_The Triple Chance_
At the beginning of her venture Jeckie had spent all her energies on the
business part of her establishment, and had laid out very little money
on the furnishing of the private rooms. A living room for meals,
bedrooms for herself and Rushie and their father, had seemed to her
sufficient for first needs; additions could come later, if the business
prospered. The business had prospered, and there came a time when she
determined to have at least a parlour into which the better class of
customers could be shown if they wanted to see her, as they sometimes
did, in private. Accordingly, she gave orders to the best firm of
furniture dealers in Sicaster to fit up a room at the side of the house
in handsome, if solid, style, having previously had it, and a lobby
adjoining it, painted and decorated in corresponding manner. The door of
the lobby opened on a little side garden; she ordered it to be painted a
rich dark green, and had it fitted with a fine brass knocker which one
of the shop-boys kept so constantly polished that its refulgence
exceeded that of the golden teapot at the front of the house. It was to
this door that George Grice stole, and at this knocker that he sounded
his summons, and the time was half-past nine at night.
Jeckie--alone, for Farnish had already retired--wondered who it could be
that came knocking there at that late hour. She picked up a hand-lamp
and went round to the lobby and opened the door; the light of the lamp
fell full on George Grice's round face, and on a certain sheepish and
furtive look in his eyes. He lifted his slouched straw hat, and even
smiled faintly, but Jeckie frowned in ominous fashion.
"What do you want?" she demanded in her least gracious manner. She had
never heard Grice's voice since the afternoon, now long since, on which
he had ridden away from Applecroft, turning a deaf ear to her prayers,
but she remembered it well enough, and she knew that there was a new
note in it when he spoke, a note of something very like meekness, if not
of positive humility.
"I could like a word or two wi' you, if you please," said Grice. "A word
i' private."
Jeckie knew from the very tone that this man who had once thrown her
aside like an old glove, and whom she had fought with the fierceness and
tenacity of a tiger, had come to acknowledge himself defeated. Without a
word she motioned him to enter, closed the door, led him into the new
parlour, lighted a handsome standard lamp that stood on the table, and
pointing him to a chair, took one herself and stared at him.
"Well?" she said.
Grice drew out a big handkerchief and mopped his bald head; it was an
old trick of his, well remembered by Jeckie, whenever he was moved or
excited.
"I made a mistake i' your case," he answered, almost dully. "I--I didn't
know it at the time, but I know it now--to my cost."
"Aye, because I've taught you to know it!" said Jeckie. "I've bested
you!" Grice looked at her, furtively. He had some knowledge of human
nature, and he suddenly realised the woman's hard, determined spirit.
"If I'd ha' known," he burst out suddenly, "what make of woman you are,
I'd ha' taken good care that things turned out different! If you'd
married our Albert--aye, things would indeed ha' been different! But I
went on t'wrong side o' t'road--and he married that niece o' mine, 'at's
now made him turn agen' his own father, and I'm left there--alone!"
"Your own fault!" said Jeckie. "Who made your bed but yourself?"
"That makes it no better," replied Grice. "Nay, it makes it worse! I've
borne more nor I ever expected to bear. This--(he waved his hand around
as if to include his rival's establishment and trade)--this is t'least
of it. You fought me fair and square, no doubt; and I'm beaten. But
there's a thing I can suggest, even at this stage."
"What?" demanded Jeckie, who was watching him keenly. "What?"
Grice put both hands on his knees and bent forward to her.
"I'm still a well-to-do man," he said, in a low, terse voice. "Accordin'
to some standards, I'm a rich man. I had a reckonin' up t'other night
o' what I were worth. If I'd to die now I should cut up well. You'd be
surprised. And I shan't leave a penny to my son! My son, Albert
Grice--not a penny!"
Jeckie continued to stare at him; herself silent, her face fixed. She
saw that her beaten rival had still a lot more to say, and that left to
himself he would say it.
"Not one penny to him!" continued Grice with emphasis. "For why? I'll
not say 'at if he were a single man or a widow man I shouldn't. But he's
wed and to my niece, and after what I've experienced at her hands I'll
take care 'at she handles no more money o' mine. It were her 'at forced
Albert to dissolve partnership wi' me. I had to pay him out wi' a lot o'
money. But they'll never see another penny of what I've got! An' as I
said just now, I'm worth, first and last, a good deal."
Jeckie suddenly opened her tightly-shut lips.
"How much?" she asked quietly.
Grice gave her a quick look; from her face his eyes wandered to the door
of the parlour, which Jeckie had left open. He suddenly rose from his
chair, tiptoed across the floor, and looked out into the lobby.
"There isn't a soul in the house but Farnish, and he's fast asleep,
t'other side of the shop," said Jeckie, laconically. "But you can shut
the door if you like."
