Miss Wilson, we wondered if you would mind our man coming in one day to
dig up the privet hedge? You know labour is so difficult to get in
Thorhaven, and we happen to have a man engaged for another month; so
perhaps you----" Her voice trailed off into silence, for she was a
little abashed by that look in Miss Ethel's pale eyes. "It won't look
so pretty, of course, but it will let light and air into the house."
"Oh yes," said Miss Ethel, smiling with strained lips.
Then they went down the drive, leaving her there in the doorway staring
at the privet hedge. Over the hedge, a fire had just been lighted in
the scarcely completed bungalow, so that the white smoke streamed like
a flag from the tall chimney, just moved a little from the south so
that it swung over towards the Cottage. A week or two more and the
hedge would be down. There would be no barrier at all between this
quiet garden and all those rows of houses which had been marching on,
nearer and nearer, ever since the first one was built. As Miss Ethel
stood there, she felt beaten. She knew at last, what she had fought so
hard not to know, that the powers against her in the world were too
strong--that her opposition was ridiculous and futile. Nothing that
she could ever say or do would make the slightest difference.
She returned to the room where Mrs. Bradford was sitting. "They will
be sending some one to take up the hedge in a few days," she said.
"You don't mean it!" exclaimed Mrs. Bradford, startled into animation.
"Oh, what a thing it is to be without a man in a matter like this! I
know my dear husband would never have allowed it."
But Miss Ethel was at the window again, quietly looking out. "They say
it will let light and air into the house. It won't look so pretty, but
it will let light and air into the house."
Then they ceased speaking for the moment because Caroline had come into
the room to take away the tea-tray; but before she had closed the door,
Mrs. Bradford began again, still for her excitedly: "Ethel! Mrs.
Graham ran in for a minute while you were upstairs, and she says Laura
Temple's wedding is put off." There came a sudden crash of crockery
just beyond the door. "Caroline!" cried Miss Ethel, "have you let the
tray fall?"
Caroline did not answer at first; then she said in a low voice:
"There's nothing broken, Miss Ethel."
But she did not move away--only forced her hands to hold the tray
steadily so that they should not know she was there. The next moment
she heard Miss Ethel cross the room and was obliged to go back to the
kitchen.
There she stood washing up over the sink, seething with a conflict
which almost maddened her. The old habit of Aunt Creddle and Aunt
Ellen--grown into an instinct in course of generations--to guess, and
listen for chance words, and piece together any drama that was going on
"in the room" because their own lives were so circumscribed, fought
with her own free impulse to return openly and ask the plain question:
"Do you know why Miss Temple's engagement is broken off?"
The conflict made her feel terribly over-excited and nervous; but she
had one over-mastering reason for not obeying that impulse to ask a
direct question--she was afraid lest these two women might see she was
in love with Godfrey. Then she happened to glance at the clock, and
saw she was already late for the promenade; but as she hurried down the
drive she heard the whistle of a railway engine and stood perfectly
still just as if some one had called to her. But that was the
five-twenty-five train, of course. That by which Godfrey invariably
returned when he had spent the day in the city, was half an hour later.
If she waited outside the station until it came in, she would be
certain to see him. He _must_ speak to her then. This maddening agony
of uncertainty and suspense would be over at least.
But as she hurried along to the station with the moist west wind in her
face, she saw--behind those engrossing thoughts--the other girl waiting
angrily to be released from the pay-box. Still, that didn't matter to
Caroline. Nothing mattered in the world, but getting that talk with
Godfrey. For she had reached a point now, when all these business men
and shopping ladies who began to flow past her from the
platform--drawing their scarves closer, and buttoning their coats as
they merged into the cool, salt air after the warmer atmosphere of the
city--seemed no more to her than flies buzzing round a path she was
bent on following.
Wilf came past, taking long strides and wearing a new hat which he
removed slightly; giving a sideways, condescending nod which said as
plainly as words: "If you're waiting for _me_, miss, it's no go!"
But though she nodded in return, she was not actually aware of him.
