HOW MARIANNE SHOWED THAT LETTER TO AN INTIMATE FRIEND, MRS. ELDRIDGE.
WHERE WAS THAT SOFA? OF COUNTRY AND TOWN HOUSES. JEALOUSY
Marianne Challis had never become quite reconciled to her new life
at the Hermitage at Wimbledon, obvious as was the improvement on her
old home in Great Coram Street. What she would have liked would have
been that Titus--for she had adopted the Christian name of his _nom de
plume_, not without pride--should become a brilliant and successful
author, that a plentiful income should take the place of the modest
salary of a subordinate--important, but still a subordinate--in a City
accountant's; but that, nevertheless, their old life should go on as it
had done since their marriage nine years ago.
She made little concessions and reservations. They would have had
a bath put up in the little room next the nursery, on the second
floor, with a regular hot-water service from the kitchen. The old
kitchen-range might have been got rid of at the same time, and a new
one put in its place, with a proper oven, and then it wouldn't have
been one long grumble-grumble-grumble from Elizabeth Barclay all day
long. They could have had the roof seen to, and the window-frames seen
to, and the drains seen to, and all the substantial repairs attended
to; and they could have made the landlord do it as soon as they were
in a position to threaten him with legal proceedings if he didn't.
But really, when you have no means but a limited salary, and a boy's
schooling to pay for!----so Mrs. Challis said to Mrs. Eldridge, a
friend in her confidence, and as _she_ didn't finish the sentence, we
need not. And then the drawing-room could have been made quite pretty,
with the same patterned paper, of course, and as near as we could get
the carpet. Only it was second-hand when poor Kate bought it fourteen
years ago, and the man from Shoolbred's said the pattern was out of
date. And as for the beds and the blinds and curtains, it would have
been just as easy to have them all new at Coram Street as at Wimbledon.
And really Titus could have done perfectly well with the top back
attic, out of the noise, to do his writing in. It could have been made
quite nice, and would have looked ever so much bigger with bookcases
round.
However, it couldn't be helped now. Titus had condemned the top back
attic, and made a fuss about the walls sloping in. Of course, she only
meant bookcases on the straight-up walls. But men were like that, and
you might talk to them till Doomsday. Mrs. Challis left something
defective here also, and we are again under no obligation to complete
the sentence for her.
Of course Titus had a much nicer room now--at least, a much larger one.
What he wanted such a big room for Marianne couldn't imagine. Just
look at the way he wrote that first book, "The Spendthrift's Legacy."
In pocket-books and on omnibuses! Just everywhere! However, it pleased
him, and when he was pleased he was satisfied. As long as he didn't
complain! And yet once more Mrs. Eldridge had to nod an implied easy
interpretation with closed lips. She--a wife herself--could understand.
Very likely the might-have-been, in Marianne Challis's mind, of a
glorified Great Coram Street, with the successful author turning out
immortal works in a glorified top back attic, was only an allotropic
form of a condemnation of things that had come to pass at the new home
at Wimbledon. Very likely, too, it was unconscious on her part. She may
never have noticed that the imaginary new chapters of the closed volume
of the old home contained no reference to the new friends her husband's
great success had brought about him, to the new Club he belonged to,
and met celebrities at, to the dinner invitations that frankly left her
out, and--almost more irritating--those that followed a perfunctory
card-shedding visit that shouted aloud, "Because we can't ask him
and leave _you_ out, good author's wife!" The imaginary visitors her
fancy saw in the renovated might-have-been drawing-room were John
and Charlotte Eldridge, and the Smithsons and Miss Macculloch--not
grandma; for Marianne's desire for her mother's presence did not go
to the length of cancelling her bronchitis in order to bring her out
on imaginary Saturday evenings. And those visionary social gatherings
never held a dream of young authoresses, with a strange power of
appealing to our hidden sympathies, and dresses that must have cost
God knows what. But she never noticed the omission. Nor that of the
theatrical people, nor the press people; nor the swells--male and
female--who came to sit at the feet of Genius, and be civil to its
wife, who, though she may have been slow about _some_ things, could see
through all _that_, and really never went out, thank you!
But a few days' change was just what her husband wanted. That was
what she had said to Lady Arkroyd of Royd Hall, in Rankshire, a case
in point, whom her husband had met at Sir Spender's, as he called
him, and had encouraged to call on Mrs. Challis at Wimbledon. Now,
at Great Coram Street, or the glorified fetch of it, no such person
appeared; though, indeed, a few inexplicable fetches were supplied by
fancy of people who were in earnest when they wanted her to come too.
Neither Lady Arkroyd nor Lady Betty Inglis, who accompanied her, had
gone beyond civility point--only men never saw anything, you knew they
didn't!
Charlotte Eldridge (in this case) knew perfectly, dear!--and backed
up Marianne in refusing to go to Royd. Alfred Challis said it was the
merest temper; but was he sorry she didn't go?--Marianne wondered. She
rather preferred not going, to say the truth, but she would have liked
Titus to be really sorry. And even though she had known just as well
that he was only pretending he wanted her to come too, she would have
liked him to pretend a little better. If he had done this, she would
really have enjoyed his absence a great deal more, and it would have
helped her to believe she didn't enjoy it. She honestly wanted to.
