After the crisis of that conversation with Mrs. Curtis, which was at the
bottom of so much harm and mischief, Arthur and Nancy stopped
quarrelling with each other. They had each done and said things which
they were disposed to repent of--and felt the existence generally of a
state of things which was alarming, which at their worst they could not
see without feeling that it might be possible to go too far. The fact
that Arthur had gone away without seeing her after her rudeness to his
aunt, his absence for hours, his absolute silence on the subject when
they met at dinner had produced a great effect upon Nancy. It had been
on her lips all the evening through to introduce the subject, to excuse
herself or defend herself according as might be most suitable at the
moment. But Arthur gave her no occasion. He had the advantage of
education over her, the habit of self-restraint, at least the sense that
it was necessary on occasion to restrain himself, an elementary lesson
which Nancy had not as yet arrived at. And the effect upon her was
great. She, too, kept silent, though against her will. She shut up in
her breast this subject which, if she had talked about it, would, no
doubt, have inflamed her to double wrath. And she grew a little
frightened of the husband whom hitherto she had played with as she
would, but who now in his newborn reserve and stillness was more than
she could manage. She was afraid of him for the moment. He was no longer
in her power. A tremendous menace seemed to lurk in his silence; and the
consequence was that they lived in much greater harmony for the next
week, both a little alarmed and penitent, and afraid of taking another
step in the wrong direction. At the end of that time Arthur made the
discovery which Nancy had already suggested to him, that howsoever great
might be his desire to go to Italy, his means would not permit it. They
had been living in their charming little apartment for three weeks, they
had used a carriage constantly, and all that a Paris hotel can furnish
that was most agreeable to eye and palate, and there was nothing, or
next to nothing left. Arthur had not realised this fact when he had
written his letter to his father. He had written indeed more out of the
painful determination within him to uphold his wife, even in the face of
what she had done to his relatives, by yielding to her will about their
future, than from any more reasonable motive. He knew very well how that
story would fly, how it would get to the ears of his mother and Lucy,
and how everybody who knew him would pity poor Arthur. This it was which
made him suddenly abandon his opposition, and determine to do as she
wished. At all hazards he would maintain her credit, whatever might be
her treatment of him. They might make her out to be what they pleased,
they might tell what stories they would--he could not he knew contest
them, but at all events everybody should see that he at least upheld her
in her way of acting, gave her his support through all. This generous,
if perhaps foolish, resolution, which was full of that grieved and
suffering love which can no longer deny the justice of the accusations
against its beloved, had been come to before he knew the necessity of
returning home; but that necessity made it less forced and unnatural.
For the last week of their stay there was little attempt at amusement.
Denham, who had found great satisfaction in watching the proceedings of
the bride, and who had already made many circles merry by his
descriptions of her husband’s anxious endeavours to interest her in what
she saw and heard, and her own absolute ignorance and unconcealed
_ennui_, was ever at hand to suggest something, and had indeed two or
three plans of his own for sharing this charming spectacle with some of
his friends, with a trust in Arthur’s simplicity, which might not have
been justified by the event. There were two in particular to whom he had
promised an introduction to his “delicious Englishwoman,” had the young
pair accepted the box at the Odéon which he had offered them, and the
mischievous attaché was much disappointed by the failure of his plans.
They declined it, however, with one accord. Nancy had quite convinced
herself that it was “no fun” going to plays when you did not understand
a word, and Arthur, on his side, had become disgusted with everything
public. How did he know that they might not meet some one else whom he
should be obliged to introduce to his wife, and whom his wife would
receive with the same amiability which she had shown to Mrs. Curtis? The
Curtises were still in Paris, and he had himself held an agitating
conference with his aunt and Mary; but they came no more to the Rue
Rivoli. This opportunity of making friends had been turned into the
easiest way of making enemies. He would make no more such essays.
Accordingly they sat “at home,” in the pretty little room with the
white walls and white curtains. Arthur could always write his
letters--it was not many he had to write now, as his family
correspondence was cut off, and he had dropped most of his friends, but
still he kept up the phrase; he wrote his letters, while she sat by the
fire, sometimes taking out and putting in frills or trimmings to her
dresses, sometimes yawning over a newspaper; they talked to each other a
little now and then, and yawned in the intervals; they had no books
except a few Tauchnitz volumes, which saved them from a complete
breakdown, and they went early to bed which seemed always a virtuous
thing to do. Thus the days went by. They did not talk any longer about
going “home,” but it was tacitly understood between them that they were
going _back_. This was what they had got to call it. And the day was
fixed, and the boxes packed, and all settled, with scarcely any further
consultation. Life, however, had become very sober prose after the
triumphant exultation of the beginning, when three weeks after their
marriage they crossed the Channel again on an early morning, Nancy very
ill, and Arthur dignified but pale, and arrived at London on a rainy
December night, wet and miserable as anything could well be.
