A LITTLE MISUNDERSTANDING.
It was years, literally, before I got over it. Indeed, I have never got
over it--never shall, while I have any power to remember things.
Death--we all know, more or less, what it means to the living whom it
has robbed. To lose a child--the mothers know, at any rate! It is no use
talking about it. Besides, there are no words to talk with that can
possibly explain.
I often hear the remark that my husband has the most patient temper in
the world, and I realise its truth when I think of that dreadful
time--how I must have wearied and discouraged him, and how he never once
reproached me for it, even by a glum look. He knew I could not help it.
For one thing, I was ill--physically ill, with the doctor coming to see
me. He ordered me tonics, stimulants, a complete change of scene, and so
on, but no doctor's prescriptions were any good for my complaint.
Winding a watch with a broken mainspring won't make it go. Tonics gave
me headaches--tonics accompanied by constant tears and
sleeplessness--and, hideous as the house was, with an empty place
staring at me from every point to which I could turn my eyes, I knew it
would be worse elsewhere. I clung to my own bed, my own privacy, my home
where I could do as I liked and shut out the foolish would-be
sympathisers and their futile condolences; and I could not bear to leave
the other children. Once you have lost a child, you never again feel any
confidence that the rest are safe; you seem to _know_ they are going to
die if they but catch a cold or scratch a finger, and that they will
have no chance at all if you let them out of your sight. Besides, there
were things to see to--the poultry, for instance, which was under my
charge--if only I could have seen to them! I tried, but sorrow made me
stupid; and when the incubator was found stone-cold, and again
overheated, and on one occasion burnt to ashes with dozens of poor
chicks inside, and when dozens more were drowned in a storm for want of
timely shelter--all fine, thriving birds, when, you couldn't get a
decent turkey in Melbourne for under a pound--I suppose it was my fault.
But Tom always said, "Never mind--don't you worry yourself, Polly," and
his first thought was to get me a glass of wine. He was like an old
nurse in the way he cosseted and coddled me. When I was more ill than
usual, he thought nothing of sitting up all night by my bedside, and
making little messes for me in the kitchen with his own hands. He never
even said, as I have heard men say at the first starting of tears--not
after they have been flowing, like mine, for weeks and weeks--"Why don't
you make an effort to control yourself? You know perfectly well that
crying only makes you worse and does nobody any good"--as if a poor
mother cried from choice and perversity and the pleasure of doing it,
when her heart was broken! He knew my heart was broken. He understood.
No one else understood. They all thought I could control myself if I
liked. Some of them said so, and told one another, I am sure, though I
did not hear them, that it was the calm and composed ones who felt the
most. That is the theory of books and cold-hearted people; I don't
believe in it for a moment. Whenever I see a woman bearing up, as they
call it, without showing ravages in some way or other, I know what
supports her--not more courage, but a harder nature than mine. A man is
different. Tom mourned for our little son with all his heart, though he
did not show it; and he did not show it because he is so unselfish. He
thought of me before himself, and would not add a straw to my burden.
Never was a tenderer husband in this world! I believe those women
thought him foolish and weak-minded to indulge me as he did, but that
was envy, naturally; they did not know, poor things, what it was to have
such a staff to lean on.
However, one day, when I was showing him how thin I had grown, taking up
handfuls of "slack" in a bodice that had been once tight for me, he
began to look--not impatient or aggrieved, but determined--as he used to
look on board ship when the law was in his own hands.
"Polly," he said, "this has gone on long enough. I'm not going to stand
by and see you die by inches before my eyes. Something must be done. I
shall take you to sea."
"To sea!" I exclaimed. "We can't leave the children. We can't leave the
farm. We can't afford----"
"I don't care," he broke in. "I'm not going to lose you, if I can help
it, for anybody or anything. You're just ready to fall into a rapid
decline, or to catch some fatal epidemic or other, and I can't have it,
Polly; it must be put a stop to before it is too late. The sea's the
thing. The sea's what you want. Come to that, it's what I want myself;
I've got quite flabby from being away from it so long. It would brace us
up, both of us, and nothing else will. You pack a few clothes, pet, and
I'll go into Melbourne and look up a nice boat. Don't you bother your
head about the farm or the children or anything--I'll see that they're
left all safe."
He was so firm about it that I had to give in. The sea, of course, was
not like any other change of air and change of scene--it did seem to
promise refreshment and renovation, peace even greater than that of my
home, where I still suffered from the mistaken kindness of neighbours
coming to expostulate with and to cheer me. Besides, when Tom said he
had got flabby for want of it, I noticed that he was not looking well.
