Three years later, as Theresa was coming down the stairs one Friday
evening, her father opened the front door, and at the sight of his
pallid face she stood still on the bottom step.
"Have you just come home?" she asked, for he had not seen her.
"It's you, Theresa? I went to the office first."
She put her arms round his neck and kissed him. "Are you very tired?"
"No, dear, no. I must find Nancy. Where is she? Where is Mother?"
"In the breakfast-room." She followed him. If there was excitement
anywhere she was not going to miss it; but she was anxious, and a sharp
pain was driven into her heart when she heard his first words to her
mother.
"It has come at last."
Pictures flashed: murder, forgery, bigamy, theft, in which of these had
her father been discovered? Her mother had his hand. "What did they
say?" she asked, and stroked it. It could not be the police: if they had
once caught him, they would never have let him go again.
"Young men. Competition. They tried to be kind. Of course, I cannot
blame them. And, it's terrible to confess it, Nancy, but in that first
moment I was thankful. People's eyes, haunting me for all these years,
seemed suddenly to have closed, and--and I could lift my head. Cowardly!
I deserve dismissal. They have offered me a clerkship, as I said they
would. How to live on it! Theresa! I did not know you were there."
"Yes, I followed you." Her voice shook with pity for him. "Mother saw
me." People's eyes! She saw them socketless, like those she had once
detached from the head of Grace's favourite doll. "Is it only money?
Then we'll manage. I'm not going to eat meat any more. I loathe the
stuff, and lentils are cheap. I'll tell Bessie to order them." They both
smiled wanly, strangely alike in that moment. "You needn't laugh. We
must be practical. Grace is nearly keeping herself, and I shall be soon.
I wish you wouldn't look so miserable." Mere poverty seemed nothing
after her fears of crime.
"We must all do what we can. I know you'll help us. Tell Bessie Father
wants his supper, dear."
He spoke in a still lower voice. "This means George, Nancy."
"Must it?"
"How else?"
She shuddered. "Will he bring the harmonium? What will the children
say?"
"They will suffer more without him."
"But will they?" She had flown past him, beyond their bodily needs, and
she saw their eager spirits starving. "He will spoil things. There will
be no freedom. Grace will be sensible and she tolerates her uncle, but
Theresa hates him. She is so violent, Ned."
"And so good."
"Yes, somewhere she is good. I dare not tell her."
"I trust her. Treat her as a woman, and she behaves as one."
Nancy smiled. "Try it, my dear."
The flinging open of the door prefaced Theresa's return. Her face looked
very thin in its whiteness. "I've just remembered," she said, squeezing
her hands together--"I've just remembered you won't go to the mountains
any more. It doesn't matter about being poor, but I don't know how we're
to do without the mountains. What shall we do? And there's Alexander,
and Mrs. Rutherford, and Janet--they feel gone. I don't know what to do.
Mother, what are we to do?"
In a soft and distinct voice Nancy answered: "I don't know what Father
will do without them, dear!"
He looked up quickly, and again Theresa was conscious of the old shadow.
"I shall miss my friends," he said firmly.
"Of course, dear."
"But there's me!" cried Theresa. "How can I dream----" She broke off,
for the shadow hid her from her parent's sight. Edward Webb was speaking
more loudly than his wont.
"I shall go and see them when I can."
"Take me." Theresa's voice was distant and ignored. She lost her sense
of solidity. Could she really be here, since they neither saw nor heard
her? She touched the sideboard: it was hard and cold.
"Expensive," Nancy said.
"I hope I shall not be self-indulgent."
"There would be excuse."
"Nancy, Nancy, at a time like this!" He dropped his appeal. "If I cannot
go to them, perhaps they would be willing to come to me."
"Not Alexander," Theresa protested.
"How would they enjoy the company of George?"
Theresa took a step forward. "Uncle George? Why?"
A new danger bridged their difference. "Tell her," said Nancy's eyes.
His mood was defiant, for he had been goaded, and he did not hesitate.
"We are thinking of asking your Uncle George to live with us," he said
smoothly.
She sat down, opening and shutting her mouth. "You're not," she said,
very low. "Nobody could live with him. He's a beast."
"Terry!"
"You know he is. What's the good of pretending? You hate him yourself.
When he comes you get all screwed up to nothing. We all hate him. If he
comes here I'll run away. If I were a boy--oh, if I were a boy!" Her
face was like a shell with a light inside it. "I'd go down to the docks,
I wouldn't stay here; I'd go to sea. And, anyway, I--I'll earn my own
living." She sank more deeply into her seat, and her hands shook in her
lap. She looked up. "You're not really going to ask him? It'll make
Mother ill for one thing."
"Not if you keep your temper, Terry."
Her voice broke out on a sob. "I _am_ keeping it! Oh, oh, oh! He'll
preach and he'll pray, and he'll whine on that old harmonium--and try to
convert us, and he'll spy on Grace, and we'll never have any fun any
more. And where's he going to sleep? Fusty old thing--he'll snore. Are
you going to turn us out of our room for him? Are you? I won't go--I
won't go!"
