Holcroft Gives His Hand
Alida was seated by a window with some of the mending in which she
assisted, and, as usual, was apart by herself. Watterly entered the
large apartment quietly, and at first she did not observe him. He had
time to note that she was greatly dejected, and when she saw him she
hastily wiped tears from her eyes.
"You are a good deal cast down, Alida," he said, watching her closely.
"I've reason to be. I don't see any light ahead at all."
"Well, you know the old saying, 'It's darkest before day.' I want you
to come with me again. I think I've found a chance for you."
She rose with alacrity and followed. As soon as they were alone, he
turned and looked her squarely in the face as he said gravely, "You
have good common sense, haven't you?"
"I don't know, sir," she faltered, perplexed and troubled by the
question.
"Well, you can understand this much, I suppose. As superintendent of
this house I have a responsible position, which I could easily lose if
I allowed myself to be mixed up with anything wrong or improper. To
come right to the point, you don't know much about me and next to
nothing of my friend Holcroft, but can't you see that even if I was a
heartless, good-for-nothing fellow, it wouldn't be wise or safe for me
to permit anything that wouldn't bear the light?"
"I think you are an honest man, sir. It would be strange if I did not
have confidence when you have judged me and treated me so kindly. But,
Mr. Watterly, although helpless and friendless, I must try to do what I
think is best. If I accepted Mr. Holcroft's position it might do him
harm. You know how quick the world is to misjudge. It would seem to
confirm everything that has been said against me," and the same painful
flush again overspread her features.
"Well, Alida, all that you have to do is to listen patiently to my
friend. Whether you agree with his views or not, you will see that he
is a good-hearted, honest man. I want to prepare you for this talk by
assuring you that I've known him since he was a boy, that he has lived
all his life in this region and is known by many others, and that I
wouldn't dare let him ask you to do anything wrong, even if I was bad
enough."
"I'm sure, sir, you don't wish me any harm," she again faltered in deep
perplexity.
"Indeed I don't. I don't advise my friend's course; neither do I
oppose it. He's certainly old enough to act for himself. I suppose I'm
a rough counselor for a young woman, but since you appear to have so
few friends I'm inclined to act as one. Just you stand on the question
of right and wrong, and dismiss from your mind all foolish notions of
what people will say. As a rule, all the people in the world can't do
as much for us as somebody in particular. Now you go in the parlor and
listen like a sensible woman. I'll be reading the paper, and the girl
will be clearing off the table in the next room here."
Puzzled and trembling, Alida entered the apartment where Holcroft was
seated. She was so embarrassed that she could not lift her eyes to him.
"Please sit down," he said gravely, "and don't be troubled, much less
frightened. You are just as free to act as ever you were in your life."
She sat down near the door and compelled herself to look at him, for
she felt instinctively that she might gather more from the expression
of his face than from his words.
"Alida Armstrong is your name, Mr. Watterly tells me?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, Alida, I want to have a plain business talk with you. That's
nothing to be nervous and worried about, you know. As I told you, I've
heard your story. It has made me sorry for you instead of setting me
against you. It has made me respect you as a right-minded woman, and I
shall give you good proof that my words are true. At the same time, I
shan't make any false pretenses to what isn't true and couldn't be
true. Since I've heard your story, it's only fair you should hear
mine, and I ought to tell it first."
He went over the past very briefly until he came to the death of his
wife. There was simple and homely pathos in the few sentences with
which he referred to this event. Then more fully he enlarged upon his
efforts and failure to keep house with hired help. Unconsciously, he
had taken the best method to enlist her sympathy. The secluded cottage
and hillside farm became realities to her fancy. She saw how the man's
heart clung to his home, and his effort to keep it touched her deeply.
"Oh!" she thought, "I do wish there was some way for me to go there.
The loneliness of the place which drove others away is the chief
attraction for me. Then it would be pleasant to work for such a man
and make his home comfortable for him. It's plain from his words and
looks that he's as honest and straightforward as the day is long. He
only wants to keep his home and make his living in peace."