Grice shut the door, slid back to his chair, and once more looked at
her.
"Five and twenty thousand pound, at least," he said in a whisper. "One
thing and another, five-and-twenty thousand pound!"
Jeckie watched him steadily through another period of silence.
"What did you come here for?" she suddenly demanded. "It wasn't for
naught, I'll be bound! You'd an idea in your head!"
Grice leaned an elbow on the table, and began to tap the smart cloth
with his thick fingers.
"An idea, aye--a suggestion," he answered, his small eyes still set on
the woman who sat bolt upright before him. "And I'll put it to you,
Jecholiah, for I know--and I wish I'd known sooner!--'at you're as keen
on brass as what I've always been. It's this here, i' one
word--marriage!"
Jeckie heard, without moving a muscle of her face nor relaxing the
steady stare of her eyes.
"You an' me," she said in a low voice. "You and me--that's what you
mean, Grice?"
"Me an' you," asserted Grice, nodding his bald head. "Me an' you--that
is what I mean, and I've thought it out careful. Look here! I'm a
certain age, but I'm a strong and well-preserved man, and worth at
least--only at least, mind you--five-and-twenty thousand pound. Now
then, this here business o' yours--and well you've conducted it!--is
worth a lot already, goodwill, stock i' hand, and so on. Mine's still
worth a good deal--old established, and I've one trade 'at you haven't
touched--hay and corn merchant--'at's as good as ever. Now I haven't
counted my businesses in that five-and-twenty thousand pound. An', do
you see, supposin' you and me were to sell our businesses to a limited
liability company, I know how and where they could be sold, and if you
want to know, to one o' them firms o' that sort 'at's takin' over
village businesses and transformin' 'em into big general stores. If, I
say, we were to do that, d'ye see what a lot o' money we should have
between us? And--you'll already have saved a good deal, I know!"
"Well, and what then?" asked Jeckie. There was not a trace of anything
but hard business dealing in her voice, and her face was as fixed as
ever. "What then, Grice?"
Grice put his head on one side, and seemed to be making some mental
reflections.
"Taking one thing with another," he said, "what I have, what I can get
for my business; what you have, what you can get for this place, I
reckon we should be uncommon well off. We'd marry, and take a nice
house, wherever you like, and keep a smart trap and horse."
"Smarter than your Albert's?" interrupted Jeckie with a sneer so faint
that Grice failed to see it. "What?"
"Aye, a deal!" asserted Grice. "And we'd show 'em how to do it!
Albert'll none ever touch a penny o' mine, now! Say the word, and it
comes off, and I'll make a will i' your favour as soon as we're wed!
What say you?"
Jeckie, still upright and rigid, sat staring at him until he thought she
would never speak. Suddenly she rose, moved to the door, and beckoned
him.
"Come here, Grice!" she said.
Grice rose and followed her round the end of the lobby into a passage
which led to the shop. She opened a door, lighted a lamp, and, standing
in the middle of the place, pointed round the heavily-stacked shelves
and counters.
"You want to know what I say, Grice?" she said in low, incisive tones
that made the old man's ears tingle. "I say this! Did ye ever see your
shop stocked like mine, did you ever do as much trade as I'm doing, did
you ever take as much brass over your counter in a fortnight as I take
in a week? Never! An' I started all this wi' your money--it was your
money that gave me my chance o' revenge. An' when I got that chance I
said to myself that I'd never rest, body or soul, till I'd seen your
shutters come down, and I never will! Go home!" she concluded, moving
swiftly across the shop, and throwing open the street door. "Go
home!--I'd as lief think o' marryin' the devil himself as o' weddin' a
man like you--I shall see you pull your shutters down yet, and--I shall
ha' done it!"
Grice went out into the night without a word, and Jeckie stood in her
doorway and watched him march heavily across the road. When he had
disappeared within his own door, she closed hers, picked up a couple of
sweet biscuits out of an open box as she crossed the shop, and went
upstairs, munching them contentedly. And not even the delight of revenge
kept her from sleep.
There were other men in Savilestowe who had eyes on Jeckie Farnish with
a view to marriage. In spite of her strenuous pursuit of money she kept
her good looks; continuous work, indeed, seemed to improve them, and if
there was a certain hardness about her she remained the handsomest woman
in the village. And not very long after her dramatic dismissal of the
old grocer she was brought face to face for the second time with the
necessity of making a decision. Calling on Stubley one day to pay her
rent, the farmer, after giving her a receipt, turned round from the old
bureau at which he had written it, and, leaning back in his elbow chair,
gazed at her critically. He was a fine-looking, well-preserved man, a
bachelor, more than comfortably off, and something in his eyes brought
the colour to his tenant's cheeks. For one second she forgot her
hardness and her ambitions and felt, rather than remembered, that she
was a woman.
