, Mary, if I'd been +there. But I'd a bad headache, and I was lying down for a minute when she +fell.... She won't go. She's sitting there in Aunt's room all the time, +talking and tiring her. Trying to poison Aunt's mind against me. Working +on her to send me away." + +Dorsy's voice dropped and her face reddened. + +"She thinks I'm after Aunt's money. She's always been afraid of her +leaving it to me. I'm only her husband's nephew's daughter. Mrs. Belk's +her real niece.... + +"I'd go to-morrow, Mary, but Aunt wants me there. She doesn't like Mrs. +Belk; I think she's afraid of her. And she can't get away from her. She +just lies there with her poor leg in the splints; there's the four-pound +weight from the kitchen scales tied on to keep it on the stretch. If you +could see her eyes turning to me when I come.... + +"One thing--Mrs. Belk's afraid for her life of me. That's why she's +trying to poison Aunt's mind." + +When they saw Mrs. Belk hurrying across the Green to Mrs. Heron's house +they knew what she was going for. + +"Poor Dorsy!" they said. + +"Poor Dorsy!" + +They had something to talk to each other about now. + + +II. + +Winter and spring passed. The thorn-trees flowered on Greffington Edge: +dim white groves, magically still under the grey, glassy air. + +May passed and June. The sleek waves of the hay-fields shone with the +brushing of the wind, ready for mowing. + +The elder tree by the garden wall was a froth of greenish white on green. + +At the turn of the schoolhouse lane the flowers began: wild geraniums and +rose campion, purple and blue and magenta, in a white spray of cow's +parsley: standing high against the stone walls, up and up the green lane. + +Down there, where the two dales spread out at the bottom, a tiny Dutch +landscape. Flat pastures. Trees dotted about. A stiff row of trees at the +end. No sky behind them. Trees green on green, not green on blue. The +great flood of the sky dammed off by the hills. + +She shut her eyes and saw the flat fields of Ilford, and the low line of +flying trees; a thin, watery mirage against the hill. + +Since Mark died she had begun to dream about Ilford. She would struggle +and break through out of some dream about Morfe and find herself in Ley +Street, going to Five Elms. She would get past the corner and see the red +brick gable end. Sometimes, when she came up to the gate, the house would +turn into Greffington Hall. Sometimes it would stand firm with its three +rows of flat windows; she would go up the flagged path and see the sumach +tree growing by the pantry window; and when the door was opening she +would wake. + +Sometimes the door stood open. She would go in. She would go up the +stairs and down the passages, trying to find the schoolroom. She would +know that Mark was in the schoolroom. But she could never find it. She +never saw Mark. The passages led through empty, grey-lit rooms to the +bottom of the kitchen stairs, and she would find a dead baby lying among +the boots and shoes in the cat's cupboard. + +Autumn and winter passed. She was thirty-two. + + +III. + +When your mind stopped and stood still it could feel time. Time going +fast, going faster and faster. Every year its rhythm swung on a longer +curve. + +Your mind stretched to the span of time. There was something exciting +about this stretch, like a new sense growing. But in your dreams your +mind shrank again; you were a child, a child remembering and returning; +haunting old stairs and passages, knocking at shut doors. This child +tried to drag you back, it teased you to make rhymes about it. You were +not happy till you had made the rhymes. + +There was something in you that went on, that refused to turn back, to +look for happiness in memory. Your happiness was _now_, in the moment +that you lived, while you made rhymes; while you looked at the white +thorn-trees; while the black-purple cloud passed over Karva. + +Yesterday she had said to Dorsy Heron, "What I can't stand is seeing the +same faces every day." + +But the hill world had never the same face for five minutes. Its very +form changed as the roads turned. The swing of your stride put in play a +vast, mysterious scene-shifting that disturbed the sky. Moving through it +you stood still in the heart of an immense being that moved. Standing +still you were moved, you were drawn nearer and nearer to its enclosing +heart. + +She swung off the road beyond the sickle to the last moor-track that led +to the other side of Karva. She came back by the southern slope, down the +twelve fields, past the four farms. + +The farm of the thorn-tree, the farm of the ash, the farm of the three +firs and the farm all alone. + +Four houses. Four tales to be written. + +There was something in you that would go on, whatever happened. Whatever +happened it would still be happy. Its happiness was not like the queer, +sudden, uncertain ecstasy. She had never known _what_ that was. It came +and went; it had gone so long ago that she was sure that whatever it had +been it would never come again. She could only remember its happening as +you remember the faint ecstasies of dreams. She thought of it as +something strange and exciting. Sometimes she wondered whether it had +really happened, whether there wasn't a sort of untruthfulness in +supposing it had. + +But that ecstasy and this happiness had one quality in common; they +belonged to some part of you that was free. A you that had no hereditary +destiny; that had got out of the net, or had never been caught in it. + +You could stand aside and look on at its happiness with horror, it didn't +care. It was utterly indifferent to your praise or blame, and the praise +or blame of other people; or to your happiness and theirs. It was open to +you to own it as your self or to detach yourself from it in your horror. +It was stronger and saner than you. If you chose to set up that awful +conflict in your soul that was your own affair. + +Perhaps not your own. Supposing the conflict in you was the tug of the +generations before you, trying to drag you back to them? Supposing the +horror was _their_ horror, their fear of defeat? + +She had left off being afraid of what might happen to her. It might never +happen. And supposing it did, supposing it had to happen when you were +forty-five, you had still thirteen years to write in. + +"It shan't happen. I won't let it. I won't let them beat me." + + +IV. + +Last year the drawer in the writing-table was full. This year it had +overflowed into the top left-hand drawer of the dressing-table. She had +to turn out all the handkerchiefs and stockings. + +Her mother met her as she was carrying them to the wardrobe in the spare +room. You could see she felt that there was something here that must be +enquired into. + +"I should have thought," she said, "that writing-table drawer was +enough." + +"It isn't." + +"Tt-t--" Mamma nodded her head in a sort of exasperated resignation. + +"Do you mean to say you're going to _keep_ all that?" + +"All that? You should see what I've burnt." + +"I should like to know what you're going to do with it!" + +"So should I. That's just it--I don't know." + +That night the monstrous thought came to her in bed: Supposing I +published those poems--I always meant to do it some day. Why haven't I? +Because I don't care? Or because I care too much? Because I'm afraid? +Afraid that if somebody reads them the illusion they've created would be +gone? + +How do I know my writing isn't like my playing? + +This is different. There's nothing else. If it's taken from me I shan't +want to go on living. + +You didn't want to go on living when Mark died. Yet you went on. As if +Mark had never died.... And if Mamma died you'd go on--in your illusion. + +If it is an illusion I'd rather know it. + +How _can_ I know? There isn't anybody here who can tell me. Nobody you +could believe if they told you--I can believe _myself_. I've burnt +everything I've written that was bad. + +You believe yourself to-day. You believed yesterday. How do you know +you'll believe to-morrow? + +To-morrow-- + + +V. + +Aunt Lavvy had come to stay. + +When she came you had the old feeling of something interesting about to +happen. Only you knew now that this was an illusion. + +She talked to you as though, instead of being thirty-three, you were +still very small and very young and ignorant of all the things that +really mattered. She was vaguer and greyer, more placid than ever, and +more content with God. + +Impossible to believe that Papa used to bully her and that Aunt Lavvy had +revolted. + +"For thirty-three years, Emilius, thirty-three years"-- + +Sunday supper at Five Elms; on the table James Martineau's _Endeavours +After the Christian Life_. + +She wondered why she hadn't thought of Aunt Lavvy. Aunt Lavvy knew Dr. +Martineau. As long as you could remember she had always given a strong +impression of knowing him quite well. + +But when Mary had made it clear what she wanted her to ask him to do, it +turned out that Aunt Lavvy didn't know Dr. Martineau at all. + +And you could see she thought you presumptuous. + + +VI. + +When old Martha brought the message for her to go to tea with Miss +Kendal, Mary slunk out through the orchard into the Back Lane. At that +moment the prospect of talking two hours with Miss Kendal was +unendurable. + +And there was no other prospect. As long as she lived in Morfe there +would be nothing--apart from her real, secret life there would be +nothing--to look forward to but that. If it was not Miss Kendal it would +be Miss Louisa or Dorsy or old Mrs. Heron. People talked about dying of +boredom who didn't know that you could really die of it. + +If only you didn't keep on wanting somebody--somebody who wasn't there. +If, before it killed you, you could kill the desire to know another mind, +a luminous, fiery crystal, to see it turn, shining and flashing. To talk +to it, to listen to it, to love the human creature it belonged to. + +She envied her youth its capacity for day-dreaming, for imagining +interminable communions. Brilliant hallucinations of a mental hunger. +Better than nothing.... If this went on the breaking-point must come. +Suddenly you would go smash. Smash. Your mind would die in a delirium of +hunger. + + +VII. + +"It's a pity we can't go to his lecture," said Miss Kendal. + +The train was moving out of Reyburn station. It was awful to think how +nearly they had missed it. If Dr. Charles had stayed another minute at +the harness-maker's. + +Miss Kendal sat on the edge of the seat, very upright in her black silk +mantle with the accordion-pleated chiffon frills. She had sat like that +since the train began to pull, ready to get out the instant it stopped at +Durlingham. + +"I feel sure it's going to be all right," she said. + +The white marabou feather nodded. + +Her gentle mauve and sallow face was growing old, with soft curdlings and +puckerings of the skin; but she still carried her head high, nodding at +you with her air of gaiety, of ineffable intrigue. + +"I wouldn't bring you, Mary, if I didn't feel sure." + +If she had not felt sure she wouldn't have put on the grey kid gloves, +the mantle and the bonnet with the white marabou feather. You don't dress +like that to go shopping in Durlingham. + +"You mean," Mary said, "that we shall see him." + +Her heart beat calmly, stilled by the sheer incredibility of the +adventure. + +"Of course we shall see him. Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield will manage that. It +might have been a little difficult if the Professor had been staying +anywhere else. But I know Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield very well. No doubt she's +arranged for you to have a long talk with him." + +"Does she know what I want to see him about?" + +"Well--yes--I thought it best, my dear, to tell her just what you told +me, so that she might see how important it is.... There's no knowing what +may come of it.... Did you bring them with you?" + +"No, I didn't. If he won't look at them I should feel such an awful +fool." + +"Perhaps," said Miss Kendal, "it is wiser not to assume beforehand. +Nothing may come of it. Still, I can't help feeling something will.... +When you're famous, Mary, I shall think of how we went into Durlingham +together." + +"Whatever comes of it I shall think of _you_." + +The marabou feather quivered slightly. + +"How long have we known each other?" + +"Seventeen years." + +"Is it so long?... I shall never forget the first day you came with your +mother. I can see you now, Mary, sitting beside my poor father with your +hand on his chair.... And that evening when you played to us, and dear +Mr. Roddy was there...." + +She thought: "Why can't I be kind--always? Kindness matters more than +anything. Some day she'll die and she'll never have said or thought one +unkind thing in all her poor, dreadful little life.... Why didn't I go to +tea with her on Wednesday?" + +On Wednesday her mind had revolted against its destiny of hunger. She had +hated Morfe. She had felt angry with her mother for making her live in +it, for expecting her to be content, for thinking that Dorsy and Miss +Louisa and Miss Kendal were enough. She had been angry with Aunt Lavvy +for talking about her to Miss Kendal. + +Yet if it weren't for Miss Kendal she wouldn't be going into Durlingham +to see Professor Lee Ramsden. + +Inconceivable that she should be taken by Miss Kendal to see Professor +Lee Ramsden. Yet this inconceivable thing appeared to be happening. + +She tried to remember what she knew about him. He was Professor of +English literature at the University of London. He had edited Anthologies +and written Introductions. He had written a _History of English +Literature_ from Chaucer to Tennyson and a monograph on Shelley. + +She thought of his mind as a luminous, fiery crystal, shining. + +Posters on the platform at Durlingham announced in red letters that +Professor Lee Ramsden, M.A., F.R.S.L., would lecture in the Town Hall at +8 P.M. She heard Miss Kendal saying, "If it had been at three instead of +eight we could have gone." She had a supreme sense of something about to +happen. + +Heavenly the long, steep-curved glass roof of the station, the iron +arches and girders, the fanlights. Foreign and beautiful the black canal +between the purplish rose-red walls, the white swans swaying on the black +water, the red shaft of the clock-tower. It shot up high out of the +Market-place, topped with the fantastically large, round, white eye of +its clock. + +She kept on looking up to the clock-tower. At four she would see him. + +They walked about the town. They lunched and shopped. They sat in the +Park. They kept on looking at the clock-tower. + +At the bookseller's in the Market-place she bought a second-hand copy of +Walt Whitman's _Leaves of Grass_.... + +A black-grey drive between bushes of smutty laurel and arbutus. A +black-grey house of big cut stones that stuck out. Gables and bow windows +with sharp freestone facings that stuck out. You waited in a drawing-room +stuffed with fragile mahogany and sea-green plush. Immense sea-green +acanthus leaves, shaded in myrtle green, curled out from the walls. A +suggestion of pictures heaved up from their places by this vigorous, +thrusting growth. + +Curtains, cream-coloured net, sea-green plush, veiled the black-grey +walks and smutty lawns of the garden. + +While she contemplated these things the long hand of the white marble +tombstone clock moved from the hour to the quarter. + +She was reading