Because she was one of those housekeepers who reconcile good
housekeeping with what they call a little peace and quiet. These
ends are contributed to by the temporary abeyance of the household.
Scarcely by its permanent absence--that would alter the character of
the position altogether. This position was that an unendurable stress
of responsibility was borne by the house's mistress in her position,
so to speak, of ship's master. The navigation rested entirely on her
shoulders, and the Captain meddled. Captains seldom did anything
else, and there _was_ no peace and quiet until they were at their
office in the City, or locked up in their cabin as might be. In that
cabin, as in Challis's case, they pursued some private end which had
no relation to the stern realities of Life. It might chance, as was
admitted in theory, to have something to do with the settlement of
weekly accounts--a remote connection of a vague ideal kind. But the
keeping of the log, the regulation of the chronometers, the comparison
of charts--well, really, it was impossible to attend to them for the
fidget, till the Captain was safely entombed in his cabin and out of
the way! And Charlotte Eldridge knew all that as well as Marianne did.
_She_ could understand, if anyone could. As for schoolboys, everybody
knew what a boy in a house was; hence, broadly speaking, the sooner he
was back at school the better. When home for the holidays, there was
_no_ peace; and it was just as well to look the fact in the face and
not be deceived by any false prophets.
However, there was something to be said for the prophets in that
Jerusalem at Wimbledon when the nominal head of the household was on
a visit in the country, and that dreadful boy was playing cricket
and wouldn't be back till late. This September afternoon there was a
little peace and quiet at last, and Charlotte Eldridge and Mrs. Challis
could chat--at least, till the husband of the former called in on his
way from the station to walk home with her across the common. Let the
record of their talk be taken anywhere, at random. Take the images of
them, also at random, from any one of a thousand semi-detached villas
in the suburbs of London, and, if you choose ladies of thirty odd, true
centres of the English middle-class, you will have all the description
you will want for the present.
"They're not girls. At least, _I_ don't call them girls," said Mrs.
Challis, shutting the pot-lid on the tea. Then she blew the spirit out,
because it wasn't wanted any more.
"Twenty-six and twenty-four," said the other lady. Not an opinion of
her own, but a placarding of authorized figures for consideration. They
remained in view, neither sanctioned nor censured. Marianne left the
point.
"Why aren't they married, is what I look at."
"Looks, perhaps. Or short tempers. Either tells. Does Mr. Challis
mention their figures? Because figures go a long way." Mrs. Eldridge
seems to speak as an authority. Marianne nods agreement as a general
rule. But presently takes exception:
"There would be money," she says. "And that makes a difference.
Besides, his letter lays a good deal of stress on one of their figures.
I'm never surprised at figures when it's those sort of persons, in
girls. They have to." The implication seemed to be that the she-toff,
figureless, got suppressed--cancelled somehow.
"He says looks _too_, doesn't he?"
"One of them, certainly. But you can't tell, from men. And it's one
thing one time, another another." Here a pause, following a question
from Mrs. Eldridge, "Have you stirred it?" and an irrelevant answer, "I
don't want it to get too strong," from Mrs. Challis. Then tea. During
which the subject is picked up and dropped at intervals, an eye being
kept on it throughout. It is like a mouse a cat is warden of.
"I suppose the good-looking one is the one he sees most of. They do."
Mrs. Eldridge is enigmatical.
Her friend is almost equally so. "I suppose it's better always to take
no notice of it," she says.
"Always better." Decisively, as from an authority.
"The other one carves something, or does art needlework. When grandma
was a girl they did painting on velvet--poonah, it was called. Or took
likenesses. But then they wore ringlets."
"I know. And their waists were goodness knows where. But they did ruins
in water-colours."
"In sepia. Ma has some in a portfolio. Ready for your other cup?" The
answer is substantially in the affirmative.
"Don't put the sugar in this time. They're such big lumps....
Thanks!... Yes, that was before it was Art Things, and Liberty's. They
were just regarded as accomplishments where there were daughters.
Then, if they became old maids, they kept it up. Because they had such
families." This did not mean that the old maids of three generations
back created scandals, but that our grandmothers' domestic cares stood
in the way of their career as poonah-painters and so forth.
Mrs. Challis cut the cake. Some always wait till this stage of tea to
do this. But there are many schools. Then she said: "Titus says it's
photography has put an end to all that sort of thing. I shouldn't
wonder."
"Nor I." But Mrs. Eldridge adds that she doesn't care about Art Objects
for their own sake, though they do for presents. She then picks up the
dropped mouse she has had an eye on. "Which is the one that slums?" she
asks.
"Oh--both! So does their lady-mother." There is a trace of bitterness
in this expression. "But only by the way. I don't suppose they stick to
anything."
"What does the good-looking one do?" No immediate answer coming, the
speaker throws a light, "Perhaps she's a vegetarian, or antivivisects?"
