_TOM DEXTER’S WIFE._
The worst of anybody who is not a regular author or authoress trying to
write out incidents of their life, or things that they know about which
they think will be interesting, is that there is always some
interruption or other just as one is getting to the point.
When I was writing my “Memoirs” as a servant, of course, it was
dreadful, for anybody who knows anything about it knows how little time
a servant gets to herself, and when she does have a quiet half-hour to
sit still in the kitchen, writing is out of the question, because there
is no quiet if you are with other servants; and if you are by yourself
there is sure to be plenty for you to do.
How I ever managed to get those “Memoirs” done at all will always be a
mystery to me; and the more I look back on the difficulties I had to
encounter, the more wonderful it seems.
When I began to put down things about our life and adventures in the
‘Stretford Arms,’ I thought to myself, “Now I am my own mistress, I
shall be able to have a quiet hour now and then, and to take more
trouble with my composition;” but, bless you, I am not sure that I am
not worse off, so far as authorship is concerned, now than when I was a
servant.
I declare I never get a real quiet hour, for there is always something
to be seen to, or somebody wanting to see me; and if it isn’t that, it’s
baby or Harry.
To tell you the truth, I sometimes think Harry is a little jealous of my
writing. I don’t mean jealous in a bad sense; but, from one or two
remarks he has let drop, he doesn’t like my going and shutting myself
away and writing. He says when we have half an hour to spare we might as
well spend it together.
Of course I am always glad to have a quiet hour with my husband, but
it’s no good my trying to write while he’s in the room. He will keep on
talking to me, and nothing will stop him; and if he doesn’t speak, I
think every minute that he is going to, and that’s worse, for it makes
me nervous and fidgety, and the ideas all get mixed up in my head
together, and I can’t tell my story straightforward, as I always like to
do.
Sometimes it is a whole fortnight before I get a chance of writing
anything in my book that I keep, and it has been even longer than that.
This is what a real author or authoress never has to put up with. I
believe, from what I’ve heard, that they have a beautiful room full of
dictionaries for the hard words and the foreign words, and maps hung all
round the room, and they sit in it all day long quite quiet, and nobody
is allowed to come in and interrupt.
I should think anybody could write like that. It must be very easy, if
you’ve got anything in you at all. But it’s very different when you’ve
got a house, and an hotel, and servants, and a baby, and a husband to
look after, and if you take your eyes off for a minute, something is
bound to go wrong.
Once or twice while I have been sitting in my own room writing, having
given orders that I was not to be disturbed, something has gone wrong,
and Harry has said, “You were writing your book, I suppose;” and I’ve
said, “Yes”; and then he’s said, “It’s my opinion, my dear, that if you
don’t make haste and finish that book, that book will finish us.”
Of course to anybody who hates what they call “pens and ink”--and some
people do, like poison--writing seems dreadfully silly and a waste of
time; and I’m afraid that Harry, with all his good qualities, hasn’t
much respect for literature. He certainly hasn’t the slightest idea how
difficult it is to write. I once said to him that I believed he thought
I could make out a bill with one hand and write my “Memoirs” with the
other, and talk to a customer at the same time, and all he said was,
“Why not?”
“Why not!” It really made me so cross I could have cried with vexation;
for it was just when I had got in rather a muddle with my book about the
‘Stretford Arms,’ finding that the housemaid had taken a lot of pages
that I had written notes on and lighted the fire with them, and I
couldn’t for the life of me remember what the notes were.
All I remembered that was on them was some things I had taken down about
Tom Dexter, our odd man, the one whose story I began to tell you when I
was interrupted; but what the others were it was weeks before I
remembered, and I quite wore myself out trying to think.
If there is one thing that annoys me more than another, it is trying to
think of something I particularly want to think of and can’t.
Sometimes Harry will say, “What was the name of that man, or that woman,
or that gentleman, or that lady,” as the case may be; and if I can’t
think of it, it worries me all day, and I keep saying, perhaps, dozens
of names, and not the right one; and after the house is closed and we’re
gone to bed, it keeps me awake, and I keep on saying names over and over
till Harry gets quite wild, and says, “Oh, bother the name! Do go to
sleep, my dear. I want to be up at six to-morrow morning.”