the inscription, in black letters, on the golden plinth: +"Presented to Thomas Smythe-Caulfield, Esqr., M.P., by the Council and +Teachers of St. Paul's Schools, Durlingham"--"Presented"--when Mrs. +Smythe-Caulfield came in. + +A foolish, overblown, conceited face. Grey hair arranged with art and +science, curl on curl. Three-cornered eyelids, hutches for small, +malevolently watching eyes. A sharp, insolent nose. Fish's mouth peering +out above the backward slope of cascading chins. + +Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield shook hands at a sidelong arm's-length, not looking +at you, holding Miss Kendal in her sharp pointed stare. They were Kate +and Eleanor: Eleanor and Kate. + +"You're going to the lecture?" + +"If it had been at three instead of eight--" + +"The hour was fixed for the townspeople's convenience." + +In five minutes you had gathered that you would not be allowed to see +Professor Lee Ramsden; that Professor Lee Ramsden did not desire to see +or talk to anybody except Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield; that he kept his best +things for her; that _all sorts of people_ were trying to get at him, and +that he trusted her to protect him from invasion; that you had been +admitted in order that Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield might have the pleasure of +telling you these things. + +Mary saw that the moment was atrocious; but it didn't matter. A curious +tranquillity possessed her: she felt something there, close to her, like +a person in the room, giving her a sudden security. The moment that was +mattering so abominably to her poor, kind friend belonged to a time that +was not her time. + +She heard the tinkle of tea cups outside the hall; then a male voice, +male footsteps. Mrs. Smythe-Caulfield made a large encircling movement +towards the door. Something interceptive took place there. + +As they went back down the black-grey drive between the laurel and +arbutus Miss Kendal carried her head higher than ever. + +"That is the first time in my life, Mary, that I've asked a favour." + +"You did it for me." ("She hated it, but she did it for me.") + +"Never mind. We aren't going to mind, are we? We'll do without them.... +That's right, my dear. Laugh. I'm glad you can. I dare say I shall laugh +myself to-morrow." + +"I don't _want_ to laugh," Mary said. She could have cried when she +looked at the grey gloves and the frilled mantle, and the sad, insulted +face in the bonnet with the white marabou feather. (And that horrible +woman hadn't even given her tea.) + +The enormous eye of the town clock pursued them to the station. + +As they settled into their seats in the Reyburn train Miss Kendal said, +"It's a pity we couldn't go to the lecture." + +She leaned back, tired, in her corner. She closed her eyes. + +Mary opened Walt Whitman's _Leaves of Grass_. + +The beginning had begun. + + + + +XXX + + +I. + +"What are you reading, Mary?" + +"The New Testament.... Extraordinary how interesting it is." + +"Interesting!" + +"Frightfully interesting." + +"You may say what you like, Mary; you'll change your mind some day. I +pray every night that you may come to Christ; and you'll find in the end +you'll have to come...." + +No. No. Still, he said, "The Kingdom of God is within you." If the Greek +would bear it--within you. + +Did they understand their Christ? Had anybody ever understood him? Their +"Prince of Peace" who said he hadn't come to send peace, but a sword? The +sword of the Self. He said he had come to set a man against his father +and the daughter against her mother, and that because of him a man's foes +should be those of his own household. "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild." + +He was not meek and mild. He was only gentle with children and women and +sick people. He was brave and proud and impatient and ironic. He wouldn't +stay with his father and mother. He liked happy people who could amuse +themselves without boring him. He liked to get away from his disciples, +and from Lazarus and Martha and Mary of Bethany, and go to the rich, +cosmopolitan houses and hear the tax-gatherer's talk and see the young +Roman captains swaggering with their swords and making eyes at Mary of +Magdala. + +He was the sublimest rebel that ever lived. + +He said, "The spirit blows where it wills. You hear the sound of it, but +you can't tell where it comes from or where it goes to. Everybody that is +born from the spirit is like that." The spirit blows where it wants to. + +He said it was a good thing for them that he was going away. If he didn't +the Holy Ghost wouldn't come to them; they would never have any real +selves; they would never be free. They would set him up as a god outside +themselves and worship Him, and forget that the Kingdom of God was within +them, that God was their real self. + +Their hidden self was God. It was their Saviour. Its existence was the +hushed secret of the world. + +Christ knew--he must have known--it was greater than he was. + +It was a good thing for them that Christ died. That was how he saved +them. By going away. By a proud, brave, ironic death. Not at all the sort +of death you had been taught to believe in. + +And because they couldn't understand a death like that, they went and +made a god of him just the same. + +But the Atonement was that--Christ's going away. + + +II. + +February: grey, black-bellied clouds crawling over Greffington Edge, over +Karva, swelling out: swollen bodies crawling and climbing, coming +together, joining. Monstrous bodies ballooning up behind them, mounting +on top of them, flattening them out, pressing them down on to the hills; +going on, up and up the sky, swelling out overhead, coming together. + +One cloud, grey as sink water, over all the sky, shredded here and there, +stirred by slight stretchings, and spoutings of thin steam. + +Then the whole mass coming down, streaming grey sink water. + +She came down the twelve fields on the south slope of Karva: she could +say them by heart: the field with the big gap, the field above the four +firs farm, the field below the farm of the ash-tree, the bare field, the +field with the thorn tree, the field with the sheep's well, the field +with the wild rose bush, the steep field of long grass, the hillocky +field, the haunted field with the ash grove, the field with the big barn, +the last field with the gap to the road. + +She thought of her thirty-four years; of the verses she had sent to the +magazines and how they had come back again; of the four farms on the +hill, of the four tales not written. + +The wet field grasses swept, cold, round her ankles. + +Mamma sat waiting in her chair, in the drawing-room, in the clear, grey, +glassy dusk of the cross-lights. She waited for the fine weather to come +when she would work again in the garden. She waited for you to come to +her. Her forehead unknitted itself; her dove's eyes brightened; she +smiled, and the rough feathers of her eyebrows lay down, appeased. + +At the opening of the door she stirred in her chair. She was glad when +you came. + +Catty brought in the lamp. When she turned up the wick the rising flame +carved Mamma's face out of the dusk. Her pretty face, delicately dinted, +whitened with a powdery down; stained with faint bistres of age. Her +little, high-bridged nose stood up from the softness, clear and young, +firm as ivory. + +The globed light showed like a ball of fire, hung out in the garden, on +the black, glassy darkness, behind the pane. Catty drew down the blind +and went. You heard the click of the latch falling to behind her. The +evening had begun. + +They took up their books. Mamma hid her face behind Anthony Trollope, +Mary hers behind Thomas Hardy. Presently she would hear Mamma sigh, then +yawn. + +Horrible tension. + +Under the edge of her book she would see Anthony Trollope lying in +Mamma's lap and Mamma's fingers playing with the fringe of her shawl. She +would put Thomas Hardy down and take up Anthony Trollope and read aloud +till Mamma's head began bowing in a doze. Then she would take up Thomas +Hardy. When Mamma waked Hardy would go down under Trollope; when she +dozed he would come to the top again. + +After supper Mamma would be wide awake. She would sit straight up in her +chair, waiting, motionless, ready. You would pick up your book but you +would have no heart in it. You knew what she wanted. She knew that you +knew. You could go on trying to read if you chose; but she would still +sit there, waiting. You would know what she was thinking of. + +The green box in the cabinet drawer. + +The green box. You began to think of it, too, hidden, hidden in the +cabinet drawer. You were disturbed by the thought of the green box, of +the little figures inside it, white and green. You would get up and go to +the cabinet drawer. + +Mamma would put out her hands on the table, ready. She smiled with shut +lips, pouting, half ashamed, half delighted. You would set out the green +and white chequer board, the rows of pawns. And the game of halma would +begin. White figures leap-frogging over green, green over white. Your +hand and your eyes playing, your brain hanging inert, remembering, +forgetting. + +In the pauses of the game you waited; for the clock to strike ten, for +Catty to bring in the Bible and the Prayer-book, for the evening to end. +Old verses, old unfinished verses, coming and going. + +In the long pauses of the game, when Mamma sat stone-still, hypnotised by +the green and white chequers, her curved hand lifted, holding her pawn, +her head quivering with indecision. + + _In dreams He has made you wise + With the wisdom of silence and prayer...._ + +Coming and going, between the leap-frogging of the green figures and the +white. + + _God, Who has blinded your eyes + With the dusk of your hair...._ + +Brown hair, sleek and thin, brown hair that wouldn't go grey. + +And the evening would go on, soundless and calm, with soft, annihilating +feet, with the soft, cruel feet of oblivion. + + +III. + +One day, when she came in, she heard the sound of the piano. The knocking +of loose hammers on dead wires, the light, hacking clang of chords +rolling like dead drum taps: Droom--Droom, Droom-era-room. + +Alone in the dusk, Mamma was playing the Hungarian March, bowing and +swaying as she played. + +When the door opened she started up, turning her back on the piano, +frightened, like a child caught in a play it is ashamed of. The piano +looked mournful and self-conscious. + +Then suddenly, all by itself, it shot out a cry like an arrow, a pinging, +stinging, violently vibrating cry. + +"I'm afraid," Mamma said, "something's happened to the piano." + + +IV. + +They were turning out the cabinet drawer, when they found the bundle of +letters. Mamma had marked it in her sharp, three cornered hand-writing: +"Correspondence, Mary." + +"Dear me," she said, "I didn't know I'd kept those letters." + +She slipped them from the rubber band and looked at them. You could see +Uncle Victor's on the top, then Maurice Jourdain's. You heard the click +of her tongue that dismissed those useless, unimportant things. The slim, +yellowish letter at the bottom was Miss Lambert's. + +"Tt-tt--" + +"Oh, let me see that." + +She looked over her mother's shoulder. They read together. + +"We don't want her to go.... She made us love her more in one fortnight +than girls we've had with us for years.... Perhaps some day we may have +her again." + +The poor, kind woman. The kind, dead woman. Years ago dead; her poor +voice rising up, a ghostlike wail over your "unbelief." + +That was only the way she began. + +"I say--I say!" + +The thin voice was quivering with praise. Incredible, bewildering praise. +"Remarkable.--remarkable".--You would have thought there had never been +such a remarkable child as Mary Olivier. + +It came back to her. She could see Miss Lambert talking to her father on +the platform at Victoria. She could see herself, excited, running up the +flagged walk at Five Elms. And Mamma coming down the hall. And what +happened then. The shock and all the misery that came after. + +"That was the letter you wouldn't let me read." + +"What do you mean?" + +"The day I came back. I asked you to let me read it and you wouldn't." + +"Really, Mary, you accuse me of the most awful things. I don't believe I +wouldn't let you read it." + +"You didn't. I remember. You didn't want me to know--" + +"Well," her mother said, giving in suddenly, "if I didn't, it was because +I thought it would make you even more conceited than you were. I don't +suppose I was very well pleased with you at the time." + +"Still--you kept it." + +But her mother was not even going to admit that she had kept it. + +She said, "I must have overlooked it. But we can burn it now." + +She carried it across the room to the fire. She didn't want even +now--even now. You saw again the old way of it, her little obstinate, +triumphant smile, the look that paid you out, that said, "See how I've +sold you." + +The violet ashen sheet clung to the furred soot of the chimney: you could +still see the blenched letters. + +She couldn't really have thought it would make you conceited. That was +only what she wanted to think she had thought. + +"It wasn't easy to make you pleased with me all the time.... Still, I +can't think why on earth you weren't pleased." + +She knelt before the fire, watching the violet ashen bit of burnt-out +paper, the cause, the stupid cause of it all. + +Her mother had settled again, placidly, in her chair. + +"Even if I _was_ a bit conceited.... I don't think I was, really. I only +wanted to know whether I could do things. I wanted people to tell me just +because I didn't know. But even if I was, what did it matter? You must +have known I loved you--desperately--all the time." + +"I didn't know it, Mary." + +"Then you were stup--" + +"Oh, say I was stupid. It's what you think. It's what you always have +thought." + +"You were--you were, if you didn't see it." + +"See what?" + +"How I cared--I can remember--when I was a kid--the awful feeling. It +used to make me ill." + +"I didn't know that. If you did care you'd a queer way of showing it." + +"That was because I thought you didn't." + +"Who told you I didn't care for you?" + +"I didn't need to be told. I could see the difference." + +Her mother sat fixed in a curious stillness. She held her elbows pressed +tight against her sides. Her face was hard and still. Her eyes looked +away across the room. + +"You were different," she said. "You weren't like any of the others. I +was afraid of you. You used to look at me with your little bright eyes. I +felt as if you knew everything I was thinking. I never knew what you'd +say or do next." + +No. Her face wasn't hard. There was something else. Something clear. +Clear and beautiful. + +"I suppose I--I didn't like your being clever. It was the boys I wanted +to do things. Not you." + +"Don't--Mamma darling--_don't_." + +The stiff, tight body let go its hold of itself. The eyes turned to her +again. + +"I was jealous of you, Mary. And I was afraid for my life you'd find it +out." + + +V. + +Eighteen ninety-eight. Eighteen ninety-nine. Nineteen hundred. +Thirty-five--thirty-six--thirty-seven. Three years. Her mind kept on +stretching; it held three years in one span like one year. The large +rhythm of time appeased and exalted her. + +In the long summers while Mamma worked in the garden she translated +_Euripides_. + +The _Bacchae_. You could do it after you had read