"No, it's neither of those. But I've no business to tell. Titus said
not, in the postscript."
"He wouldn't mind me."
"I don't know, dear. Perhaps it was you he meant. However, you must
promise not to tell, if I get the letter."
"My dear!--as if I should tell! You know I never say a word!"
Marianne felt she had done her duty by this letter as she left the room
to get it. For had she not honourably resolved not to show it, and even
gone the length of locking it into a drawer to prove her resolution?
And didn't her getting up from her tea show what an honourable intent
she had been acting under? Oh yes, she had done her duty. Besides, what
did it matter?
"Here's his letter. I don't expect he'll be home till Thursday.... No,
I suppose I mustn't show you the whole. I'll read the bits."
"You hadn't had your tea." Mrs. Eldridge felt quite secure of the
mouse, as she knew her husband wouldn't come before 6.30, and the
train was always behind. She felt so secure that she interjected a
remark on another subject--dress. She saw Marianne had on her plaid,
and admitted her wisdom; it had gone so much colder. How those stuffs
did last out! It really looked as good as new. Then she recommended
those little oblong things with jam in the middle, which she had tried
and her hostess hadn't; the latter, though, had bought them at the new
confectioner's.
Marianne put the letter safe out of the way of spills and slops, and
finished her tea. During which the mouse may be said to have remained
on the floor, watched. Then she picked up the letter, and after
glancing through a page not germane to the matter, identified that
which was. "Here it is," she said, and went on reading:--"'You will
be amused at what I think I have found out about Judith, the handsome
eldest one I told you of. She is stage-struck--wants to go on the
boards! She has not said it directly to me, but I feel pretty certain
that a "friend" she tells me of, who has these aspirations, is no other
than _herself_. However, I may be mistaken. This is what I judge from:
We were sitting on a sofa'...." The reader paused, looking on into the
text.
Mrs. Eldridge struck in: "Where was the sofa? Does he say where the
sofa was?"
"My dear Charlotte!" Marianne expostulated, "_can_ it matter? Besides,
he _says_---- However, I'll go straight on if you're going to fancy
I'm leaving anything out." And then continued, reading fair: "...
'on a sofa in the drawing-room after dinner. When she had told me
about this friend, having asked me first if I knew lots of actors and
actresses, I asked what sort of looking girl the friend was. _I saw her
look in a glass on the wall before she answered._ And then she said
something rather evasive about beauty being a matter of opinion, and
that there was probably enough in this case for working purposes. She
had disparaged her friend's performance, as it struck me, out of all
proportion to her apparent anxiety to advocate her cause, and a sort
of confidence that she would succeed. I put this down to protest of
personal modesty, as well as the look in the glass.'"
Marianne paused, saying, "I see that," and Mrs. Eldridge said also:
"I see _that_." Whereupon the former said, unreasonably: "What _don't_
you see?" and her friend replied: "Nothing. Go on." Which Marianne did,
after a very slight hesitation, as of doubt.
"'I annex a plan of the position showing the angle at which the mirror
was placed, the relative positions of myself and the lady, and our
respective images in the glass. So I could see plainly by looking
at her reflection that she took a good long look at herself before
answering my question.'"
"Is there another cup left, dear?" said Mrs. Eldridge. "Never mind if
you haven't...."
"It won't be good," said the tea-maker feelingly. But the applicant
said never mind, that would do! She liked it strong. But might she look
at the plan? She would promise not to read. There was nothing there she
needn't read, said her friend. Nevertheless, she folded back the script
behind the rough bird's-eye view, with dotted lines of sight to show
how things had worked.
"Well!" said Marianne, as she handed the cup of tea--which didn't look
bad.
"I don't believe the sofa was half as long as that."
"Charlotte--you're ridiculous!"
"Well, I _don't_! Now go on reading.... 'She took a good long look
at herself....'" Mrs. Eldridge considered whether she should reveal
the thought in her mind that Mr. Challis must also have taken a good
long look to know. No!--she would not! Whatever she was, she was not
a mischief-maker; and to prove this to her own satisfaction, she
not infrequently abstained from saying something about a lady and
gentleman. She often found an opportunity of doing this, as she never
thought on any subject not spiced with both. Satisfaction to conscience
through this abstention would be sure to result in free handling soon
after. Also, the abstention was easy to her this time, because she
believed--rightly or wrongly--that Marianne knew she was making it.
Perhaps rightly, but no outward sign to that effect came. Marianne
glanced forward in the letter, and went on reading: "'This young woman,
I fancy, is savagely jealous of the younger sister posing as an active
promoter of all sorts of upnesses-to-date....' I wish," said the reader
parenthetically, "that Titus wouldn't use such unusual expressions.
I dare say they are very clever, but I don't profess to understand
... what?... Oh, of course, I see what he _means_, but it's a kind
of thing I shall never understand.... No, my dear Charlotte!--it's
no use talking and trying to persuade me. 'Upnesses-to-date'--just
fancy!" Now Titus had been in two minds whether to allow this phrase
to remain, but had decided to do so, as better on the whole than
to provoke speculation over an obliterated text. _He_ might have
speculated himself over such an erasure.
