I
Mary Cole had been, all her life, that thing beloved of the sentimental
novelist, a misunderstood child. She was the only misunderstood member
of the Cole family, and she was misunderstood, as is very often
the case, in a large measure because she was so plain. Had she been
good-looking as Helen, or independent as Jeremy, she would have either
attracted the world in general, or have been indifferent as to whether
she attracted it or not. As it was, she longed to attract everyone, and,
in truth, attracted nobody. She might have found consolation in books
or her own highly-coloured imaginations had it not been for the burning
passions which she formed, at a very early age, for living people. For
some years now her life had centred round her brother Jeremy. Had the
Coles been an observant family they might, perhaps, have found some
pathos in the way in which Mary, with her pale sallow complexion, her
pear-shaped face with its dull, grey eyes, her enormous glasses, her
lanky colourless hair, and her thin, bony figure, gazed at her masculine
and independent brother.
Uncle Samuel might have noticed, but he was occupied with his painting.
For the rest they were not observant. Mary was only seven years of age,
but she had the capacity for being hurt of a person of thirty. She was
hurt by everything and everybody. When somebody said: “Now, Mary, hurry
up. You're always so slow,” she was hurt. If Helen told her that she was
selfish, she was hurt, and would sit wondering whether she was selfish
or no. If Mrs. Cole said that she must brush her hair more carefully she
was hurt, and when Jeremy said anything sharp to her she was in agony.
She discovered very quickly that no one cared for her agonies. The Coles
were a plain, matter-of-fact race, and had the day's work to finish.
They had no intention of thinking too much of their children's feelings.
Thirty years ago that was not so popular as it is now. Meanwhile, her
devotion to her brother grew with every month of her life. She thought
him, in all honesty, the most miraculous of all human beings. There
was more in her worship than mere dog-like fidelity. She adored him for
reasons that were real and true; for his independence, his obstinacy,
his sense of fun, his sudden, unexpected kindnesses, his sudden
helplessness, and above all, for his bravery. He seemed to her the
bravest hero in all history, and she felt it the more because she was
herself compact of every fear and terror known to man. It was not enough
for her, the ordinary panic that belongs to all human life at every
stage of its progress. She feared everything and everybody, and only
hid her fear by a persistent cover of almost obstinate stupidity,
which deceived, to some extent, her relations, but never in any degree
herself. She knew that she was plain, awkward and hesitating, but she
knew also that she was clever. She knew that she could do everything
twice as fast as Jeremy and Helen, that she was often so impatient
of their slow progress at lessons that she would beat her foot on the
ground in a kind of agonised impatience. She knew that she was clever,
and she wondered sometimes why her cleverness did not give her more
advantage. Why, for instance, should Helen's good looks be noticed at
once by every visitor and her own cleverness be unnoticed? Certainly,
on occasions, her mother would say: “And Mary? I don't think you've met
Mary. Come and say, how do you do, Mary. Mary is the clever one of the
family!” but it was always said in a deprecating, apologetic tone, which
made Mary hang her head and hate both herself and her mother.
She told herself stories of the times when Jeremy would have to depend
entirely upon the splendour of her brains for his delivery from some
horror--death, torture or disgrace. At present those times were, she was
bound to confess to herself, very distant. He depended upon no one
for anything; he could not be said to need Mary's assistance in any
particular. And with this burning desire of hers came, of course,
jealousy. There are some happy, easy natures to whom jealousy is,
through life, unknown. They are to be envied. Jealousy in a grown-up
human being is bad; in a child it is terrible. Had you told Mrs.
Cole--good mother though she was--that her daughter Mary, aged seven,
suffered tortures through jealousy, she would have assured you that it
was not, in reality, jealousy, but rather indigestion, and that a little
medicine would put it right.
Mary was quite helpless. What is a child to do if she is jealous? Other
children do not understand her, her elders laugh at her. Mary, with a
wisdom greatly beyond her years, realised very quickly that this was
some sort of horrible disease, with which she must wrestle alone. Above
all, she must never allow Jeremy to know anything about it. He was, of
course, sublimely unaware of the matter; he knew that Mary was silly
sometimes, but he attributed that to her sex; he went on his way,
happily indifferent whether anyone cared for him or no...
