THE KNOT IS CUT.
A storm broke over Hanwitch that night, and left behind it a strong
wind which swept up great masses of clouds; and the morning sunshine
streamed and darkened in quick alternations, and made the air lively
with the movement of shadow.
Holdsworth, deeply disturbed by conflicting anxieties, had slept but
little; and at eight o’clock left his bed and started for a walk before
breakfast, hoping that the breeze which thundered about the house would
freshen and inspirit him.
Gaining the High Street, he turned to the left and walked along a
narrow pathway that took him through the fields to Maldon Heights, as
the hill that overlooked Hanwitch was called. He climbed the grassy
slope and stood awhile on the summit, drinking in the hooting wind and
watching the fluctuating scene that ran from his feet to the horizon.
The oats and barley in many fields were not yet cut; and it was a sight
to see them breaking into wide spaces of delicate gold under the sun,
and growing gray again as the cloud-shadows sailed over them. When the
sunshine lingered awhile, these fields seemed to reflect the shadows
which had passed, for the wind rushed like a dark arm along them,
and pressed the graceful grain into the likeness of a wave, which
swept forwards with swiftness, making the fields dark where it ran.
The farther trees appeared to hold steady under the breeze; but there
were nearer trees which swayed their branches in wild gesticulations
of entreaty, and flogged the wind as it roared among them, bearing
away trophies of green leaves and broken twigs. The birds breasted the
gale with short flights, or turned and yielded to the invisible power
with small cries. Every object the eye rested on appeared in motion,
so lively was the effect of the cloud shadows upon the houses and the
weight of the wind upon the surrounding country.
It was a morning to clear the most hypochondriacal mind of despondency,
and Holdsworth felt its cheerful influence as he stood exposed to the
swinging rush of warm air, and watched nature dancing to the tunes sung
by the wind as it swept through the sky.
He had made up his mind to call at the brewery that morning, and he
took a look at it as he passed the street in which it stood on his
way home. The gaol-like building, with the steam about its windows
resembling rich London fog, which refused either to stop in or go
away, was scarcely calculated to improve his hopes. Big beef-faced men
in aprons rolled huge casks out of a courtyard into a cellar filled
with sawdust, damp, and gloom; the throb of the engine could be heard
distinctly, and the wind that blew out of the street came in agitated,
disordered puffs, as though the smell of the beer had made it rather
drunk.
Holdsworth shook his head as he passed on. It struck him that there
would be little chance of his getting employment in that steaming,
panting, perspiring quarter; and that he would be acting more wisely
if, instead of challenging rudeness by personal inquiries at places
where nobody wanted him, he spent a few shillings in advertising for a
situation.
Determining to do this, he made what haste he could back to his
lodgings, meaning there and then to manufacture an advertisement.
He entered his sitting-room, rang the bell to let Mrs. Parrot know he
had returned, and sat himself down to consider the terms in which he
should make his wants known.
“What would you like for breakfast, sir?” said Mrs. Parrot, opening the
door.
“Oh, anything you please. A new-laid egg if you can find me one.”
“Yes, sir. I took four beauties out just now. Have you heard the news,
sir?”
“No. What news?”
“Well, sir, it’s what I allus thought must happen; and day after day
I’ve bin expectin’ it, as mother’ll bear me out. They’ve got the
brokers in at the Conways.”
“The brokers!” exclaimed Holdsworth, turning round in his chair quickly.
“Yes, sir. Their gal told the milkman just now, as giv’ me the news.
And what’s wuss--leastways some might call it wuss, though I should
consider it a good job myself if I was his wife--Mr. Conway hasn’t been
home all night!”
“The villain!” exclaimed Holdsworth through his teeth. And then he
jumped up and began to pace the room excitedly.
“Stop!” he cried, observing that Mrs. Parrot was about to withdraw.
“Are you sure this news is true?”
“Oh, I’ve no doubt of it, sir. When the milkman told me, I was jest
goin’ to run across and see the poor lady, and then I says to myself,
‘What use can I be to her?’”
“I may be of some use, though,” interrupted Holdsworth. “Never mind
about my breakfast just yet. When did the man enter the house to take
possession?”
“Last night, sir, the gal told the milkman.”
