UNDER THE APPLE THEE
I am under the apple tree trying to be busy. In front of me lies a
waif and stray garment--a flannel petticoat. There is no house mending
to do--everything is new and holeless. Dimbie had a trousseau as well
as I. Occasionally he will wear a small hole in one of his socks, the
mending of which will take me half an hour, then my work is finished.
So I have taken to waif and stray garments and deep-sea fishermen's
knitting in self-defence.
Were I not engaged on this I should be making wool-work mats like the
old men in the workhouse--I can see it in the tail of Amelia's eye; so
I keep a garment well to the front, ready to pick up at the sound of
her first footstep, which, being squeaky, fortunately warns me of the
advance of the enemy.
Now but for Amelia I should be only too content to laze through the
summer--just staring at the sky and the soft, white, fleecy clouds
through the breaks in the foliage of the apple tree; for though I do
nothing I am tired, always tired. Perhaps it is the warmth of the
summer, for the rain and cold are gone. By and by I am going to be
very energetic, and do little things for Amelia, whether she considers
it helpful or otherwise. I shall peel apples in the autumn when the
weather is cooler, and stone the plums for jam, and skin the mushrooms.
But now I want to be idle. I just want to watch the bird and insect
life of the garden.
Much to my delight, a colony of ants has settled at the base of the
apple tree. I get Amelia to wheel the couch close to their
head-quarters, and I lean over and gently drop little things in front
of the openings to their tunnels. Sometimes a tiny bit of twig lies
across their front door, or a cherry-stone bars the cellar entrance;
and then what excitement and confusion reign, what a twinkling of a
myriad tiny legs! Nine strong, able-bodied men are requisitioned to
tackle the cherry-stone. I smile and chuckle as I picture one excited
ant--who is not eager to tell the news?--rushing off to inform the
others that he has discovered a thunderbolt lying at their cellar-door,
and they must marshal their forces for an attack. And then what a
straining and pushing and levering there is! First six men arrive;
they look like policemen. Presently one rushes away and brings back
three more. They then sort of take their bearings, trotting in and out
of the front door and eyeing with indignation the obstacle that lies in
their path.
"Hurrah!" I cry as they lever the cherry-stone the fraction of an inch;
and Amelia, appearing at the front door, says--
"I beg your pardon, mum."
Amelia certainly has a most tiresome habit of cropping up at the tense
moments of life. Should I call, gently at first, "A-me-li-a," and then
louder, "A-ME-LI-A!" and then in stentorian tones, "A-ME-LI-A!" finally
degenerating into cat-calls and war-whoops, she wouldn't dream of
hearing me; but when I apostrophise the thrush which comes to sing in
the apple tree of an evening, or encourage the ants in their labours,
or laugh at the ridiculous wagtails bobbing up and down the lawn, she
appears suddenly and stands and stares at me.
Just now I said, "You shouldn't stare at me"; and when she replied,
"You're so pretty, mum," I felt hers was the gentleness of the dove and
the cunning of the serpent combined.
I had been trying to persuade her not to whiten the front-door step,
which is of cool grey stone. She appears to regard it in the same
light as a kitchen-hearth bestowed by a bountiful Providence. She
smears it with wet donkey-stone, and when dry it gleams and
scintillates in the hot sun with dazzling intensity. Then she attacks
the scraper, which she polishes with a black-lead brush till it
resembles the kitchen kettle after "siding up." You cannot prevent
Amelia from "siding up." Every now and again she "sides up" me. She
says my hair is untidy and approaches me with a brush. She suggests
that the wearing of a pearl necklace round my throat, the collar of
which is cut low for comfort, would smarten me up. She picks up my
slippers, which I have kicked on to the grass, and compels me to put
them on in case I have callers.
She constantly threatens me with these callers. She dangles them in
front of me when I am idling with _The Vicar of Wakefield_, and offers
to bring me my best hat, as "that Liberty garden thing is shabby and
old-fashioned." She thinks the vicar may call. He has been laid up
for some weeks; but he is better, and it is his _bounded_ duty to call
to see a poor sick lady.
I gently bring her back to the discussion of the step, and after some
stubbornness on her part she asks if I would like it done like the
Tompkinses'. Knowing that the Tompkinses are superior people,
indulging in "hoary doves" at their dinner, I say "Yes" without any
further parley, trusting to their good taste.