Mary suffered agonies when, as sometimes happened, Jeremy sat with his
arm round Helen's neck and his cheek up against hers. She suffered when,
in a mood of tempestuous affection to the whole world, he kissed Miss
Jones. She even suffered when he sat at his mother's feet whilst she
read “The Dove in the Eagle's Nest,” or “Engel the Fearless.”
Most of all, however, she suffered over Hamlet. She knew that at this
present time Hamlet was the one creature for whom Jeremy passionately
cared. He loved his mother, but with the love that custom and habit
has tamed and modified, although since Mrs. Cole's illness in the early
summer he had cared for her in a manner more demonstrative and openly
affectionate. Nevertheless, it was Hamlet who commanded Jeremy's heart,
and Mary knew it. Matters were made worse by the undoubted truth that
Hamlet did not care very much for Mary--that is, he never gave any signs
of caring, and very often walked out of the room when she came into it.
Mary could have cared for the dog as enthusiastically as Jeremy--she was
always sentimental about animals--but now she was shut out from their
alliance, and she knew that when she came up to them and began to pat or
stroke Hamlet, Jeremy was annoyed and Hamlet's skin wriggled in a kind
of retreating fashion under her fingers. Wise people will say that it
is impossible for this to be a serious trouble to a child. It was
increasingly serious to Mary.
Jeremy was not, perhaps, so tactful as he might have been. “Oh bother,
Mary!” he would say. “You've gone and waked Hamlet up!” or “Don't stroke
Hamlet that way, Mary; he hates it!” or “No, I'm going for a walk with
Hamlet; we don't want anyone!” Or Hamlet himself would suddenly bark at
her as though he hated her, or would bare his teeth and grin at her in a
mocking, sarcastic way that he had. At first, as an answer to this, she
had the ridiculous idea of herself adopting an animal, and she selected,
for this purpose, the kitchen cat, a dull, somnolent beast, whose sleek
black hair was furtive, and green, crooked eyes malignant. The cat
showed no signs of affection for Mary, nor could she herself honestly
care for it. When she brought it with her into the schoolroom, Hamlet
treated it in a scornful, sarcastic fashion that was worse than
outrageous attack. The cat was uncleanly, and was speedily banished back
into the kitchen. Mary's jealousy of Hamlet then grew apace, and with
that jealousy, unfortunately, her secret appreciation of his splendours.
She could not help admitting to herself that he was the most attractive
dog in the world. She would look at him from under her spectacles when
she was supposed to be reading and watch him as he rolled, kicking his
legs in the air, or lay stretched out, his black wet nose against his
paws, his eyes gleaming, his gaze fixed like the point of a dagger
raised to strike, upon some trophy, or enemy, or spoil, or sat, solemn
and pompous, like the Lord Mayor holding a meeting, as Jeremy said, up
against his master's leg, square and solid as though he were cut out
of wood, his peaked beard supercilious, his very ears at a patronising
angle; or, as Mary loved best of all to see him, when he was simply
childish, playing, as though he was still a new-found puppy, with
pieces of paper or balls of string, rolling and choking, growling,
purring, staggering and tumbling. At such times, again and again, her
impulse would be to go forward and applaud him, and then, the instinct
that she would be checked by Jeremy stayed her.
She knew very well that Jeremy realised nothing of this. Jeremy was
not given to the consideration of other people's motives--his own
independence saved him from anxiety about others. He had the English
characteristic of fancying that others must like and dislike as he
himself liked and disliked. Of sentiment he had no knowledge whatever.
