She did her shopping in her unhurried, careful way, and went on to the
outfitter who made John's corduroy trousers. Clothes that looked as if
they were made of cardboard hung outside the shop; unyielding coats,
waistcoats and trousers seemed to be glued against the door: stockings,
suspended by their gaudy tops, flaunted stiff toes in the breeze, and
piles of more manageable garments were massed on chairs inside, and
Helen was aghast at the presence of so many semblances of man.
It was dark in the shop, and the smell of fustian absorbed the air. The
owner, who wore an intricately-patterned tie, stood on the pavement and
talked to a friend, while a youth, pale through living in obscurity,
lured Helen in.
She gave her order: two pairs of corduroy trousers to be made for Mr.
Caniper of Brent Farm, to the same measurements as before: she wished to
see the stuff.
"If you'll take a seat, miss--"
She would rather stand outside the door, she said, and he agreed that
the day was warm.
The narrow street was thronged with people who were neither of the town
nor of the country, and suffered the disabilities of the hybrid. There
were few keen or beautiful faces, and if there were fine bodies they
were hidden under clumsy clothes. Helen wanted to strip them all, and
straighten them, and force them into health and comeliness, and though
she would not have her moor peopled by them, she wished they might all
have moors of their own.
The young man was very slow. She could hear him struggling with bales of
cloth and breathing heavily. It was much hotter here than on the moor,
and she supposed that human beings could grow accustomed to any smell,
but she stepped further towards the kerbstone and drew in what air the
street could spare to her.
Quite unconscious of her fairness against the dingy background, she
watched the moving people and heard the talk of the two men near her.
They spoke of the hay crop, the price of bacon, the mismanagement of the
gas company, and the words fell among the footsteps of the passers-by,
and the noise of wheels, and became one dull confusion of sound to her;
but all sounds fainted and most sights grew misty when she saw Zebedee
walking on the other side of the street, looking down as he went, but
bending an ear to the girl beside him.
Men and women flitted like shadows between him and Helen, but she saw
plainly enough. Zebedee was interested: he nodded twice, looked at the
girl and laughed, while she walked sideways in her eagerness. She was
young and pretty: no one, Helen thought, had ever married her.
The noise of the street rushed on her again, and she heard the shopman
say, "That's a case, I think. I've seen that couple about before. Time
he was married, too."
Slowly Helen turned a head, which felt stiff and swollen, to look at the
person who could say so. She restrained a desire to hold it, and,
stepping to the threshold of the shop, she called into the depths that
she would soon return.
Without any attempt at secrecy she followed that pair absorbed in one
another. She went because there was no choice, she was impelled by her
necessity to know and unhindered by any scruples, and when she had seen
the two pass down the quiet road leading to his house, with his hand on
her elbow and her face turned to his, Helen went back to the young man
and the bales of cloth.
She chose the corduroy and left the shop, and it was not long before she
found herself outside the town, but she could remember nothing of her
passage. She came to a standstill where the moor road stretched before
her, and there she suffered realization to fall on her with the weight
of many waters. She cried out under the shock, and, turning, she ran
without stopping until she came to Zebedee's door.
An astonished maid tried not to stare at this flushed and elegant lady.
"The doctor is engaged, miss," she said.
"I shall wait. Please tell him that I must see him."
"What name shall I say?"
"Miss Caniper. Miss Helen Caniper." She had no memory of any other.
She sat on one of the hard leather chairs and looked at a fern that died
reluctantly in the middle of the table. Her eyes burned and would not be
eased by tears, her heart leapt erratically in her breast, yet the one
grievance of which she was exactly conscious was that Zebedee had a new
servant and had not told her. If she had to have her tinker, surely
Zebedee might have kept Eliza. She was invaded by a cruel feeling of his
injustice; but her thoughts grew vague as she sat there, and her dry
lips parted and closed, as though they tried to frame words and could
not. For what seemed a long, long time, she could hear the sound of
voices through the wall: then the study door was opened, a girl laughed,
Zebedee spoke; another door was opened, there were steps on the path and
the gate clicked. She sat motionless, still staring at the fern, but
when Zebedee entered she looked up at him and spoke.
"Zebedee," she said miserably.
"Come into my room," he said.
The door was shut on them, and she dropped against it.
"Zebedee, I can't bear it."
"My little life!"
"I was so happy," she said piteously, "and, in the street, I saw you
with that girl. You held her arm, and I had to come to you. I had,
Zebedee."
"Had you, dear?" he said. He was pulling off her gloves, gently and
quickly, holding each wrist in turn, and together they looked at the
broad band of gold. Their eyes met in a pain beyond the reach of words.
She bowed her head, but not in shame.
"My hat, too," she said, and he found the pins and took it from her.
"Your ring is here," she said, and touched herself. Her lips trembled.
"I can't go back."
"You need not, dearest one. Sit down. I must go and speak to Mary."
"She is better than Eliza," Helen said when he returned.
"Yes, better than Eliza." He spoke soothingly. "Are you comfortable
there? Tell me about it, dear." He folded his arms and leaned against
his desk, and as he watched her he saw the look of strain pass from her
face.