Her heart beat unevenly and she felt a suspense which ran through every
nerve and every vein--she had no feeling beyond it. Her face was ashen
as she stood by the entrance to the station, with the breakers beyond
looking cruel in the cold light. Her eyes shone black, owing to the
pupils being so distended, but she appeared pinched and quiet as she
stood there, at the edge of the crowd, for her whirling emotions had
now reached that point which looks like stillness.
All of a sudden the blood rushed up over her forehead, and she
instinctively put her hand to her heart because it seemed to be leaping
out of its place. Here was Godfrey at last, walking with another man.
She moved forward and stood directly in his way, so that he must see
her. "Good evening," he said, then continued his conversation with the
broad, prosperous-looking merchant who walked by his side.
Caroline remained planted there, staring after them with an almost
foolish expression on her face. She could not take it in. It seemed
incredible. Then the two men vanished round the corner, and at the
same moment she heard a girl saying in her ear: "Cheer up, Carrie! If
Wilf hasn't caught this, he will get the next. He isn't dead."
"What do you mean?" said Carrie, but her voice sounded muffled and
vague, even to herself.
"Why, you came to meet your boy, didn't you? And he hasn't turned up.
That's what you looked like, anyway," said the girl, laughing.
Carrie made an immense effort to fight off that feeling of faintness,
saying jerkily: "Oh, well, I'm off with Wilf, you know." But the words
seemed to echo in some great, vague place a long distance away.
_Chapter XVII_
_The Benefit Concert_
During the evening and many hours of the night Caroline remained in a
white heat of anger and hurt pride which left no room for regret. It
was true, then, that Godfrey had only been behaving to her all the time
as Aunt Creddle said gentlemen did behave to working girls upon whom
they bestowed their attentions. She'd been treated exactly like any
little ignorant servant girl waiting at a street corner for her young
man: just such a one as her aunts and her mother had been; and yet she
felt violently that she was different. In the middle of the night she
woke to find herself muttering: "I aren't going to stand it! I aren't
going to stand it!" Then she bit the sheet to prevent herself from
breaking out into a storm of weeping. She loved him so, but was no
longer certain of his love. She could give him up almost gladly if he
loved her and would always love her--but this was more than she could
bear. There seemed to her no paradox in that--it was just what she
felt.
Then she saw his heavily cut face on the darkness, as he had looked
when he walked past her with that other man--both of them solid,
self-contained, out of her reach! And with that the cold wave of anger
swept over her again, overwhelming her. "I can't stand it! I aren't
going to stand it. He'd no right to treat me like that, as if I were
dirt beneath his feet. I'm as good as he is."
So the conflicting thoughts went on during the night hours; all the
doubts and feelings which she had inherited, or had imbibed from the
Creddles, warring with her own independence and pride. A girl like
herself was good enough for any man. He'd no right to insult her by
passing her like that in the street when they'd kissed as they did on
the cliff top. She'd given him up, but she was going to be treated
properly--not like a girl who had done something of which they were
both ashamed. And again the helpless threat: "I aren't going to stand
it!"
At last it was time to get up, and after a while to go down to the
promenade. She was by now so exhausted with emotion that she could not
feel any more and let her perceptions drift vaguely over outside
things. A bill was up on the road-side, announcing the Benefit Concert
for the band for that evening; another advertised second-hand tents and
folding chairs for sale, cheap. A girl told her about a tent that had
blown down the day of the gale, revealing a fat lady in a bathing
towel--behaviour of rude Boreas which seemed to have put an end to
bathing from tents for the season. Then a man came down the road with
a barrow, crying, "Meller pears! Fine meller pe-a-a-rs!" Caroline
bought some to take to Aunt Creddle, though she had had no definite
thought of going there when she started ten minutes earlier than usual,
but the ache of her exhausted emotion drew her subconsciously towards
the jolly, serene nature as a hurt child runs to its mother.
The house door was open, so she walked straight in and put the pears
down on the table. But she did not kiss her aunt, because she
instinctively feared that the slightest breath of emotion might upset
her self-control. "I bought these off a barrow. Don't know if they'll
be sweet," she said. "Can't stop!"
"Sit down a minute," said Mrs. Creddle. "You look fit to drop. Aren't
you feeling well, Carrie?"
"Oh, I'm all right," she answered impatiently. "What's that you are
ironing?"