Then I leave off trying to think the name out loud, and I think it to
myself, and perhaps, after about an hour’s agony, I suddenly recollect
it, and then I’m obliged to get it off my mind by waking Harry up and
telling it him before I forget it.
It’s bad enough with a name, but it’s worse with a thing. I remember
once in service tying a piece of cotton round my finger to remind me to
do something that I particularly didn’t want to forget, and I went to
bed with the cotton on my finger, and never thought any more about it
until the next afternoon, and then I was a whole day trying to remember
what I’d tied the cotton round my finger for; and go mad over it I
really thought I should, it kept me on such tenter-hooks all the time.
What was in the notes that stupid girl destroyed I don’t suppose I
shall ever remember: that is, not anything worth remembering.
The notes about our odd man, of course, I recollected, because they
didn’t matter, he being in our service still at the time, and I could
get all I wanted about him by talking to him.
When I was interrupted I had told you as far as where he went into the
casual ward, with his wife and little girl, and how he came out.
It must have been a dreadful experience for him, poor fellow, seeing
that it was not his own fault that the misery and ruin had come to him,
after years of hard work.
When he got out of the casual ward, he and his wife and child walked
along the streets, and his wife began to cry and to say it was all her
fault, and she had brought him to it, and if she was dead he would be a
happier man.
He tried to comfort her, and said it was no use talking about being
dead. She could make him much happier by living, if she’d only give up
the dreadful drink. He said they couldn’t go much lower than they’d got;
now was the time to begin to go up again. If he tried and got work,
would she keep straight, so that they could get a home together again?
“No; she knew she couldn’t,” she said. “It was no use. If she ever got
any money again, she knew the temptation would be too strong for
her--she’d tried over and over again to stop herself, and it was no use.
She’d go away and leave Tom free, and then he might have a chance, and
perhaps, some day, it might all come right; but she was sure, if she
stopped with him, she would only keep him down as low as he was now, and
perhaps bring him to worse, for she might bring him to crime.”
Tom didn’t argue any more with her, because it was no use: she was in
that weak, low, dreadful state that people are in who have drunk a great
deal and then can’t get it. Sometimes, in cases I have known of the
sort, I’ve thought it would be a mercy, if people with that awful curse
upon them, settled themselves quickly, for the sake of their friends and
relations and those about them. If they are treated very skilfully when
force is used to make them leave off, or if they are kept where they
can’t get anything, and taken very great care of, they may, and do
sometimes, get cured; but, as a rule, all the trouble and anxiety are of
no use, and the dreadful end comes.
I have known such sad cases--most people in our line do know of
them--that my heart has bled to think about them. It is such an awful
thing--that slow, deliberate suicide by drink, those awful living
wrecks, hardly human in their horribleness, that the poor victims of the
disease--for it must be a disease--become.
I thought of what I knew while Tom Dexter was telling me his story, and
I quite understood what an awful position it was for a man to be placed
in: loving his wife as he did, and she loving him, and it all having
come about through her grief at the loss of her boy, made it doubly
terrible.
Really, it makes you shudder sometimes when you think what awful
tragedies there are in some people’s lives; and oh, how thankful we
ought to be who live peacefully and happily, and never know the dark and
awful side that there is to life!
Tom told me that he himself almost gave up when he heard his wife talk
like that, and the thought came into his head that it would be much
better if they all three went to some nice quiet part of the canal, that
was near where they were, and dropped in, and then there would be no
more trouble for any of them.
He was thinking that when, as they were walking along, he met an old
friend of his that he hadn’t seen for a long time--a man that had worked
with him, but had married a widow who kept a public-house, and was now
well off.
He saw that things were bad with Tom at a glance--he saw it by his face
and his clothes, and the clothes of his wife and child; but he was a
good fellow, and instead of passing by on the other side, as many would
have done, he came up to Tom, and took his hand, and said, “Hullo, old
fellow! I’m sorry to see you under water. What does it mean?”