As this year grew towards summer Mary had the feeling that Jeremy was
slipping away from her. She did not know what had happened to him. In
the old days he had asked her opinion about many things; he had scorned
to enjoy the long stories that she had told him--at any rate, he had
listened to them very politely--and he had asked her to suggest games or
to play with his toys. Now as the summer drew near, he did none of
these things. He was frankly impatient with her stories, never asked her
advice about anything, and never played with her. Was he growing very
conceited? Was it because he was going to school, and thought himself
too old for his sisters? No, he did not seem to be conceited--he had
always been proud, but never conceited. It was rather as though he had
lately had thoughts of his own, almost against his will, and that these
had shut him off from the people round him.
Then, when their mother was so ill and Barbara made her startling
appearance Jeremy kept more to himself. He never talked about his
mother's illness, as did the others, and yet Mary knew that he had
been more deeply concerned than any of them. She had been miserable, of
course, but to Jeremy it had been as though he had been led into a new
world altogether; Helen and she were still in their old places, and
Jeremy had left them.
At last just before they all moved to Cow Farm Mary made a silly scene.
She had not intended to make a scene. Scenes seemed to come upon her,
like evil birds, straight out of the air, to seize her before she knew
where she was, to envelop and carry her up with them; at last, when all
the mischief was done, to set her on her feet again, battered, torn and
bitterly ashamed. One evening she was sitting deep in “Charlotte Mary,”
and Hamlet, bunched up against his master's leg, stared at her. She had
long ago told herself that it was ridiculous to mind what Hamlet
did, that he was not looking at her, and, in any case, he was only a
dog--and so on.
But to-night she was tired, and had read so long that her head
ached--Hamlet was laughing at her, his eyes stared through his hair at
her, cynically, superciliously, contemptuously. His lip curled and
his beard bristled. Moved by a sudden wild impulse she picked up “The
Chaplet of Pearls” and threw it at him. It hit him (not very severely),
and he gave the sharp, melodramatic howl that he always used when it was
his dignity rather than his body that was hurt. Jeremy looked up,
saw what had happened, and a fine scene followed. Mary had hysterics,
stamped and screamed and howled. Jeremy, his face white, stood and said
nothing, but looked as though he hated her, which at that moment he
undoubtedly did. It was that look which more than anything else in the
world she dreaded.
She made herself sick with crying; then apologised with an abjection
that only irritated him the more; finally remembered the smallest
details of the affair long after he had forgotten all about it.
II
During the first weeks at Cow Farm Mary was happy. She had then many
especial private joys, such as climbing into one of the old apple trees
behind the house and reading there, safe from the world, or inventing
for herself wonderful adventures out of the dark glooms and sunlit
spaces of the orchard, or creeping about the lofts and barns as though
they were full of the most desperate dangers and hazards that she alone
had the pluck and intelligence to overcome. Then Mrs. Monk was kind
to her, and listened to her imaginative chatter with a most marvellous
patience. Mary did not know that, after these narrations, she would
shake her head and say to her husband: “Not long for this world, I'm
thinking, poor worm...not long for this world.”
Then, at first Jeremy was kind and considerate. He was so happy that
he did not mind what anyone did, and he would listen to Mary's stories
quite in the old way, whistling to himself, not thinking about her at
all perhaps, really, but very patient. After the first fortnight he
slipped away from her again--and now more than ever before. He went off
for long walks with Hamlet, refusing to take her with them; he answered
her questions so vaguely that she could see that he paid her no
attention at all; he turned upon her and rent her if she complained.
And it was all, she was sure, that horrible dog. Jeremy was always with
Hamlet now. The free life that the farm gave them, no lessons, no set
hours, no care for appearances, left them to choose their own ways, and
so developed their individualities. Helen was now more and more with
her elders, was becoming that invaluable thing, “a great help to her
mother,” and even, to her own inexhaustible pride, paid two calls with
Mrs. Cole on the wives of neighbouring farmers. Then, Barbara absorbed
more than ever of Helen's attention, and Mary was not allowed to share
in these rites and services because “she always made Barbara cry.”