There could be no doubt about the proposed trip being beneficial to
him--I must have urged him to take it for his own health's sake--and I
could not be left without him. So I mustered a little energy to begin
preparations while he went to town; for though I had begged for time to
think the matter over, he would not hear of delay. I never knew him so
resolute, even with a crew.
At night he brought back a brighter face than had been seen in our house
for many a long day. I was sitting up for him, and even I had stirrings
in my heavy heart of a reviving interest in life. All day I had been
thinking of our old voyage in the Racer--remembering the beautiful parts
of it, forgetting all the rest.
"Well, Polly," said he; "did you wonder what was keeping me so late? The
old man"--he meant the head of his old firm--"insisted on my dining with
him, and I couldn't well refuse. Talked about everything as frank and
free as if I'd been his brother--all the business of the old shop--and
said they'd give a hundred pounds to have me back again. By Jove, if it
wasn't for you and the children--no, no, I don't mean that; we're
happiest as we are--or will be when you are well and heartened up a bit.
What do you think, Polly? I'm to take the old Bendigo her next trip.
Watson hasn't had a spell for years, and there's a new baby at his
place; I saw Watson first--he put me up to it--but the old man was
ready to do anything I liked to ask him. 'Certainly,' says he; 'by all
means, and whenever you choose. And bring the missus, of course--only
too proud to have her company on any ship she fancies.' You know he
always thought a deal of you, Polly; I declare he was quite affectionate
in his inquiries after you--never thought he could be so kind and jolly.
I could have got free passages for both of us easy enough, but it's
pleasanter to work for them; and I don't think, somehow, that I could
feel at home in the old Bendigo anywhere but on the bridge."
"And I should not like to see you anywhere else," I said; "not if we
paid full fares twice over. And how nice not to have to pay, when the
farm is keeping us so short! How nice an arrangement altogether! I can
be upstairs with you--the old man would wish me to do whatever I
liked--and have more liberty than would be possible if another was in
command, and so can you. It's a charming plan! And the Bendigo,
too--our own old Bendigo! Oh, Tom, do you remember _that night!_"
It was some years since he had left the boat on board of which he had
been introduced to his eldest son; but whenever we recalled the time
that he was captain of her our first thoughts pictured the moonlit
bridge and the baby; at any rate mine did. And in my terribly deepened
sense of the significance of motherhood nothing could have suited me
better than to go back to the dear place where my mother-life began, for
it did not properly begin until Tom shared it with me. I would sooner
have chosen the Bendigo to have a trip in--if I had the choice--than the
finest yacht or liner going.
So we went to bed almost happy. And two days later, having been quite
brisk in the interval, safeguarding our home and children as completely
as it could be done, we walked down the familiar wharf, amongst the
bales and cases, to where the steamer lay, feeling exhilarated by the
thought of our coming holiday, as if old times were back again. It was
on the verge of winter now and an exquisite afternoon. Even the filthy
Yarra looked silky and shimmering in the mild sunlight, tinted rose and
mauve by the city smoke; and the vile smells were kept down by the clean
sharpness of the air, so that I did not notice them. We were to sail at
five, but went on board early so that Tom could gather the reins into
his hand and have all shipshape before passengers arrived.
How pleasant it was to see the way they welcomed him! Mr. Jones was
first officer now (and had babies of his own), and some of the old faces
were amongst the crew. The head steward was the same, and the head
engineer, and the black cook who made pastry so well; and they all
smiled from ear to ear at the sight of their old master, making it quite
evident to me that they had found poor Watson, as they would have found
any one else, an indifferent substitute for him. Above all, there was
the "old man," as he was irreverently styled--the important chief
owner--in person, down on purpose to receive me, with a bouquet for me
in his hand. Dear, kind old man! He was something like Captain Saunders
in his extreme admiration and respect for "pretty Mrs. Braye," as I was
told they called me, and nothing could have been friendlier than his few
words of sympathy for my trouble and his real anxiety to make me
comfortable on board. One might have imagined I was an owner myself by
the fuss they all made over me. It always gratified me--on Tom's
account--that I was never put on a level with the other captains' wives.