Tom stopped a minute and talked to him, and told him as well as he could
without “rounding on his missus,” as he called it, and then his friend
said, “Well, Tom, I’m awfully sorry, old fellow. Look here! let me lend
you a couple of sovereigns, and you can pay me back as soon as you get a
bit straight.”
The tears came into Tom’s eyes, and his throat swelled up; but, before
he could say anything, his friend had turned off sharp and gone away.
Tom showed the sovereigns to his wife, and said, “There, my lass, look
at that! there’s a chance for us to make another start. It’s a bit of
good luck, and it’s a good omen; it means what the old proverb says,
that when things are at the worst they will mend. Let us both try; we’ve
had a rough lesson, and if we’ve learnt it, perhaps it will be all the
better for us for the rest of our lives.”
Tom’s wife didn’t say anything, but only turned her head away.
That night he got a bit of a lodging for himself and his wife and his
child, and he went to bed full of hope and faith in the future, and he
determined the first thing in the morning to get out and look for work.
But when he woke up in the morning his wife was gone. She had got up
quietly, while he was fast asleep, and had gone away, and left a bit of
a note saying she was sure she should bring him to ruin again, and she
didn’t want to do it now he had another chance. For his own sake and the
sake of the child it was better he should be rid of her, for she was
only a burden and a curse to him. If ever she cured herself, and felt
that she could trust herself, she would come back to him; but if she
didn’t, it was just as well he should never know what had become of her.
It was an awful letter for poor Tom to find just as everything looked so
promising, and it dashed his hopes to the ground and made him very
miserable.
He told me that when he read that letter he felt so low that the
temptation came to him to go out and drink to drown his trouble and
black thoughts that came into his mind. Then he thought of the little
girl--the poor little girl, that had suffered so much already--and he
made up his mind that he would do his duty by her, and be father and
mother to her both, now her mother had gone away and left her; and he
knelt down by her bed-side where she was fast asleep, and made a vow
that he would never touch a drop of drink again as long as he lived.
He spent the whole of the first day trying to find some trace of his
wife, but it was no good. Nobody knew them where they had taken the
lodging, and no one had noticed the woman go away. He had a dreadful
idea that she would kill herself, and he went to the police-station, and
everywhere he could think of for days after that, to find out if anybody
had been found in the water; or anything of the sort.
But while he was doing this he looked for work too, and after two days
he got taken on for a short time at some works, and, when that job was
over, he got another to help in a mews; and then, through somebody that
knew him, he got a better place offered him down in the country at a
little hotel, but it was one where he would have to sleep on the
premises.
By this time he had given up all hope of tracing his wife, for he had
been unable to find out anything concerning her, and now he was worried
what to do about his little girl. He couldn’t take her into the country,
because there would be no home for her, and, besides, there would be
nobody to look after her.
But his good luck, which had never failed since those two sovereigns got
him out of the difficulty, came to his aid now. He was able to get his
little girl into a capital school, where she would be educated and
trained for domestic service, and he felt it was the best thing for her
to grow up like that under proper control, and with good people; and,
though he felt parting with her very much, he was glad to think she
would be so well cared for, and get such a good start in life.
When he had said good-bye to his little girl, and taken her to the
school, which was a little way out of London, he felt that he was really
making a fresh start. He went to his place, and was there till the house
was given up as an hotel and turned into something else, and then, with
a good character, he went to another place as outdoor man, and it was
from this place that Harry, who had heard of him when he was inquiring
for a trustworthy man, took him, and he came to us.
I didn’t know all his story at first, because he didn’t know it himself
then. The most wonderful part of it happened after he was with us.
I knew he must make a good bit of money, because most of the visitors
gave him something when they left, as he put their luggage on to the fly
if they had one, and if they didn’t he wheeled it up to the station; and
as he never drank, and was very careful, and hardly seemed to spend
anything, I wondered what he was doing with his money.
But one day he told me that he was putting it all in the bank, and
saving it, so that he might have a good home for his little girl when
she was old enough to come home; and if she went into service, then it
would be for her when he died or when she married.
“And you know, sometimes, ma’am,” he said, “I think that I may hear of
my wife again. I often lie awake at night and wonder what’s become of
her, and then the thought will come into my head that we may come
together again. God’s mercy is very wonderful, and He brings strange
things to pass. Oh, if I could only find her, and have my home again, as
it used to be!”