"It's some curtains for Miss Temple. I was there ironing yesterday,
but didn't get these finished."
Caroline sharply turned with her back to the kitchen, looking out of
the window. "Did they say anything about the wedding being put off?"
"Yes. Miss Laura's got a chill. Something to do with her digestion.
She can't scarcely eat nothing."
"Oh!" Caroline could not say another word.
"Of course, it's hard on Mr. Wilson; but I think she's in the right on
it. No use going away to them grand hotels if you can't enjoy the
food," pursued Mrs. Creddle.
"Did you--did you hear how long it was put for?" said Caroline.
"Not exactly, as you may say," answered Mrs. Creddle. "Miss Panton
came into the kitchen while I was there, and she said delays was
dangerous. You know her way. She seemed to think it would be next
month." She paused, then added uncomfortably: "I was on pins and
needles for fear they might have heard about you and Mr. Wilson,
Carrie, you know--being about the lanes at night together, and that.
But I'm sure they hadn't." She paused again. "Well, I aren't sorry
you had a lesson that night you were locked out, Carrie. Your mother
and I had the same sort of temptations when we were out in
placing--though you mayn't think it. There was a young gentleman from
college in my last situation who begged me almost on his bended knees
to walk out with him, but I knew what that led to." She paused again.
"Cheer up, lass; it hurts a bit at the time, but it's all for the best.
Once bitten, twice shy."
"You're always talking about what people did when _you_ were young,"
said Caroline, turning away abruptly.
"I know that. Things is very altered since my day," said Mrs. Creddle.
"But there's some things----"
"I've no patience with people like you, aunt," said Caroline. "You
know everything has changed, and yet you go on expecting girls to be
the one thing that hasn't. It isn't common sense."
She was flinging out of the kitchen, when Mrs. Creddle caught her up
and put a motherly arm about her. "Good-bye, my lass. You think
nobody's felt like you before about a young man, but they have."
"I don't know what you're talking about. I've a bit of a head, but
that's all," said Carrie.
After that she went away. But all the same she was a little
comforted--real, disinterested love being the one ointment that can
soothe tender hearts not yet cauterized by pain.
So the day passed; then the next wore on towards evening, with no sign
of Godfrey. And all through the long hours, Caroline sat in the
pay-box looking out of her little window--small, set face, very pale,
and bright eyes intently watching--like some creature of the wild
behind a gap in the thick leafage.
Now it was past sunset. The residents of Thorhaven had taken
possession of their town again and the few visitors who remained were
sprinkled about inconspicuously among the audience in the concert
hall--the dominant factor no longer. Caroline exchanged greetings with
many of her acquaintances who emerged from the seclusion entailed by
letting rooms or vacating houses, and now shook their feathers like
hens coming off the nest with the pleasant knowledge of a nest-egg
successfully achieved. "Pretty good season, considering," ran the
verdict; but the general mind was a happy one, in spite of a certain
feeling of exhaustion. "Pickles!" said Lillie's mother. "I give you
my word, Carrie, one lot ate cheese and pickles after the promenade
every night to that degree it fair curdles my inside to think of. But
as I say, each person's inside is their own. Live and let live, say
I." And the good woman hurried on to spend part of the proceeds of
this wise neutrality, her Sunday hat still quite like new from lack of
use, and a holiday spirit radiating from her rather worn features.
Caroline had responded to all these greetings, but she was glad when
the concert began in the promenade hall and only a few stragglers
passed through the barrier at long intervals. Once more she was free
to resume that silent, intent watch which had occupied nearly the whole
day.
But night was coming on fast now--with a heavy ground-swell and a wild
streak of orange on the western sky. Caroline never thought once of
the sea, and certainly was not conscious of being affected by it--she
was, in fact, not aware of it at all. Yet it was just because she did
most deeply respond to it that her affair with Godfrey was lifted for
her beyond the trivial into those regions where passion really has
dignity. That interview of theirs on the cliff top would have been
poignant for both if it had taken place in a dingy back sitting-room;
but something must have been absent--that unforgettable thrill which
comes when beauty is joined to great emotion.
After a while, Caroline saw a woman leave the concert hall to cross the
promenade, which already gleamed darkly with rain-drops. As she went
through the turnstile she said: "I doubt we shall have a wet night."