I had the deck cabin again, and we went there for afternoon tea. The
steward brought cakes and tarts and all sorts of unusual things, to do
honour to the special occasion; and I put my flowers in water, wearing a
few of them, and it was all very nice and cheerful. I felt better
already, although we had not stirred from the wharf, and although a New
Zealand boat close by us was turning in the stream, stirring up the dead
cats and things with her propeller, and making a stench so powerful that
it was like pepper to the nose.
Then, as five o'clock drew near, the "old man" went to look after
business about the ship, and Tom to put on his uniform. How splendid he
looked in it! Almost the only regret I had for his leaving the sea was
that he could no longer wear the clothes which so well became him. Talk
about the fascination of a red coat! I never could see anything in it.
But a sailor in his peaked cap and brass buttons is the finest figure in
the world.
I was just going to meet him and tell him how nice he looked, when one
of the lady passengers who had been coming on board, and whom I had been
manoeuvring to avoid, cut across my bows, so to speak, and rushed at him
like a whirlwind. I really thought the woman was going to throw her arms
round his neck.
"Oh, Captain Braye!" she exclaimed loudly, "how too, too charming to see
you here again. Have you come back to the Bendigo for good? Oh, how I
hope you have! Do you know, I was going to Sydney by the mail, and was
actually on my way to the P.&O. office, when somebody told me you were
taking Captain Watson's place. I said at once, 'Then no mail steamers
for me, thank you. No other captain for me if I can get Captain Braye.'
And so here I am. I managed to get packed up in a day and a half."
I could see that Tom looked quite confused. We had both hoped so much
that the people would all be strangers who would leave us alone, and he
guessed the annoyance I should feel at the threatened curtailment of our
independence by this forward person. But there was no need for him to
inveigle her out of earshot, and there stand and talk to her for ever so
long, as if there were secrets between them not for me to overhear. I
know what she wanted--I heard her ask for it--whether she could have the
deck cabin as before! A very few seconds should have sufficed to answer
_that_ question. She was a stylish person in her way, and her clothes
were good, and the servants paid court to her; I asked one of them who
she was, and he said the "lady" of a merchant of some standing in
Melbourne--just the class of passenger we were most anxious to be
without. When their confabulation was at an end Tom brought her to the
bench where I was sitting and introduced her to me.
"My wife, Mrs. Harris--Mrs. Harris, dear--who has sailed with me
before."
"Often," said Mrs. Harris, extending a bejewelled hand. "We are very old
friends, the captain and I."
"Indeed?" I said, bowing. He had never mentioned her name to me. But, as
he explained when I told him so, he couldn't be expected to remember the
names of the thousands of strangers he carried in the course of the
year. I reminded him that she considered herself not a stranger, but a
friend; and he said, with a laugh, "Oh, they all do that."
I confess I did not take to Mrs. Harris. I should not have liked any one
coming in our way as she did, when we wanted to be free and peaceful,
but she was particularly repugnant to me. She gushed too much; she
talked too familiarly of Tom--to me also, not discriminating between
one captain's wife and another; and she accosted the servants and
officers as they passed quite as if the ship belonged to her. However, I
stood it as long as she chose to sit there, making herself pleasant, as
she doubtless supposed. As soon as it occurred to her to go and look at
her cabin I seized my hood and cloak, and went to seek sanctuary on the
bridge with Tom. It was nearly six o'clock, and he was just casting off.
"Oh, Polly," he said, turning to me with a slightly worried air, "you
wouldn't mind staying on deck till we get down the river a bit, would
you, pet? It don't look professional, you know, for ladies to show up
here. And Mrs. Harris might----"
I interrupted him in what he was going to say, because anything to do
with Mrs. Harris had nothing whatever to do with the case.
"Passengers," said I, "are one thing--the captain's wife is
another--_quite_ another--and especially when the old man has asked me,
as a sort of favour to himself, to make myself at home, as he calls it.
Is he on the wharf, by the way? I should like to wave a hand to him. It
would please him awfully. Thank Heaven, we are not subject to Mrs.
Harris, nor to anybody else, on board this, ship. That's the beauty of
it."
"I feel in a sense subject to Watson," said Tom, "and he's a punctilious
sort of chap. I don't care to seem to make too free with his
command--for it's his, not mine. And there are heaps of people about
besides the old man. You really would oblige me very much, Polly----"
"Oh, of course, dear!"