“Poor fellow!” I said to myself; “he will go on thinking that all his
life, and it will never happen.”
I thought so much of poor Tom Dexter and his story that I told Harry all
about it, and while I was telling him, Mr. Wilkins was in the parlour.
Somehow or other Mr. Wilkins had never taken to Tom--he was the only
person about the place that hadn’t; but, after all, it was only human
nature, because we had taken Tom on instead of somebody Mr. Wilkins
wanted to recommend after Dashing Dick had turned out so dreadfully.
Harry said it was a very sad story, and he felt very sorry for Tom, and
was glad he had got hold of him; but Mr. Wilkins was nasty, and said, he
dare say that it was six of one and half-a-dozen of the other, for it
was generally the husband’s fault if the wife turned out badly.
I defended Tom heartily, and Mr. Wilkins and me had a few words,
because he presumes a little sometimes. What put me out was his saying
that he thought I’d better not put Tom’s story in my book, as very
likely it was all a pack of lies. That made me say I knew very well what
to put in my book without Mr. Wilkins’s advice, and one thing led to
another, till Mr. Wilkins put on his hat and coat and went off in a
huff; but not before he had been very objectionable about the Scotch
whiskey, trying to make out it was not as good as usual, and talking
about his having noticed that the spirits were of an inferior quality
lately.
That put my back up, and I said I was very sorry that our spirits were
not good enough for Mr. Wilkins; but, of course, if we lost his
patronage we should try and bear up with Christian resignation under the
loss.
I know it was very wrong of me to say that, because in our business you
must always keep your temper, and try to please customers and not offend
them. And Mr. Wilkins is really an important local man in his way, and
might, if he left us and went to the other house, take a few of the
local people with him, though I may say without pride, and not wishing
to run my neighbours down, that as the other house is quite a common
sort of place, and more used by waggoners and labourers, and with only a
very common tap-room, that there wouldn’t be any grave danger of Mr.
Wilkins stopping away long, if he did go.
Still, it was not my place to be rude to him, and I never should have
been, but for his presuming so much about my “Memoirs.” It wasn’t the
first time he had done it, as I have told you before; though, of course,
in his heart he meant no harm. Poor old gentleman, it was only his
ignorance!
Why I have mentioned about my little difference with Mr. Wilkins is to
explain how Tom Dexter and his story got impressed on his mind. It was
through this that one day Mr. Wilkins came to me with the _Morning
Advertiser_, which he had borrowed from our coffee-room, in his hand,
and he said, “I say, Mrs. Beckett, just look at this advertisement.”
I took it and read it, and I said, “Dear me, I wonder if it’s the
same?”
The advertisement was this:--
“Thomas Dexter, formerly of ---- Street, London, if alive, is requested
to communicate with Mrs. Lyons, such and such an address, London.”
Of course Mr. Wilkins must have his joke, and say what nonsense to say
“if alive,” as if Thomas Dexter could communicate with anybody if he was
dead; but I didn’t take any notice of him, but went straight out to the
stables, where Tom was at work, and showed him the advertisement.
He stared at it, and said, “That’s me, right enough, ma’am, for that’s
the street we used to live in before things went wrong.”
“What does it mean, Tom?” I said.
“What does it mean, ma’am?” he said, his face quite bright with
happiness; “why, it means that my prayer’s been answered, and that I’m
going to hear of my wife again, after all these years.”
“Tom, my good fellow,” I said, “I’m sure I hope it is so, and I don’t
want to dispirit you, but don’t build on it too much, for fear it should
be something else. It might be--well, it might be to tell you----”
I hesitated to say what was in my mind.
“To tell me she’s dead! No, ma’am, it ain’t that, I’m sure of it. It’s
to tell me she’s alive and cured, and ready for the home as I’ve been
saving up to give her all these years.”
He was so sure, that I didn’t argue with him any more, but I asked him
what he was going to do, and he said, “Write to the address at once.”
I got him a sheet of paper and an envelope, and I helped him to compose
the letter, for I was quite anxious to know the result. It was only to
say that Tom Dexter was at the ‘Stretford Arms’ Hotel.