"I don't think it implies anything," said Mrs. Eldridge, meaning of
course, anything about a lady and gentleman. "I fancy he is only
referring to Art Movements and Liberty silks and things. Go on." And
Marianne read:
"'All sorts of upnesses-to-date, doing things her grandmothers would
have thought _infra dig_....' What does that mean?"
"Lord, Marianne!--_that_ doesn't mean anything. Do go on. Only what
they would be too swell to do! That's all." Marianne continued:
"'_Infra dig._, while she herself is not allowed to try her luck and
face the music. She has the courage for it, evidently. Old Norman
blood! By-the-bye, I've been damning William the Conqueror up and down
ever since I came. For the old cock is besotted about him. Says he was
the first Socialist, and never talks of anything else!'... It's not
interesting, this!" She stopped.
"No--that's not interesting. I want to hear more about the girl's
looks. Couldn't you find what he says about her figure? You said he
laid stress on it."
"In his other letter. Tall and striking. Dignified kind of girl."
"I should hardly call that laying stress on her _figure_, as such."
Mrs. Challis reflects upon this rather paradoxical view of her
friend's. She is not as clear as she might be often over her husband's
elisions and hyperboles, and does not feel sure she reported him
rightly. "Perhaps," she says, "I should not have said 'laid stress
on.'" Her friend says oh no!--"laid stress on" was all right. But there
was some indeterminateness in what he was said to have laid stress
on. However, Mrs. Eldridge excuses further elucidation. "Sure there's
nothing more about that girl?" she asks.
"Yes, there's some more somewhere. Oh--here!... 'As to the lovely
Judith, of course, she might prove a duffer behind the footlights. But
then, again, she mightn't. She's the very thing for Aminta Torrington
in "Mistaken Delicacy."' That's the name his new play's to be called. I
liked 'Atalanta in Paddington' better myself."
"Not nearly such a good title. No! If 'Mistaken Delicacy' hasn't been
had a dozen times before, there couldn't be a better title. Of course,
he wants her to play in it. What else is there?"
"'Very thing for Aminta Torrington....' Oh yes!--it's here ... 'and I
shall try to get her to see Prester John about it' ... that's what they
call Mr.--what's his name?--the manager at the Megatherium, don't you
know?... 'about it, and see if we couldn't drill her up to performance
point. She couldn't be a total ...' something crossed out...."
"Let me look ... oh no--that's nothing! Only _fiasco_. It's the same
as failure." Mrs. Eldridge retained the letter and went on reading,
unopposed. The erasure had clearly been an almost insultingly merciful
one, to meet a defective knowledge half-way. She went on reading,
scrapwise, half inaudibly at times; sometimes saying "hm-hm-hm," to
stand for omissions.... "'Couldn't be a total failure, because it
isn't every day ... thing happens ... sort of Court-beauty ... good
family ... make a set-off against inexperience ...' hm-hm! ... 'elocution
very good, as far as I can judge....' I don't see any more about her."
Mrs. Eldridge read a good deal more of the letter to make sure of the
point, although Marianne reached out her hand to take it back. The
latter lady was looking rather nettled. She knew that _fiasco_ meant
_fizzle_ perfectly well, and it was ridiculous of Titus to treat her
like a schoolgirl.
Those who know the sort of person this young mater-familias in a plain
dress was, must know also what she meant by the phrase "a proper
pride." It is easy for superior persons--toffs of birth, toffs of
Science, Letters, Art--to decide that this phenomenon is a ridiculous
egotism in anything so middle, so Victorian, so redolent of Leech or
Cruikshank as Marianne Challis; to pronounce it an outcome of a simple
incapacity to realize her own insignificance. Gracious mercy!--suppose
we were all suddenly to "realize" our own insignificance!... But
really the subject is not one that will bear thinking of. Dismiss your
insignificance with a caution! And pray for a cloudy sky, that the
stars may not remind you of it.
When Charlotte Eldridge had read all down the next page of the letter,
she surrendered it to the hand that was waiting for it. But, even then,
not without a glance down the following one as she let it go. Her
friend apologized for taking it away.
"I shouldn't mind your reading it all, dear," she said. "But as I
promised...!"
"Quite right, dear!" And both these ladies felt they had made a
sacrifice to Duty. The letter wasn't to be shown, and a great deal of
it had _not_ been shown. What more could the most exacting ask? How
many ideals are as nearly attained in this imperfect world?
"However, there's nothing in what you haven't seen that could have
interested you in the very least." Having made out a good case for
Conscience, why weaken it? But probably Mrs. Challis is unaware that
she does so. "No!--there's not a word more about the girl." This is in
answer to a question that could hardly remain unanswered merely because
nobody had asked it. The negative chilled the conversation. _Why_ was
there not a word more about the girl?
A disturbance upstairs caused Mrs. Challis to get up and leave the
room. It was those children. Oh dear, what little plagues they were!