I saw his point of view, and at once effaced myself. I went into the
little bridge house, just behind the wheel--he was satisfied with
that--where I could see him close to me through the bow window, and
speak to him when I chose. He lit the candle lamp at the head of the
bunk, so that I could lie there and read; but I did not want to read. I
preferred to stand by the window, which held all there was of table--the
top of drawers and lockers--on which I spread my arms, propping my face
in hollowed palms, and to look out upon the river with the sunset upon
it, and the fading daylight, and the starry lights ashore. To call that
city-skirting stream romantic is to provoke the derision of those who
know it best, but it _was_ romantic that night--to me. Anything can be
romantic under certain circumstances, in certain states of atmosphere
and mind.
We were alone together. The dinner-bell rang downstairs, but Tom never
left the bridge till he was out of the river, and I did not need to ask
him to let me share his meal. The steward brought us up a tray, and we
stood in the warm little cabin--the table was not made to sit at--and
ate roast chicken and apple pie, like travellers at a railway buffet,
Tom stepping out and back between hasty mouthfuls to see that all was
right. He was intensely business-like, and as happy as a boy at his old
work. We both had the young feeling that comes to holiday-makers who
don't have a holiday very often. I could not help it.
Then--when we steamed out between the river lights into the bay--how we
sniffed the first breath of the salt sea! And what memories it brought
to us!--to me, at least, who had been so long away from it. The
passengers were at dinner still, and it was falling dark, and there were
no spectators save the man at the wheel, who was nothing but a voice, an
echo of the quiet word of command, most pleasant to hear; I was free to
roam the bridge from end to end, hanging to my husband's supporting
arm--to bathe myself in air that was literally new life to both of us.
Cold and clean and briny to the lips--oh, what is there to equal it in
the way of medicine for soul and body? What sort of insensate creatures
can they be who do not love the sea?
Hobson's Bay was ruffled with a south wind--belted round with twinkling
lights that grew thicker and brighter every moment, a gleaming ring of
stars set in the otherwise invisible shores, in a dusk as soft as
velvet. Somewhere amongst them, doubtless, was the lighted window that
had once been mine, where I used to stand half a dozen lamps and candles
in a bunch, to show Tom that I was watching for him when he used to pass
out after nightfall. Our eyes turned in that direction simultaneously.
"When we are old folks, Polly," said he, with an arm round my shoulder,
"when the kids are all grown up and out in the world, and you and I
settle down alone again, as we did at the beginning, I should like us to
have a little place somewhere where we could see blue water and the
ships going by."
"Yes," I said at once, feeling exactly as he did--that though the farm
and our country home were well enough under present circumstances, they
would not be our choice when we had only ourselves to think of--that the
sea was the sea, in short, and had reclaimed our allegiance--"yes, that
is what we will do. We will end our married life where we began it--with
this beautiful sound in our ears!"
We had turned the breakwater at Williamstown, and were meeting the wind
and tide of the outer bay, which was a little ocean this fresh night.
The sharp bows of the Bendigo, and her threshing screw astern, made that
noise of racing waves and running foam which was thrilling me like music
and champagne together, so that I had no words to describe the
sensation. My hair was blown hard back from my forehead and out of the
control of hairpins; my face felt as if smacked by an open hand, and I
had to screw up my eyes and pinch my lips together to stand the blow; I
felt the keen blast pierce to my skin through all the invalid wrappings
that I was swathed in--and it was lovely! Tom thought I should catch
cold, but I knew better, though I was glad to be tied into his 'possum
rug, with an oilskin overall to take the flying spray; and I insisted on
staying out with him till nearly midnight--till we had passed the
furious Rip and were battling with the real swell of the real ocean,
which tossed the steamer like a cork without making me seasick. It was
squally and galey and dark as a wolf's mouth--neither moon nor
stars--only the lighthouse lights which were all we needed, and the
white streaks in the black sea which were the long rollers coming to
meet us. And I felt as safe as--there is nothing that can give a notion
of how safe I felt. My husband took care of me as he used to do on the
Racer, only fifty thousand times more carefully, because he was my
husband. Ah, how sweet it was! With all our sorrows, how happy we were!
And might have remained so if we had not been interfered with.
But that wretched woman spoiled it all. I had forgotten her altogether
during the evening, when dinner and darkness and the rough weather kept
her from us; I forgot her in the night, which I spent in my deck cabin
so as to leave Tom his bunk on the bridge for such snatches of sleep as
he had a mind for; the deck as well as the cabin was my own--his and
mine, for he still came down at intervals to look at me through the open
door and assure himself that I was all right--and the common herd were
under it. But when I emerged in the morning, just as the breakfast-bell
was ringing, the first thing I saw was Mrs. Harris coming down the
stairs which had "no admittance" plainly affixed to them, and Tom in
attendance on her as if she were the Queen. She descended backwards,
feeling each step with her glittering pointed shoe, slower than any
tortoise, and he guided her with one hand and held her skirts down with
the other, out of the wind. It was a windy morning, but sunshiny and
beautiful, and I had intended to enjoy my first meal in the air and in
privacy with my husband, as I had done the last.