Whitman. If you gave up +the superstition of singing; the little tunes of rhyme. If you left off +that eternal jingling and listened, you could hear what it ought to be. + +Something between talking and singing. If you wrote verse that could be +chanted: that could be whispered, shouted, screamed as they moved. Agave +and her Maenads. Verse that would go with a throbbing beat, excited, +exciting; beyond rhyme. That would be nearest to the Greek verse. + + * * * * * + +September, nineteen hundred. + +Across the room she could see the pale buff-coloured magazine, on the +table where, five minutes ago, Mamma had laid it down. She could see the +black letters of its title and the squat column of the table of contents. +The magazine with her poem in it. + +And Mamma, sitting very straight, very still. + +You would never know what she was thinking. She hadn't said anything. You +couldn't tell whether she was glad or sorry; or whether she was afraid. + +The air tingled with the thought of the magazine with your poem in it. +But you would never know what she was thinking. + + +VI. + +A long letter from Uncle Edward. Uncle Edward was worrying Mamma. + +"He never could get on with your poor father. Or your Uncle Victor. He +did his best to prevent him being made trustee.... And now he comes +meddling, wanting to upset all their arrangements." + +"Why?" + +"Just because poor Victor's business isn't doing quite so well as it +did." + +"Yes, but why's he bothering _you_ about it?" + +"Well, he says I ought to make another will, leaving half the boys' money +to you. That would be taking it from Dan. He always had a grudge against +poor Dan." + +"But you mustn't do anything of the sort." + +"Well--he knows your father provided for you. You're to have the Five +Elms money that's in your Uncle Victor's business. You'd suppose, to hear +him talk, that it wasn't safe there." + +"Just tell him to mind his own business," Mary said. + +"Actually," Mamma went on, "advising me not to pay back any more of +Victor's money. I shall tell him I sent the last of it yesterday." + +There would be no more debts to Uncle Victor. Mark had paid back his; +Mamma had paid back Roddy's, scraping and scraping, Mark and Mamma, over +ten years, over twenty. + +A long letter from Uncle Victor. Uncle Victor was worrying Mamma. + +"Don't imagine that I shall take this money. I have invested it for you, +in sound securities. Not in my own business. That, I am afraid I ought to +tell you, is no longer a sound security." + +"Poor Victor--" + +"It almost looks," Mamma said, "as if Edward might be right." + +So right that in his next letter Uncle Victor prepared you for his +bankruptcy. + +"It will not affect you and Mary," he wrote. "I may as well tell you now +that all the Five Elms money has been reinvested, and is safe. As for +myself, I can assure you that, after the appalling anxiety of the last +ten years, the thought of bankruptcy is a relief. A blessed relief, +Caroline." + +All through September and October the long letters came from Uncle +Victor. + +Then Aunt Lavvy's short letter that told you of his death. + +Then the lawyer's letters. + +It seemed that, after all, Uncle Victor had been mistaken. His affairs +were in perfect order. + +Only the Five Elms money was gone; and the money Mark and Mamma had paid +back to him. He had taken it all out of his own business, and put it into +the Sheba Mines and Joe's Reef, and the Golconda Company where he thought +it would be safe. + +The poor dear. The poor dear. + + +VII. + +So that you knew-- + +Mamma might believe what Aunt Lavvy told her, that he had only gone to +look out of the window and had turned giddy. Aunt Lavvy might believe +that he didn't know what he was doing. + +But you knew. + +He had been afraid. Afraid. He wouldn't go up to the top-landing after +they took Aunt Charlotte away; because he was afraid. + +Then, at last, after all those years, he had gone up. When he knew he was +caught in the net and couldn't get out. He had found that they had moved +the linen cupboard from the window back into the night nursery. And he +had bolted the staircase door on himself. He had shut himself up. And the +great bare, high window was there. And the low sill. And the steep, bare +wall, dropping to the lane below. + +END OF BOOK FOUR + + + + +BOOK FIVE +MIDDLE AGE (1900-1910) + + +XXXI + + +I. + +She must have been sitting there twenty minutes. + +She was afraid to look up at the clock, afraid to move an eyelid lest she +should disturb him. + +The library had the same nice, leathery, tobaccoey smell. Rough under her +fingers the same little sharp tongue of leather scratched up from the arm +of her chair. The hanging, half-open fans of the ash-tree would be making +the same Japanese pattern in the top left hand pane of the third window. +She wanted to see it again to make sure of the pattern, but she was +afraid to look up. + +If she looked up she would see him. + +She mustn't. It would disturb him horribly. He couldn't write if he +thought you were looking at him. + +It was wonderful that he could go on like that, with somebody in the +room, that he let you sit in it when he was writing. The big man. + +She had asked him whether she hadn't better go away and come back again, +and he had said No, he didn't want her to go away. He wouldn't keep her +waiting more than five minutes. + +It was unbelievable that she should be sitting there, in that room, as if +nothing had happened; as if _they_ were there; as if they might come in +any minute; as if they had never gone. A week ago she would have said it +was impossible, she couldn't do it, for anybody, no matter how big or how +celebrated he was. + +Why, after ten years--it must be ten years--she couldn't even bear to go +past the house while other people were in it. She hated them, the people +who took Greffington Hall for the summer holidays and the autumn +shooting. She would go round to Renton by Jackson's yard and the fields +so as not to see it. But when the brutes were gone and the yellow blinds +were down in the long rows of windows that you saw above the grey garden +wall, she liked to pass it and look up and pretend that the house was +only waiting for them, only sleeping its usual winter sleep, resting till +they came back. + +It _was_ ten years since they had gone. + +No. If Richard Nicholson hadn't been Mr. Sutcliffe's nephew, she +couldn't, no matter how big and how celebrated he was, or how badly he +wanted her help or she wanted his money. + +No matter how wonderful and important it would feel to be Richard +Nicholson's secretary. + +It wasn't really his money that she wanted. It would be worth while +doing it for nothing, for the sake of knowing him. She had read his +_Euripides_. + +She wondered: Supposing he kept her, how long would it last? He was in +the middle of his First Series of _Studies in Greek Literature_; and +there would be two, or even three if he went on. + +He had taken Greffington Hall for four months. When he went back to London +he would have to have somebody else. + +Perhaps he would tell her that, after thinking it over, he had found he +didn't want her. Then to-day would be the end of it. + +If she looked up she would see him. + +She knew what she would see: the fine, cross upper lip lifted backwards +by the moustache, the small grizzled brown moustache, turned up, that +made it look crosser. The narrow, pensive lower lip, thrust out by its +light jaw. His nose--quite a young nose--that wouldn't be Roman, wouldn't +be Sutcliffe; it looked out over your head, tilted itself up to sniff the +world, obstinate, alert. His eyes, young too, bright and dark, sheltered, +safe from age under the low straight eyebrows. They would never have +shabby, wrinkled sagging lids. Dark brown hair, grey above his ears, +clipped close to stop its curling like his uncle's. He liked to go +clipped and clean. You felt that he liked his own tall, straight +slenderness. + +The big library rustled with the quick, irritable sound of his writing. + +It stopped. He had finished. He looked at the clock. She heard a small, +commiserating sound. + +"Forgive me. I really thought it would only take five minutes. How on +earth do you manage to keep so quiet? I should have known if a mouse had +moved." + +He turned towards her. He leaned back in his chair. "You don't mind my +smoking?" + +He was settling himself. Now she would know. + +"Well," he said, "if I did keep you waiting forty minutes, it was a good +test, wasn't it?" + +He meditated. + +"I'm always changing my secretaries because of something. The last one +was admirable, but I couldn't have stood her in the room when I was +writing.... Besides, you work better." + +"Can you tell? In a week?" + +"Yes. I can tell.... Are you sure you can spare me four months?" + +"Easily." + +"Five? Six?" + +"If you were still here." + +"I shan't be. I shall be in London.... Couldn't you come up?" + +"I couldn't, possibly." + +His cross mouth and brilliant, irritated eyes questioned her. + +"I couldn't leave my mother." + + +II. + +Five weeks of the four months gone. And to-morrow he was going up to +London. + +Only till Friday. Only for five days. She kept on telling herself he +would stay longer. Once he was there you couldn't tell how many days he +might stay. But say he didn't come back till the middle of July, still +there would be the rest of July and all August and September. + +To-day he was walking home with her, carrying the books. She liked +walking with him, she liked to be seen walking with him, as she used to +like being seen walking with Roddy and Mark, because she was proud of +them, proud of belonging to them. She was proud of Richard Nicholson +because of what he had done. + +The Morfe people didn't know anything about what he had done; but they +knew he was something wonderful and important; they knew it was wonderful +and important that you should be his secretary. They were proud of you, +glad that they had provided him with you, proud that he should have found +what he was looking for in Morfe. + +Mr. Belk, for instance, coming along the road. He used to pass you with a +jaunty, gallant, curious look as if you were seventeen and he were +saying, "There's a girl who ought to be married. Why isn't she?" He had +just sidled past them, abashed and obsequious, a little afraid of the big +man. Even Mrs. Belk was obsequious. + +And Mr. Spencer Rollitt. He was proud because Richard Nicholson had asked +him about a secretary and he had recommended you. Funny that people could +go on disapproving of you for twenty years, and then suddenly approve +because of Richard Nicholson. + +And Mamma. Mamma thought you wonderful and important, too. + +Mamma liked Mr. Nicholson. Ever since that Sunday when he had called and +brought the roses and stayed to tea. She had gone out of the room and +left them abruptly because she was afraid of his "cleverness," afraid +that he would begin to talk about something that she didn't understand. + +And he had said, "How beautiful she is--" + +After he had gone she had told Mamma that Richard Nicholson had said she +was beautiful; and Mamma had pretended that it didn't matter what he +said; but she had smiled all the same. + +He carried himself like Mr. Sutcliffe when he walked, straight and tall +in his clean cut grey suit. Only he was lighter and leaner. His eyes +looked gentle and peaceable now under the shadow of the Panama hat. + +The front door stood open. She asked him to come in for tea. + +"May I? ... What are you doing afterwards?" + +"Going for a walk somewhere." + +"Will you let me come too?..." + +He was standing by the window looking at the garden. She saw him smile +when he heard Catty say that Mamma had gone over to Mrs. Waugh's and +wouldn't be back for tea. He smiled to himself, a secret, happy smile, +looking out into the garden.... She took him out through the orchard. He +went stooping under the low apple boughs and laughing. Down the Back Lane +and through the gap in the lower fields, along the flagged path to the +Bottom Lane and through the Rathdale fields to the river. Over the +stepping stones. + +She took the stones at a striding run. He followed, running and laughing. + +Up the Rathdale fields to Renton Moor. Not up the schoolhouse lane, or on +the Garthdale Road, or along the fields by the beck. Not up Greffington +Edge or Karva. Because of Lindley Vickers and Maurice Jourdain; and Roddy +and Mark. + +No. She was humbugging herself. Not up Karva because of her secret +happiness. She didn't want to mix him up with _that_ or with the self +that had felt it. She wanted to keep him in the clear spaces of her mind, +away from her memories, away from her emotions. + +They sat down on the side of the moor in the heather. + +Indoors when he was working he was irritable and restless. You would hear +a gentle sighing sound: "D-amn"; and he would start up and walk about the +room. There would be shakings of his head, twistings of his eyebrows, +shruggings of his shoulders, and tormented gestures of his hands. But not +out here. He sat in the heather as quiet, as motionless as you were, +every muscle at rest. His mind was at rest. + +The strong sunlight beat on him; it showed up small surface signs. +Perhaps you could see now that he might really be forty, or even +forty-five. + +No, you couldn't. You couldn't see or feel anything but the burning, +inextinguishable youth inside him. The little grey streaks and patches +might have been powder put on for fun. + +"I want to finish with all my Greek stuff," he said suddenly. "I want to +go on to something else--studies in modern French literature. Then +English. I want to get everything clean and straight in five pages where +other people would take fifty.... I want to go smash through some of the +traditions. The tradition of the long, grey paragraph.... We might learn +things from France. But we're a proud island people. We won't learn.... +We're a proud island people, held in too tight, held in till we burst. +That's why we've no aesthetic restraint. No restraint of any sort. Take +our economics. Take our politics. We've had to colonise, to burst out +over continents. When our minds begin moving it's the same thing. They +burst out. All over the place.... When we've learned restraint we shall +take our place inside Europe, not outside it." + +"We do restrain our emotions quite a lot." + +"We do. We do. That's precisely why we don't restrain our expression of +them. Really unrestrained emotion that forces its way through and breaks +down your intellectual defences and saturates you with itself--it hasn't +any words.... It hasn't any words; or very few." + + * * * * * + +The mown fields over there, below Greffington Edge, were bleached with +the sun: the grey cliffs quivered in the hot yellow light. + +"It might be somewhere in the South of France." + +"_Not_ Agaye." + +"No. Not Agaye. The limestone country.... I can't think why I never came +here. My uncle used to ask me dozens of times. I suppose I funked it.... +What the poor old chap must have felt like shut up in that house all +those years with my aunt--" + +"Please don't. I--I liked her." + +"You mean you liked him and put up with her because of him. We all did +that." + +"She was kind to me." + +"Who wouldn't be?" + +"Oh, but you don't know how kind." + +"Kind? Good Lord, yes. There are millions of kind people in the world. +It's possible to be kind and at the same time not entirely brainless." + +"He wouldn't mind that. He wouldn't