HOW MEMORY CREPT BACK AND BACK, AND FENWICK KEPT HIS OWN COUNSEL.
ROSALIND NEED NEVER KNOW IT. OF A JOLLY BIG BLOB OF MELTED CANDLE,
AND SALLY'S HALF-BROTHER. OF FENWICK'S IMPROVED GOOD SPIRITS
That was a day of many little incidents, and a fine day into the
bargain. Perhaps the next day was helped to be a flat day by the
barometer, which had shown its usual untrustworthiness and gone down.
The wind's grievance--very perceptible to the leeward of keyholes and
window-cracks--may have been against this instability. It had been
looking forward to a day's rest, and here this meteorology must needs
be fussing. Neptune on the contrary was all the fresher for his
half-holiday, and was trotting out tiny white ponies all over his
fields, who played bo-peep with each other in and out of the valleys
of the plough-land. But they were grey valleys now, that yesterday
were smiling in the sun. And the sky was a mere self-coloured sky
(a modern expression, as unconvincing as most of its congeners), and
wanted to make everything else as grey as itself. Also there came
drifts of fine rain that wetted you through, and your umbrella wasn't
any good. So a great many of the visitors to St. Sennans thought they
would stop at home and get those letters written.
Sally wouldn't admit that the day was flat _per se_, but only that it
had become so owing to the departure of Lætitia and her husband. She
reviewed the latter a good deal, as one who had recently been well
under inspection and had stood the test. He was really a very nice
fellow, haberdasher or no, wasn't he, mother? To which Rosalind
replied that he was a very nice fellow indeed, only so quiet. If he
had had his violin with him, he would have been much more perceptible.
But she supposed it was best to travel with it as little as possible.
For it had been decided, all things considered, that the precious
Strad should be left locked up at home. "It's got an insurance policy
all to itself," said Sally, "for three hundred pounds." She was quite
awestruck by the three hundred golden sovereigns which these pounds
would have been if they had had an existence of their own off paper.
"_You_ ought to have an insurance policy all to yourself, Sarah," said
Fenwick. "Only I don't believe any office would accept you. Fancy your
swimming out like that yesterday! How far did you go?"
"Round the buoy and aback again. I say, Jeremiah, if ever I get
drowned, mind you rush to the bathing-machine and see if there's a
copy of 'Ally Sloper' or 'Tit-Bits'. Because there'd be fifty pounds
for each. Think of that!" Sally is delighted with these sums, too, to
the extent of quite losing sight of the sacrifice necessary for their
acquisition.
"Two whole fifties!" Fenwick says, adding after consideration: "I
think we had sooner keep our daughter, eh, Rosey?" And Rosalind
agreed. Only she really was a shocking madcap, the kitten!
Had some flavour of Fenwick's mental history got in the air, that
Sally, presumably with no direct information about its last chapter,
should say to him suddenly: "It _is_ such a puzzle to me, Jeremiah,
that you've never recollected the railway-carriage"? He was saved from
telling fibs in reply--for he _had_ recollected the railway-carriage,
and left it, as it were, for Mr. Harrisson--by Sally continuing: "When
you were Mr. Fenwick, and I wasn't at liberty to kiss you." She did
so to illustrate.
"I don't see how I could reasonably have resented your kissing me,
Sarah. And I'm Mr. Fenwick now."
"On the contrary, you're Jeremiah. But if you were he ever so, I'm
puzzled why Mr. Fenwick _now_ can't remember Mr. Fenwick _then_."
"He _can't_, Sarah dear. He can no more remember Mr. Fenwick
_then_ than if no such person had ever existed." It was a clever
equivocation, for though he had so far made nothing of the name on his
arm, he was quite clear he came back to England Harrisson. His gravity
and sadness as he said it may have been not so much duplicity as a
reflection from his turgid current of thought of the last two days.
It imposed on Sally, who decided in her own mind on changing the topic
as soon as she could do it without a jerk. Meanwhile, a stepping-stone
was available--extravagant treatment of the subject with a view to
help from laughter.
"I wonder what Mr. Fenwick _then_ would have thought if I had kissed
him in the railway-carriage."
"He'd have thought you must be Sally, only he hadn't noticed it.
_He_ wouldn't have made a rumpus on high moral grounds, I'm sure. But
I don't know about the old cock that talked about the terms of the
Company's charter...."