I suppose I looked my surprise, for they both seemed to colour up when
they perceived me standing and watching them. In one breath they bade me
a loud good morning, and made unnecessary announcements about the
weather.
"You have been on the bridge?" I questioned, with my eyes fixed on the
brass plate which proclaimed the bridge sacred.
"Oh, yes," said Mrs. Harris gaily. "It's the nicest place I know to be
on, especially at this time of day. Many an early visit have I paid the
captain up there, haven't I, Captain?"
I lifted eyebrows at Tom, but he would not look.
"Got an appetite for breakfast, Polly?" he shouted, taking my arm. "Come
along, and let's see if you don't do your doctor credit."
"I am not going to the saloon," I returned quietly, disengaging myself;
"I am going to have my breakfast on the bridge with you."
"But I'm not going to breakfast there. I'm off duty, and we may as well
be comfortable when we can."
Then he congratulated us both on being such good sailors as to be able
to go to breakfast the first morning, and, not to make a fuss, I let him
take me down into the saloon, and seat me at the public table by his
side, _vis-à-vis_ with Mrs. Harris. He spoke to other passengers,
shaking hands with some, and introducing me to one or two. A rather
nice man talked to me throughout the meal, while Mrs. Harris monopolised
Tom entirely.
This was not what I had come to sea for, and so, as soon as I had
finished, I slipped away, ran up to the bridge, got out a little chair,
and prepared for a quiet morning with my husband, where no one had the
right to disturb us. In fact, I was fully resolved to defend that
bridge, if need were, against unauthorized intruders. Mrs. Harris might
have done what she liked with it and him in those old times that she was
for ever flinging in my face. She would not do it now.
Scarcely had I opened my workbag and threaded my needle when up she came
as bold as brass, with a yellow-back under her arm. It was too much. I
felt that, if I were to make any stand at all, it must be now or never,
or I should be altogether trodden under foot. So I looked at her with an
air of calm inquiry, and said, "Oh! Mrs. Harris--do you want anything?"
"No, thanks," she replied in an off-hand tone. "The steward is bringing
up my chair."
"Bringing it _up?--here?_"
"Certainly. Why not?"
"Only that--perhaps you don't know--nobody is allowed on the bridge. The
notice is stuck up against the stairs."
"Then why are you here?" she retorted, bristling.
"I am the captain's wife."
"I presume the captain's wife is as much a passenger as the rest of us,"
she argued, with an offensive laugh. "I presume the captain can do what
he likes with his own bridge, at any rate. If _he_ gives one the freedom
of the city, one certainly has it, beyond question; and I have always
been accustomed to sit here when travelling with him. Thank you,
steward--in this corner, please."
She took possession of her chair.
"If one person has the freedom of the city," I said, trying to keep my
voice from shaking, "all should have it. He has no business to make
distinctions where all are equal."
"All are not equal," she cried, reddening. And I remembered that she was
a considerable person in her own eyes. But I said firmly, "Pardon me.
All who pay the same fares are on the same footing--or should be. And
there is not room here for everybody."
"The captain," said she, "can entertain his friends as he chooses, and I
am one of his oldest friends, besides being related to his owners. And
as for his having no business to do this or that--oh, my dear Mrs.
Braye, do allow the poor man to know his own business best--I assure you
he knows it perfectly, nobody better--and let him be master, at any
rate, on his ship, whatever he may be in his home."
She laughed again, as she settled herself and opened her book. I was
simply speechless with indignation. But, even had I been able to speak,
I was not one to bandy words with that sort of person. I just rolled up
my work, quietly rose, and went downstairs to my cabin on deck.
"Why do you go away?" she asked, as I passed her. "Isn't the bridge big
enough for us both?"
"No," I replied. And that was my last word to her.
Going down the stairs, I met Tom coming up. He said, "Hullo, Polly,
where are you off to?" I looked at him steadily--that's all. And his
face clouded over. He passed on, leaving me alone.