Next day they went _back_. Arthur had taken rooms at the little inn
which stood opposite Mr. Eagles’ house, looking on the green, where
Durant had been lodged. But before they reached that place there was a
greeting to be got through at the station, the whole Bates family, no
less, having assembled to welcome their daughter. Nancy’s spirits had
risen from the moment she had touched English soil. She had talked to
everybody, guards, porters, the servants at the hotel, with exuberant
satisfaction, notwithstanding the bad passage and its natural
consequences.
“Oh, what a blessing to be at home!” she said. “Oh, Arthur, isn’t it
nice to be back? I feel as if I should like to hug everybody. How much
nicer everything looks in England! One can have some tea or some beer,
instead of always that sour wine; and sausage-rolls and Bath buns!”
cried Nancy, looking at these appalling luxuries in the Dover
refreshment-room with unfeigned delight. It had been on Arthur’s lips to
cry out, “For heaven’s sake speak a little lower!” but he said to
himself, what was the use? One or two people turned round and smiled.
And she bought a Bath-bun notwithstanding her recent sufferings. It
seemed to Nancy better than all the delicate _plats_ in the world. It
was English, it was adapted to her native tastes and her usually fine
digestion. Arthur hurried her away with the objectionable dainty in a
little paper-bag in her hand.
“We must give in to prejudices a little,” he said. “You know most people
think there is nothing like French cookery.”
“I would not give a nice plain English dinner--mother will have one for
us to-morrow, I know--for all the little oddments they have in France,”
said Nancy.
When she was Nancy Bates she did not talk like this, nor eat Bath-buns
out of paper bags. The fact of being Mrs. Arthur Curtis, with a fine
gentleman, an unmistakeable “swell” for a husband, became again an
exhilarating consciousness, and turned Nancy’s head a little as soon as
she had got to England again; and how could she show her satisfaction so
well as by that demonstrative indulgence of personal tastes, and
ostentation of personal satisfaction which is the essence of vulgarity,
yet may be the mere froth of ignorance and light-hearted confidence? All
this was sufficiently trying to Arthur, especially when strangers heard
these patriotic outbursts, and showed by their smiles, as they passed,
their appreciation of her simplicity. But when they got to Underhayes
station, where Mrs. Bates, Matilda, and Sarah Jane stood on the platform
waiting, Arthur’s heart sank in his bosom. Why? If Nancy’s mother had
been a duchess, she could not have done anything different. But Mrs.
Bates, with her brown front, and the flowers in her bonnet, and Sarah
Jane in the latest fashion, were too much for poor Arthur. He busied
himself about the luggage, and wondered how it was, for all so many
times as he had seen them before, that he had never seen them until now?
And this was how he was to be surrounded for the rest of his life!
Visions of his mother and Lucy came gliding before him as he saw Nancy’s
boxes, so much larger and heavier now than when they went away, lifted
out--his own people! with their light steps, their soft voices, the
tender delight in their eyes. Mrs. Bates was probably as fond of her
child as Lady Curtis was of Arthur; that she should show that fondness
so differently was not her fault, but that of Providence which had
settled her lot in life. He tried to say to himself that this was so,
but it was hard. On the whole, the best thing was to look after the
boxes until those welcomes and embraces were over, which all the town
seemed to have come out to see. Some of Mr. Eagles’ “men” were among the
passengers by the train. Arthur shrank among the luggage altogether to
escape from their eyes.
“Where is Arthur?” said Mrs. Bates. “I hope Arthur knows that you’re not
going to be allowed to go off to an inn the first day you come back. To
be sure, it’s tea, not dinner, as I suppose you’ve been accustomed to;
but tea, with a nice roast chicken and sausages, which is as good as a
dinner every day; and it’s all ready and waiting. Arthur! How long he is
about the boxes to be sure. Shall we leave him to send them down to the
‘Dragon,’ and you come along, my Nancy, with me?”