She was, therefore, very much alone, and felt all her injuries twice as
deeply as she had felt them before. Hamlet began to be an obsession with
her. She had always had a habit of talking to herself, and now she could
be heard telling herself that if it were not for the dog, Jeremy would
always be with her, would play with her, walk with her, laugh with her
as he used to do. She acquired now an awkward habit of gazing at him
with passionate intensity. He would raise his eyes and find the great
moon-faced spectacles fixed upon him with a beseeching, reproachful
glare in the light of them. This would irritate him intensely. He would
say:
“You'll know me next time, Mary.”
She would blush crimson and then, with trembling mouth, answer:
“I wasn't looking.”
“Yes, you were.”
“No, I wasn't.”
“Of course, you were--staring as though I were an Indian or Chinaman. If
my face is dirty, say so.”
“It isn't dirty.”
“Well, then--”
“You're always so cross.”
“I'm not cross--only you're so silly--”
“You usen't always to say I was silly. Now you always do--every minute.”
“So you are.” Then as he saw the tears coming he would get up and go
away. He didn't mean to be unkind to her; he was fond of her--but he
hated scenes.
“Mary's always howling about something now,” he confided to Helen.
“Is she?” Helen answered with indifference. “Mary's such a baby.”
So Mary began to attribute everything to the dog. It seemed to her then
that she met the animal everywhere. Cow Farm was a rambling building,
with dark, uneven stairs, low-ceilinged rooms, queer, odd corners, and
sudden unexpected doors. It seemed to Mary as though in this place there
were two Hamlets. When, in the evening she went to her room, hurrying
through the passages for fear of what she might see, stumbling over
the uneven boards, sniffling the mice and straw under the smell of
her tallow candle, suddenly out of nowhere at all Hamlet would appear
scurrying along, like the White Rabbit, intent on serious business.
He came so softly and with so sudden a flurry and scatter when she did
hear him that her heart would beat for minutes afterwards, and she would
not dare that night to search, as she usually did, for burglars under
her bed, but would lie, quaking, hot and staring, unable to sleep. When
at last dreams came they would be haunted by a monstrous dog, all hair
and eyes, who, with padding feet, would track her round and round a room
from which there was no escape. Hamlet, being one of the wisest of dogs,
very quickly discovered that Mary hated him. He was not a sentimental
dog, and he did not devote his time to inventing ways in which he might
placate his enemy, he simply avoided her. But he could not hinder
a certain cynical and ironic pleasure that he had of, so to speak,
flaunting his master in her face. He clung to Jeremy more resolutely
than ever, would jump up at him, lick his hands and tumble about in
front of him whenever Mary was there, and then suddenly, very straight
and very grave, would stare at her as though he were the most devout
and obedient dog in the place. Indeed, he bore her no malice; he could
afford to disregard the Marys of this world, and of women in general he
had a poor opinion. But he loved to tease, and Mary was an easy prey. He
had his fun with her.
After the affair of the sea-picnic, Jeremy was for some time under a
cloud. It was felt that he was getting too big for anyone to manage. It
was not that he was wicked, not that he kept bad company with the boys
on the farm, or was dishonest, or told lies, or stole things--no, he
gave no one that kind of anxiety--but that he was developing quite
unmistakably a will of his own, and had a remarkable way of doing what
he wanted without being actually disobedient, which was very puzzling
to his elders. Being a little in disgrace he went off more than ever by
himself, always appearing again at the appointed time, but telling
no one where he had been or what he had been doing. His father had
no influence over him at all, whilst Uncle Samuel could make him do
whatever he wanted--and this, as Aunt Amy said, “was really a pity.”
“It's a good thing he's going to school in September,” sighed his
mother. “He's getting out of women's hands.”
Mary longed with feverish longing to share in his adventures. If only
he would tell her what he did on these walks of his. But no, only Hamlet
knew. Perhaps, if he did not go with the dog he would go with her. When
this idea crept into her brain she seized it and clutched it. That was
all he wanted--a companion! Were Hamlet not there he would take her.
Were Hamlet not there... She began to brood over this. She wandered...
She considered. She shuddered at her own wickedness; she tried to drive
the thoughts from her head, but they kept coming.