She smiled at him. "Your cheeks are twitching."
"Are they?"
"They always do when you think hard."
"You are sitting where you sat when you first came here."
"And there were no cakes."
"Only buns."
"And they were stale."
"You said you liked them."
"I liked--everything--that day."
"I think," he said, jerking his chin upwards, "we won't have any
reminiscences."
"Why not?" she asked softly. She went to him and put her arms round his
neck. "It's no good, Zebedee. I've tried. I really loved him--but it's
you--I belong to you." He could hardly hear what she said. "Can you love
me any longer? I've been--his. I've liked it. I was ready to do
anything--like that--for him."
"Speak a little louder, dear."
"You see, one could forget. And I did think about children, Zebedee, I
couldn't help it."
"Precious, of course you couldn't."
"But you were always mine. And when I saw you this afternoon, there was
no one else. And no one else can have you. You don't love any one but
me. How could you? She can't have you. I want you. And you're mine. Your
hands--and eyes--and face--this cheek--You--you--I can't--I don't know
what I'm saying. I can't go back! He'll--he put this ring on me today. I
let him. I was glad--somehow. Glad!" She broke away from him and burst
into a fit of weeping.
He knew the properties of her tears, and he had no hope of any gain but
what could come to him by way of her renewed serenity; he made shift to
be content with that, and though the sound of her crying hurt him
violently, he smiled at her insistence on possessing him. She had
married another man, but she would not resign her rights to the one she
had deserted, though he, poor soul, must claim none. It was one of the
inconsistencies he loved in her, and he was still smiling when she
raised her head from the arm of the chair where she had laid it.
"I'm sorry, Zebedee. I'm better now. I'm--all right."
"Wipe your eyes, Best of all. We're going to have some tea. Can you look
like some one with a--with a nervous breakdown?"
"Quite easily. Isn't that just what I have had?"
Mary was defter than Eliza and apparently less curious, and while she
came and went they talked, like the outfitter and his friend, about the
crops; but when she had gone Zebedee moved the table to the side of
Helen's chair, so that, as long ago, no part of her should be concealed.
"Yes," he said, looking down, "but I like you better in your grey
frocks."
"Do you? Do you? I'm glad," she said, but she did not tell him why. Her
eyes were shining, and he found her no less beautiful for their reddened
rims. "You are the most wonderful person in the world," she said. "It
was unkind of me to come, wasn't it?"
"No, dear. Nothing is unkind when you do it."
"But it was, Zebedee. Because I'm going back, after all."
"I knew you would."
"Did you? I must, you know."
"Yes," he said, "I know. Helen, that girl--Daniel's in love with her."
"Oh, poor Miriam! Another renegade! But I'm not jealous any more, so
don't explain."
"But I want to tell you about her. He pursues and she wearies of him.
I'm afraid he's a dreadful bore."
"But that's no reason why you should take her arm."
"Did I take it? I like her. I wish she would marry Daniel, but he is
instructive in his love-making. He has no perceptions. I'm doing my best
for him, but he won't take my advice. Yes, I like her, but I shall never
love any one but you."
"Oh, no, you couldn't really. But see what I have had to do!" Her eyes
were tired with crying. "And have to do," she added in a lower tone. "It
makes one think anything might happen. One loses faith. But now, here
with you, I could laugh at having doubted. Yes, I can laugh at that, and
more. That's the best of crying. It makes one laugh afterwards and see
clearly. I can be amused at my struggles now and see how small they
were."
"But what of mine?" he asked.
"I meant yours, too. We are not separate. No. Even now that I--that I
have a little love for George. He's rather like a baby, Zebedee. And he
doesn't come between. Be sure of that; always, always!"
"Dearest, Loveliest, if you will stay with me--Well, I'm here when you
need me, and you know that."
"Yes." She looked beyond him. "Coming here, this afternoon, I saw the
way. I made it beautiful. And then I saw you, and the mists came down
and I saw nothing else. But now I see everything by the light of you."
There was a pause. "I've never loved you more," she said. "And I want to
tell you something." She spoke on a rising note. "To me you are
everything that is good and true--and kind and loving. There is no limit
to your goodness. You never scold me, you don't complain, you still wait
in case I need you. I ought not to allow you to do that, but some day,
some day, perhaps I'll be as good as you are. I want you to remember
that you have been perfect to me." She said the word again and lingered
on it. "Perfect. If I have a son, I hope he'll be like you. I'll try to
make him."
"Helen--"
"Wait a minute. I want to say some more. I'm not going back because I am
afraid of breaking rules. I don't know anything about them, but I know
about myself, and I'm going back because, for me, it's the only thing to
do; and you see," she looked imploringly at him, "George needs me now
more than he did before. He trusts to me."
"It is for you to choose, Beloved."
"Yes," she said. "There's nothing splendid about me. I'm just--tame. I
wish I were different, Zebedee."
"Then you are the only one who wishes it."
She laughed a little and stood close to him.
"Bless me before I go, for now I have to learn it all again."