“Arthur! Arthur!” cried Sarah Jane at the top of her voice, rushing
towards him, “mother’s gone on with Nancy, and I’m to wait for you. You
needn’t be so particular about the boxes, the porter will take them safe
enough. And come along, do come along! Nancy’s gone on before with
mother, and I’m quite hungry for my tea.”
One of the “men” at Mr. Eagles’ turned round, hearing every word of this
speech, and grinned, Arthur thought, in derision.
“Don’t wait for me,” he said, faintly. “Go on, please, and I will
follow. There are a great many things to be looked after, and I must see
what sort of rooms they have given us. Go on, and never mind me.”
“Oh, if you’re too fine to walk down Underhayes with your own
sister-in-law!” cried Sarah Jane; and to Arthur’s great relief she took
offence, and rushed after her mother and sisters, calling this time,
“Nancy! Nancy! stop a bit, I’m coming.”
The “man” lingered till she was gone, perhaps with a little pity for the
bridegroom. He was a happy boy of twenty, working his eyes out for the
Indian Civil examination, who had always been accustomed to think that
his was rather a hard case, and that Curtis was a great “swell.”
“How d’ye do, Curtis? Can I look after these things for you?” he said,
coming up shyly. Arthur made haste to clear every sign of cloudy weather
from his downcast face.
“It is a bother looking after them,” he said; “my first try, you
know--and one loses one’s temper. Still grinding hard, I suppose?”
“Harder and harder! Eagles gets more mad every day. What lucky fellows
some people are!” said the young man with a little sigh, as he nodded
and turned away.
Arthur felt himself echo the sigh. Was it he that was the lucky fellow?
He had thought so too when he left Underhayes, carrying with him the
bride for whom he had felt willing to relinquish all the world. This is
an easy thing enough to say. To relinquish all the world, and carry
one’s Nancy off into some flowery Eden where nobody could intermeddle
with one’s bliss--ah, yes; but the Bates family! They, it was evident
would not permit themselves to be relinquished like all the world.
Arthur walked at his leisure, glad to defer the moment of reunion, down
to the inn, and saw his rooms and deposited his luggage. Perhaps Nancy
had a right to be angry when at last he followed her. They had waited
till the chicken and sausages were nearly cold; but by this time they
were in the middle of their meal, Mr. Bates already in his slippers at
the foot of the table when Arthur arrived. The little parlour was hot
and close, full of mingled odours; they were all a little flushed, what
with the unusual warmth, what with the meal. Nancy herself had been
placed next to the fire, as the traveller to whom the best place was
necessarily given, and she was crimson with excitement, pleasure, anger,
and the stifling atmosphere all combined. The voices all ceased when
Arthur came in.
“I think you might have paid my mother the respect of coming directly,”
said Nancy in high tones.
“Oh, hush, dear, hush! I am sure Arthur didn’t mean any rudeness,” said
Mrs. Bates.
But there was an interval of silence, marking general disapproval, and
they all turned to look at him as at a culprit. He sat down in the
vacant place much against his will, amid unfriendly or indignant looks.
Even to the Bates’ family he was no longer welcome as an angel from
Heaven.
“I am sorry everything is cold,” said Mrs. Bates; “we waited as long as
we could. But Nancy wanted her tea very badly after her journey. Here is
a leg of chicken I saved for you.”
“I am not hungry,” said Arthur, feeling his new alienation and
separation amid all the silent party. “I will take a cup of tea,
please. I had the boxes to look after.”
“You might have left the boxes to take care of themselves,” said his
wife; “you are not always so careful. You might have come with me when I
first came home after being married. And all the people about staring;
but you don’t mind. It used to be different when we were here before;
but I ain’t of so much consequence now,” cried Nancy. “Wives are
different from sweethearts; I see that all now.”
Arthur felt a sensation of chill despair come over him in the midst of
this domestic heat. He restrained himself by a strange effort and would
say nothing; and, indeed, he did not feel the impulse of passion to
speak. A dreary despondency took possession of him. How often he had sat
there on the sofa in the corner, and felt himself happy! What was it
that made the change? for Nancy had shown “tempers,” fits of caprice,
uncertainty of mood before their marriage. But it had not affected him
as it did now. Succour came to him, however, in an unexpected way.
“I don’t approve of nagging at a man, whatever he’s done,” said Mr.