Mother is coming to-morrow, and I know just how she is feeling about
me. She will be thinking if ever her daughter Marguerite wanted her it
will be now--now, when she is lonely and tired and without Dimbie. Her
dear face will be brimful of joy at being wanted by anyone, and at the
prospect of getting away from Peter. She would not own up to the last.
If ever there was a loyal, patient soul in this world it is mother.
She won't allow herself to believe that Peter is selfish and
domineering. He is her husband, and with a wavering curve of her sweet
lips she pronounces him as just tiresome.
And, best of all, I know she will like being here without Dimbie. She
likes him, she admires him, but she is secretly jealous of him. I
believe I should be too if I had a daughter married. When a child
gives herself into somebody else's keeping the mother is dethroned; the
child--always a child in the mother's eyes--takes her joys and sorrows
to her husband. He bandages the little cut leg, figuratively speaking,
kisses the crushed fingers, wipes away the tears of sorrow. The mother
has to take a back seat, and her heart is sore. When Dimbie and I, in
the short days of our engagement, would try to slip away to another
room, to be by ourselves, I have seen mother close her eyes and heard
her give a little gasping sigh. She would smile bravely when her eyes
caught mine, but I had heard the sigh, and though my heart ached at the
thought of leaving her alone with Peter, I was unable to keep the
happiness away from my own eyes and voice. Poor little mother! It is
hard, but it was ever thus. You left your mother, and I in turn have
left you. It is one of Nature's edicts--cruel it may seem, but not to
be resisted. Were Dimbie to call, I should follow him to the end of
the world, I know.
But during the days mother is with me I mean to let her have it all her
own way. I shall pretend that Dimbie is dethroned. I shall not talk
of him; at least, I shall try with unusual strength not to speak of
him, beyond mentioning the bare fact that he is well and ministering to
the wants of Aunt Letitia.
And we shall also not talk of Peter more than we can possibly help.
Long ago we decided that Peter must be a tabooed subject between us.
"We might be led into saying things about your father which we ought
not to say," mother had implied without putting it into so many words,
and I had nodded.
"Besides, he might--he might have been so much worse."
I fear I looked doubtful about this point, for she added quickly, "He
doesn't steal."
"No," I admitted, "he is certainly not a thief."
"And he doesn't drink."
"No."
"And he doesn't gamble."
"No," I conceded somewhat grudgingly.
"And----" she hesitated.
"He doesn't go off with other men's wives, you want to say."
"That's it. Your father is--is quite moral."
"It's a pity he is," I said laughing. "If only he would run away with
someone you could get a divorce."
Dear mother looked terribly shocked, and glanced fearfully at the door.
"It's all right," I reassured her; "he's resting in the library,
overcome by your insubordination. He's not used to it. He lunged at
me with his stick because he detected me in a smile, but I dodged him."
I remember mother smiled faintly, and told me I ought not to dodge him.
This conversation took place after an unusually violent outburst on
Peter's part because he had lost his best gold collar stud, which he
accused mother of having taken. And when she tremblingly said that she
had never in her life worn anything around her neck but a lace tucker,
which did not necessitate the wearing of a gold stud, he said lace
tuckers were foolish fripperies, and that she ought to wear a linen
collar the same as other sensible women. And when mother protested
that her neck was not long enough, he replied snappily: "Then stretch
it till it is. You are a woman without any resources."
I smile as I conjure up dear mother's expression of countenance when he
said this. She usually, with unquestioning obedience to Biblical
commands, turned her other cheek to him for a smite, but on this
occasion she didn't do anything of the kind. She simply turned her
back on him, drew herself up to her full height of five feet nothing,
and pranced out of the room. I say pranced, because she did prance,
just like a thoroughbred horse chafing at the bearing rein. Peter
watched this prancing with unconcealed astonishment; in fact, he put up
his monocle and stared at the closed door. Now if mother had only
pranced a little oftener. Peter might have been a much better behaved
person. But mother is not of the stuff of which people like Amelia and
Napoleon are composed. She is not a ruler, and she is not a fighter.
She cannot stand up for herself, and so Peter has taken advantage of
her sitting position--which sounds as though I were referring to a hen,
and not to mother at all.
I find on turning back the pages that I said mother was rarely disloyal
to Peter, that she pronounced his selfishness and bad temper as "just
tiresomeness." Still, the worm _will_ turn sometimes, and on this
occasion she did turn. To-morrow she will probably ignore him
altogether--glad to get away from an unpleasant subject.