think she was brainless--" + +"He wasn't in love with her--there was another woman--a girl. It was so +like the dear old duffer to put it off till he was forty-five and then +come a cropper over a little girl of seventeen." + +"That isn't true. I knew him much better than you do. He never cared for +anybody but her.... Besides, if it was true you shouldn't have told me. +I've no business to know it...." + +"Everybody knew it. The poor dear managed so badly that everybody in the +place knew it. She knew, that's why she dragged him away and made him +live abroad. She hated living abroad, but she liked it better than seeing +him going to pieces over the girl." + +"I don't believe it. If there was anything in it I'd have been sure to +have heard of it.... Why, there wasn't anybody here but me--" + +"It must have been years before your time," he said. "You could hardly +even have come in for the sad end of it." + + * * * * * + +Dorsy Heron said it was true. + +"It was you he was in love with. Everybody saw it but you." + +She remembered. His face when she came to him. In the library. And what +he had said. + +"A man might be in love with you for ten years and you wouldn't know +about it if he held his tongue." + +And _her_ face. Her poor face, so worried when people saw them together. +And that last night when she stroked your arm and when she saw him +looking at it and stopped. And her eyes. Frightened. Frightened. + +"How I must have hurt him. How I must have hurt them both." + + * * * * * + +Mr. Nicholson had come back on Friday as he had said. + + +III. + +He put down his scratching pen and was leaning back in his chair, looking +at her. + +She wondered what he was thinking. Sometimes the space of the room was +enormous between her table by the first tall window and his by the third; +sometimes it shrank and brought them close. It was bringing them close +now. + +"You can't see the text for the footnotes," she said. "The notes must go +in the Appendix." + +She wanted to make herself forget that all her own things, the things she +had saved from the last burning, were lying there on his table, staring +at her. She was trying not to look that way, not to let herself imagine +for a moment that he had read them. + +"Never mind the notes and the Appendix." + +He had got up. He was leaning now against the tall shutter of her window, +looking down at her. + +"Why didn't you tell me? Before I let you in for that horrible drudgery? +All that typing and indexing--If I'd only known you were doing anything +like this.... Why couldn't you have told me?" + +"Because I wasn't doing it. It was done ages ago." + +"It's my fault. I ought to have known. I did know there was something. I +ought to have attended to it and found out what it was." + +He began walking up and down the room, turning on her again and again, +making himself more and more excited. + +"That translation of the _Bacchae_--what made you think of doing it +like that?" + +"I'd been reading Walt Whitman--It showed me you could do without rhyme. +I knew it must sound as if it was all spoken--chanted--that they mustn't +sing. Then I thought perhaps that was the way to do it." + +"Yes. Yes. It is the way to do it. The only way.... You see, that's what +my Euripides book's about. The very thing I've been trying to ram down +people's throats, for years. And all the time you were doing it--down +here--all by yourself--for fun ... I wish I'd known ... What are you +going to do about it?" + +"I didn't think anything could be done." + +He sat down to consider that part of it. + + * * * * * + +He was going to get it published for her. + +He was going to write the Introduction. + +"And--the other things?" + +"Oh, well, that's another matter. There's not much of it that'll stand." + +He knew. He would never say more or less than he meant. + +Not much of it that would stand. Now that she knew, it was extraordinary +how little she minded. + +"Still, there are a few things. They must come out first. In the spring. +Then the _Bacchae_ in the autumn. I want it to be clear from the start +that you're a poet translating; not the other way on." + +He walked home with her, discussing gravely how it would be done. + + +IV. + +It had come without surprise, almost without excitement; the quiet +happening of something secretly foreseen, present to her mind as long as +she could remember. + +"I always meant that this should happen: something like this." + +Now that it had happened she was afraid, seeing, but not so clearly, what +would come afterwards: something that would make her want to leave Morfe +and Mamma and go away to London and know the people Richard Nicholson had +told her about, the people who would care for what she had done; the +people who were doing the things she cared about. To talk to them; to +hear them talk. She was afraid of wanting that more than anything in the +world. + +She saw her fear first in Mamma's eyes when she told her. + +And there was something else. Something to do with Richard Nicholson. +Something she didn't want to think about. Not fear exactly, but a sort of +uneasiness when she thought about him. + +His mind really was the enormous, perfect crystal she had imagined. It +had been brought close to her; she had turned it in her hand and seen it +flash and shine. She had looked into it and seen beautiful, clear things +in it: nothing that wasn't beautiful and clear. She was afraid of wanting +to look at it again when it wasn't there. Because it had made her happy +she might come to want it more than anything in the world. + +In two weeks it would be gone. She would want it and it would not be +there. + + +V. + +When she passed the house and saw the long rows of yellow blinds in the +grey front she thought of him. He would not come back. He had never come +before, so it wasn't likely he would come again. + +His being there was one of the things that only happened once. Perhaps +those were the perfect things, the things that would never pass away; +they would stay for ever, beautiful as you had seen them, fixed in their +moment of perfection, wearing the very air and light of it for ever. + +You would see them _sub specie ceternitatis_. Under the form of eternity. + +So that Richard Nicholson would always be like that, the same whenever +you thought of him. + +Look at the others: the ones that hadn't come back and the ones that had. +Jimmy Ponsonby, Harry Craven, Mr. Sutcliffe. And Maurice Jourdain and +Lindley Vickers. If Maurice Jourdain had never come back she would always +have seen him standing in the cornfield. If Lindley Vickers had never +come back she wouldn't have seen him with Nannie Learoyd in the +schoolhouse lane; the moment when he held her hands in the drawing-room, +standing by the piano, would have been their one eternal moment. + +Because Jimmy Ponsonby had gone away she had never known the awful thing +he had done. She would go through the Ilford fields for ever and ever +with her hot hand in his; she happy and he innocent; innocent for ever +and ever. Harry Craven, her playmate of two hours, he would always be +playing, always laughing, always holding her hand, like Roddy, without +knowing that he held it. + +Suppose Mr. Sutcliffe had come back. She would have hurt them more and +more. Mrs. Sutcliffe would have hated her. They would have been +miserable, all three. All three damned for ever and ever. + +She was not sure she wanted Richard Nicholson to come back. + +She was not sure he wasn't spoiling it by writing. She hadn't thought he +would do that. + +A correspondence? Prolonging the beautiful moment, stretching it thin; +thinner and thinner; stretching it so thin that it would snap? You would +come to identify him with his letters, so that in the end you would lose +what had been real, what had been perfect. You would forget. You would +have another and less real kind of memory. + +But his letters were not thin; they were as real as his voice. They +_were_ his voice talking to you; you could tell which words would take +the stress of it. "I don't know how _much_ there is of you, whether this +is all of it or only a little bit. You gave me an impression--you made me +feel that there might be any _amount_ gone under that you can't get at, +that you may _never_ get at if you go on staying where you are. I believe +if you got clean away it might come to the top again. + +"But I don't _know_. I don't know whether you're at the end or the +beginning. I could tell better if you were here." + +She counted the months till April when her poems would come out. She +counted the days till Tuesday when there might be a letter from Richard +Nicholson. + +If only he would not keep on telling you you ought to come to London. +That was what made you afraid. He might have seen how impossible it was. +He had seen Mamma. + +"Don't try to dig me out of my 'hole.' I _can_ 'go on living in it for +ever' if I'm never taken out. But if I got out once it would be awful +coming back. It isn't awful now. Don't make it awful." + +He only wrote: "I'll make it awfuller and _aw_fuller, until out you +come." + + + + +XXXII + + +I. + +Things were happening in the village. + +The old people were dying. Mr. James had died in a fit the day after +Christmas Day. Old Mrs. Heron had died of a stroke in the first week of +January. She had left Dorsy her house and furniture and seventy pounds a +year. Mrs. Belk got the rest. + +The middle-aged people were growing old. Louisa Wright's hair hung in a +limp white fold over each ear, her face had tight lines in it that pulled +it into grimaces, her eyes had milky white rings like speedwell when it +begins to fade. Dorsy Heron's otter brown hair was striped with grey; her +nose stood up sharp and bleak in her red, withering face; her sharp, +tender mouth drooped at the corners. She was forty-nine. + +It was cruel, cruel, cruel; it hurt you to see them. Rather than own it +was cruel they went about pulling faces and pretending they were happy. +Their gestures had become exaggerated, tricks that they would never grow +out of, that gave them the illusion of their youth. + +The old people were dying and the middle-aged people were growing old. +Nothing would ever begin for them again. + +Each morning when she got out of bed she had the sacred, solemn certainty +that for her everything was beginning. At thirty-nine. + +What was thirty-nine? A time-feeling, a feeling she hadn't got. If you +haven't got the feeling you are not thirty-nine. You can be any age you +please, twenty-nine, nineteen. + +But she had been horribly old at nineteen. She could remember what it had +felt like, the desperate, middle-aged sadness, the middle-aged certainty +that nothing interesting would ever happen. She had got hold of life at +the wrong end. + +And all the time her youth had been waiting for her at the other end, at +the turn of the unknown road, at thirty-nine. All through the autumn and +winter Richard Nicholson had kept on writing. Her poems would be out on +the tenth of April. + +On the third the note came. + +"Shall I still find you at Morfe if I come down this week-end?--R.N." + +"You will never find me anywhere else.--M.O." + +"I shall bike from Durlingham. If you've anything to do in Reyburn it +would be nice if you met me at The King's Head about four. We could have +tea there and ride out together.--R.N." + + +II. + +"I'm excited. I've never been to tea in an hotel before." + +She was chattering like a fool, saying anything that came into her head, +to break up the silence he made. + +She was aware of something underneath it, something that was growing more +and more beautiful every minute. She was trying to smash this thing lest +it should grow more beautiful than she could bear. + +"You see how I score by being shut up in Morfe. When I do get out it's no +end of an adventure." (Was there ever such an idiot?) + +Suddenly she left off trying to smash the silence. + +The silence made everything stand out with a supernatural clearness, the +square, white-clothed table in the bay of the window, the Queen Anne +fluting on the Britannia metal teapot, the cups and saucers and plates, +white with a gentian blue band, The King's Head stamped in gold like a +crest. + +Sitting there so still he had the queer effect of creating for both of +you a space of your own, more real than the space you had just stepped +out of. There, there and not anywhere else, these supernaturally clear +things had reality, a unique but impermanent reality. It would last as +long as you sat there and would go when you went. You knew that whatever +else you might forget you would remember this. + +The rest of the room, the other tables and the people sitting at them +were not quite real. They stood in another space, a different and +inferior kind of space. + +"I came first of all," he said, "to bring you _that_." + +He took out of his pocket and put down between them the thin, new white +parchment book of her _Poems_. + +"Oh ... Poor thing, I wonder what'll happen to it?" Funny--it was the +least real thing. If it existed at all it existed somewhere else, not in +this space, not in this time. If you took it up and looked at it the +clearness, the unique, impermanent reality would be gone, and you would +never get it again. + + * * * * * + +They had finished the run down Reyburn hill. Their pace was slackening on +the level. + +He said, "That's a jolly bicycle of yours." + +"Isn't it? I'm sure you'll like to know I bought it with the wonderful +cheque you gave me. I should never have had it without that." + +"I'm glad you got something out of that awful time." + +"Awful? It was one of the nicest times I've ever had.... Nearly all my +nice times have been in that house." + +"I know," he said. "My uncle would let you do anything you liked if you +were young enough. He ought to have had children of his own. They'd have +kept him out of mischief." + +"I can't think," she said to the surrounding hills, "why people get into +mischief, or why they go and kill themselves. When they can ride bicycles +instead." + + +III. + +Mamma was sitting upright and averted, with an air of self-conscious +effacement, holding the thin white book before her like a fan. + +Every now and then you could see her face swinging round from behind the +cover and her eyes looking at Richard Nicholson, above the rims of her +glasses. Uneasy, frightened eyes. + + +IV. + +The big pink roses of the chintzes and the gold bordered bowls of the +black mirrors looked at you rememberingly. + +There was a sort of brutality about it. To come here and be happy, to +come here in order to be happy, when _they_ were gone; when you had hurt +them both so horribly. + +"I'm sitting in her chair," she thought. + +Richard Nicholson sat, in a purely temporary attitude, by the table in +the window. Against the window-pane she could see his side face drawn in +a brilliant, furred line of light. His moustache twitched under the +shadow of his nose. He was smiling to himself as he wrote the letter to +Mamma. + +There was a brutality about that, too. She wondered if he had seen old +Baxter's pinched mouth and sliding eyes when he took the letter. He was +watching him as he went out, waiting for the click of the latch. + +"It's all right," he said. "They expect you. They think it's work." + +He settled himself (in Mr. Sutcliffe's chair). + +"It's the best way," he said. "I want to see you and I don't want to +frighten your mother. She _is_ afraid of me." + +"No. She's afraid of the whole thing. She wishes it