Bates. “If you’ve had any tiffs honeymooning, you should have the sense
to stop ’em now. If you like to quarrel in your own place, I’ll not
interfere, I haven’t got the right; but don’t do it here. Your father’s
house is no more than a friend’s house so far as that goes. It ain’t
your place, Nancy, to expose your husband here.”
“I hope I know what’s my place, as well as you or anyone,” said Nancy,
growing red, and accepting the challenge. She had never been fond of
restraint, and she liked it now less than ever. She gave her head a toss
of defiance, entrenched as she was behind the walls of support and
shelter which her mother and sisters gave, who unconditionally took her
side. She flashed defiance at the other end of the table, where Arthur
sat with a flush of shame on his face, and poor Mr. Bates in his
crumpled white tie for his sole partisan.
“I think Mr. Bates is right,” said Arthur, “and that it would be better
to postpone this question till we are alone.”
“And I hope you found Paris pleasant, Sir,” said the well-intentioned
father. “I have often heard that it was a very fine city. It must have
been a great advantage for Nancy, seeing it with one that knew it well.
In my young days going to France was more of a business than going to
America is now. Me and Mrs. Bates never had the benefit of foreign
travel; but there are a many things you young people enjoy now that your
fathers and your mothers didn’t have.”
“You may speak for yourself, Mr. Bates,” said his wife. “I cannot say
that I ever had any desire to go to foreign parts. There is plenty to
learn in England if one would make a good use of what one knows; and
Nancy, poor child, don’t seem to have enjoyed it. Look how thin she is,
and so pale. She quite frightened me when I saw her first. ‘Is that my
blooming Nancy?’ I said to myself--not meaning to throw any reflection
upon Arthur. What does man know of such things? She’s been doing too
much. I feel sure that’s what it is, rattling about here and there and
everywhere, and engagements in the evening--”
“We didn’t have many engagements in the evening,” said Nancy. “We used
to go to the theatres at first; but we soon got tired. The acting was so
bad, not like English acting; and such queer French, not a bit like
anything I ever learnt. For one thing, they talk so fast. But I could
not understand a bit, and what was the good of going to a play and not
understanding a word? And we never saw anybody, except an aunt of
Arthur’s, a person--but I won’t speak of her, for she was rude to
me--and Sir John Denham, who used to come and sit of an evening, and who
brought us tickets for places. It was very kind of him; and there was a
lot of places to see, and a whole lot of old pictures and things that
Arthur thought I was to go crazy over; but I never did. One place was
where some prison was knocked down (I never remembered the names) and,
another was where the Queen had her head cut off.”
“Oh, la!” cried Sarah Jane.
“Yes, that was a pleasant thing to be interested in, wasn’t it? Oh, the
lots and lots of people that had their heads cut off, if you could put
any faith in it! As if that was what one wanted to see! I never believed
one quarter of what they said.”
“And quite right,” said her mother; “they do make up stories; but didn’t
you go to see something a little livelier, Nancy? I thought there was
everything that was gay in Paris. But if that was all, my poor child, I
don’t wonder if you felt low, away from everybody you knew. But things
will be quite different now,” she said, encouragingly. “You will settle
down, you and Arthur, in a nice snug little English ’ome. There is no
place like ’ome, as the song says. And you’ll fall into each other’s
ways; and you’ll have us close at hand if anything’s wrong. Oh, you’ll
see everything will go as smooth as velvet! and me, or Sarah Jane, or
Matty always to help you to put things straight.”
At this prospect Nancy brightened up, and the conversation went on in a
livelier strain. But Nancy’s brows lowered when Arthur, feeling it all
grow more and more intolerable, got up just before the rum-and-water
stage, under pretence of business.
“I have some letters which I must write,” he said. Nancy’s countenance
grew dark again, and Mr. Bates lamented audibly.
“I thought you’d have joined me and been comfortable, now you’re a
married man and got your courting over,” said the tax-collector. Poor
Arthur! was this expected of him, that he should share the rum-and-water
too? He scarcely knew how he managed to get away at last, promising to
return for his wife when his letters were written. But he had in reality
no letters to write. He walked about through the darkness very sadly,
wondering what he was to do. It was weak perhaps to have yielded to her,
to have suffered her to lead him back here; it was all intolerable, the
house, the family, the talk. They had been well enough once, how did it
happen that they were beyond all patience now?