Then followed a storm of applause from the hall. "There!" added the
woman, "I wish I could have stopped for the encore, but I had to get
away, though I was forced to squeeze past Miss Temple and her gentleman
on my way out. She does look bad, my word! Them that said it was all
a tale about her being ill, have only to look at her. Well, good
night."
Caroline waited a moment, then thrust her head forward and peered round
the black space between her and the hall; and as she did so, her
likeness to some watching wild creature became intensified. Then she
withdrew her head, rose from her seat and came out of the pay-box,
looking over her shoulder. With light, quick steps she went round the
glass walls of the hall until she reached a place through which she
could see the occupants of the front seats. Just as she came to a
stand, seeking for Laura with heart throbbing and every pulse alert,
the singer returned to give the encore.
The voice was long past its prime, but a window above had been opened
wide for ventilation and the song could be heard clearly enough. As
Caroline peered in vain through the glass dimmed by heat and human
breath, the sentimental words floated out over her head; and the heavy
organ-like accompaniment of the ground-swell made them more than ever
ephemeral. A few bars of music, sounding so thin and strange against
the booming of the sea, and then the next verse:
Now we are young,
Life's meaning all grows clear,
Does he but whisper low:
"My dear--my dear!"
She pressed her forehead close to the glass, trying to keep back the
tears, for she despised crying. Then the singer began again--the clear
articulation almost all she had left:
And if we part,
I shall not cease to hear
For ever in my heart:
"My dear--my dear!"
Caroline could not keep the tears back any longer. They would come,
and she wiped them away with her fingers as she walked away. But the
singer was evidently roused by applause to an extra effort, for the
voice gained for the moment some of the timbre of her triumphant youth,
and Caroline could hear more and more softly as she went farther off:
When we are old
Some love-words disappear,
But this goes all the way;
"My dear--my dear!"
She did not see the sentimentality of the song because she liked it,
just as she liked the simple love-stories with bright covers; and she
had hardly time to dry her eyes before the band began to play God Save
the King, and the people to surge through the large gates which were
now set open. As soon as she could shut up the pay-box she slipped
away into the darkness of the promenade, to escape the crowd who went
mostly by the high road. A few steps beyond the north exit took her
into absolute solitude, but the rain which was already falling quickly
made her afraid of venturing far along the slippery path. The sea and
sky were all dark--no white breakers on the heavy swell and no stars in
the sky. She felt unutterably sad and deserted, standing there for a
moment before she turned up the little terrace which led to the main
road. But though she told herself that she was going this way because
she had been crying and wished to meet no one, she knew, behind that,
that she was lying to herself. She _had_ to know why she really came
this way, and what she meant to do, because she had an honest soul.
Then she turned round and went up the uneven road between the dark
little houses in the terrace. Only one house still remained lighted
downstairs, though the upper blinds were nearly all illuminated from
within. Caroline's eyes were fixed on that one house as she went
along, and without allowing herself time to think she opened the little
iron gate. Then she paused a moment, glancing up towards the attic
bedroom where the woman with whom Godfrey lodged was already taking off
her tightly curled fringe, and the uncompromising corsets in which she
barricaded herself during the waking hours.
With a long knowledge of Thorhaven ways Caroline gently turned the
front-door handle, and was not surprised to find the door left on the
latch against Godfrey's return. She entered very quietly, tip-toeing
down the passage, and went straight into the front room where stood
lamp, kettle and other preparations for a light meal.
Caroline breathed hard as she reached the middle of the room,
experiencing the odd sense of having been followed by unknown dangers
which children know when they run down a long stairway in the dark.
But here she was safe. The lamp--the chair--newspaper--the little meal
set ready--all reassured her. Yet she was still standing, peering
bright-eyed here and there, when a quick step sounded outside, and the
next minute Godfrey hurried into the room. "You, here!" he said,
staring at her, greatly startled. "What's the matter?"
"Nothing." She moved back towards the fireplace. . . . He had not
kissed her; he had not even held out his hand. "I aren't going to
stop," she said in a low tone. "I only wanted to know if--if your
wedding was really broken off for the reason they said. I felt as if I
must know. I--I thought perhaps she'd heard something about you and
me."