hadn't happened. +She's afraid of what'll happen next. I can't make her see that nothing +need happen next." + +"She's cleverer than you think. She sees that something's got to happen +next. I couldn't stand another evening like the last." + +"You couldn't," she agreed. "You couldn't possibly." + +"We can't exactly go on like--like this, you know." + +"Don't let's think about it. Here we are. Now this minute. It's an hour +and a half till dinner time. Why, even if I go at nine we've got three +hours." + +"That's not enough.... You talk as though we could think or not think, as +we chose. Even if we left off thinking we should have to go on living. +Your mother knows that." + +"I don't think she knows more than we do." + +"She knows enough to frighten her. She knows what _I_ want.... I want to +marry you, Mary." + +(This then was what she had been afraid of. But Mamma wouldn't have +thought of it.) + +"I didn't think you wanted to do that. Why should you?" + +"It's the usual thing, isn't it? When you care enough." + +"_Do_ you care enough?" + +"More than enough. Don't you? ... It's no use saying you don't. I know +you do." + +"Can you tell?" + +"Yes." + +"Do I go about showing it?" + +"No; there hasn't been time. You only began yesterday." + +"When? _When_?" + +"In the hotel. When you stopped talking suddenly. And when I gave you +your book. You looked as though you wished I hadn't. As though I'd +dragged you away from somewhere where you were happy." + +"Yes.... If it only began yesterday we can stop it. Stop it before it +gets worse." + +"I can't. I've been at it longer than that." + +"How long?" + +"Oh--I don't know. It might have been that first week. After I'd found +out that there was peace when you came into the room; and no peace when +you went out. When you're there peace oozes out of you and soaks into me +all the time." + +"Does it feel like that?" + +"Just like that." + +"But--if it feels like that now, we should spoil it by marrying." + +"Oh no we shouldn't." + +"Yes.... If it's peace you want. There won't be _any_ peace.... Besides, +you don't know. Do you remember telling me about your uncle?" + +"What's he got to do with it?" + +"And that girl. You said I couldn't have known anything about it.... You +said I couldn't even have come in for the sad end of it." + +"Well?" + +"Well.... I did.... I _was_ the sad end of it.... The girl was me." + +"But you told me it wasn't true." + +...He had got up. He wanted to stand. To stand up high above you. + +"You _know_," he said, "you told me it wasn't true." + + * * * * * + +They would have to go through with it. Dining. Drinking coffee. Talking +politely; talking intelligently; talking. Villiers de L'Isle Adam, +Villiers de L'Isle Adam. "The symbolistes are finished ... Do you know +Jean Richepin? 'Il était une fois un pauvre gars Qui aimait celle qui ne +l'aimait pas'? ... 'Le coeur de ta mère pour mon chien.'" He thinks I +lied. "You ought to read Henri de Regnier and Remy de Gourmont. You'd +like them." ... Le coeur de ta mère. He thinks I lied. Goodness knows +what he doesn't think. + +The end of it would come at nine o'clock. + + * * * * * + +"Are you still angry?" + +He laughed. A dreadful sniffling laugh that came through his nostrils. + +"_I_'m not. If I were I should let you go on thinking I lied. You see, I +didn't know it was true. I didn't know I was the girl." + +"You didn't _know_?" + +"How could I when he never said a word?" + +"I can't understand your not seeing it." + +"Would you like me better if I had seen it?" + +"N-no.... But I wish you hadn't told me. Why did you?" + +"I was only trying to break the shock. You thought I couldn't be old +enough to be that girl. I meant you to do a sum in your head: 'If she was +that girl and she was seventeen, then she must be thirty-nine now.'" + +"Is _that_ what you smashed up our evening for?" + +"Yes." + +"I shouldn't care if you were fifty-nine. I'm forty-five." + +"You're sorry. You're sorry all the same." + +"I'm sorry because there's so little time, Mary. Sorry I'm six years +older than you...." + +Nine o'clock. + +She stood up. He turned to her. He made a queer sound. A sound like a +deep, tearing sigh. + + * * * * * + +"If I were twenty I couldn't marry you, because of Mamma. That's one +thing. You can't marry Mamma." + +"We can talk about your mother afterwards." + +"No. Now. There isn't any afterwards. There's only this minute that +we're in. And perhaps the next.... You haven't thought what it'll be +like. You can't leave London because of your work. I can't leave this +place because of Mamma. She'd be miserable in London. I can't leave +her. She hasn't anybody but me. I promised my brother I'd look after +her.... She'd have to live with me." + +"Why not?" + +"You couldn't live with her." + +"I could, Mary." + +"Not you. You said you couldn't stand another evening like yesterday.... +_All the evenings would be like yesterday_.... Please.... Even if there +wasn't Mamma, you don't want to marry. If you'd wanted to you'd have +done it long ago, instead of waiting till you're forty-five. Think of +two people tied up together for life whether they both like it or not. +It isn't even as if one of them could be happy. How could you if the +other wasn't? Look at the Sutcliffes. Think how he hated it.... And _he_ +was a kind, patient man. You know you wouldn't dream of marrying me if +you didn't think it was the only possible way." + +"Well--isn't it?" + +"No. The one impossible way. I'd do anything for you but that.... +Anything." + +"Would you, Mary? Would you have the courage?" + +"It would take infinitely more courage to marry you. We should be risking +more. All the beautiful things. If it wasn't for Mamma.... But there _is_ +Mamma. So--you see." + +She thought: "He _hasn't_ kissed me. He _hasn't_ held me in his arms. +He'll be all right. It won't hurt him." + + +V. + +That was Catty's white apron. + +Catty stood on the cobbled square by the front door, looking for her. +When she saw them coming she ran back into the house. + +She was waiting in the passage as Mary came in. + +"The mistress is upset about something," she said. "After she got Mr. +Nicholson's letter." + +"There wasn't anything to upset her in that, Catty." + +"P'raps not, Miss Mary; but I thought I'd tell you." + +Mamma had been crying all evening. Her pocket-handkerchief lay in her +lap, a wet rag. + +"I thought you were never coming back again," she said. + +"Why, where did you think I'd gone?" + +"Goodness knows where. I believe there's nothing you wouldn't do. I've no +security with you, Mary.... Staying out till all hours of the night.... +Sitting up with that man.... You'll be the talk of the place if you don't +take care." + +(She thought: "I must let her go on. I won't say anything. If I do it'll +be terrible.") + +"I can't think what possessed you...." + +("Why did I do it? _Why_ did I smash it all up? Uncle Victor suicided. +That's what I've done.... I've killed myself.... This isn't me.") + +"If that's what comes of your publishing I'd rather your books were sunk +to the bottom of the sea. I'd rather see you in your coffin." + +"I _am_ in my coffin." + +"I wish I were in mine," her mother said. + + * * * * * + +Mamma was getting up from her chair, raising herself slowly by her arms. + +Mary stooped to pick up the pocket-handkerchief. "Don't, Mamma; I've got +it." + +Mamma went on stooping. Sinking, sliding down sideways, clutching at the +edge of the table. + +Mary saw terror, bright, animal terror, darting up to her out of Mamma's +eyes, and in a place by themselves the cloth sliding, the lamp rocking +and righting itself. + +She was dragging her up by her armpits, holding her up. Mamma's arms were +dangling like dolls' arms. + +And like a machine wound up, like a child in a passion, she still +struggled to walk, her knees thrust out, doubled up, giving way, her feet +trailing. + + +VI. + +Not a stroke. Well, only a slight stroke, a threatening, a warning. +"Remember she's getting old, Mary." + +Any little worry or excitement would do it. + +She was worried and excited about me. Richard worried and excited her. + +If I could only stay awake till she sleeps. She's lying there like a +lamb, calling me "dear" and afraid of giving me trouble.... Her little +hands dragged the bedclothes up to her chin when Dr. Charles came. She +looked at him with her bright, terrified eyes. + +She isn't old. She can't be when her eyes are so bright. + +She thinks it's a stroke. She won't believe him. She thinks she'll die +like Mrs. Heron. + +Perhaps she knows. + +Perhaps Dr. Charles really thinks she'll die and won't tell me. Richard +thought it. He was sorry and gentle, because he knew. You could see by +his cleared, smoothed face and that dreadfully kind, dreadfully wise +look. He gave into everything--with an air of insincere, provisional +acquiescence, as if he knew it couldn't be for very long. Dr. Charles +must have told him. + +Richard wants it to happen.... Richard's wanting it can't make it happen. + +It might, though. Richard might get at her. His mind and will might be +getting at her all the time, making her die. He might do it without +knowing he was doing it, because he couldn't help it. He might do it in +his sleep. + +But I can stop that.... If Richard's mind and will can make her die, my +mind and will can keep her from dying.... There was something I did +before. + +That time I wanted to go away with the Sutcliffes. When Roddy was coming +home. Something happened then.... If it happened then it can happen now. + +If I could remember how you do it. Flat on your back with your eyes shut; +not tight shut. You mustn't feel your eyelids. You mustn't feel any part +of you at all. You think of nothing, absolutely nothing; not even think. +You keep on not feeling, not thinking, not seeing things till the +blackness comes in waves, blacker and blacker. That's how it was before. +Then the blackness was perfectly still. You couldn't feel your breathing +or your heart beating.... It's coming all right.... Blacker and blacker. + +It wasn't like this before. + +_This_ is an awful feeling. Dying must be like this. One thing going +after another. Something holding down your heart, stopping its beat; +something holding down your chest, crushing the breath out of it.... +Don't think about the feeling. Don't feel. Think of the blackness.... + +It isn't the same blackness. There are specks and shreds of light in it; +you can't get the light away.... Don't think about the blackness and the +light. Let everything go except yourself. Hold on to yourself.... But you +felt your self going. + +Going and coming back; gathered together; incredibly free; disentangled +from the net of nerves and veins. It didn't move any more with the +movement of the net. It was clear and still in the blackness; intensely +real. + +Then it willed. Your self willed. It was free to will. You knew that it +had never been free before except once; it had never willed before except +once. Willing was this. Waves and waves of will, coming on and on, making +your will, driving it through empty time.... "The time of time": that was +the Self.... Time where nothing happens except this. Where nothing +happens except God's will. God's will in your will. Self of your self. +Reality of reality.... It had felt like that. + +Mamma had waked up. She was saying she was better. + + * * * * * + +Mamma was better. She said she felt perfectly well. She could walk across +the room. She could walk without your holding her. + +It couldn't have been that. It couldn't, possibly. It was a tiny +haemorrhage and it had dried up. It would have dried up just the same if +you hadn't done anything. Those things _don't happen_. + +What did happen was extraordinary enough. The queer dying. The freedom +afterwards. The intense stillness, the intense energy; the certainty. + +Something was there. + + * * * * * + +That horrible dream. Dorsy oughtn't to have made me go and see the old +woman in the workhouse. A body without a mind. That's what made the dream +come. It was Mamma's face; but she was doing what the old woman did. + +"Mamma!"--That's the second time I've dreamed Mamma was dead. + +The little lamb, lying on her back with her mouth open, making that funny +noise: "Cluck-cluck," like a hen. + +Why can't I dream about something I want to happen? Why can't I dream +about Richard? ... Poor Richard, how can he go on believing I shall +come to him? + + +VII. + +Dear Dr. Charles, with his head sticking out between the tubes of the +stethoscope, like a ram. His poor old mouth hung loose as he breathed. He +was out late last night; there was white stubble on his chin. + +"It won't do it when you want it to." + +"It's doing quite enough.... Let me see, it's two years since your mother +had that illness. You must go away, Mary. For a month at least. Dorsy'll +come and take care of your mother." + +"Does it matter where I go?" + +"N-no. Not so much. Go where you'll get a thorough change, my dear. I +wouldn't stay with relations, if I were you." + +"All right, I'll go if you'll tell me what's the matter with me." + +"You've got your brother Rodney's heart. But it won't kill you if you'll +take care of yourself." + +(Roddy's heart, the net of flesh and blood drawing in a bit of your +body.) + + + + +XXXIII + + +I. + +Richard had gone up into his own flat and left her to wash and dress and +explore. He had told her she was to have Tiedeman's flat. Not knowing who +Tiedeman was made it more wonderful that God should have put it into his +head to go away for Easter and lend you his flat. + +If you wanted anything you could ring and they would come up from the +basement and look after you. + +She didn't want them to come up yet. She wanted to lie back among her +cushions where Richard had packed her, and turn over the moments and +remember what they had been like: getting out of the train at King's +Cross and finding Richard there; coming with him out of the thin white +April light into the rich darkness and brilliant colours of the room; the +feeling of Richard's hands as they undid her fur stole and peeled the +sleeves of her coat from her arms; seeing him kneel on the hearthrug and +make tea with an air of doing something intensely interesting, an air of +security and possession. He went about in Tiedeman's rooms as if they +belonged to him. + +She liked Tiedeman's flat: the big outer room, curtained with thick +gentian blue and thin violet. There was a bowl of crimson and purple +anemones on the dark oval of the oak table. + +Tiedeman's books covered the walls with their coloured bands and stripes +and the illuminated gold of their tooling. The deep bookcases made a +ledge all round half-way up the wall, and the shallow bookcases went on +above it to the ceiling. + +But--those white books on the table were Richard's books. _Mary +Olivier--Mary Olivier. My_ books that I gave him.... They're Richard's +rooms. + +She got up and looked about. That long dark thing was her coat and fur +stretched out on the flat couch in the corner where Richard had laid +them; stretched out in an absolute peace and rest. + +She picked them up and went into the inner room that showed through the +wide square opening. The small brown oak-panelled room. No furniture but +Richard's writing table and his chair. A tall narrow French window +looking to the backs of houses, and opening on a leaded balcony. +Spindle-wood trees, green balls held up on ramrod stems in green tubs. +Richard's garden. + +Curtains of thin