“Great heaven! And has she been alone all night?” He stopped short,
seized his hat, and, brushing past Mrs. Parrot, went quickly out of the
house.
Mrs. Parrot watched him from the porch, lost in amazement.
He pushed open the gate, marched up to the door, and knocked loudly.
His mood was one of deep excitement. The sense of the crushing misery
that had fallen upon Dolly had given a poignancy to feeling that set
all self-control at defiance.
The door was opened by the servant, and out with her came a smell of
strong tobacco smoke.
“Is Mr. Conway in?”
“No, sir, he ain’t,” answered the girl, looking behind her and then at
Holdsworth, with a scared face.
“Where’s your mistress?”
“In the parlour, sir.”
“I should like to see her.”
“She’s not wisible. She’s in grief, and ain’t to be seen.”
“Go and tell her that Mr. Hampden has called and would like to say a
word to her.”
“I don’t think----”
“Do what I tell you!” exclaimed Holdsworth.
The girl slouched backwards and pushed her head into the parlour-door.
“She ain’t here. She’s gone upstairs,” said she, and upstairs she went,
slapping the staircase with her shoes as she went.
An individual with a round red face, a white hat, a spotted shawl, a
coat nearly to his ankles, a long waistcoat, and a black clay pipe
in his mouth, lounged elegantly out of the room which Mr. Conway had
called his “Surgery” at the end of the passage, and leaning collectedly
against the door, nodded familiarly to Holdsworth, took his pipe from
his mouth, expectorated, and said “Morning.”
“Good morning. Are you the man in possession?” replied Holdsworth.
The individual nodded and replaced his pipe.
“When did you come?”
“Last night,” answered the man in a thick voice. “And a werry queer
look-out it is. Blowed if they’ve got any butter in this house!”
“What is the amount of the debt?”
“Twenty-three pun four and sevenpence,” said the man, removing his pipe
to expectorate again. “Are you a creditor?”
“No,” answered Holdsworth, listening for Dolly’s footsteps.
“Then if you vent on your bended knees for gratitood you vouldn’t be
overdoin’ it,” said the man, giving Holdsworth a sagacious nod. “There
ain’t above ten pound in the house, and not that. Cast yer eye into
that parler. The best of the goods is there, and if you can make three
pound out of ’em, I’ll swaller my pipe.”
And then an idea smiting him:
“You ain’t come to have a tooth drawed, have yer?”
“No.”
“Vot’s your opinion of tooth-drawin’?” inquired the man confidentially,
retiring and reappearing again, holding up a pair of forceps. “Ain’t it
rayther a queer go, don’t you think? I knew a barber as drawed teeth.
He never used nothing of this kind. Vot do you think he did? Bust me if
he doesn’t set you in a chair, fastens a bit o’ vire to the tooth as is
to come out, and ties t’other end of the vire to the leg of a table.
Ven all’s ready, ‘Mind yer eye’ he sings out, ups with a razor, rushes
at yer makin’ horrible mouths, up jumps you, avays you run, and leaves
your tooth behind yer!”
He gargled an asthmatical laugh, adding: “That’s vot I call a sensible
vay of drawin’ a tooth; no bits of cold iron shoved into yer mouth as
if yer tongue vas hair and vanted curling.”
“Please, sir, will you step into the parlour and sit down,” said the
girl, thrusting her head over the banisters and calling to Holdsworth.
“Missis’ll be with yer in a minute.”
He entered the wretched little parlour, while the “man in possession”
retreated to the surgery arm-chair, and sat severely contemplating some
unfinished teeth on the table in front of him.
In a few moments Holdsworth heard footsteps outside, and Dolly came in,
holding Nelly’s hand. She was terribly pale, with a look of terror and
exhaustion on her face painful to see. There was an unnatural sleepless
brilliancy in her eyes that heightened her worn, hopeless expression.
She had thrown an old shawl over her shoulders, and through the portion
of the fair skin of the neck that was exposed the veins showed dark.
The hand she gave to Holdsworth was like a stone.
He was so overcome by the sight of her misery, that for some moments
he could not speak. The child came up to him and rubbed her cheek
against his hand.