"How should she hear anything?" he said. "The poor girl is ill enough,
as anybody can see. But she would come to this rotten concert to-night
in spite of all Miss Panton and I could say. She seems unable to keep
quiet." He paused and added jerkily: "I suppose you know we were to
have been married to-day?"
"Yes." Caroline felt the room swim round her, but she clutched the
mantelpiece and kept quiet.
"I came for a couple of umbrellas. She and Miss Panton are waiting
under shelter in the hall. I can't stay." He spoke abruptly, uneasily.
"Oh, I won't keep you." She moved a step or two forward and swayed a
little, so that he was obliged to catch hold of her by the arm. The
next second he was clasping her close while they looked into each
other's eyes with a burning curiosity that must at all costs be
satisfied. "Do you love me still? Do you love me still?" And yet
there was absolute silence in the room while the question was asked and
answered.
"Oh, I don't mind now," sobbed Caroline. "I don't mind now. It was
only when I thought----"
"Hush!" said Godfrey, moving away. "What's that?"
"It sounds like Miss Armitage coming down," said Caroline, hurrying
towards the door. "I'll slip out as quickly as I----" She drew back.
"Oh!" Then pulled herself together as the landlady in curled fringe
and long grey ulster entered the room, primming long, thin lips.
"Oh! Good evening, Miss Raby," said the woman. "I'm sorry if I
intrude. I heard voices down below and I didn't know who it might be.
I wasn't aware, Mr. Wilson, you had visitors."
"No more have I," said Godfrey lightly. "Miss Raby has just come with
a message from Miss Wilson. I suppose you can't lend her an umbrella,
Miss Armitage? I have to hurry away to the promenade with both mine.
Miss Temple and Miss Panton are waiting for me there." He turned to
Caroline. "I'm afraid I must hurry away. Good night."
As he went off. Miss Armitage said somewhat grudgingly: "If you wait a
minute, I dare say I can find you an old umbrella some visitors left
here in the summer."
"Please don't bother. I'm neither sugar nor salt," said Caroline
pleasantly. "Good night, Miss Armitage."
And her happy tone was not all put on; because though the tangle and
bitterness would come back again before the morning, she could realize
nothing in the world now but the triumphant answer to that question she
had wanted to ask during all those hours when she looked at the waves
without seeing them and heard their moaning only inside her heart.
_Chapter XVIII_
_Uprooting_
Mrs. Bradford and Miss Ethel came out of the Cottage and walked through
the garden in which--on so many windy, sunshiny mornings--they had done
a little weeding or planting before they went to shop in the long
street, where everybody knew them and everybody treated them with
respect. "Yes, Miss Wilson. I'll be sure to let you have the middle
cut, ma'am. Beautiful day for the time of year." But now there was a
"Take it or leave it" attitude which grated very much on Miss Ethel's
susceptibilities as she gave her small orders, and she felt thankful
there was no shopping to be done on this particular morning. All the
same, the errand on which she actually was bent made the way as painful
to her as if she had been treading on sharp stones.
"I think Godfrey might have gone over the house with us, as he
promised, instead of just leaving the key," she said.
"Did Caroline take the key in? I suppose there was no message?" said
Mrs. Bradford.
"No: she said not. I asked her." Miss Ethel paused. "I thought there
was something rather funny in her manner."
"What! You don't think there is anything in what the Grahams said?"
exclaimed Mrs. Bradford, speaking far more alertly than usual.
"Of course I don't," said Miss Ethel.
"But Mr. Graham is sure he saw Godfrey go up to Caroline at the Gala on
the promenade the minute our backs were turned. It was when he went
back to buy those air-balloons for the children at the Home and he
happened to look round."
"Well, what is there in that? I don't say he is by any means my ideal
of a young man," said Miss Ethel. Then she added after a pause: "You
must not dream of mentioning the subject to Caroline. It is not our
affair."
They walked a few paces in silence, aware that they could not afford to
send Caroline away even if she were a bad girl, and yet shamed within
themselves by the knowledge.
"The Grahams seemed to think Godfrey has had serious money losses,"
remarked Mrs. Bradford at last. "Lucky he had Laura's money to fall
back on."