"Theresa, we are in difficulties. We want your help."
"I won't do anything if you let that George come. What's the good of
having money if you're miserable? Religious old pig! I'll tell him I
hate the Bible; I'll fetch it and jump on it before him, and--and throw
it at him. I will not have my life spoilt--it's wicked! I hate him! I
hate you! I loathe his snarly old hymns and his religion. It's all lies.
'Gentle Jesus,' that's the way he says it, watching to see if your eyes
are shut. Old beast! If he comes I'll never speak to him. Never, never!
You're selfish, you're only thinking of yourselves. Oh----" She stood
up, shaking, crying, mad with impotence. She seemed to seek a last
explosive word. It came with a wrench from her throat. "It'll be hell,
hell, hell!" She made a desperate lunge at her chair, overturned it,
kicked it viciously, and rushed from the room. They heard her stumbling
up the stairs, noisily, blindly, and at last, the banging of her bedroom
door.
"She'll kill me," Nancy moaned.
* * * * *
Theresa lay on her bed in a blackness of misery that absorbed the
night's darkness entering the room. She seemed to be lying in a pit out
of which she could never be raised. She was not ashamed of her
sentiments, but of having uttered them: she regretted not so much her
cruelty to her parents as the pitiful display of her own weakness. How
could she brave the light and face her father? The questions of her
childhood reappeared. Had Bessie heard the clamour? Would she tell Bill?
Worst of all, how could she live without thinking happily of herself?
She lay there, turning and twisting, gazing through a tunnel-like
future, pitch dark without the light of her self-respect. How long
before she neared the end and saw a glimmer? Already life had taught her
the kindliness of time, but she had not yet learnt patience. How could
she wait until custom and forgetfulness had done their work?
The minutes went slowly by; the two darknesses covered her. She was a
prisoner in the dungeon of her own despair, and, like all prisoners, she
began to plan escape. Dare she creep out and pretend nothing had
happened? Should she crave a forgiveness hardly desired, or should she
offer submission on honourable terms--no mention of her offences, and,
beyond all, no Uncle George? She found it impossible to move. How many
hours had passed? She was cold. She wondered if Alexander, that
recurrent image, were as violent in anger as she; not now, of course,
for he was a man, but when he was a boy.
She heard steps on the stairs, voices, the opening of her mother's door.
Someone was mounting heavily. She held her breath. Was her mother coming
to speak to her? No, she had passed, very slowly, into the opposite
room. Her father was speaking; there was a strange, flapping sound--that
was Bessie's felt slippers wearing her stockings into holes. She seemed
to be in a hurry. Were they all going to bed? Was it so late? And, if
so, why had not Grace returned?
In a little while there was a swift, light step, and Grace entered.
"Terry, where are you? On the bed? Get up quickly. Where are the
matches? Mother's ill, and you must go for the doctor."
"Ill?" Theresa blinked in the gaslight.
"It's her heart."
"Her heart," Theresa repeated dully.
"Yes, be quick! I must go and see to her."
"Is it late?"
"Only nine o'clock."
"Nine!" Theresa slipped from the bed, felt for her slippers, and ran
out, hatless, into the quiet streets. She was accompanied by the fear of
death. She was a fast runner, and she made little noise in her thin
shoes, but more silently ran that fear. She saw it with a mocking face
and claw-like hands.
Peremptorily she summoned the doctor, appearing like a dishevelled
sprite to the startled maid, and sped again down the garden path. The
shrubs were dark and thick and they rustled as she passed.
She found the front-door open when she reached home, and her father
hovering in the hall.
"My child! No hat!" He took her hands and she yielded them gladly,
dropping her head to his shoulder.
"I did it," she whispered. "She isn't going to die, is she?"
"We do not know. We do not know."
"I did it," she repeated.
He patted her shoulder. "Hush. Don't think about yourself. See if Grace
wants you."
Slowly she went upstairs. She could not have analyzed her pain, it had
too many parts, but perhaps the sharpest of them was her sense of
slight. She confessed, tacitly asked forgiveness, and he bade her not
think about herself! Her next thought was not formed, but it lived in
her, telling her that he should have shown gratitude for the killing of
her pride. She drove the nails into her palms. He had thought nothing of
the confession which, to her, had pulsed with more than repentance,
which had been quick with drama. He was blind or callous, and the hot
colour of shame ran up her face, but faded as she reached her mother's
door.
She turned the handle softly, and stepped over the threshold into a dim,
hushed room, full of the mystery of sickness. Grace was at the
washstand, moving crockery and bottles without noise, a conscious
control of the situation plain in her bearing and in the air of the room
which had been miraculously converted into tidiness.