“This is kind, very kind of you, Mr. Hampden,” she exclaimed in a low,
faint voice, sinking upon the sofa and shivering as she hugged the
shawl about her shoulders.
“You are in great distress, I fear. I only heard the news just now. I
came over to you at once,” he answered tremulously, the fierce beating
of his heart sounding an echo through his voice.
“It is what I have been daily expecting for many months--for many
bitter, cruel months!” she exclaimed. “It has come at last. We are
homeless now. And my husband, who ought to be at my side, has left me.
He was away all day yesterday and last night. O God! what a night it
has been!” she moaned, rocking herself to and fro.
“Don’t say you are homeless,” he cried; “you have a friend. Let me be
your friend. Mrs. Parrot shall give you a home for the present ... if
you will accept it.”
She looked at him with stupefied eyes as one who doubts her senses,
then said: “We have no claim upon you. Oh! how noble-hearted! Nelly,
Nelly, come to me, come to me!”
The child ran to her mother, and, being frightened by the passionate
despair in her voice, hid her face in her lap and burst into tears. But
Dolly’s eyes remained dry--lost nothing of their wild brilliancy. She
dragged her child to her, and swayed to and fro with tearless sobs that
shook and convulsed her.
“I have deserved this,” she presently moaned. “I was faithless to the
truest love God ever blessed a woman with. Why was he taken from me?
My child was starving, and the sight of her wasted body drove me mad
with grief. I never loved Mr. Conway--he knew it ... He has left me!
Oh! he is a coward to leave me! What am I to do? I am a lonely woman--I
have this child to feed and clothe--I have not a relative to turn
to--and now we are homeless! O God! this is too much, too much!”
She hid her face in her child’s hair.
Nothing but the dread that the truth, at that moment, might kill her
to hear, prevented him, as he listened to her heart-broken words, from
kneeling to her and calling her wife. He watched her with a strange
steadfastness of gaze, and with a face more bloodless than hers. The
impulse to avow himself had recoiled and driven the blood to his heart;
a faintness overcame him, but he battled with the deadly weakness, and
the better to do so, rose and strode across the room and stood near his
wife and child, looking down upon them.
“I will help you to the utmost of my power,” he said, speaking slowly,
and with a difficulty that presently passed. “Whilst I live, neither
you nor your child will be friendless. Trust me, and make me happy by
knowing me to be your friend.”
She raised her feverishly-lighted eyes, and said in a quick, febrile
whisper: “You cannot take the burden of the three of us upon yourself.”
“No! I would not raise a finger to serve your husband now. He has
money, but he left you in want all day yesterday, and you have been
alone through the night... But I will befriend you and your child.
Whatever I can do shall be done. I am not rich--I would to God I were,
for your sake. Were I to pay this debt, I should only delay the loss
of your furniture for a few days; others would come, and I should not
have the money to deal with them.”
“What am I to do?” she wailed, clinging to her child.
“Mrs. Parrot’s house will be your home for the present. We must wait
until we get news of Mr. Conway.”
“Oh, Mr. Hampden, is he not cruel to have left me in this position!
No one knows but God what I have endured during the last year! When I
was battling with poverty alone I was happier and richer. My memories
were fresh and pure, my conscience was clear, but I sacrificed them for
Nelly’s sake, and now I am deserted and the most miserable woman in the
whole world!”
She broke into a long piteous cry, but no tears came into her eyes.
“Let me take you at once from this wretched home. Come!”
He went to the door and held it open. Dolly stared around her like a
sleeper suddenly aroused, and then rose with the child in her arms.
Holdsworth called to the servant and told her to fetch her mistress’s
hat. The “man in possession” lounged out of the back room and stared
with a dry smile.
“Goin’?” he asked.
Holdsworth did not answer him. The weight of the child was too great
for the half-fainting mother, who tottered as she stood. Holdsworth
took Nelly from her and placed her on the ground.
“You ain’t a goin’, missis, are yer?” said the servant, handing Dolly
the hat, and whimpering.
“Yes,” replied Holdsworth; “and if Mr. Conway should call, tell him
that his wife is at Mrs. Parrot’s.”
“Oh, mum, I don’t like to be left alone with that man!” cried the
servant, looking down the passage.