But they were not long together. Five minutes later I heard her voice
suddenly through the open port of my cabin--that horrible deck cabin,
where I was surrounded and pressed upon by talking, boot-clumping
passengers, who just could not spy in upon me because I had door shut
and window curtain down. Doubtless she did it on purpose. She must have
known where I was, seeing that I was not on the bridge or sitting out on
deck. She was speaking to some man of her acquaintance.
"It is always a mistake," she said, "for captains to have their wives on
board. I wonder the owners allow it. It spoils the comfort of the other
passengers--who, after all, are the chief persons to be considered--and
demoralises the poor fellows to such an extent that they are not like
the same men. Look at Captain Braye, whom I've known for ages--the
dearest old boy you can imagine when he's let alone--it's pitiful to see
him henpecked and cowed, and afraid to call his soul his own, shaking in
his very shoes before that vixen of a woman!" Her companion said
something that I could not hear--I believe it was my pleasant neighbour
at breakfast whom she was trying to set against me--and then she put on
the crowning touch. "It is always the fate of those exceptionally nice
men," said she, "to marry women who don't know how to appreciate them."
I wondered for a moment if I could have heard aright. It was hard to
believe in such consummate insolence--such a wild, malignant, perversion
of facts. To talk of _Tom_ as a henpecked husband! To dub _me_, of all
people in the world, a vixen!! To say that I--_I_--did not appreciate
him!!! The thing was too utterly ludicrous to be taken seriously, and
yet it made me so angry that I could hardly contain myself. It made me
feel that it would have been a pleasure to rush out upon her and tear
her hair from her head, just like the real vixens do. I felt that my
husband, who was also the commander of the ship, ought to have spared me
this gross indignity, which could not have occurred if he had respected
his position, and kept himself to himself.
Knowing that she was not with him now, I went back to the bridge. But
alas and alas! The bridge, that had been a little paradise, was a place
despoiled. Though the serpent had gone out of it, she had been there and
poisoned everything. Tom was not the same to me. All the pleasure of our
trip was at an end. I had a wretched day, and at night a gale came on,
and I was seasick for the first time. He did not know it, and I would
not send for him. Oh, it was horrible! It was tragical! It was
heart-breaking! I can't talk about it any more.
* * * * *
People came to meet her at Sydney, but she could not leave without a
ceremonious good-bye to her dear captain. She was calling for him
everywhere while he was busy making fast, and when she got him she shook
hands two or three times over, standing apart with him as at first,
regardless of me. Goodness knows I did not want to intrude, yet it was
impossible to help noticing the fuss she made. I heard her say--I am
quite _sure_ I heard her--that she was coming back with us; meaning, of
course, with him. She explained that she had but a day's business to do
in Sydney, and would then be able to return by the "dear old Bendigo"--I
distinctly caught those three words, in her high-pitched voice. And I
thought to myself that this would really be more than I could
stand--more than I could in reason be expected to stand. In fact, I was
so enraged that I was strongly tempted to put it to my husband that he
must make his choice between her and me. However, on second thoughts, I
perceived that it would be more dignified to say nothing, but to let my
acts speak for me. We had never been accustomed to bicker between
ourselves, he and I, and to a certain extent he was not responsible for
the situation. Any one not suffering from madness or an infectious
disease had the right to travel in the ship; he could not help it. But
if he could not turn the otherwise objectionable person off, he could
keep him or her in the passengers' proper place. My grievance with him
was that he did not keep that woman in her place.
Being quite determined not to have another voyage with her, and not
wishing to say nasty things to him about it, I was glad when an old
acquaintance, paying us a call on board, asked me to stay awhile with
her, for the further benefit of my health, representing that the time
covered by the sea trip was all too short to recruit in.
"Thank you very much," I answered, on the spur of the moment. "I really
think I will. I was never in Sydney but once, and then I had no chance
to see the beauties of the place, of which I have heard so much; and I
daresay it would do me good to have a longer change."
I was aware of Tom's utter, silent astonishment, but I would not look at
him; I left him to read the riddle for himself. When he spoke it was to
quietly fall in with the proposal, adding suggestions that would have
made it difficult for me to draw back if I had wanted to do so. He was
so ready to leave me, indeed, that I fancied he _wanted_ to get rid of
me--of course he did not, but any one would have thought so--and
naturally that made me bitter. I spoke but little to him afterwards, and
he was certainly cold to me---he seemed to divine my suspicions and to
resent them--and I did not go to see him off; I could not. In short, our
holiday was entirely and irreparably ruined.