silk, brilliant magenta, letting the light through. The +hanging green bough of a plane tree, high up on the pane, between. A worn +magentaish rug on the dark floor. + +She went through the door on the right and found a short, narrow passage. +Another French window opening from it on to the balcony. A bathroom on +the other side; a small white panelled bedroom at the end. + +She had no new gown. Nothing but the black chiffon one (black because of +Uncle Victor) she had bought two years ago with Richard's cheque. She had +worn it at Greffington that evening when she dined with him. It had a +long, pointed train. Its thin, open, wide spreading sleeves fell from her +shoulders in long pointed wings. It made her feel slender. + + * * * * * + +There was no light in the inner room. Clear glassy dark twilight behind +the tall window. She stood there waiting for Richard to come down. + +Richard loved all this. He loved beautiful books, beautiful things, +beautiful anemone colours, red and purple with the light coming through +them, thin silk curtains that let the light through like the thin silky +tissues of flowers. He loved the sooty brown London walls, houses +standing back to back, the dark flanks of the back wings jutting out, +almost meeting across the trenches of the gardens, making the colours in +his rooms brilliant as stained glass. + +He loved the sound of the street outside, intensifying the quiet of the +house. + +It was the backs that were so beautiful at night; the long straight +ranges of the dark walls, the sudden high dark cliffs and peaks of the +walls, hollowed out into long galleries filled with thick, burning light, +rows on rows of oblong casements opening into the light. Here and there a +tree stood up black in the trenches of the gardens. + +The tight strain in her mind loosened and melted in the stream of the +pure new light, the pure new darkness, the pure new colours. + +Richard came in. They stood together a long time, looking out; they +didn't say a word. + +Then, as they turned back to the lighted outer room, "I thought I was to +have had Tiedeman's flat?" + +"Well, he's up another flight of stairs and the rain makes a row on the +skylight. It was simpler to take his and give you mine. I want you to +have mine." + + +II. + +She turned off the electric light and shut her eyes and lay thinking. The +violent motion of the express prolonged itself in a ghostly vibration, +rocking the bed. In still space, unshaken by this tremor, she could see +the other rooms, the quiet, beautiful rooms. + +I wonder how Mamma and Dorsy are getting on.... I'm not going to think +about Mamma. It isn't fair to Richard. I shan't think about anybody but +Richard for this fortnight. One evening of it's gone already. It might +have lasted quite another hour if he hadn't got up and gone away so +suddenly. What a fool I was to let him think I was tired. + +There will be thirteen evenings more. Thirteen. You can stretch time out +by doing a lot of things in it; doing something different every hour. +When you're with Richard every minute's different from the last, and he +brings you the next all bright and new. + +Heaven would be like that. Imagine an eternity of heaven; being with +Richard for ever and ever. But nobody ever did imagine an eternity of +heaven. People only talk about it because they can't imagine it. What +they mean is that if they had one minute of it they would remember that +for ever and ever. + + * * * * * + +This is Richard's life. This is what I'd have taken from him if I'd let +him marry me. + +I daren't even think what it would have been like if I'd tried to mix up +Mamma and Richard in the same house.... And poor little Mamma in a +strange place with nothing about it that she could remember, going up and +down in it, trying to get at me, and looking reproachful and disapproving +all the time. She'd have to be shut in her own rooms because Richard +wouldn't have her in his. Sitting up waiting to be read aloud to and +played halma with when Richard wanted me. Saying the same things over and +over again. Sighing. + +Richard would go off his head if he heard Mamma sigh. + +He wants to be by himself the whole time, "working like blazes." He likes +to feel that the very servants are battened down in the basement so that +he doesn't know they're there. He couldn't stand Tiedeman and Peters if +they weren't doing the same thing. Tiedeman working like blazes in the +flat above him and Peters working like blazes in the flat below. + +Richard slept in this room last night. He will sleep in it again when I'm +gone. + +She switched the light on to look at it for another second: the +privet-white panelled cabin, the small wine-coloured chest of drawers, +the small golden-brown wardrobe, shining. + +My hat's in that wardrobe, lying on Richard's waistcoat, fast asleep. + +If Tiedeman's flat's up there, that's Richard walking up and down over my +head.... If it rains there'll be a row on the skylight and he won't +sleep. He isn't sleeping now. + + +III. + +It would be much nicer to walk home through Kensington Gardens and Hyde +Park. + +She was glad that they were going to have a quiet evening. After three +evenings at the play and Richard ruining himself in hansoms and not +sleeping.... After this unbelievable afternoon. All those people, those +terribly important people. + +It was amusing to go about with Richard and feel important yourself +because you were with him. And to see Richard's ways with them, his nice +way of behaving as if _he_ wasn't important in the least, as if it was +you they had made all that fuss about. + +To think that the little dried up schoolmasterish man was Professor Lee +Ramsden, prowling about outside the group, eager and shy, waiting to be +introduced to you, nobody taking the smallest notice of him. The woman +who had brought him making soft, sentimental eyes at you through the gaps +in the group, and trying to push him in a bit nearer. Then Richard asking +you to be kind for one minute to the poor old thing. It hurt you to see +him shy and humble and out of it. + +And when you thought of his arrogance at Durlingham. + +It was the women's voices that tired you so, and their nervous, snapping +eyes. + +The best of all was going away from them quietly with Richard into +Kensington Gardens. + +"Did you like it, Mary?" + +"Frightfully. But not half so much as this." + + +IV. + +She was all alone in the front room, stretched out on the flat couch in +the corner facing the door. + +He was still writing his letter in the inner room. When she heard him +move she would slide her feet to the floor and sit up. + +She wanted to lie still with her hands over her shut eyes, making the +four long, delicious days begin again and go on in her head. + +Richard _would_ take hansoms. You couldn't stop him. Perhaps he was +afraid if you walked too far you would drop down dead. When it was all +over your soul would still drive about London in a hansom for ever and +ever, through blue and gold rain-sprinkled days, through poignant white +evenings, through the streaming, steep, brown-purple darkness and the +streaming flat, thin gold of the wet nights. + +They were not going to have any more tiring parties. There wasn't enough +time. + +When she opened her eyes he was sitting on the chair by the foot of the +couch, leaning forward, looking at her. She saw nothing but his loose, +hanging hands and straining eyes. + +"Oh, Richard--what time is it?" She swung her feet to the floor and sat +up suddenly. + +"Only nine." + +"Only nine. The evening's nearly gone." + + * * * * * + +"Is that why you aren't sleeping, Richard? ... I didn't know. I didn't +know I was hurting you." + +"What-did-you-think? What-did-you-think? Isn't it hurting you?" + +"Me? I've got used to it. I was so happy just being with you." + +"So happy and so quiet that I thought you didn't care.... Well, what was +I to think? If you won't marry me." + +"That's because I care so frightfully. Don't let's rake that up again." + +"Well, there it is." + +She thought: "I've no business to come here to his rooms, turning him +out, making him so wretched that he can't sleep. No business.... +Unless--" + +"And we've got to go on living with it," he said. + +He thinks I haven't the courage ... I can't _tell_ him. + +"Yes," she said, "there it is." + +Why shouldn't I tell him? ... We've only ten days. As long as I'm here +nothing matters but Richard ... If I keep perfectly still, still like +this, if I don't say a word he'll think of it.... + +"Richard--would you rather I hadn't come?" + +"No." + +"You remember the evening I came--you got up so suddenly and left me? +What did you do that for?" + +"Because if I'd stayed another minute I couldn't have left you at all." + +He stood up. + +"And you're only going now because you can't see that I'm not a coward." + + * * * * * + +This wouldn't last, the leaping and knocking of her heart, the eyelids +screwing themselves tight, the jerking of her nerves at every sound: at +the two harsh rattling screams of the curtain rings along the pole, at +the light click of the switches. Only the small green-shaded lamp still +burning on Richard's writing table in the inner room. She could hear him +moving about, softly and secretly, in there. + +He was Richard. That was Richard, moving about in there. + + +V. + +Richard thought his flat was a safe place. But it wasn't. People creeping +up the stairs every minute and standing still to listen. People would +come and try the handle of the door. + +"They won't, dear. Nobody ever comes in. It has never happened. It isn't +going to happen now." + +Yet you couldn't help thinking that just this night it would happen. + +She thought that Peters knew. He wouldn't come out of his door till you +had turned the corner of the stairs. + +She thought the woman in the basement knew. She remembered the evening at +Greffington: Baxter's pinched mouth and his eyes sliding sideways to look +at you. She knew now what Baxter had been thinking. The woman's look was +the female of Baxter's. + +As if that could hurt you! + + +VI. + +"Mary, do you know you're growing younger every minute?" + +"I shall go on growing younger and younger till it's all over." + +"Till what's all over?" + +"This. So will you, Richard." + +"Not in the same way. My hair isn't young any more. My face isn't young +any more." + +"I don't want it to be young. It wasn't half so nice a face when it was +young.... Some other woman loved it when it was young." + +"Yes. Another woman loved it when it was young." + +"Is she alive and going about?" + +"Oh, yes; she's alive and she goes about a lot." + +"Does she love you now?" + +"I suppose she does." + +"I wish she didn't." + +"You needn't mind her, Mary. She was never anything to me. She never will +be." + +"But I do mind her. I mind her awfully. I can't bear to think of her +going about and loving you. She's no business to.... Why do I mind her +loving you more than I'd mind your loving her?" + +"Because you like loving more than being loved." + +"How do you know?" + +"I know every time I hold you in my arms." + +There have been other women then, or he wouldn't know the difference. +There must have been a woman that he loved. + +I don't care. It wasn't the same thing. + +"What are you thinking?" + +"I'm thinking nothing was ever the same thing as this." + +"No.... Whatever we do, Mary, we mustn't go back on it.... If we could +have done anything else. But I can't see.... It's not as if it could last +long. Nothing lasts long. Life doesn't last long." + +He sounded as if he were sorry, as if already, in his mind, he had gone +back on it. After three days. + +"You're not _sorry_, Richard?" + +"Only when I think of you. The awful risks I've made you take." + +"Can't you see I _like_ risks? I always have liked risks. When we were +children my brothers and I were always trying to see just how near we +could go to breaking our necks." + +"I know you've courage enough for anything. But that was rather a +different sort of risk." + +"No. No. There are no different sorts of risk. All intense moments of +danger are the same. It's always the same feeling. I don't know whether +I've courage or not, but I do know that when danger comes you don't care. +You're hoisted up above caring." + +"You _do_ care, Mary." + +"About my 'reputation '? You wouldn't like to think I didn't care about +it.... Of course, I care frightfully. If I didn't, where's the risk?" + +"I hate your having to take it all. I don't risk anything." + +"I wish you did. Then you'd be happier. Poor Richard--so safe in his +man's world.... You can be sorry about that, if you like. But not about +me. I shall never be sorry. Nothing in this world can make me sorry.... I +shouldn't like Mamma to know about it. But even Mamma couldn't make me +sorry.... I've always been happy about the things that matter, the real +things. I hate people who sneak and snivel about real things.... People +who have doubts about God and don't like them and snivel. I had doubts +about God once, and they made me so happy I could hardly bear it.... +Mamma couldn't bear it making me happy. She wouldn't have minded half so +much if I had been sorry and snivelled. She wouldn't mind so much if I +was sorry and snivelled about this." + +"You _said_ you weren't going to think about your mother." + +"I'm not thinking about her. I'm thinking about how happy I have been and +am and shall be." + +Even thinking about Mamma couldn't hurt you now. Nothing could hurt the +happiness you shared with Richard. What it was now it would always be. +Pure and remorseless. + + +VII. + +Delicious, warm, shining day. She had her coat and hat on ready to go +down with him. The hansom stood waiting in the street. + +They were looking up the place on the map, when the loud double knock +came. + +"That's for Peters. He's always getting wires--" + +"If we don't go to-day we shall never go. We've only got five more now." + +The long, soft rapping on the door of the room. Knuckles rapping out +their warning. "You can't say I don't give you time." + +Richard took the orange envelope. + +"It's for you, Mary." + +"Oh, Richard, '_Come at once. Mother ill.