“Vy not?” said the man. “If you’re all goin’, who’s to cook my wittles,
I should like to know?”
“_I_’ll not stop!” exclaimed the girl. “I wouldn’t trust myself anear
him.”
“You’re free to stop or go, as you please,” said Holdsworth, giving her
some money.
“Then I ain’t to be paid out arter all?” exclaimed the man, striking a
match, and holding it flaming in one hand and his pipe in the other.
“Not by me,” answered Holdsworth, opening the hall-door.
He took Nelly’s hand and gave Dolly his arm. She drew a long quivering
sob as she passed through the garden; and then, seeing some inquisitive
faces staring over the wire-blinds in the opposite house, hung her head
and stepped out quickly.
Mrs. Parrot, hearing them come in, ran out of the kitchen, and stood
looking from one to the other of them in mute astonishment.
“Mrs. Conway will make a temporary home of your house, Mrs. Parrot,”
said Holdsworth. “You will kindly prepare a bed-room for her and Miss
Nelly, and place your drawing-room at her disposal.”
Dolly had sunk into a chair. He poured out some wine and held it to
her, but she waved it away, striving to suppress her sobs.
“Oh, ma’am, pray don’t take on so,” cried Mrs. Parrot, going up to her.
“Things’ll come right, ma’am. You’ll be heasy an’ comfortable here.”
Holdsworth knelt on a chair beside her, holding the wine. Oh, it was
hard that he could not take her to his heart and whisper the word that
would change all her anguish into joy. But if ever the barrier that was
raised between them had been felt, it was felt by him then. Her honour
now, more than ever it had been, was become peculiarly his care. The
sense of her being another’s, that his own claims were as naught in the
presence of her belief that she was Conway’s wife, was never before
so sharply felt. Her misery had given her in his eyes a sanctity that
made his yearning love sacrilegious. Humility conquered emotion, and
he crept away from her side, and stood looking at her from a distance,
holding Nelly’s hand.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Parrot’s fingers were busy with Dolly’s hat strings and
the shawl over her shoulders, and she murmured incessantly all manner
of kindly sentences, of which their extreme triteness as consolatory
axioms was greatly qualified by her motherly manner.
“There, my dear,” she exclaimed, laying the hat upon the table, “drink
a little wine: you’ll be better presently. Life’s full o’ troubles,
God knows! and there are husbands in this world as is enough to make a
woman forget her sect and strike ’em. But a friend, ma’am, is as good
as sunshine to a frost-bitten man, and I’m sure you’ve got a good and
kind one in Mr. Hampden.”
“It’s my husband’s desertion,” cried Dolly, “that I think of. I don’t
mind the loss of my home. But to think of _his_ deserting me and my
little one when he _could_ not know that I had a friend--when I married
him for Nelly’s sake, to get her bread. Yes, Mrs. Parrot, to save her
from starving. And to feel that I defied my conscience only to be
brought so low--_so_ low!”
“God forbid, my dear, that iver _I_ should set husband an’ wife agin’
each other,” replied Mrs. Parrot, glancing at Holdsworth, to see how
he might relish her remark; “but I _must_ say that, if Mr. Conway’s
left yer, it’s a good thing, an’ the last thing on this airth as would
trouble me if I was you. You’ve gone through a deal o’ sufferin’ for
him, an’ if he’s desairted you, you can’t come to worse harm nor was he
to have stood by his home like a man, which he niver was; and there’s
not one o’ your neighbours as don’t know that you’ve had more trouble
than any Christian woman i’ this world ought to have. And it may sound
a hard sayin’, but if he’s gone,” she exclaimed, looking defiantly at
Holdsworth, “I hope and pray it’s for good an’ all.”
It often happens in real life, as in books, that a closing remark will
take a weird appropriateness by the sudden confrontment of the fact
of which it is only the shadow. Mrs. Parrot had barely shut her mouth
when the passage echoed with the clattering of the knocker on the
house-door. Never was such a delirious knocking. Mrs. Parrot turned
pale, persuaded that Mr. Conway had come home drunk, and had reeled
across to her house to demand his wife and create a horrible “scene.”