I believe I cried nearly the whole time that I was in Sydney. It did
seem hard, in my state of health and under the sad circumstances, to be
stranded amongst strangers, who did not understand my sorrows, nor my
habits of life, and gave me none of the little pettings and coddlings
that I needed and was accustomed to; and the thought of that woman going
home with Tom, having the deck cabin, sitting on the bridge with him of
nights, making free with the whole ship, usurping my place and
privileges, drove me simply frantic--until one day I met her in the
street, and found she had not gone with him after all.
Shaken all to pieces with the awful overland journey, more dead than
alive, I reached home a day or two after him, and discovered him calmly
digging the garden, as if he had forgotten my very existence. When he
saw me he smiled in an odd, constrained way, and said, as though it
didn't matter one way or the other: "Well, Polly? Had about enough of
it?"
Angry as I was with him, I could not maintain any dignity at all--I was
too spent and weary. I broke down completely, and he took me into the
tool-shed to comfort me--took me into his arms, where I had simply ached
to be ever since I had left them, driven out by that detestable little
scheming, mischief-making snake-in-the-grass.
"Oh," I sobbed, when I could find words and strength to utter them, "how
_could_ you leave me behind? How _could_ you abandon me like that, when
I was so ill and unhappy?"
"Because," said he, "you wanted to be left. You distinctly asked and
were determined to be left. As for abandoning--it's I that was
abandoned, it seems to me."
"You _knew_ I did not want to be left," I urged--for of course he knew.
"You must have seen that I only did it because I was vexed."
"And what were you vexed about?" he inquired. "I must be too dense and
stupid for anything, but I'll be shot if I can understand you this time,
Polly."
I told him that he was dense and stupid indeed, or he would not need to
ask the question. But when I told him, further, what it was that had
vexed me, he said that in some ways, when it came to denseness and
stupidity, he was not a patch on me.
Of course it was not his fault in the very least. It was all hers.
* * * * *
P.S.--I have forgiven her now. Poor thing, it was only a manner with
her; she meant no harm. I did not see it then--no one could have seen
it, and I do not blame myself for being imposed on by appearances that
would have deceived a very angel, which I confess I am not, though the
least suspicious and uncharitable of women--but I became convinced of it
afterwards.
It was when my Harry was made _dux_ of his school, a year later than he
would have been but for the favouritism of a master, who deliberately
miscalculated examination marks. Harry, by the way, will not allow that
this was the case, but that is his modesty and his feeling for the
honour of the school; he does not know as much about it as I do. I was
told on the best authority that he ought to have had the position, being
far and away (as I well knew) the cleverest boy, and that a certain
master had a "set" or "down" on him because he had caricatured the
wretch on the blackboard. It was another sixth-form fellow who said he
felt sure the figures must be wrong when he heard the result.
However, there was no mistake about it this time. I, at any rate, was
sure of it, when I dressed for the Speech Day function, although the
names in the prize list were supposed to be unknown beforehand. Besides,
I had only to look at his face, calmly elated, the eyes twinkling with
suppressed excitement, to see that he had the secret--to be assured that
his merits were to meet their just reward at last. But there were some
mothers who allowed their mother's partiality to run away with them. I
heard of two who, up to the last moment, fully expected _their_ sons to
come out top. And Mrs. Harris was one of these.
There was some justification for hope on her part, because young Harris
was really a very industrious, plodding fellow, and had always given a
good account of himself. He had not half Harry's brains, of course, but
he had great application and perseverance, and the moral of the hare
and tortoise fable is often exemplified in these cases. Especially when
the hare is such an all-round genius as my boy, a prize-taker for
goal-kicking, the mile handicap and the long jump, as well as for work
in class. Several times I had heard Harry say, with quite a serious air,
that the only one he was afraid of was Harris, and they stuck very close
together through the examinations, as far as the figures were known. So
when she crushed into the seat in front of me, gorgeously dressed and
beaming, nodding to right and left, I saw how it was. She was prepared
for any amount of envious notice and congratulation, quite thinking she
was going to outshine me. I smiled--I could not help it. But I was glad
afterwards that she had not seen me smile.
I was also glad that Tom had not been able to accompany us this time,
though grieved for the cause--an accident to his foot while
tree-chopping. Our proximity to the maker of so much trouble in the
past, as to which we were still sore and reticent, might have rendered
the situation uncomfortable and altered its development altogether.