As he had talked her nervous embarrassment passed away, and the deep
sense of her own need was pressing upon her again. She saw that he
also was in great need. His business talk was revealing deep trouble
and perplexity. With the quick intuitions of a woman, her mind went
far beyond his brief sentences and saw all the difficulties of his lot.
His feeling reference to the loss of his wife proved that he was not a
coarse-natured man. As he spoke so plainly of his life during the past
year, her mind was insensibly abstracted from everything but his want
and hers, and she thought his farmhouse afforded just the secluded
refuge she craved. As he drew near the end of his story and hesitated
in visible embarrassment, she mustered courage to say timidly, "Would
you permit a suggestion from me?"
"Why, certainly."
"You have said, sir, that your business and means would not allow you
to keep two in help, and as you have been speaking I have tried to
think of some way. The fact that your house is so lonely is just the
reason why I should like to work in it. As you can understand, I have
no wish to meet strangers. Now, sir, I am willing to work for very
little; I should be glad to find such a quiet refuge for simply my
board and clothes, and I would do my very best and try to learn what I
did not know. It seems to me that if I worked for so little you might
think you could afford to hire some elderly woman also?" and she looked
at him in the eager hope that he would accept her proposition.
He shook his head as he replied, "I don't know of any such person. I
took the best one in this house, and you know how she turned out."
"Perhaps Mr. Watterly may know of someone else," she faltered. She was
now deeply troubled and perplexed again, supposing that he was about to
renew his first proposition that she should be his only help.
"If Mr. Watterly did know of anyone I would make the trial, but he does
not. Your offer is very considerate and reasonable, but--" and he
hesitated again, scarcely knowing how to go on.
"I am sorry, sir," she said, rising, as if to end the interview.
"Stay," he said, "you do not understand me yet. Of course I should not
make you the same offer that I did at first, after seeing your feeling
about it, and I respect you all the more because you so respect
yourself. What I had in mind was to give you my name, and it's an
honest name. If we were married it would be perfectly proper for you
to go with me, and no one could say a word against either of us."
"Oh!" she gasped, in strong agitation and surprise.
"Now don't be so taken aback. It's just as easy for you to refuse as
it is to speak, but listen first. What seems strange and unexpected
may be the most sensible thing for us both. You have your side of the
case to think of just as truly as I have mine; and I'm not forgetting,
and I don't ask you to forget, that I'm still talking business. You
and I have both been through too much trouble and loss to say any silly
nonsense to each other. You've heard my story, yet I'm almost a
stranger to you as you are to me. We'd both have to take considerable
on trust. Yet I know I'm honest and well-meaning, and I believe you
are. Now look at it. Here we are, both much alone in the world--both
wishing to live a retired, quiet life. I don't care a rap for what
people say as long as I'm doing right, and in this case they'd have
nothing to say. It's our own business. I don't see as people will
ever do much for you, and a good many would impose on you and expect
you to work beyond your strength. They might not be very kind or
considerate, either. I suppose you've thought of this?"
"Yes," she replied with bowed head. "I should meet coldness, probably
harshness and scorn."
"Well, you'd never meet anything of the kind in my house. I would
treat you with respect and kindness. At the same time, I'm not going
to mislead you by a word. You shall have a chance to decide in view of
the whole truth. My friend, Mr. Watterly, has asked me more'n once,
'Why don't you marry again?' I told him I had been married once, and
that I couldn't go before a minister and promise the same things over
again when they wasn't true. I can't make to you any promises or say
any words that are not true, and I don't ask or expect you to do what I
can't do. But it has seemed to me that our condition was out of the
common lot--that we could take each other for just what we might be to
each other and no more. You would be my wife in name, and I do not ask
you to be my wife in more than name. You would thus secure a good home
and the care and protection of one who would be kind to you, and I
would secure a housekeeper--one that would stay with me and make my
interests hers. It would be a fair, square arrangement between
ourselves, and nobody else's business. By taking this course, we don't
do any wrong to our feelings or have to say or promise anything that
isn't true."
"Yet I can't help saying, sir," she replied, in strong, yet repressed
agitation, "that your words sound very strange; and it seems stranger
still that you can offer marriage of any kind to a woman situated as I
am. You know my story, sir," she added, crimsoning, "and all may soon
know it. You would suffer wrong and injury."
