The next afternoon Mrs Bowater was out when Dr Phelps made his call. It
was Fanny who ushered him into the room. He felt my pulse again, held up
the phial of medicine to the light, left unconsulted my tongue, and
pronounced that "we are doing very nicely." As indeed I was. While this
professional inquiry was in progress Fanny stood silently watching us,
then exclaimed that it was half-past four, and that I must have my tea.
She was standing behind Dr Phelps, and for a few seconds I watched with
extreme interest but slow understanding a series of mute little
movements of brows and lips which she was directing at me while he was
jotting down a note in a leather pocket-book. At length I found myself
repeating--as if at her dictation--a polite little invitation to him to
take tea with me. The startled blue eyes lifted themselves above the
pocket-book, the square, fair head was bowing a polite refusal, when,
"But, of course, Dr Phelps," Fanny broke in like one inspired, "how very
thoughtless of me!"
"Thank you, thank you, Miss Bowater, but----" cried Dr Phelps, with a
smooth uplifted hand, and almost statuesque in his pose. His refusal was
too late. Miss Bowater had hastened from the room.
His panic passed. He reseated himself, and remarking that it was a very
cold afternoon, predicted that if the frost continued, skating might be
expected. Conversation of this kind is apt so soon to faint away like a
breeze in hot weather, that I kept wondering what to say next. Besides,
whenever Dr Phelps seemed impelled to look at me, he far more quickly
looked away, and the sound of his voice suggested that he was uncertain
if he was not all but talking to himself. To put him more at his ease I
inquired boldly if he had many other midgets among his patients.
The long lashes swept his cheeks; he pondered a while on my landlady's
window curtains. "As a matter of fact perhaps _not_," he replied at
last, as if giving me the result of a mathematical calculation.
"I suppose, Dr Phelps," I then inquired, "there _might_ be more, at any
time, might there not?" Our glances this time met. He blinked.
"My father and mother, I mean," I explained in some confusion, "were
just of the com--of the ordinary size. And what I was wondering is,
whether you yourself would be sorry--in quite a general way, of
course--if you found your practice going down like that."
"Going down?"
"I mean the _patients_ coming smaller. I never had the opportunity of
asking our own doctor, Dr Grose. At Lyndsey, you know. Besides, I was a
child then. Now, first of all, it is true, isn't it, that giants are
usually rather dull-witted people? So nobody would deliberately choose
_that_ kind of change. If, then, quality does vary with quantity,
mightn't there be an improvement in the other direction? You will think
I am being extremely ego--egotistical. But one must take Jack's side,
mustn't one?--even if one's Jill?"
"Jack?"
"The Giant Killer."
He looked at me curiously, and his finger and thumb once more strayed up
towards the waistcoat pocket in which he kept his thermometer. But
instead of taking it out, he coughed.
"There is a norm----" he began in a voice not quite his own.
"Ah," I cried, interrupting him, and throwing up my hands, "there is
indeed. But why, I ask myself, so vast a number of examples of it!"
It was as if a voice within were prompting me. Perhaps the excitement of
Fanny's homecoming was partly to blame. "I sit at my window here and
watch the passers-by. Norms, in mere size, Dr Phelps, every one of them,
if you allow for the few little defects in the--the moulding, you know.
And just think what London must be like. Why, _nobody_ can be
noticeable, there."
"But surely," Dr Phelps smiled indulgently, though his eyelashes seemed
to be in the way, "surely variety is possible, without--er--excess.
Indeed there must be variety in order to arrive at our norm, mustn't
there?"
"You'd be astonished," I assured him, "how slight the differences
really are. A few inches or ounces; red or black or fawn; and age, and
sex, of course; that's all. Now, isn't it true, Dr Phelps, that almost
any twenty women--unselected, you know--would weigh about a ton? And
surely there's no particular reason why just human shells should weigh
as much as that. We are not lobsters. And yet, do you know, I have
watched, and they really seem to enjoy being the same as one another.