Presently she came back, explanatory. She believed it was really that
odious girl Martha's fault. She would have to get rid of her. But Titus
always sided with the girl, and that made it so difficult.... What was
it this time?... Oh, the child wanted the iron. Martha was ironing, and
of course paying no attention, and Emmie had burnt herself. No--not
badly; but a nasty burn! Marianne's style does not favour definition.
The two ladies sit on into the twilight--early, from a southeast
wind bringing the town-fog westward--and are less talkative. The
slow-combustion grate's first snail-like manifestations this year--for
the weather has been mild till to-day--begin to glimmer in a half-dusk
favourable to their detection. The children will be down directly to
say good-night. One can't talk till they are done with and out of the
way. Presently they come, but are not allowed to rush to the cake at
once. They shall have some directly. The casualty, Emmie, who yelled,
exhibits an arm between four and five years old with a scar on it. She
consents to goldbeater's skin on condition that she licks the place
herself. But what did that matter when there was cake? All children
have but one relation to cake. They _want_ it, and when that piece is
done, they want another the same size, or larger. These two were quite
one with their kind on this point, but they took the first piece behind
a sofa to devour it; even as a Royal Bengal Tiger at the Zoological
carries away a horror a vegetarian would die of into his bedroom, lest
you should get it and eat it first. But they came out for more; which
the tiger never does, because he knows it isn't any use, and prefers to
pretend he doesn't care to ask favours and be refused.
"I shall give them a couple of grains of Dover's powder apiece," said
their mother. "They've had nothing for a month." This good lady held
with the practice of a dose now and again, independent of symptoms. "If
it were not for me, they would be left altogether without medicine.
It's a thing their father always opposes me about." The words "Dover's
powder" were said a little too soon to be unheard by the persons
concerned, and the consequence was that Emmie, the younger one, bit
Martha, the nurse, going upstairs. However, this incident, with the
ructions that arose from it, was closed in time; and a little more
peace and quiet followed in its wake.
"I wonder at your husband and that Martha girl. Look at her teeth!"
"My dear Charlotte, Titus quite likes Martha, compared to Harmood,
whose teeth are really good, considering that she only takes sixteen
pounds." Harmood was the house-and-parlourmaid--a special antipathy of
the great author's.
"Well!--I wonder at it, is all I can say. They go so much by teeth.
Besides, look at the way she hooks her dress. The whole thing! You may
depend on it that Mr. Challis is only doing it for a blind, because
Harmood's pretty...."
"Doing what for a blind?"
"Oh, my dear child, what a silly you are! You know perfectly well what
I mean. That sort of thing. He wants you to think he hasn't any eyes,
and makes believe to prefer the ugly one. Lots of husbands go on like
that--only simpletons never see anything."
"I can't see that it makes any difference to me, either way."
"Very well, dear! Look at it your own way. Only don't blame me and say
I didn't tell you!"
Marianne wanted to say something sharp to her friend, but could not,
owing to lack of constructive power in emergencies. However, as that
lady closed with a snap, even as a moral physician who had written
a prescription and done her duty, there was time to consider an
extempore--an _ex multo tempore_, one might say.
"I wish you would say exactly what you mean, Charlotte."
"What about? About the servants?"
"No. About Titus."
"My dear Marianne, it isn't any use talking about it. A woman in your
position has to expect it...."
"Yes! But expect what?"
"If you won't interrupt me, I'll tell you. Of course, you know I
know perfectly well your husband is to be trusted, and all that sort
of thing. He has too much genuine regard for you. But I always have
thought, and always shall think, that men can't help themselves...."
"What for? I mean, why do you go on raking up? Can't you leave alone?"
"That's just what I was going to say, dear! Especially in this case.
Because there's really no need, if you come to think of it. I'll tell
you, dear, exactly what I should _recommend_ you to do--what _I_ should
do if I were in your place. I should either say _absolutely nothing_,
or if I said anything at all, just make it chaff--talk about his new
flame--say you will evidently have to get somebody else, don't you see?
As if it was entirely out of the question! Or perhaps that would be
dangerous, and it wouldn't do to have him thinking you suspected him of
fancying you weren't in earnest. No!--on the whole, I recommend saying
_absolutely nothing_."
Marianne's brain refuses to receive complications beyond a certain
point. She picks up the last intelligible phrase. "As if _what_ was
entirely out of the question?"
But Mrs. Eldridge is on her guard against making mischief. "You mustn't
run away with the idea that I said there _was_ anything," is the form
her caution takes. And then, in response to an angry flush on her
friend's face, "I'm sure there isn't the slightest reason for you to
be uneasy. I have far too much faith in your husband to suppose such a
thing possible for one moment.... No, indeed, dear!--even if she gets
him to get her into this play of his--and then, of course, they would
go on seeing each other--I shouldn't feel the smallest uneasiness.
Because look at her social position!"
"What _has_ her social position got to do with it?"