"Hullo!" Sally interrupts him blankly. He had better have let it
alone. But it wouldn't do to admit anything.
"What's 'hullo,' Sarah?"
"See how you're recollecting things! Jeremiah's recollecting the
railway-carriage, mother--the electrocution-carriage."
"Are you, darling?" Rosalind, coming behind his chair, puts her hands
round his neck. "What have you recollected?"
"I don't think I've recollected anything the kitten hasn't told me,"
says Fenwick dreamily. But Sally is positive she never told him
anything about the terms of the Company's charter.
Rosalind adheres to her policy of keeping Sally out of it as much as
possible. In this case a very small fib indeed serves the purpose:
"You must have told him, chick; or perhaps I repeated it. I remember
your telling _me_ about the elderly gentleman who was in a rage with
the Company." Sally looked doubtful, but gave up the point.
Nevertheless, Fenwick felt certain in his own heart that "the terms
of the Company's charter" was a bit of private recollection of his
own. And Rosalind had never heard of it before. But it was true she
had heard of the elderly gentleman. Near enough!
* * * * *
As to the crowd of memories that kept coming, some absolutely clear,
some mere phantoms, into the arena of Fenwick's still disordered mind,
they would have an interest, and a strong one, for this story if its
object were the examination of strange freaks of memory. But the only
point we are nearly concerned with is the rigid barrier drawn across
the backward pathway of his recollection at some period between ten
and fifteen years ago. Till this should be removed, and the dim image
of his forgotten marriage should acquire force and cohesion, he and
his wife were safe from the intrusion of their former selves on
the scene of their present happiness--safe possibly from a power of
interference it might exercise for ill--safe certainly from risk of a
revelation to Sally of her mother's history and her own parentage--but
safe at a heavy cost to the one of the three who alone now held the
key to their disclosure.
However vividly Fenwick had recalled the incidents of his arrival in
England, and however convinced he was that no part of them was mere
dream, they all belonged for him to that buried Harrisson whose
identity he shrank from taking on himself--_would_ have shrunk from,
at the cost that was to be paid for it, had the prize of its
inheritance been ten times as great. Still, one or two connecting
links had caught on either side, the chief one being Sally, who had
actually spoken with him whilst still Harrisson--although it must be
admitted she had not kissed him--and the one next in importance, the
cabman. The pawnbroker made a very bad third--in fact, scarcely
counted, owing to his own moroseness or reserve. But the cabman! Why,
Fenwick had it all now at his fingers' ends. He could recall the start
from New York, the wish to keep the secret of his gold-mining success
to himself on the ship, and his satisfaction when he found his name
printed with one _s_ in the list of cabin passengers. Then a pleasant
voyage on a summer Atlantic, and that nice young American couple whose
acquaintance he made before they passed Sandy Hook, every penny of
whose cash had been stolen on board, and how he had financed them,
careless of his own ready cash. And how then, not being sure if he
should go to London or to Manchester, he decided on the former, and
wired his New York banker to send him credit, prompt, at the bank he
named in London; and then Livermore's Rents, 1808, and the joy of the
cabman; and then the Twopenny Tube; and then Sally. He tried what he
could towards putting in order what followed, but could determine
nothing except that he stooped for the half-crown, and something
struck him a heavy blow. Thereupon he was immediately a person, or a
confusion, sitting alone in a cab, to whom a lady came whom he thought
he knew, and to this lady he wanted to say, "Is that you?" for no
reason he could now trace, but found he could scarcely articulate.
Recalling everything thus, to the full, he was able to supply links
in the story that we have found no place for so far. For instance,
the loss of a small valise on the boat that contained credentials that
would have made it quite unnecessary for him to cable to New York for
credit, and also an incident this reminded him of--that he had not
only parted with most of his cash to the young Americans, but had
given his purse to the lady to keep her share of it in, saying he had
a very good cash pocket, and would have plenty of time to buy another,
whereas _they_ were hurrying through to catch the tidal boat for
Calais. This accounted for that little new pocket-book without a card
in it that had given no information at all. He could remember having
made so free with his cards on the boat and in the train that he had
only one left when he got to Euston.