Harry had escorted me and his eldest sister--she a perfect dream, though
I say it, in pink cambric and a white muslin hat--and had now left us to
go and sit with his comrades at the back of the hall, whence a deafening
noise arose continuously, most exhilarating to hear. Dear lads! I
screwed my head round to look and laugh at their delightful antics, and
the figure of my fine boy leading all the revelry, until Phyllis's face
showed her sense of the indecorum of the proceeding. Children are so
dreadfully proper where their parents are concerned, and I am always
forgetting that I have to sit up and look dignified if I would have
their approval and respect.
When the hall was crowded so that not another creature could squeeze
into it, a fresh demonstration heralded the entrance of the headmaster,
hooded and gowned, escorting the distinguished visitors, chief of whom
was the Exalted Personage who had consented to distribute the prizes.
They packed the daïs, round the book-piled table; the boys yelled and
thumped the floor with their boot-heels, sung a Latin hymn with all
their might, subsided with difficulty, and allowed the formal
proceedings to begin. I sat in a perfect simmer of joyous excitement and
expectation, fully equal to theirs, and I noticed that Mrs. Harris's
face was flushed and that she kept smiling to herself in a vague way,
restless and fidgety. Poor thing! Her boy was an only son, like mine,
and she was one of those many love-blind mothers who mistake their geese
for swans. I saw quite plainly that she had no suspicion of the truth,
and was sorry for her. Some one ought to have given her a hint.
The headmaster read his annual report--every paragraph punctuated with
vociferous cheers from the back benches--and the Exalted Personage made
a speech, unnecessarily diffuse. Then there was a shuffling and
whispering and readjustment of the blocks of books on the table, the
E.P. advanced to the front of the daïs, the H.M. lined up beside him
with his list, and after a few little preliminaries (the awarding of a
couple of scholarships) the great moment arrived. Although I had known
so certainly what would happen, when it did happen I literally jumped
from my seat.
"_Dux_ of School--_Henry Thomas Beauchamp Braye._"
My heart seemed to leap into my throat, I clasped my hands, I suppose I
made some exclamation unconsciously, for Phyllis plucked at my sleeve
and whispered "Hush-sh!" quite fiercely. The child was not grown-up
then, but still thought herself competent to teach me how to behave in
public. She sat herself like any stock or stone, an image of propriety,
as if it was a matter of no concern to her at all that her brother was
set on the highest pinnacle of honour that a schoolboy could reach.
He came striding up the hall like a young prince, with none of that shy
awkwardness which made the other boys look so clumsy, and his mates
cheered him to the echo as he mounted the platform to receive his load
of prize-books and the congratulations of all the great folks. I never
saw anything prettier than his quiet bows, his modest and yet dignified
bearing, and his kind way with the fellows who crowded up to shake hands
with him when he came down amongst them again, helping him to carry his
trophies and making a regular royal progress of his return to his seat.
I noticed young Harris amongst the first of these, and thought to myself
that a defeated rival who could behave so nicely to the successful one
must have the essential spirit of a gentleman in him. And I found it was
so when I came to know him.
A little later, when the lesser prizes were being disposed of, and the
interest of the proceedings was not so all-absorbing--as I just sat in
placid ecstasy, thinking of nothing but my own happiness--a movement in
front of me brought his poor mother to my mind. She had ceased to
fidget, and I had forgotten to notice her. Now she rose slowly, in a
fumbling sort of way, remarking to a lady near her that the heat of the
hall was insufferable and was making her faint. It was very hot, and
she looked faint, with all the colour gone from her cheeks and her lips
twitching and trembling; but, oh, _I_ knew what the trouble was! Poor,
stricken soul! She felt just as I should have felt had I been in her
place--just as I had felt a year ago when told that that pig-faced
Middleton boy had ousted Harry--and my heart bled for her. Of course she
pretended not to see me as she passed out--I should have done the same
had our positions been reversed--and must have almost wanted to murder
me, indeed; but--well, mothers have a fellow-feeling at these times,
under all the feelings common to humanity at large. I could not resist
the impulse that came to me. She had no sooner disappeared through the
nearest door, seeking the fresh air for her faintness, than I, defiant
of my daughter's dumb protests, got up and went out after her.
She was leaning against the grey wall, holding her handkerchief to her
eyes. When she heard me she turned and glared, like a strange cat that
you have penned into a corner. The next moment we were in each other's
arms, and she was sobbing on my neck with the abandonment of a child.
And we have been the greatest friends ever since.