One would think they tried to be--manners and habits, knowledge and
victuals, hats and boots, everything. And if on the outside, I suppose
on the inside, too. What a mysterious thing it seems. All of them
_thinking_ pretty much the same: Norm-_Thoughts_, you know; just
five-foot-fivers. After all, one wouldn't so much mind the monotonous
packages, if the contents were different. 'Forty feeding like one'--who
said that? Now, truly, Dr Phelps, don't you feel?---- It would, of
course, be very serious at first for their mothers and fathers if all
the little human babies here came midgets, but it would be amusing, too,
wouldn't it?... And it isn't quite my own idea, either."
Dr Phelps cleared his throat, and looked at his watch. "But surely," he
said, with a peculiar emphasis which I have noticed men are apt to make
when my sex asks intelligent or unintelligent questions: "Surely you and
I are understanding one another. _I_ try to make myself clear to _you_.
So extremes _can_ meet; at least I hope so." He gave me a charming
little awkward bow. "Tell me, then, what is this peculiar difference you
are so anxious about? You wouldn't like a pygmy England, a pygmy
Universe, now, would you, Miss M.?"
It was a great pity. A pygmy England--the thought dazzled me. In a few
minutes Dr Phelps would perhaps have set all my doubts at rest. But at
that moment Miss Bowater came in with the tea, and the talk took quite
another turn. She just made it Fanny's size. Even Dr Phelps looked a
great deal handsomer in her company. More sociable. Nor were we to
remain "three's none." She had finished but one slice of toast over my
fire, and inflamed but one cheek, when a more protracted but far less
vigorous knock than Dr Phelps's on the door summoned her out of the room
again. And a minute or two afterwards our tea-party became one of four,
and its sexes (in number, at any rate) equally matched.
By a happy coincidence, just as Good King Wenceslas had looked out on
the Feast of Stephen, so Mr Crimble, the curate-in-charge at St Peter's,
had looked in. By his "Ah, Phelps!" it was evident that our guests were
well acquainted with one another; and Fanny and I were soon enjoying a
tea enriched by the cream of local society. Mr Crimble had mild dark
eyes, gold spectacles, rather full red lips, and a voice that reminded
me of raspberries. I think he had heard of me, for he was very
attentive, and handled my small cup and saucer with remarkable, if
rather conspicuous, ingenuity.
Candles were lit. The talk soon became animated. From the weather of
this Christmas we passed to the weather of last, to Dr Phelps's
prospects of skating, and thence to the good old times, to Mr Pickwick,
to our respective childish beliefs in Santa Claus, stockings, and to
credulous parents. Fanny repeated some of the naive remarks made by her
pupils, and Mr Crimble capped them with a collection of biblical _bons
mots_ culled in his Sunday School. I couldn't glance fast enough from
one to the other. Dr Phelps steadily munched and watched Mr Crimble. He
in turn told us of a patient of his, a Mrs Hall, who, poor old creature,
was 101, and enjoyed nothing better than playing at "Old Soldier" with a
small grandson.
"Literally, second childhood. Senile decay," he said, passing his cup.
From Mrs Hall we naturally turned to parochial affairs; and then Mr
Crimble, without more ado, bolted his mouthful of toast, in order to
explain the inmost purpose of his visit.
He was anxious to persuade Miss Bowater to sing at the annual Parish
Concert, which was to be given on New Year's Eve. Try as he might, he
had been unable to persuade his vicar of the efficacy of Watch Night
Services. So a concert was to be given instead. Now, would Miss Bowater,
as ever, be ever so kind, and would I add my entreaties to his? As he
looked at Fanny and I did too--with one of those odd turns of the mind,
I was conscious that the peculiar leaning angle of his head was exactly
the same as my own. Whereupon I glanced at Dr Phelps, but he sat fair
and foursquare, one feeding like forty. Fanny remaining hesitant, appeal
was made to him. With almost more cordiality than Mr Crimble appeared
to relish, he agreed that the musical talent available was not so
abundant as it might be, and he promised to take as many of the
expensive tickets as Miss Bowater would sing songs.