Dolly raised her head, and it was plain that the same idea had occurred
to her, by the indescribable expression of mingled hate, fear, and
loathing that entered her face.
Mrs. Parrot giving her moral organisation a twist, ran out. Scarcely
had she opened the door when in burst Martha, the servant from over the
way.
“Oh, missis! oh, missis!” she screeched, “what do you think? Master’s
drowned! O Lord! Where’s Mrs. Conway? He’s dead an’ gone! Here’s the
gent as brought the noos. Oh, sir, please tell the missis here!”
She turned, and in her excitement caught hold of the sleeve of a little
stout man who stood behind, and literally dragged him forward.
“Let go, you fool! What are you a doing of? Are you Mrs. Conway?” he
asked of Mrs. Parrot, who stood staring with wide-open eyes, grasping
her dress as if she were only waiting to take a deep breath before
tearing herself in two.
“No, she ain’t! This ain’t Mrs. Conway!” cried the excited Martha.
“You told me she was here!” exclaimed the man.
“So she is; ain’t she, missis?”
“Great ’iven! what a clatterin’!” cried Mrs. Parrot, recovering her
tongue. “What is it you’ve got to say, sir?”
“Why, this,” answered the little man, who was evidently a very
irritable little man--“Mr. Conway’s body was found in the river this
morning at a quarter before seven, and he’s lying now in the Town Hall,
and I’ve come to give the news; and curse me if ever I’ll undertake
such a job again, if I am to be mauled about by such a fool as this
when I’m out of breath, and fit to drop with perspiration.”
“Mrs. Parrot! Mrs. Parrot!” called Holdsworth.
The half-distracted woman ran into the sitting-room, where the first
thing she saw was Dolly in a dead faint, lying upon the sofa, with
Holdsworth kneeling by her side.
“She overheard your voices!” he exclaimed, turning up a face as white
as death. “Pray God the shock may not kill her. Look to her, Mrs.
Parrot, I _must_ speak to the man outside.”
He jumped up and left the room, and found the little irritable man in
the act of walking away.
“I beg your pardon. One moment!” he cried, running out after him. “Pray
excuse my agitation--you have brought shocking news. Is it _indeed_
true?”
The little man turned and took in Holdsworth from head to foot, and
answered: “It is true, sir. I’ve seen the body myself. It’s in the Town
Hall. He’s been in the water all night, the doctor says.”
“All night?”
“He was found by a man named Williamson. They all knew who he was when
they saw him. He must have been drunk when he fell into the water, for
the path was wide enough for a horse and cart. Dr. Tanner asked me
to step round with the news as he heard I was coming this way. Good
morning.”
The little man nodded and walked away. Had Dolly been a rich man’s
wife, a sympathetic deputation, introduced by the churchwardens, might
have made a procession to her house to break the news gently, but how
can you expect sympathy for the wife of a man who dies owing everybody
money?
Holdsworth was stunned, and stood for some moments staring idly from
the porch. He then returned hastily to Dolly’s side.
“She’s comin’ to, sir,” said Mrs. Parrot, slapping the poor girl’s
hand, and expending what breath she had upon the cold white forehead.
“What awful noos, sir!... Conway dead! I can’t believe it. And drowned,
too! Oh, poor wretch!”
“Hush!” exclaimed Holdsworth.
Dolly had opened her eyes, and was staring blindly at him. He moistened
his handkerchief with water on the sideboard and pressed it to her
head. Nelly stood at the window gazing at her mother with a look of
wistful fear in her face. At the door was Martha’s countenance, seamed
with lines of perspiration, her mouth open, and her hair hanging like
a string of young carrots over her forehead.
* * * * *
“I feel very weak,” muttered Dolly, striving to sit upright, but
falling back.
“Something terrible has happened. Ah! Robert is dead!”
The memory rushed upon her like a spasm, and she spoke in a cry.
“Come, my dear, don’t try to speak yet,” said Mrs. Parrot.
“Where is Nelly?”
Holdsworth led the child to the sofa. The mother looked at her little
girl, opened her arms, and burst into tears.
“Thank God for that!” said Holdsworth, turning away. Watching her face
as her consciousness had dawned, he had felt that, if tears did not
relieve her, her heart would break.