Mrs. Eldridge elevates her eyebrows, and perhaps her shoulders,
slightly, as though asking space what next? But she brings both down to
the level of her friend's knowledge of the world before answering: "I
should have said _everything_. A woman in her position doesn't commit
herself in any way with a man in your husband's, however distinguished
he may be. Read any divorce case of that sort of people, and see
if they don't have co-respondents of condition. Of course, I'm not
speaking of disgraceful cases, where the woman isn't received after.
But ordinary divorce cases in Fashionable Life."
"I can't see what you're talking about, Charlotte."
"Then I can't help it, dear. But I should have thought it was pretty
plain, for all that!"
Marianne laughs, a little uneasily. "Do you mean to say, Charlotte,
that because Titus goes away for a week to a country-house...?"
"Go on, dear." But Marianne is not constitutionally a
sentence-finisher. She begins again:
"Why isn't Titus to speak to a lady without a preach about it?"
"My dear child, nobody's preaching. If you were to listen to me,
instead of becoming impatient...."
"I'm not impatient! But you know it's irritating, and you can't deny
it."
"Very well, dear, I don't then. But let me finish what I was saying.
If you had listened to me, you would have seen my meaning. I was
all the time exonerating your husband from the suspicion of even
the slightest flirtation with this showy girl. I was trying to make
your mind easy about them, and to say that even if they _are_ rather
thrown together--as of course they must be, because one knows what
country-houses are...."
"Now, Charlotte, that _is_ nonsense! Why are country-houses any
different from town-houses? What stuff!" Marianne sees a light on
the horizon. She knows about country-houses, because she was a girl
in the country once. But much of her friend's analyses and insights
had been so much unqualified Sordello to her, and had left her brain
spinning. She can and will hold fast that which is good, and stick to
the country-houses. And clearly, if she can prove that country and
town houses are on all fours for the purposes of Charlotte's world--a
world where a sort of dowdy Eros dodders respectably about, all the
Greek fire knocked out of him--then a stopper will be put on these
suggestions of infidelities. She does not see all the connecting-links,
but would like to unhorse her opponent somehow.
That lady is also ready to let the issue turn provisionally on town and
country-house life. But this is for a reason of her own. She pursues
the subject: "It's _not_ stuff, dear. There's all the difference in
the world. In country-houses people split up into couples, and there's
no check. Chaperones on long walks, of course!--only they can't go so
quick, and get left behind. In town, no such thing. And there's really
no such thing as staying with, in town, either. Practically! Of course,
now and again friends from the country to stay a few days. But it isn't
the same thing, going to the Royal Academy and the New Gallery. The
Zoological Gardens is a good deal more like, only scarcely anybody
goes. Wasn't that John's knock?"
It was, apparently, and was followed by John's pocket-handkerchief--at
least, that was how a very loud noise was inexactly classified.
Whatever its proper name was, it caused its promoter's wife to fear
his cold was worse. He must have his feet in mustard and hot water.
But his attitude was, when he had replaced the contingent remainder
of the noise--a real pocket-handkerchief--in his pocket, that his cold
was nearly well, and no human power should induce him to submit to
treatment of any sort; but mustard and hot water least of all. He would
go and have a Turkish Bath, and kill himself. Not that _he_ anticipated
a fatal result; his wife forecast that for him. It transpired shortly
that he habitually set himself in opposition to all her wishes, and
went his own way. But in so doing he encountered frequent disasters,
his rescues from which were always achieved by her, single-handed, with
constant addition to a long score of debt, unpaid by him, on account of
which he never so much as said, thank you!
Mr. Eldridge was a person who defied description, in a certain sense;
but only because description calls for materials, and he supplied
none, or nearly none. He might have been the Average Man himself, for
any salient point that he presented. An observant person, called on
to recollect what he was like, would probably have remembered that
he shaved, all but a little whisker, and given up the rest of him to
oblivion.
His conversation, after the Turkish Bath had passed away, was an
inquiry if his wife was ready; and, after he had been told not to fuss,
but to sit down and make himself agreeable, a statement that it was a
good deal colder than yesterday. So it afforded a natural opportunity
to his good lady of giving him a chance to enrich it by comment on the
subject in hand at the time of his arrival. She did not wish to drop
it, having, in fact--as hinted above--a purpose in dwelling on it.
"We're talking about country-houses," said she.
"What houses?" said he; and then, without waiting for an answer:
"Oh--country-houses! Where?"
"Don't pretend to be stupid, John. Nowhere, of course! No particular
houses--country-houses in general. And town-houses."
"Oh, I see! What about 'em? How's the children?"
"Never mind them! Listen to me." Marianne interjected that perhaps
they hadn't gone to bed, and she could ring for Martha to see. But
she didn't do it, and no one urged it. So the children lapsed, and
Mrs. Eldridge proceeded: "Pay attention to what I'm saying, John,
and put that glass down. You'll break it." He did as he was bid.