With her back to the door and close to the head of the bed, Theresa
peeped at her mother, who lay with closed eyes, then glanced admiringly
at Grace, who was not afraid of acting nurse, who could lower her voice
naturally and divine needs before they were felt. Theresa envied her:
she was so quiet, so sure and kind--so lovely! She watched her as she
bent over her mother, and the easy curve of her body was so fresh and
perfect that the clothes seemed to fall away, leaving her pristine and
unencumbered. Theresa's soul ached at such beauty and with desire for
it. She felt awkward, useless, in the way. She could not help her
mother, for all her cleverness; indeed, she had driven her to this bed
over which Grace, whom she sometimes despised for her flirtations and
frivolity, could lean with such tenderness and skill. There was
something fine in Grace, and she felt herself shrivelling. Doubts swept
her. Where were the capacities in which she had believed? Oh, but she
would be great! She must begin at once. She could not be wasted. She
felt the strength of her energy leaping in her, and her feet scraped the
shabbily stained boards on which she stood.
Grace raised a hand that commanded silence, and tiptoed to the door.
"She's asleep, I think. Is he coming? Soon?"
Theresa nodded. They whispered on the landing. "Is she going to die?"
"Don't!"
"But I must know. It was me that did it. I was angry. I didn't know her
heart was really bad. I'd like to tell her that, if she's going to die."
"You mustn't speak to her."
"But if she dies without knowing----"
Grace's soft eyes were scornful. "She knows all you could tell her,
child! You'd kill her with your fussings, and I'm not going to let her
die. She shall not. I want her."
"You're not the only one!"
"I must go back." Grace slipped into the room and Theresa sat down on
the stairs, while tears of angry pain rolled into her neck. She
disdained to dry them: their wetness and the after-stiffening of their
channels were balm to soreness, and she could forget her fault in pity
for herself, because no one understood her, because her feelings were
such a torturing, yet somehow delightful medley, past the power of her
own mind to unravel.
The doctor's report was immediately comforting, but not very hopeful for
the future. Edward Webb learnt that his wife's heart was very weak, that
all excitement and worry must be spared her, that a shock would probably
kill her.
"She shall not have a shock," he said, lifting his grey face.
"She must be saved anxiety."
"She shall be."
"She had better do nothing energetic."
"Certainly not." He frowned heavily, as though he saw difficulties here.
"Women," said the doctor genially, "are difficult to manage. They think
they're indispensable, and they're right--but Mrs. Webb must be
persuaded that she's not. You're fortunate in having daughters. Miss
Grace is very capable. She has a head. I think you can rely on her."
"Yes," he said--"yes." He was forlorn and afraid as he closed the door
on the doctor, and he saw Nancy afloat on an ebbing tide. She was
leaving him, very slowly; she was dwindling in his sight, and soon
there would be no more than a memory of her fragrance. He could not stay
the mighty sea which bore her from him, but he strained his eyes for
another glimpse of her grace, and a sob jerked itself from his throat.
"Nancy," he said, "not yet, not yet!" He made indefinite movements with
his hands. He had not known how ill she was. She had hidden her
suffering from him, she was brave and good, and he must keep her. Again
he called on her name, curving his fingers as though they held her hand.
There was a creaking of the stairs. He felt his arm clasped.
"What did he say?" Theresa whispered. "Tell me--tell me, oh, what did he
say?"
They went together to the dark dining-room, and sat close to the table
on the hard, leather-covered chairs.
"She will recover," he said, stretching his limp arms on the tablecloth;
"but she will need care, constant care, Theresa. She must have no
excitement, no shock, no worry."
"I'll help you." The words were hard to say, but her reward came.
"I have great faith in you, Theresa."
"I'll truly try to help." The quivering of her voice was involuntary,
but the sound pleased her.
"I know." There was a silence in which Theresa began an immortal poem.
Very quickly it must be written to bring fame and money to this stricken
house.
"We can't afford another servant, and your mother will need much care."
Theresa's hands worked together under the table.
"Grace is earning money, she must not be taken from her work."
"But there's Uncle George coming," she said in quiet desperation.
"But my salary is halved. We are very poor!"
She sat in a blackness which had become peopled by selfish desires that
warred with unselfish ones. She saw them as opposing hosts, she heard
the clash of armour and weapons, steel against steel, and she bowed her
head in fear of blows, felt herself running from the horrid dangers of
the fray. What a coward, to escape when the issue of battle lay in her
own strength! More than sinners she hated cowards, and suddenly the
tumult ended.
"I'm sixteen--more," she said aloud. "I'll leave school. I'll work at
home. Anyhow, I'm not the kind that gets much good from lessons."
A faint murmur from Edward Webb resolved itself into the words: "There's
your future, your career. It ought not to be sacrificed, my child."
"It doesn't matter," she mumbled.
"I can't allow it, yet," his voice rose wailingly, "what am I to do?
What am I to do?"
She rubbed her untidy head against his shoulder. "I'll work at home,"
she whispered. "There'll be lots of time. I won't--I won't be beaten, I
promise you." She felt again the smouldering force within, and
triumphantly she cried: "If there's any power, it can't be crushed, it
can't! You'll see. And oh!" she added more softly, "let me make up if I
can. I was wicked. I'll even be an angel to Uncle George!"
She could almost hear the slipping of his burden. "Thank you, Theresa.
Thank you, my child. You never fail me."
His faith thrilled her, gave her wings, yet it was now that she had the
first doubt of her ability to fly.