I told Tom to go and post the letter himself, and he did; and all that
evening and the next day we were quite excited. I don’t know which was
the worst, Tom or me. I could see what a state of mind he was in, though
he didn’t show it so much outwardly. For the first time he made a
mistake with the luggage, and in the morning he got wrong with the
boots, having actually taken them from the doors without chalking the
numbers on, and a nice state of confusion it was, for our hotel happened
to be quite full at the time, there being a grand ball at a mansion in
the neighbourhood the night before, and we having had to put up some of
the guests, and that, with our other visitors had filled us quite up.
But I forgave him, though mixing the boots is a dreadful thing in an
hotel, and has been done sometimes as a trick in a big hotel by young
fellows for a lark, and all the bells have been ringing in the morning,
and gentlemen swearing, wanting to catch trains, and everybody having
the wrong boots.
Tom was awfully sorry, and couldn’t think how he could have been so
foolish, but I knew; and between us we got the boots right, being able
to guess fairly well, some being patents and some lace-ups and heavies,
and you can generally tell the patent-leather customers from the others
by their general appearance.
All that day I was on tenter-hooks, and I wasn’t right till the next
morning, and when the post came in there was a letter for “Mr. Dexter.”
I took it to Tom myself, and my heart almost stood still while he opened
it.
“Tain’t her writing, ma’am, on the envelope,” he said; and his lip
trembled as he tore the envelope open clumsily, as people do who don’t
often have letters.
He opened it at last and got the letter out, a bit torn in opening the
envelope. He looked at it hard a minute; then he dropped it, and his
face went blood-red, then deadly white. Then he put his hands up over
his face, and cried like a child.
“Tom,” I said, “my poor Tom! Tell me, is she----”
“It’s all right, ma’am,” he said. “I’ve expected it; but it took me a
bit aback. She’s alive and well, and she’s waiting for me--waiting to
show me that she’s the good, loving little woman of the dear old
days--waiting for her husband and her daughter, and the home that she’s
going to be the light of and the joy of, please God, for all the rest of
her life!”
* * * * *
Tom Dexter and his wife and their little girl--not very little now--are
in a happy home. Tom left us, and sorry were we to part with him, and
he with us; but it was his wife’s wish that they should be together, and
she was housekeeper to the lady who had saved her from ruin, and made a
new woman of her, and wanted her always to live near her.
After she left Tom, she had gone away to drown herself, and had been
taken by the police for trying to do so, but had given a false name to
the magistrate, and Tom had heard nothing about it. A lady was in court,
and had promised to look after the poor woman, if she was given up to
her, and, after a week’s remand, this was done. Tom’s wife didn’t tell
the lady she was married, but said she was a widow; and the lady took
her to be her servant, and tried to wean her from the drink. She had
lost a sister from it, and devoted her life to good work, as some people
do who have a great sorrow.
It was hard work, for Mrs. Dexter fretted about her husband and her lost
home now, and the temptation would come, and then, somehow or other, she
would get the drink.
But the lady would not turn her away; she was grieved, but she
determined to try and try again, and at last a whole year went by and
Tom’s wife had kept the pledge she had made.
But she then felt, if she was to go back to her husband, and have her
liberty, she might break down again.
She was afraid of herself.
She said she would try another year, and she did, and then she felt
safe; and one day she told her mistress all her story, and how strong
the yearning had come upon her for her husband and her home again.
And then the lady put that advertisement in the paper, and Tom and his
wife came together again, as he always believed they would, and now
there isn’t a happier home in all England.
Tom works on the lady’s estate, and is a great favourite with her, and
he has a cottage all his own, with roses and a big garden, and only the
other day he sent me the loveliest pumpkin of his own growing, and with
it was a letter from his wife thanking me for----
* * * * *
The beer sour! Who says so? Mr. Wilkins? Let me taste it. So it is; it’s
the thunderstorm. I suppose the whole lot’s gone wrong. Harry! Harry!
Where’s your master? Up in the billiard-room? Good gracious! isn’t that
billiard-table fitted up yet? The men have been at it all day!