"We--_are_--_talking_--_about_--the differences between country-houses
and town-houses." To which Mr. Eldridge replied, "Oh, ah!--yes, to be
sure! Well!--you'd have to see 'em both," causing his wife to despair
visibly of male intelligence, with endurance, before starting afresh
with an appearance of willingness to make things easy for a slow
apprehension: "We were talking about the difference of the way one
lives, in town and in the country. Nothing to _do_ with premises."
She then went on to put a hypothetical case, to enable her husband to
grasp the full range of the recent conversation. Supposing that he
had been a young man enamoured of a damsel whose sentiments towards
himself were a matter of conjecture--suppose, in fact, he were "paying
attention"; that was how the lady put it--would he prefer to press
his suit in a town-house or a country-house? She made the question a
leading one by suggesting divine solitudes congenial to the development
of tender passions, and a climate favourable to the inspection of
sunsets and moonrises. So tempting was the prospect to the mind of
her hearer that he made a grimace expressive of greedy delight, and
gave a low whistle. "'Ooky!" said he, dropping an aspirate humorously.
"Country-houses--rather!"
"_Any_ man would say so at once, Marianne." Which Mrs. Eldridge
contrives to articulate in a way that implies, Heaven knows how, that
their discussion has had application to some particular case--no mere
abstract review of the subject. For the apprehension of her husband is
reached, with the effect that he says, with an expression of roused
interest: "I say, Lotty, tell up. Who's the party? Who's at it now?"
But he does not press for information, because his wife checks him
skilfully with, "Hush, John!--never mind now! I'll tell you after." His
comment, "Some gal, I suppose," suggests some lucid vision into life
and character beyond its drain on the resources of language.
Marianne Challis would have entered joyously enough with her friend
into the building up of a situation involving only a neighbour's
husband or wife, but she would fain have put a brake on the car of
Gossip in her own husband's case. The worst of it was that every word
she had said so far, with that intention, had only brought about an
increase of speed. And now she was conscious that if she put in any
protest of her faith in her husband's stability, matters would be made
ten times worse. The horses would get the bit in their teeth. At least,
his name had not been mentioned, nor the company he was in, before this
stupid John Eldridge. All this, or the protoplasm of it, hung about
her mind as she began saying, "If you mean ..." and stopped. But she
had, even with those three words, put her head in the lion's mouth past
recall. Her friend interrupted.
"I don't mean to say a _single_--_word_--_more_, dear, to you or to
anyone. So don't be uneasy. But you see what John thinks." The speaker,
as she rose to her feet with these words, as one gathering up for
departure, showed as a young woman in black, of a lissome, yet angular
type; taller than her friend, and with more claim, from personal
experience of her own figure, to sit in judgment on other women's. But
her complexion is not as good as Marianne's--a rather sallow one, not
free from a sense of freckles. However, that may only be the firelight.
John, merely conscious that something male and female was under
discussion, had put on what he conceived to be the proper look for the
father of a family equal to all moral emergencies. His face would have
served just as well for that of a person doing subtraction with a sense
of responsibility. This ambiguity of outward rendering of the phases
of his mind, of course, gave corresponding latitude to his wife's
interpretation of it.
Marianne had a growing misgiving that she was becoming skilfully
entangled in the meshwork of an undeserved embarrassment, and
floundered in desperation. "I don't the least understand what you
_mean_, Charlotte," she said. "What _does_ he think? What _about_?" On
this he asserted himself.
"No, I say, you know! Don't bring _me_ in--don't bring _me_ in! _I_
know nothing, you know--nothing at all, you know! Mum's the word, you
know--always keep out of this sort of thing!" He enforced his words by
pursing up his mouth and shaking his head continuously, in a kind of
paroxysm of caution. He also turned somewhat purple, and his eyes grew
smaller. These combinations put the finishing-touch on the strength of
his wife's position. She threw up a new and final entrenchment, and, as
it were, closed the subject officially.
"You do--quite--right, John," said she, "to keep out of it. That's all
you've got to do." She then assumed quite suddenly a large-hearted
tone of liberality. "And, after all," she said, "what does it all
come to? Just nothing whatever! I'm sure, dear Marianne, you need not
allow yourself to feel the _least_ uneasiness--not for a moment! With
a husband like yours! Only think! You'll see it will be all right,
dear--just recollect what I say! Now we must go. I'll go and get my
cloak--it's upstairs. No!--don't _you_ come...." But Marianne goes, for
all that.
Mr. Eldridge, left to himself, whistled a monotonous tune over and over
again, and flicked a glove that was on with another that was off. He
threw his eyes opener by fits and starts, as if he were trying on a new
pair of lids. Then he produced the vanished pocket-handkerchief, and
held it by two corners before him, spread out, as though he admired
the pattern. Then, as though he decided suddenly that it was not Saint
Veronica's, he availed himself of it as a resource of civilization,
and returned it resolutely to his pocket. We are not responsible for
this gentleman's actions, and can only record, without explanation,
that he then said quite distinctly, "Pum, pum, pum!" and slapped his
hands heavily together. He added: "Time's gettin' on"--a remark equally
true of all periods. Then he listened to the voices of the two ladies
returning down the stairs.