He found himself, as the hours passed, better and better able to dream
and speculate about the life he now chose to imagine was Harrisson's
property, not his; and the more so the more he felt the force of the
barrier drawn across the earlier part of it. Had the barrier remained
intact, he might ultimately have convinced himself, for all practical
purposes, that Harrisson's life was all dream. Yes, all a dream! The
cold and the gold of the Klondyke, the French Canadians at Ontario,
four years on a cattle-ranch in California, five of unsuccessful
attempts to practise at the American Bar--all, all a dream of another
man named Harrisson, dreamed by Algernon Fenwick, that big hairy man
at the wine-merchant's in Bishopsgate, who has a beautiful wife and a
daughter who swims like a fish. One of the many might-have-beens that
were not! But a decision against its reality demanded time, and his
revival of memory was only forty-eight hours old so far.
Of course, he would have liked, of all things, to make full
confession, and talk it all out--this quasi-dream--to Rosalind; but
he could not be sure how much he could safely bring to light, how much
would be best concealed. He could not run the _slightest_ risk when
the thing at stake was her peace of mind. No, no--Harrisson be hanged!
Him and his money, too.
So, though things kept coming to his recollection, he could hold his
peace, and did so. There was nothing to come--not likely to be--that
could unsay that revelation that he had been a married man, and did
not know of his wife's death; not even that he and she had been
divorced, which would have been nearly as bad. He knew the worst of
it, at any rate, and Rosalind need never know it if he kept it all
to himself, best and worst.
So that day passed, and there was nothing to note about it, unless
we mention that Sally was actually kept out of the Channel by
Neptune's little white ponies aforesaid, which spoiled the swimming
water--though, of course, it wasn't rough--backed by the fact that
these little sudden showers wetted you through, right through your
waterproof, before you knew where you were. Dr. Conrad came in as
usual in the evening, reporting that his mother was "rather better."
It was a discouraging habit she had, when she was not known to have
been any worse than usual. This good lady always caught Commiseration
napping, if ever that quality took forty winks. The doctor was very
silent this evening, imbibing Sally without comment. However, St.
Sennans was drawing to a close for all others. That was enough to
account for it, Sally thought. It was the last day but one, and poor
Prosy couldn't be expected to accept her own view--that the awful
jolliness of being back at Krakatoa Villa would even compensate--more
than compensate--for the pangs of parting with the Saint. Sally's
optimism was made of a stuff that would wash, or was all wool.
According to her own account, she had spent the whole day wondering
whether the battle between Tishy and her mother had come off. She
said so last thing of all to _her_ mother as she decanted the melted
paraffin of a bedroom candle whose wick, up to its neck therein, was
unable to find a scope for its genius, and yielded only a spectral
blue spark that went out directly if you carried it. Tilted over,
it would lick in the end--this was Sally's testimony; and if you
dropped the grease on the back of the soap-dish and thickened it up
to a good blob, it would come off click when it was cold, and not
make any mess at all.
"Yes, I've been wondering all day long," said she. "How I should enjoy
being there to see! How freezing and dignified the Dragon will be!
Mrs. Sales Wilson! Or perhaps she'll flare. (I wish this wick would;
and it's such disgraceful waste of good candle!)"
"I do think, kitten, you're unkind to the poor lady. Just think how
she must have dreamed about the splendid match her handsome daughter
was going to make! And, you know, it _is_ rather a come down...."
"Yes, of course it's a come down. But I don't pity the Dragon one bit.
She should have thought more of Tishy's happiness, and less of her
grandeur. (It's just beginning; the flame will go white directly.)"
"She'd got some one else in view then?" Rosalind was quickly
perceptive about it.
"Oh yes; don't you know? Sir Penderfield. (That'll do now, nicely;
there's the white flame!) Sir Oughtred Penderfield. He's a Bart.,
of course. But he's a horror, and they say his father was even worse.
Like father, like son! And the Dragon wanted Tishy to accept him."
At the name Rosalind shivered. The thought that followed it sent
a knife-cut to her heart. This man that Sally had spoken of so
unconsciously was _her brother_--at least, he was brother enough to
her by blood to make that thought a blade to penetrate the core of her
mother's soul. It was a case for her strength to show itself in--a
case for nettle-grasping with a vengeance. She would grasp this nettle
directly; but oh, for one moment--only one moment--just to be a little
less sick with the slice of the chill steel! just to quench the tremor
she knew would come with her voice if she tried now to say, "What was
the name? Tishy's _prétendu_'s, I mean; not his father's."