"Well, mi lass!" said Stubley. "And how long's this to go on?"
"How long's what to go on?" asked Jeckie.
"All this tewin' and toilin' and scrattin' after brass?" he said, with a
half-amused, half-cynical laugh. "You've been at it a good while now,
and you've about done what ye set out to do. Grice'll none keep his
shutters up much longer. They say his takings have fallen to naught."
"I know they have," assented Jeckie with a flash of her keen eyes. "He's
scarce any trade left."
"Aye, and you have it all, and I'll lay aught you've already made a nice
little fortune for yourself!" continued Stubley. "So--why go on? What's
the use of wasting your life, a handsome woman like you? There's
something else in life than all this money-making, you know, lass. Sell
your business--and live a bit!"
"Live a bit?" she said. "I--I don't know what you mean?"
Stubley waved his hand towards the window. There was a beautiful and
well-kept garden outside, and beyond it a wide stretch of equally
well-kept land. And Jeckie knew what the gesture meant.
"You know me," he said quietly. "Here's t'best farm-house and t'best
farm in all this countryside. There's naught wanting here, mi lass--it's
plenty ... and peace. And there's no mistress to it, and naught to
follow me, neither lad nor lass. Say the word, and get rid o' yon shop,
and I'll marry you whenever you like. And--you'd never regret it."
Jeckie stood up, trembling in spite of her strength. She thought of the
hard, grinding, sordid, unlovely life which she was living in the
pursuit of money, and then of what might be as mistress of that fine old
farm and wife of an honest, good-natured, dependable man. But as she
thought, recollection came back to her--a recollection which was with
her day and night. She saw herself standing in the empty, stockless fold
at Applecroft, watching George Grice drive away, deaf to her entreaties
for help. The old demon of hatred and determination for revenge, and the
lust for money and power which had sprung from his workings, rose up
again and conquered her.
"No," she said, turning away. "I can't! I'm obliged to you, Mr.
Stubley--you're a straight man, and you mean well. But--I can't do it!
I've set myself to a certain thing, and I must go on--I can't stop now!"
"What certain thing, mi lass?" asked Stubley. "What're you aimin' at?"
Jeckie looked round her, at the old furniture, the old pictures and
framed samplers on the walls of the farm-house parlour, and from them to
Stubley, and her eyes grew deep and sombre.
"I'm going to be the richest woman in all these parts!" she whispered.
"I've set my mind to it, and it's got to be. I've no time to think of
men--I'm after money--money!"
Then she turned and went swiftly out, leaving the farmer staring after
her with wonder in his eyes. And he shook his head as he picked up the
cheque which she had just given him and locked it in his bureau. He was
thinking of the times when Jeckie Farnish could not have put her name to
a cheque for a penny piece. But now--
There was yet one more man who wanted to marry the determined,
money-grubbing woman. Bartle, who had seen Jeckie Farnish every day of
his life since he had first come, seeking a job, to her father's door, a
lad of fifteen, and who had served her like a faithful dog from the
beginning of her big venture, came to feel that with him it was either
going to be all or nothing. He had developed into a fine, handsome
fellow, whose steadiness was a by-word in the village; in looks and
character he was a man that any woman might well have been proud of. And
one Sunday, having occasion to see Jeckie about some business of the
ensuing morning, he suddenly spoke straight out, as he and she stood
among the flowers in her garden.
"Missis!" he said, his bronzed cheeks taking on a deep blush. "There's a
word I mun either say or burst--I cannot hold it longer! I been i' love
wi' you ever sin I were a lad, and you a lass, and it grows waur and
waur! Will you wed me?--for if you weern't missis, I mun go!"
Jeckie looked at him, and knew the reality of what he had said. And for
a moment she felt something remind her that she was a woman--but in the
next she had steeled herself.
"It's no good, lad!" she said softly. "No good! Put it away from you."
Bartle turned white as his Sunday shirt, but he stood erect.
"Then you mun let me go, missis, and at once," he said huskily. "I've
saved money, and I'll go a long way off--to this here Canada 'at they
talk about. But go I will!"
He came to say good-bye to her three days later, and Jeckie put a
hundred pounds in banknotes into his hand. It was the only deed of its
sort that she ever wanted to do, but Bartle would have none of it. His
eyes looked another appeal as he said his farewell, and Jeckie shook her
head and let him go. And so he went, white-faced and dry-eyed, and with
him went the last chance of redemption that Jeckie Farnish ever had. She
had sold herself by then, body and soul, to Mammon.