I am full of delightful anticipations of the peaceful time she and I
will spend together under the apple tree. At first she will lean
forward when I speak to her as though she had been deafened by a storm.
To live with Peter is to live in a succession of storms, and when
mother reaches the calmer spaces of the world she wears an almost dazed
expression. I must speak very slowly and gently till she becomes
accustomed to being in a quiet haven. We will chat in the mornings and
doze in the warm afternoons and discuss Amelia in the evenings. I know
I shall be unable to resist discussing Amelia with mother. She will be
so interested in her not wearing cloth boots. She will be so surprised
at my having given in. She gives in herself over every question in
life, great or small. But she is quite surprised if other people do
the same, especially her own daughter. She imagines I have inherited
some of Peter's characteristics, which Heaven forbid. She thinks his
bullying is strength of character. Ah, little mother, I am not strong,
if you only knew it. I am as weak as water towards people I love.
You, Dimbie and Nanty could do anything with me.
Amelia has been to tell me that we are out of Shinio, and shall she run
to the village. She didn't call it Shinio, but Shiny. She has quite
an extraordinary affection for the evil-smelling stuff, and is always
"requiring" it.
"But you won't be cleaning anything this afternoon," I said. "You are
dressed, and it must be nearly five o'clock."
"It's for the brasses to-morrow morning," she answered in a tired
voice, as though she were weary of explaining things to me. "It's
kitchen-day, and I do my steels and brasses before breakfast."
"Oh, of course," I murmured hastily while looking for my purse, which I
can never find, and which she unearthed with lightning rapidity from
under the tortoise.
I handed her sixpence, but she didn't go.
"Anything further?" I asked pleasantly.
"No, mum; but I was just considerin' if we couldn't alter your
pocket--put it in front of your tea-gown, a sort of flap-pocket
right-hand side, like motorists and golfists and cyclists has."
"Put a flap-pocket on my right-hand side," I repeated. "But I don't
motor or golf or cycle."
"No, mum, but it might help you not to lose your purse so frequently,
and save you and me a lot of trouble. I expect you lies on your pocket
mostly?"
"I do nothing of the kind," I replied coldly, "for I haven't got one."
"There!" she said triumphantly, "I might have knowed it. I'll fix you
one up in two shakes. I'm a good hand at sewing. Have you a bit of
white serge like your gown, mum?"
"No, I haven't; and I forbid your putting a pocket on me anywhere."
She looked surprised at my warmth.
"All right, mum; I won't if you don't wish it. I only thought it would
save time. You see, when the purse isn't lost the tortis is. The
tortis is a beggar for gettin' away. See now, it's slippin' down the
Hilkley at this minute." She caught it by the tail and placed it on
the little table which always stands at the side of my couch. "The
creature might be alive," she finished, shaking her fist at it.
"Don't be ridiculous, Amelia," I commanded, endeavouring not to laugh.
"I will try and not lose it so often, but things _do_ disappear."
"Yes, mum, they do," she responded gravely. "If nothing was ever lost,
like hair-pins, the world wouldn't hold 'em." With which oracular
remark she swept down the garden path to the gate, her two heels
leaning over at a more dangerous angle than usual.
I drew Dimbie's letter--he writes every day, sometimes twice--from
beneath the cushions, and read it over for--well, I won't say how many
times, but one passage I already knew off by heart:--
"Dear one, I am glad that you miss me--very glad, isn't that cruel? If
you want me, how much more do I want you, my poor little girl. I long
to put my arms round you and kiss your big, wistful eyes--kiss away the
wistfulness, which only came with your suffering, and I will do it when
I come home.
"Aunt Letitia is slowly sinking. She is not suffering, and her mind is
quite clear. She has asked a great many questions about you, and has
even laughed feebly at Amelia and her household arrangements--I mean
_your_ household arrangements. For the squeaking and cracking of bones
and wearing of unsuitable slippers she has no suggestions to offer.
She says there is always _something_. With old Ann it has been a
misfit in artificial teeth. They have moved horribly, and the gums
have gaped at her, but she has not considered this of sufficient
importance to give Ann notice.
"I wired to Nanty to know how you were. You don't tell me in your
letters, bad girl. I shall scold and slap you when I get home, as well
as kiss you."
I glanced carefully round to see that neither Amelia nor Jumbles were
watching me, and holding the letter to my lips, I kissed it over and
over again.