"I don't pretend to be musical, not like you, Crimble. But I don't mind
a pleasant voice--in moderation; and I assure you, Miss Bowater, I am an
excellent listener--given a fair chance, you know."
"But then," said Fanny, "so am I. I believe now really--and one can
judge from one's speaking voice, can't one, Mr Crimble?--I believe you
sing yourself."
"Sing, Miss Bowater," interjected Mr Crimble, tipping back his chair.
"'The wedding guest here beat his chest, for he heard the loud bassoon.'
Now, conjuring tricks, eh, Phelps? With a stethoscope and a clinical
thermometer; and I'll hold the hat and make the omelette. It would bring
down the house."
"It was his _breast_ he beat; not his _chest_," I broke in.
The six eyes slid round, as if at a voice out of the clouds. There was a
pause.
"Why, exactly," cried Mr Crimble, slapping his leg.
"But I wish Dr Phelps _would_ sing," said Fanny in a small voice,
passing him the sugar.
"He must, he shall," said Mr Crimble, in extreme jubilation. "So that's
settled. _Thank_ you, Miss Bowater," his eyes seemed to melt in his head
at his success, "the programme is complete."
He drew a slip of paper from his inside pocket and brandished a silver
pencil-case. "Mrs Browning, 'The Better Land'--better and better every
year. 'Caller Herrin'' to follow--though what kind of herrings caller
herrings are I've never been able to discover." He beamed on me. "Miss
Finch--she is sending me the names of her songs this evening. Miss
Willett and Mr Bangor--'O that we two,' and a queer pair they'd look;
and 'My luv is like.' Hardy annuals. Mrs Bullace--recitations, 'Abt
Vogler,' and no doubt a Lord Tennyson. Flute, Mr Piper; 'Cello, Miss
Oran, a niece of Lady Pollacke's; and for comic relief, Tom Sturgess, of
course; though I hope he will be a little more--er--eclectic this year.
And you and I," again he turned his boyish brow on me, "will sit with
Mrs Bowater in the front row of the gallery--a claque, Phelps, eh?"
He seemed to be in the topmost height of good spirits. Well, thought I,
if social badinage and _bonhomie_ were as pleasant and easy as this, why
hadn't my mother----?
"But why in the gallery?" drawled Fanny suddenly from the hearthrug,
with the little steel poker ready poised; "Miss M. _dances_."
The clear voice rasped on the word. A peculiar silence followed the
lingering accents. The two gentlemen's faces smoothed themselves out,
and both, I knew, though I gave them no heed, sat gazing, _not_ at their
hostess. But Fanny herself was looking at me now, her light eyes quite
still in the flame of the candles, which, with their reflections in Mrs
Bowater's pier glass were not two, but four. It was into those eyes I
gazed, yet not into, only at.
All day my thoughts had remained on her, like bubbles in wine. All day
hope of the coming night and of our expedition to the woods had been, as
it were, a palace in which my girlish fancy had wandered, and now,
though only a few minutes ago I had been cheeping my small extemporary
philosophy into the ear of Dr Phelps, the fires of self-contempt and
hatred burned up in me hotter than ever.
I forgot even the dainty dressing-jacket on my back. "Miss Bowater is
pleased to be satirical," I said, my hand clenched in my lap.
"Now _was_ I?" cried Fanny, appealing to Dr Phelps, "be just to me." Dr
Phelps opened his mouth, swallowed, and shut it again.
"I really think not, you know," said Mr Crimble persuasively, coming to
her rescue. "Indeed it would be extremely kind and--er--entertaining;
though dancing--er--and--unless, perhaps, so many strangers.... We can
count in any case on your being _present_, can we not, Miss M.?" He
leaned over seductively, finger and thumb twitching at the plain gold
cross suspended from his watch-chain on his black waistcoat.