But she could take the whole of a moment, and another, for that
matter. So she left her words on her tongue's tip to say later, and
felt secure that Sally would not look up and see the dumb white face
she herself could see in the mirror she sat before. For, of course,
she saw Sally's reflection, too, its still thoughtful eyelids half
shrouded in a broken coil of black hair their owner's pearly teeth
are detaining an end of, to stop it falling in the paraffin she is
so intent on, as she watches it cooling on the soap-dish.
"I've made it such a jolly big blob it'll take ever so long to cool.
You can, you know, if you go gently. Only then the middle stops soft,
and if you get in a hurry it spoils the clicket." But it is hard
enough now to risk moving the hair over it, and Sally's voice was free
to speak as soon as her little white hand had swept the black coils
back beyond the round white throat. Mrs. Lobjoit's mirror has its
defects apart from some of the quicksilver having been scratched off;
but Rosalind can see the merpussy's image plain enough, and knows
perfectly well that before she looks up she will reap the harvest of
happiness she has been looking forward to. She will "clicket" off the
"blob" with her finger.
The moment of fruition comes, and a filbert thumbnail spuds the
hardened lozenge off the smooth glaze. "There!" says Sally, "didn't
I tell you? Just like ice.... What, mother?" For her mother's question
had been asked, very slightly varied, in a nettle-grasping sense. She
has had time to think.
"_What_ was Tishy's man's name--the other applicant? Christian name,
I mean; not his father's."
"Sir Oughtred Penderfield. Why?"
"I remember there was a small boy in India, twenty-two years ago,
named Penderfield. Is Oughtred his only name?" The nettle-grasping
there was in this! Rosalind felt consoled by her own strength.
"Can't say. He may have a dozen. Never seen him. Don't want to! But
his hair's as black as mine, Tishy says.... I say, mother, isn't it
deliciously smooth?" But this refers to the paraffin lozenge, not
to the hair.
"Yes, darling. Now I want to get to bed, if you've no objection."
"Certainly, mother darling; but say I'm right about the Dragon and
Sir Penderfield. Because I _am_, you know."
"Of course you are, chick. Only you never told me about him; now,
did you?"
"Because I was so honourable. It was a secret. Very well, good-night,
then.... Oh, you poor mother! how cold you are, and I've been keeping
you up! Good-night!"
And off went Sally, leaving her mother to reason with herself about
her own unreasonableness. After all, what was there in the fact that
the little chap she remembered, seven years old, at the Residency at
Khopal twenty odd years ago had grown up and inherited his father's
baronetcy? What was there in this to discompose and upset her, to make
her breath catch and her nerves thrill? A longing came on her that
Gerry should not look in to say good-night till she was in a position
to refuse interviewing on the score of impending sleep. She made a
dash for bed, and got the light out, out-generalling him by perhaps
a minute.
What could she expect? Not that little Tamerlane, as his father called
him, should die just to be out of her path. It was no fault of his
that he was his father's son, with--how could she doubt after what
Sally had just said?--the curse of his father's form of manhood or
beasthood upon him. And yet, might it not have been better that he
should have died, the innocent child she knew him, than live to follow
his father's footsteps? Better, best of all that the whole evil brood
should perish and be forgotten.... Stop!
For the thought she had framed caught her breath and held it, caught
her by the heart and checked its beating, caught her by the brain and
stopped its thinking; and she was glad when her husband's voice found
her, dumb and stunned in the silence, and brought a respite to the
unanswerable enigma she was face to face with.
"Hullo! light out already? Beg your pardon, darling. Good-night!"
"I wasn't asleep." So he came in and said good-night officially and
departed. His voice and his presence had staved off a nightmare idea
that was on the watch to seize on her--how if chance had brought Sally
across this unsuspected relation of hers, and events had forced a full
declaration of their kinship? Somnus jumped at the chance given by its
frustration; the sea air asserted itself, and went into partnership
with him, and Rosalind's mind was carried captive into dreamland.
But not before she had heard her husband stop singing to himself a
German student's song as he closed his door on himself for the night.
"War ich zum grossen Herrn geboren, wie Kaiser Maximilian...."
There could be no further unwelcome memories there, thank Heaven!
No mind oppressed by them could possibly sing "Kram-bam-bambuli,
krambam-bu-li!"