"I offer you open and honorable marriage before the world, and no other
kind. Mr. Watterly and others--as many as you pleased--would witness
it, and I'd have you given a certificate at once. As for your story,
it has only awakened my sympathy. You have not meant to do any wrong.
Your troubles are only another reason in my mind for not taking any
advantage of you or deceiving you in the least. Look the truth
squarely in the face. I'm bent on keeping my house and getting my
living as I have done, and I need a housekeeper that will be true to
all my interests. Think how I've been robbed and wronged, and what a
dog's life I've lived in my own home. You need a home, a support, and
a protector. I couldn't come to you or go to any other woman and say
honestly more than this. Isn't it better for people to be united on
the ground of truth than to begin by telling a pack of lies?"
"But--but can people be married with such an understanding by a
minister? Wouldn't it be deceiving him?"
"I shall not ask you to deceive anyone. Any marriage that either you
or I could now make would be practically a business marriage. I should
therefore take you, if you were willing, to a justice and have a legal
or civil marriage performed, and this would be just as binding as any
other in the eye of the law. It is often done. This would be much
better to my mind than if people, situated as we are, went to a church
or a minister."
"Yes, yes, I couldn't do that."
"Well, now, Alida," he said, with a smile that wonderfully softened his
rugged features, "you are free to decide. It may seem to you a strange
sort of courtship, but we are both too old for much foolishness. I
never was sentimental, and it would be ridiculous to begin now. I'm
full of trouble and perplexity, and so are you. Are you willing to be
my wife so far as an honest name goes, and help me make a living for us
both? That's all I ask. I, in my turn, would promise to treat you
with kindness and respect, and give you a home as long as I lived and
to leave you all I have in the world if I died. That's all I could
promise. I'm a lonely, quiet man, and like to be by myself. I
wouldn't be much society for you. I've said more today than I might in
a month, for I felt that it was due to you to know just what you were
doing."
"Oh, sir," said Alida, trembling, and with tears in her eyes, "you do
not ask much and you offer a great deal. If you, a strong man, dread
to leave your home and go out into the world you know not where, think
how terrible it is for a weak, friendless woman to be worse than
homeless. I have lost everything, even my good name."
"No, no! Not in my eyes."
"Oh, I know, I know!" she cried, wringing her hands. "Even these
miserable paupers like myself have made me feel it. They have burned
the truth into my brain and heart. Indeed, sir, you do not realize
what you are doing or asking. It is not fit or meet that I should bear
your name. You might be sorry, indeed."
"Alida," said Holcroft gravely, "I've not forgotten your story, and you
shouldn't forget mine. Be sensible now. Don't I look old enough to
know what I'm about?"
"Oh, oh, oh!" she cried impetuously, "if I were only sure it was right!
It may be business to you, but it seems like life or death to me. It's
more than death--I don't fear that--but I do fear life, I do fear the
desperate struggle just to maintain a bare, dreary existence. I do
dread going out among strangers and seeing their cold curiosity and
their scorn. You can't understand a woman's heart. It isn't right for
me to die till God takes me, but life has seemed so horrible, meeting
suspicion on one side and cruel, significant looks of knowledge on the
other. I've been tortured even here by these wretched hags, and I've
envied even them, so near to death, yet not ashamed like me. I know,
and you should know, that my heart is broken, crushed, trampled into
the mire. I had felt that for me even the thought of marriage again
would be a mockery, a wicked thing, which I would never have a right to
entertain.--I never dreamt that anyone would think of such a thing,
knowing what you know. Oh, oh! Why have you tempted me so if it is
not right? I must do right. The feeling that I've not meant to do
wrong is all that has kept me from despair. But can it be right to let
you take me from the street, the poorhouse, with nothing to give but a
blighted name, a broken heart and feeble hands! See, I am but the
shadow of what I was, and a dark shadow at that. I could be only a
dismal shadow at any man's hearth. Oh, oh! I've thought and suffered
until my reason seemed going. You don't realize, you don't know the
depths into which I've fallen. It can't be right."