--DORSY_.'" + +She would catch the ten train. That was what the hansom was there for. + +"I'll send your things on after you." + +The driver and the slog-slogging horse knew that she would catch the +train. Richard knew. + +He had the same look on his face that was there before when Mamma was +ill. Sorrow that wasn't sorrow. And the same clear thought behind it. + + + + +XXXIV + + +I. + +Dorsey's nerves were in a shocking state. You could see she had been +afraid all the time; from the first day when Mamma had kept on saying, +"Has Mary come back?" + +Dorsy was sure that was how it began; but she couldn't tell you whether +it was before or afterwards that she had forgotten the days of the week. + +Anybody could forget the days of the week. What frightened Dorsy was +hearing her say suddenly, "Mary's _gone_." She said it to herself when +she didn't know Dorsy was in the room. Then she had left off asking and +wondering. For five days she hadn't said anything about you. Not anything +at all. When she heard your name she stared at them with a queer, scared +look. + +Catty said that yesterday she had begun to be afraid of Dorsy and +couldn't bear her in the room. That was what made them send the wire. + + * * * * * + +What had she been thinking of those five days? It was as though she knew. + +Dorsy said she didn't believe she was thinking anything at all. Dorsy +didn't know. + + +II. + +Somebody knew. Somebody had been talking. She had found Catty in the room +making up the bed for her in the corner. Catty was crying as she tucked +in the blankets. "There's some people," she said, "as had ought to be +poisoned." But she wouldn't say why she was crying. + +You could tell by Mr. Belk's face, his mouth drawn in between claws of +nose and chin; by Mrs. Belk's face and her busy eyes, staring. By the old +men sitting on the bench at the corner, their eyes coming together as you +passed. + +And Mr. Spencer Rollitt, stretching himself straight and looking away +over your head and drawing in his breath with a "Fivv-vv-vv" when he +asked how Mamma was. His thoughts were hidden behind his bare, wooden +face. He was a just and cautious man. He wouldn't accept any statement +outside the Bible without proof. + +You had to go down and talk to Mrs. Waugh. She had come to see how you +would look. Her mouth talked about Mamma but her face was saying all the +time, "I'm not going to ask you what you were doing in London in Mr. +Nicholson's flat, Mary. I'm sure you wouldn't do anything you'd be sorry +to think of with your poor mother in the state she's in." + +I don't care. I don't care what they think. + +There would still be Catty and Dorsy and Louisa Wright and Miss Kendal +and Dr. Charles with their kind eyes that loved you. And Richard living +his eternal life in your heart. + +And Mamma would never know. + + +III. + +Mamma was going backwards and forwards between the open work-table and +the cabinet. She was taking out the ivory reels and thimbles and button +boxes, wrapping them in tissue paper and hiding them in the cabinet. When +she had locked the doors she waited till you weren't looking to lift up +her skirt and hide the key in her petticoat pocket. + +She was happy, like a busy child at play. + +She was never ill, only tired like a child that plays too long. Her face +was growing smooth and young and pretty again; a pink flush under her +eyes. She would never look disapproving or reproachful any more. She +couldn't listen any more when you read aloud to her. She had forgotten +how to play halma. + +One day she found the green box in the cabinet drawer. She came to you +carrying it with care. When she had put it down on the table she lifted +the lid and looked at the little green and white pawns and smiled. + +"Roddy's soldiers," she said. + + * * * * * + +Richard doesn't know what he's talking about when he asks me to give up +Mamma. He might as well ask me to give up my child. It's no use his +saying she "isn't there." Any minute she may come back and remember and +know me. + +She must have known me yesterday when she asked me to go and see what +Papa was doing. + +As for "waiting," he may have to wait years and years. And I'm forty-five +now. + + +IV. + +The round black eye of the mirror looked at them. Their figures would be +there, hers and Richard's, at the bottom of the black crystal bowl, small +like the figures in the wrong end of a telescope, very clear in the deep, +clear swirl of the glass. + +They were sitting close together on the old rose-chintz-covered couch. +_Her_ couch. You could see him putting the cushions at her back, tucking +the wide Victorian skirt in close about the feet in the black velvet +slippers. And she would lie there with her poor hands folded in the white +cashmere shawl. + +Richard knew what you were thinking. + +"You can't expect me," he was saying, "to behave like my uncle.... +Besides, it's a little too late, isn't it?... We said, whatever we did we +wouldn't go back on it. If it wasn't wrong then, Mary, it isn't wrong +now." + +"It isn't that, Richard." + +(No. Not that. Pure and remorseless then. Pure and remorseless now.) + +She wondered whether he had heard it. The crunching on the gravel walk +under the windows, stopping suddenly when the feet stepped on to the +grass. And the hushed growl of the men's voices. Baxter and the gardener. +They had come to see whether the light would go out again behind the +yellow blinds as it had gone out last night. + +If you were a coward; if you had wanted to get off scot-free, it was too +late. + +Richard knows I'm not a coward. Funk wouldn't keep me from him. It isn't +_that_. + +"What is it, then?" + +"Can't you see, can't you feel that it's no use coming again, just for +this? It'll never be what it was then. It'll always be like last night, +and you'll think I don't care. Something's holding me back from you. +Something that's happened to me. I don't know yet what it is." + +"Nerves. Nothing but nerves." + +"No. I thought it was nerves last night. I thought it was this room. +Those two poor ghosts, looking at us. I even thought it might be Mark and +Roddy--all of them--tugging at me to get me away from you.... But it +isn't that. It's something in me." + +"You're trying to tell me you don't want me." + +"I'm trying to tell you what happened. I did want you, all last year. It +was so awful that I had to stop it. You couldn't go on living like +that.... I willed and willed not to want you." + +"So did I. All the willing in the world couldn't stop me." + +"It isn't that sort of willing. You might go on all your life like that +and nothing would happen. You have to find it out for yourself; and even +that might take you all your life.... It isn't the thing people call +willing at all. It's much queerer. Awfully queer." + +"How--_queer_?" + +"Oh--the sort of queerness you don't like talking about." + +"I'm sorry, Mary. You seem to be talking about something, but I haven't +the faintest notion what it is. But you can make yourself believe +anything you like if you keep on long enough." + +"No. Half the time I'm doing it I don't believe it'll come off.... But it +always does. Every time it's the same. Every time; exactly as if +something had happened." + +"Poor Mary." + +"But, Richard, it makes you absolutely happy. That's the queer part of +it. It's how you know." + +"Know _what_?" + +He was angry. + +"That there's something there. That it's absolutely real." + +"Real?" + +"Why not? If it makes you happy without the thing you care most for in +the whole world.... There must be something there. It must be real. Real +in a way that nothing else is." + +"You aren't happy now," he said. + +"No. And you're with me. And I care for you more than anything in the +whole world." + +"I thought you said that was all over." + +"No. It's only just begun." + +"I can't say I see it." + +"You'll see it all right soon.... When you've gone." + + +V. + +It was no use not marrying him, no use sending him away, as long as he +was tied to you by his want. + +You had no business to be happy. It wasn't fair. There was he, tied to +you tighter than if you _had_ married him. And there you were in your +inconceivable freedom. Supposing you could give him the same freedom, the +same happiness? Supposing you could "work" it for him, make It (whatever +it was) reach out and draw him into your immunity, your peace? + + +VI. + +Whatever It was It was there. You could doubt away yourself and Richard, +but you couldn't doubt away It. + +It might leave you for a time, but it came back. It came back. Its going +only intensified the wonder of its return. You might lose all sense of it +between its moments; but the thing was certain while it lasted. Doubt it +away, and still what had been done for you lasted. Done for you once for +all, two years ago. And that wasn't the first time. + +Even supposing you could doubt away the other times.--You might have made +the other things happen by yourself. But not that. Not giving Richard up +and still being happy. That was something you couldn't possibly have done +yourself. Or you might have done it in time--time might have done it for +you--but not like that, all at once, making that incredible, supernatural +happiness and peace out of nothing at all, in one night, and going on in +it, without Richard. Richard himself didn't believe it was possible. He +simply thought it hadn't happened. + +Still, even then, you might have said it didn't count so long as it was +nothing but your private adventure; but not now, never again now when it +had happened to Richard. + +His letter didn't tell you whether he thought there was anything in it. +He saw the "queerness" of it and left it there: + +"Something happened that night after you'd gone. You know how I felt. I +couldn't stop wanting you. My mind was tied to you and couldn't get away. +Well--that night something let go--quite suddenly. Something went. + +"It's a year ago and it hasn't come back. + +"I didn't know what on earth you meant by 'not wanting and still caring'; +but I think I see now. I don't 'want' you any more and I 'care' more than +ever.... + +"Don't 'work like blazes.' Still I'm glad you like it. I can get you any +amount of the same thing--more than you'll care to do." + + +VII. + +He didn't know how hard it was to "work like blazes." You had to keep +your eyes ready all the time to see what Mamma was doing. You had to take +her up and down stairs, holding her lest she should turn dizzy and fall. +If you left her a minute she would get out of the room, out of the house +and on to the Green by herself and be frightened. + +Mamma couldn't remember the garden. She looked at her flowers with +dislike. + +You had brought her on a visit to a strange, disagreeable place and left +her there. She was angry with you because she couldn't get away. + +Then, suddenly, for whole hours she would be good: a child playing its +delicious game of goodness. When Dr. Charles came in and you took him out +of the room to talk about her you would tell her to sit still until you +came back. And she would smile, the sweet, serious smile of a child that +is being trusted, and sit down on the parrot chair; and when you came +back you would find her sitting there, still smiling to herself because +she was so good. + +Why do I love her now, when she is like this--when "_this_" is what I was +afraid of, what I thought I could not bear--why do I love her more, if +anything, now than I've ever done before? Why am I happier now than I've +ever been before, except in the times when I was writing and the times +when I was with Richard? + + +VIII. + +Forty-five. Yesterday she was forty-five, and to-day. To-morrow she would +be forty-six. She had come through the dreadful, dangerous year without +thinking of it, and nothing had happened. Nothing at all. She couldn't +imagine why she had ever been afraid of it; she could hardly remember +what being afraid of it had felt like. + +Aunt Charlotte--Uncle Victor-- + +If I were going to be mad I should have gone mad long ago: when Roddy +came back; when Mark died; when I sent Richard away. I should be mad now. + +It was getting worse. + +In the cramped room where the big bed stuck out from the wall to within a +yard of the window, Mamma went about, small and weak, in her wadded +lavender Japanese dressing-gown, like a child that can't sit still, +looking for something it wants that nobody can find. You couldn't think +because of the soft pad-pad of the dreaming, sleepwalking feet in the +lamb's-wool slippers. + +When you weren't looking she would slip out of the room on to the landing +to the head of the stairs, and stand there, vexed and bewildered when you +caught her. + + +IX. + +Mamma was not well enough now to get up and be dressed. They had moved +her into Papa's room. It was bright all morning with the sun. She was +happy there. She remembered the yellow furniture. She was back in the old +bedroom at Five Elms. + +Mamma lay in the big bed, waiting for you to brush her hair. She was +playing with her white flannel dressing jacket, spread out before her on +the counterpane, ready. She talked to herself. + +"Lindley Vickers--Vickers Lindley." + +But she was not thinking of Lindley Vickers; she was thinking of Dan, +trying to get back to Dan. + +"Is Jenny there? Tell her to go and see what Master Roddy's doing." She +thought Catty was Jenny.... "Has Dan come in?" + +Sometimes it would be Papa; but not often; she soon left him for Dan and +Roddy. + +Always Dan and Roddy. And never Mark. + +Never Mark and never Mary. Had she forgotten Mark or did she remember him +too well? Or was she afraid to remember? Supposing there was a black hole +in her mind where Mark's death was, and another black hole where Mary had +been? Had she always held you together in her mind so that you went down +together? Did she hold you together now, in some time and place safer +than memory? + +She was still playing with the dressing-jacket. She smoothed it, and +patted it, and folded it up and laid it beside her on the bed. She took +up her pocket-handkerchief and shook it out and folded it and put it on +the top of the dressing-jacket. + +"What are you doing, you darling?" + +"Going to bed." + +She looked at you with a half-happy, half-frightened smile, because you +had found her out. She was putting out the baby clothes, ready. Serious +and pleased and frightened. + +"Who will take care of my little children when I'm laid aside?" + +She knew what she was lying in the big bed for. + + +X. + +It was really bedtime. She was sitting up in the armchair while Catty who +was Jenny made her bed. The long white sheet lay smooth and flat on the +high mattress; it hung down on the floor. + +Mamma was afraid of the white sheet. She wouldn't go back to bed. + +"There's a coffin on the bed. Somebody's died of cholera," she said. + +Cholera? That was what she thought Mark had died of. + + * * * * * + +She knows who I am now. + + +XI. + +Richard had written to say he was married. On the twenty-fifth of +February. That was just ten days after Mamma died. + +"We've known each other the best part of our lives. So you see it's a +very sober middle-aged affair." + +He had married the woman who loved him when he was young. "A very sober +middle-aged affair." Not what it would have been if you and he--He +didn't want you to think that _that_ would ever happen again. He wanted +you to see that with him and you it had been different, that you had +loved him and lived with him in that other time he had made for you where +you were always young. + +He had only made it for you. She, poor thing, would have to put up with +other people's time, time that made them middle-aged, made them old. + +You had got to write and tell him you were glad. You had got to tell him +Mamma died ten days ago. And he would say to himself, "If I'd waited +another ten days--" There was nothing he could say to you. + +That was why he didn't write again. There was nothing to say. + + + + +XXXV + + +I. + +She would never get used to the house. + +She couldn't think why she had been such a fool as to take it. On a seven +years' lease, too; it would feel like being in prison for seven years. + +That was the worst of moving about for a whole year in boats and trains, +and staying at hotels; it gave you an unnatural longing to settle down, +in a place of your own. + +Your own--Undying lust of possession. If you _had_ to have things, why a +house? Why six rooms when two would have done as well and left you your +freedom? After all that ecstasy of space, that succession of heavenly +places with singing names: Carcassone and Vezelay; Rome and Florence and +San Gimignano; Marseilles and Arles and Avignon; filling up time, +stretching it out, making a long life out of one year. + +If you could go moving on and on while time stood still. + +Oh this damned