"Oh no!--you needn't be the _least_ afraid about John. He's discretion
itself in a thing of this sort. And you'll see it will be just as I
say. When your dear husband comes back it will all be _exactly_ the
same, and...." Here her voice dropped, and John listened hard, but
missed a great deal.... "So now, dear, you will promise to be quite
happy about it, and not let yourself fret. Won't you?"
"But, Charlotte dear, it's all about _nothing_...."
"That's the right view to take, dear. That's just exactly what it
_is_--all about nothing! Now let's try and be happy, and not think
about it. John!--where are you? Do come and let's be off! I hope it
isn't raining."
"Pavement was dry enough when _I_ came in," was Mr. Eldridge's
testimony. To corroborate it he went out in the front garden and gazed
upwards, open-mouthed. "Oh no--_it's_ not raining, fast enough," said
he. Which seemed to imply that perhaps something else was.
* * * * *
Marianne went back into her parlour and rang the bell for Elizabeth
Barclay to come and take away the tea-things, because Harmood was out
for her holiday. She looked and felt flushed and irritated, but could
not have said whether it was with Charlotte Eldridge, with herself,
or with this showy girl at Royd. With all her stupidity--and she had
plenty--she was not wanting in loyalty to her husband; although it may
be a good deal of this loyalty was only a form "proper pride"--that
is to say, _amour propre_--took. How one wonders that commonplace,
uninteresting people should have any _amour propre_--should love those
insipid selves of theirs at all! But they have it--the dullest of them.
As she sat there in the growing dusk, watching the slow-combustion
stove economizing its coal, and making attempts to consume its own
smoke, her soul was doing battle on its own behalf against the
insidious siren Jealousy, who came and came and came again each time
she thrust her contemptuously away. Had she, perhaps, despised her
a little too roundly when her first whispers were audible? Had she
treated them too much as an absurdity when her husband's first great
success had been followed by a sudden uplifting of him into a world she
resented--resented because the only part she could play in it had been
a very minor one? Had she taken it too easily for granted that no harm
would come if he went his way and she hers--she, who didn't mean to be
patronized, whoever else did! Might it not have been really wiser to
brace herself up to the bearing of one or two slights and humiliations,
to laugh them off and acknowledge that a homely, uneducated woman of
her sort must needs fall contentedly into a back rank, rather than
to refuse indignantly to march with the army at all? _She_ was not
going to be tolerated, and made allowances for, not she!--that was
her attitude. That Arkroyd woman would have been just civil to her
in time, no doubt; but how about all the affronts and indignities
she would have had to put up with during apprenticeship? No--it was
best as it was: Titus to go his way and she hers! Besides, her being
constantly hatching him would do no good, if there _were_--that is to
say, if there _had been_--any truth in this nonsense of Charlotte's.
But, really, it was all so idiotic. As if she couldn't trust Titus for
five minutes away from her apron-strings! Of course, Titus was to be
trusted!... Was he?
She got up and walked about the room in the flickering firelight,
conscious of her heart-beats, and half-inclined to cry, if she could
have chosen. But her eyes felt dry over it, as a matter of fact. She
caught herself beginning to feel angry with Titus, convicted herself
of it, and reprimanded the culprit severely. Idiot that she was, to
be affected by mere unfounded gabble! For she was far from believing,
all the while, that Charlotte had any faith in her own insinuations.
She fully recognized that her friend's pleasure in dwelling on the
constructive relations of Paul and Virginia, Paolo and Francesca, Adam
and Eve, for that matter--anywhom male and female, anywhere--was only
human sympathy, leavened with hysteria. Had she not helped her, _lubens
et ex animo_, when the improper study of mankind seemed good to their
hours of leisure? The study, that is, of man and womankind in braces,
selected by the student? But when the model suggested for study was her
own husband, in leash with a strange young lady, whom she had not seen,
she felt the position of a philosophical analyst uncongenial.
Why could she not be angry with Charlotte? That might have seemed the
most natural safety-valve. Marianne had never read "Othello"--or much
to speak of else--but she had seen it at the play. So she may easily
have recalled Iago's cautions against the green-eyed monster that doth
make the meat it feeds on, and compared it with the way her friend
had somehow contrived to appear a warning voice, crying beware! to a
suspicious soul adrift in a wilderness of its own unreason. She was not
so very unlike the Moor in her ready acceptance of the character _her_
Iago had claimed for herself. Of course, Charlotte was a fool, and
fanciful; but, equally of course, she was no mischief-maker. Why, see
what a perfect faith she had in Titus's integrity! Marianne was angry
with herself for allowing a doubt of it, without having the shrewdness
to see that she never would have felt one if it had not been for
Charlotte. In fact, left to herself in the growing darkness, to brood
over her own scarcely fledged suspicion, she could not for the life of
her have said what on earth began it all. She forgot all details of her
conversation with Charlotte, and only knew that something in it had
made her feel very uncomfortable.
Really, one is sometimes inclined to believe that imps of darkness
hang about, to run and help whenever they see a little bit of mischief
brewing.