Holcroft was almost appalled at this passionate outburst in one who
thus far had been sad, indeed, yet self-controlled. He looked at her
in mingled pity and consternation. His own troubles had seemed heavy
enough, but he now caught glimpses of something far beyond trouble--of
agony, of mortal dread that bordered on despair. He could scarcely
comprehend how terrible to a woman like Alida were the recent events of
her life, and how circumstances, with illness, had all tended to create
a morbid horror of her situation. Like himself she was naturally
reticent in regard to her deeper feelings, patient and undemonstrative.
Had not his words evoked this outburst she might have suffered and died
in silence, but in this final conflict between conscience and hope, the
hot lava of her heart had broken forth. So little was he then able to
understand her, that suspicions crossed his mind. Perhaps his friend
Watterly had not heard the true story or else not the whole story. But
his straightforward simplicity stood him in good stead, and he said
gently, "Alida, you say I don't know, I don't realize. I believe you
will tell me the truth. You went to a minister and were married to a
man that you thought you had a right to marry--"
"You shall know it all from my own lips," she said, interrupting him;
"you have a right to know; and then you will see that it cannot be,"
and with bowed head, and low, rapid, passionate utterance, she poured
out her story. "That woman, his wife," she concluded, "made me feel
that I was of the scum and offscouring of the earth, and they've made
me feel so here, too--even these wretched paupers. So the world will
look on me till God takes me to my mother. O, thank God! She don't
know. Don' you see, now?" she asked, raising her despairing eyes from
which agony had dried all tears.
"Yes, I see you do," she added desperately, "for even you have turned
from me."
"Confound it!" cried Holcroft, standing up and searching his pockets
for a handkerchief. "I--I--I'd like--like to choke that fellow. If I
could get my hands on him, there'd be trouble. Turn away from you, you
poor wronged creature! Don't you see I'm so sorry for you that I'm
making a fool of myself? I, who couldn't shed a tear over my own
troubles--there, there,--come now, let us be sensible. Let's get back
to business, for I can't stand this kind of thing at all. I'm so
confused betwixt rage at him and pity for you--Let me see; this is
where we were: I want someone to take care of my home, and you want a
home. That's all there is about it now. If you say so, I'll make you
Mrs. Holcroft in an hour."
"I did not mean to work upon your sympathies, only to tell you the
truth. God bless you! That the impulses of your heart are so kind and
merciful. But let me be true to you as well as to myself. Go away and
think it all over calmly and quietly. Even for the sake of being
rescued from a life that I dread far more than death, I cannot let you
do that which you may regret unspeakably. Do not think I misunderstand
your offer. It's the only one I could think of, and I would not have
thought of it if you had not spoke. I have no heart to give. I could
be a wife only in name, but I could work like a slave for protection
from a cruel, jeering world; I could hope for something like peace and
respite from suffering if I only had a safe refuge. But I must not
have these if it is not right and best. Good to me must not come
through wrong to you."
"Tush, tush! You mustn't talk so. I can't stand it at all. I've
heard your story. It's just as I supposed at first, only a great deal
more so. Why, of course it's all right. It makes me believe in
Providence, it all turns out so entirely for our mutual good. I can do
as much to help you as you to help me. Now let's get back on the
sensible, solid ground from which we started. The idea of my wanting
you to work like a slave! Like enough some people would, and then
you'd soon break down and be brought back here again. No, no; I've
explained just what I wish and just what I mean. You must get over the
notion that I'm a sentimental fool, carried away by my feelings. How
Tom Watterly would laugh at the idea! My mind is made up now just as
much as it would be a week hence. This is no place for you, and I
don't like to think of your being here. My spring work is pressing,
too. Don't you see that by doing what I ask you can set me right on my
feet and start me uphill again after a year of miserable downhill work?
You have only to agree to what I've said, and you will be at home
tonight and I'll be quietly at my work tomorrow. Mr. Watterly will go
with us to the justice, who has known me all my life. Then, if anyone
ever says a word against you, he'll have me to settle with. Come,
Alida! Here's a strong hand that's able to take care of you."
She hesitated a moment, then clasped it like one who is sinking, and
before he divined her purpose, she kissed and bedewed it with tears.