"Oh, yes," I replied, "you can count on me for the claque."
The room had sunk into a stillness. Constraint was in the air. "Then
that's settled. On New Year's Eve we--we all meet again. Unless, Miss
Bowater, there is any hope of seeing you meanwhile--just to arrange the
_titles_ and so on of your songs on the programme."
"No," smiled Fanny, "I see no hope whatever. You forget, Mr Crimble,
there are dishes to wash. And hadn't you better see Miss Finch first?"
Mr Crimble cast a strange look at her face. He was close to her, and it
was almost as if he had whispered, "Fanny." But there was no time for
further discussion. Dr Phelps, gloved and buttoned, was already at the
door.
Fanny returned into the room when our guests had taken their departure.
I heard their male voices in vivacious talk as they marched off in the
cold dark air beneath my window.
"I thought they were never going," said Fanny lightly, twisting up into
her hair an escaped ringlet. "I think, do you know, we had better say
nothing to mother about the tea--at least not yet a while. They are dull
creatures: it's pottering about so dull and sleepy a place, I suppose.
What _could_ have inspired you to invite Dr Phelps to tea? Really,
really, Miss M., you are rather astonishing. Aren't you, now?"
What right had she to speak to me like this, as if we had met again
after another life? She paused in her swift collection of the remnants
of our feast. "Sulking?" she inquired sweetly.
With an effort I kept my self-possession. "You meant what you said,
then? You really think I would sink to that?"
"'Sink!' To what? Oh, the dancing, you mean. How funny you should still
be fretting about that. Still, you look quite entertaining when you are
cross: 'Diaphenia like the daffadowndilly,' you know. Good Heavens!
Surely we shouldn't hide any kind of lights under bushels, should we?
I'm sure the Reverend Harold would agree to that. Isn't it being the
least bit pedantic?"
"I should think," I retorted, "Mr Crimble would say anything pleasant to
_any_ young woman."
"I have no doubt he would," she agreed. "The other cheek also, you know.
But the real question is what the young woman would say in reply. You
are too sensitive, Miss M."
"Perhaps I am." Oh that I could escape from this horrible net between
us. "I know this, anyhow--that I lay awake till midnight because you had
made a kind of promise to come in. Then I--I 'counted the pieces.'"
Her face whitened beneath the clear skin. "Oh, so we list----" she
began, turning on me, then checked herself. "I tell you this," she said,
her hand trembling, "I'm sick of it all. Those--those fools! Ph! I
thought that you, being as you are--snippeting along out of the
night--might understand. There's such a thing as friendship on false
pretences, Miss M."
Was she, too, addressing, as she supposed, a confidant hardly more
external to herself than that inward being whom we engage in such
endless talk and argument? Her violence shocked me; still more her
"fools." For the word was still next-door neighbour in my mind to the
dreadful "_Raca_."
"'Understand,'" I said, "I do, if you would only let me. You just hide
in your--in your own outside. You think because I am as I am that I'm
only of that much account. It's you are the--foolish. Oh, don't let us
quarrel. You just came. I never knew. Every hour, every minute...."
Inarticulate my tongue might be, but my face told its tale. She must
have heard many similar confessions, yet an almost childish incredulity
lightened in hers.
"Keep there," she said; "keep there! I won't be a moment."
She hastened out of the room with the tea things, poising an instant
like a bird on a branch as she pushed open the door with her foot. The
slave left behind her listened to her footsteps dying away in a mingling
of shame, sorrow, and of a happiness beyond words. I know now that it is
not when we are near people that we reach themselves, not, I mean, in
their looks and words, but only by following their thoughts to where the
spirit within plays and has its being. Perhaps if I had realized this
earlier, I shouldn't have fallen so easy a prey to Fanny Bowater. I
waited--but that particular exchange of confidences was never to be
completed. A key sounded in the latch. Fanny had but time to show
herself with stooping, almost serpent-like head, in the doorway.
"To-night!" she whispered. "And not a word, not a word!"