house. It would be you sitting still while time tore by, +as it used to tear by at Morfe before Richard came, and in the three +years after he had gone, when Mamma-- + + +II. + +It was rather attractive, when you turned the corner and came on it +suddenly, flat-roofed and small, clean white and innocent. The spring +twilight gave it that look of being somewhere in Italy, the look that +made you fall in love with it at first sight. + +As for not getting used to it, that was precisely the effect she wanted: +rooms that wouldn't look like anything in the house at Morfe, things that +she would always come on with a faint, exquisite surprise: the worn +magentaish rug on the dark polished floor, the oak table, the gentian +blue chair, the thin magenta curtains letting the light through: the +things Richard had given her because in their beginning they had been +meant for her. Richard knew that you were safe from unhappiness, that you +had never once "gone back on it," if you could be happy with his things. + +He had thought, too, that if you had a house you would settle down and +work. + +You would have to; you would have to work like blazes, after spending all +the money Aunt Charlotte left you on rushing about, and half the money +Aunt Lavvy left you on settling down. It was horrible this living on +other people's deaths. + + +III. + +Catty couldn't bear it being so different. You could see she thought you +were unfaithful not to have kept the piano when Mamma had played on it. + +Catty's faithfulness was unsurpassable. She had wanted to marry +Blenkiron, the stonemason at Morfe, but first she wouldn't because of +Mamma and then she wouldn't because of Miss Mary. When you told her to go +back and marry him at once she would only laugh and say, "There's your +husband, and there's your children. You're my child, Miss Mary. Master +Roddy was Jenny's child and you was always mine." + +You were only ten years younger than Catty, but like Richard she couldn't +see that you were old. + +You would never know whether Catty knew about Richard; or whether Dorsy +knew. Whatever you did they would love you, Catty because you were her +child, and Dorsy because you were Mark's sister. + + +IV. + +The sun had been shining for a fortnight. She could sit out all day now +in the garden. + +It was nonsense to talk about time standing still if you kept on moving. +Just now, in the garden, when the light came through the thin green silk +leaves of the lime tree, for a moment, while she sat looking at the lime +tree, time stood still. + +Catty had taken away the tea-things and was going down the four steps +into the house. It happened between the opening and shutting of the door. + +She saw that the beauty of the tree was its real life, and that its real +life was in her real self and that her real self was God. The leaves and +the light had nothing to do with it; she had seen it before when the tree +was a stem and bare branches on a grey sky; and that beauty too was the +real life of the tree. + + +V. + +If she could only dream about Mark. But if she dreamed about any of them +it was always Mamma. She had left her in the house by herself and she had +got out of her room to the stair-head. Or they were in London at the +crossing by the Bank and Mamma was frightened. She had to get her through +the thick of the traffic. The horses pushed at Mamma and you tried to +hold back their noses, but she sank down and slid away from you sideways +under the wheel. + +Or she would come into this room and find her in it. At first she would +be glad to see that Mamma was still there; then she would be unhappy and +afraid. She would go on to a clear thought: if Mamma was still there, +then she had got back somehow to Morfe. The old life was still going on; +it had never really stopped. But if that was real, then this was not +real. Her secure, shining life of last year and now wasn't real; nothing +could make it real; her exquisite sense of it was not real. She had only +thought it had happened. + +Nothing had happened but what had happened before; it was happening now; +it would go on and on till it frightened you, till you could not bear it. +When she woke up she was glad that the dream had been nothing but a +dream. + +But that meant that you were glad Mamma was not there. The dream showed +you what you were hiding from yourself. Supposing the dead knew? +Supposing Mamma knew, and Mark knew that you were glad-- + + +VI. + +It came to her at queer times, in queer ways. After that horrible evening +at the Dining Club when the secretary woman put her as far as possible +from Richard, next to the little Jew financier who smelt of wine. + +She couldn't even hear what Richard was saying; the little wine-lapping +Jew went on talking about Women's Suffrage and his collection of +Fragonards and his wife's portrait by Sargent. His tongue slid between +one overhanging and one dropping jaw, in and out like a shuttle. + +She tried not to hate him, not to shrink back from his puffing, wine-sour +breath, to be kind to him and listen and smile and remember that his real +secret self was God, and was holy; not to attend to Richard's voice +breaking the beat of her heart. + +She had gone away before Richard could get up and come to her. She wanted +to be back in her house by herself. She had pushed open the French +windows of the study to breathe the air of the garden and see the tall +sycamore growing deep into the thick blue night. Half the room, reflected +on the long pane, was thrown out into the garden. She saw it thinning +away, going off from the garden into another space, existing there with +an unearthly reality of its own. She had sat down at last, too tired to +go upstairs, and had found herself crying, incredibly crying; all the +misery, all the fear, all the boredom of her life gathered together and +discharging now. + +"If I could get out of it all"--Her crying stopped with a start as if +somebody had come in and put a hand on her shoulder. Everything went +still. She had a sense of happiness and peace suddenly there with her in +the room. Not so much her own as the happiness and peace of an immense, +invisible, intangible being of whose life she was thus aware. She knew, +somehow through It, that there was no need to get away; she was out of it +all now, this minute. There was always a point where she could get out of +it and into this enduring happiness and peace. + + +VII. + +They were talking to-night about Richard and his wife. They said he +wasn't happy; he wasn't in love with her. + +He never had been; she knew it; yet she took him, and tied him to her, an +old woman, older than Richard, with grey hair. + +Oh well--she had had to wait for him longer than he waited for me, and +she's in love with him still. She's making it impossible for him to see +me. + +Then I shan't see him. I don't want him to see me if it hurts her. I +don't want her to be hurt. + +I wonder if she knows? _They_ know. I can hear them talking about me when +I've gone. + +..."Mary Olivier, the woman who translated Euripides." + +..."Mary Olivier, the woman Nicholson discovered." + +..."Mary Olivier, the woman who was Nicholson's mistress." + +Richard's mistress--I know that's what they say, but I can't feel that +they're saying it about _me_. It must be somebody else, some woman I +never heard of. + + +VIII. + +Mr. Sutcliffe is dead. He died two weeks ago at Agaye. + +I can see now how beautiful they were; how beautiful he was, going away +like that, letting her take him away so that the sight of me shouldn't +hurt her. + +I can see that what I thought so ugly was really beautiful, their +sticking to each other through it all, his faithfulness and her +forgiveness, their long life of faithfulness and forgiveness. + +But my short life with Richard was beautiful too; my coming to him and +leaving him free. I shall never go back on that; I shall never be sorry +for it. + +The things I'm sorry for are not caring more for Papa, being unkind to +Mamma, not doing enough for her, not knowing what she was really like. +I'd give anything to have been able to think about her as Mark thought, +to feel about her as he felt. If only I had known what she was really +like. Even now I don't know. I never shall. + +But going to Richard--No. If it was to be done again to-morrow I'd do it. + +And I don't humbug myself about it. If I made Richard happy I made myself +happy too; _he_ made me happy. Still, if I had had no happiness in it, if +I'd hated it, I'd have done it for Richard all the same. + + +IX. + +All this religious resignation. And the paradox of prayer: people praying +one minute, "Thy will be done," then praying for things to happen or not +happen, just as they please. + +God's will be done--as if it wouldn't be done whatever they did or didn't +do. God's will was your fate. The thing was to know it and not waste your +strength in the illusion of resistance. + +If you were part of God your will was God's will at the moment when you +really willed. There was always a point when you knew it: the flash point +of freedom. You couldn't mistake your flash when it came. You couldn't +doubt away that certainty of freedom any more than you could doubt away +the certainty of necessity and determination. From the outside they were +part of the show of existence, the illusion of separation from God. From +the inside they were God's will, the way things were willed. Free-will +was the reality underneath the illusion of necessity. The flash point of +freedom was your consciousness of God. + +Then praying would be willing. There would be no such thing as passive +prayer. There could be no surrender.... And yet there was. Not the +surrender of your will, but of all the things that entangle and confuse +it; that stand between it and you, between God and you. When you lay +still with your eyes shut and made the darkness come on, wave after wave, +blotting out your body and the world, blotting out everything but your +self and your will, that was a dying to live; a real dying, a real life. + +The Christians got hold of real things and turned them into something +unreal, impossible to believe. The grace of God was a real thing. It was +that miracle of perfect happiness, with all its queerness, its divine +certainty and uncertainty. The Christians knew at least one thing about +it; they could see it had nothing to do with deserving. But it had +nothing to do with believing, either, or with being good and getting into +heaven. It _was_ heaven. It had to do with beauty, absolutely un-moral +beauty, more than anything else. + +She couldn't see the way of it beyond that. It had come to her when she +was a child in brilliant, clear flashes; it had come again and again in +her adolescence, with more brilliant and clearer flashes; then, after +leaving her for twenty-three years, it had come like this--streaming in +and out of her till its ebb and flow were the rhythm of her life. + +Why hadn't she known that this would happen, instead of being afraid that +she would "go like" Aunt Charlotte or Uncle Victor? People talked a lot +about compensation, but nobody told you that after forty-five life would +have this exquisite clearness and intensity. + +Why, since it _could_ happen when you were young--reality breaking +through, if only in flashes coming and going, going altogether and +forgotten--why had you to wait so long before you could remember it and +be aware of it as one continuous, shining background? She had never been +aware of it before; she had only thought about and about it, about +Substance, the Thing-in-itself, Reality, God. Thinking was not being +aware. + +She made it out more and more. For twenty-three years something had come +between her and reality. She could see what it was now. She had gone +through life wanting things, wanting people, clinging to the thought of +them, not able to keep off them and let them go. + + +X. + +All her life she had gone wrong about happiness. She had attached it to +certain things and certain people: Mamma and Mark, Jenny, visits to Aunt +Bella, the coming of Aunt Charlotte and Aunt Lavvy and Uncle Victor, the +things people would say and do which they had not said and not done: when +she was older she had attached it to Maurice Jourdain and to Mark still +and Mamma; to going back to Mamma after Dover; to the unknown houses in +Morfe; to Maurice Jourdain's coming; then to Mark's coming, to Lindley +Vickers. And in the end none of these things had brought her the +happiness she had seemed to foresee in them. + +She knew only one thing about perfect happiness: it didn't hide; it +didn't wait for you behind unknown doors. There were little happinesses, +pleasures that came like that: the pleasure of feeling good when you sat +with Maggie's sister; the pleasure of doing things for Mamma or Dorsy; +all the pleasures that had come through the Sutcliffes. The Sutcliffes +went, and yet she had been happy. They had all gone, and yet she was +happy. + +If you looked back on any perfect happiness you saw that it had not come +from the people or the things you thought it had come from, but from +somewhere inside yourself. When you attached it to people and things they +ceased for that moment to be themselves; the space they then seemed to +inhabit was not their own space; the time of the wonderful event was not +their time. They became part of the kingdom of God within you. + +Not Richard. He had become part of the kingdom of God without ceasing to +be himself. + +That was because she had loved him more than herself. Loving him more +than herself she had let him go. + +Letting go had somehow done the trick. + + +XI. + +I used to think there was nothing I couldn't give up for Richard. + +Could I give up this? If I had to choose between losing Richard and +losing this? (I suppose it would be generally considered that I _had_ +lost Richard.) If I had had to choose seven years ago, before I knew, +I'd have chosen Richard; I couldn't have helped myself. But if I had +to choose now--knowing what reality is--between losing Richard in the +way I have lost him and losing reality, absolutely and for ever, losing, +absolutely and for ever, my real self, knowing that I'd lost it?... + +If there's anything in it at all, losing my real self would be losing +Richard, losing Richard's real self absolutely and for ever. Knowing +reality is knowing that you can't lose it. That or nothing. + + +XII. + +Supposing there isn't anything in it? Supposing--Supposing-- + +Last night I began thinking about it again. I stripped my soul; I opened +all the windows and let my ice-cold thoughts in on the poor thing; it +stood shivering between certainty and uncertainty. + +I tried to doubt away this ultimate passion, and it turned my doubt into +its own exquisite sting, the very thrill of the adventure. + +Supposing there's nothing in it, nothing at all? + +That's the risk you take. + + +XIII. + +There isn't any risk. This time it was clear, clear as the black pattern +the sycamore makes on the sky. If it never came again I should remember. + + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary Olivier: A Life, by May Sinclair + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY OLIVIER: A LIFE *** + +This file should be named 9366-8.txt or 9366-8.zip + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Beth Trapaga and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +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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