After all, no one need know. For a day or two Jeremy would be sorry
and then he would forget. She knew the man who went round selling
dogs--selling dogs and buying them.
She shuddered at her wickedness.
III
The last days of August came, and with them the last week of the
holiday. Already there was a scent of autumn in the air, leaves were
turning gold and red, and the evenings came cool and sudden, upon the
hot summer afternoons. Mary was not very well; she had caught a cold
somewhere, and existed in the irritating condition of going out one day
and being held indoors the next. This upset her temper, and at night
she had nightmares, in which she saw clouds of smoke crawling in at her
window, snakes on the floor, and crimson flames darting at her from the
ceiling. It was because she was in an abnormal condition of health that
the idea of doing something with Hamlet had gained such a hold upon her.
She considered the matter from every point of view. She did not want to
be cruel to the dog; she supposed that after a week or two he would be
quite happy with his new master, and, in any case, he had strolled in
so casually upon the Cole family that he was accustomed to a wandering
life.
She did not intend that anyone should know. It was to be a deep secret
all of her own.
Jeremy was going to school in September, and before then she must make
him friendly to her again. She saw stretching in front of her all the
lonely autumn without him and her own memories of the miserable summer
to make her wretched. She was an extremely sentimental little girl.
As always happens when one is meditating with a placated conscience a
wicked deed, the opportunity was suddenly offered to Mary of achieving
her purpose. One morning Jeremy, after refusing to listen to one of
Mary's long romances, lost his temper.
“I can't stop,” he said. “You bother and bother and bother. Aunt Amy
says you nearly make her mad.”
“I don't care what Aunt Amy says,” Mary on the edge of tears replied.
“Hamlet and I are going out. And I'm sick of your silly old stories.”
Then he suddenly stopped and gazed at Mary, who was beginning, as usual,
to weep.
“Look here, Mary, what's been the matter with you lately? You're always
crying now or something. And you look at me as though I'd done something
dreadful. I haven't done anything.”
“I--never--said you--had,” Mary gulped out. He rubbed his nose in a way
that he had when he was puzzled.
“If it's anything I do, tell me. It's so silly always crying. The
holidays will be over soon, and you've done nothing but cry.”
“You're--never--with me--now,” Mary sobbed.
“Well, I've been busy.”
“You haven't. You can't be busy all--by yourself.”
“Oh, yes, you can.” He was getting impatient. “Anyway, you might let
Hamlet and me alone. You're always bothering one of us.”
“No, I'm not.” She choked an enormous sob and burst out with: “It's
always Hamlet now. I wish he'd never--come. It was much nicer before.”
Then he lost his temper. “Oh, you're a baby! I'm sick of you and your
nonsense,” he cried, and stamped off.
In Mary's red-rimmed eyes, as she watched him go, determination grew.
It happened that upon the afternoon of that same day Miss Jones
announced that she would take Mary for a walk; then, just as they passed
through the farm gates, Hamlet, rushing out, joined them. He did not
often honour them with his company, despising women most especially when
they walked, but to-day his master was busy digging for worms in the
vegetable garden, and, after a quarter of an hour's contemplation of
this fascinating occupation, he had wandered off in search of a livelier
game. He decided to join Miss Jones; he could do what he pleased, he
could amuse himself with her ineffectual attempts to keep him in order,
and he could irritate Mary; so he danced along, with his tail in the
air, barking at imaginary rats and poking his nose into hedges.
Mary, with a sudden tightened clutching of the heart, realised that
her hour was upon her. She felt so wicked as she realised this that she
wondered that the ground didn't open up and swallow her, as it had done
with those unfortunate people in the Bible. But no, the world was calm.
Little white milky clouds raced in lines and circles across the sky, and
once and again a leaf floated from a tree, hung for a moment
suspended, and then turned slowly to the ground. The hedges were a dark
black-green, high and thick above the dusty road; there had been no rain
for weeks. Truly a stable world. Mary, glaring at Fate, wondered how it
could be so.
Miss Jones, who was happy and optimistic to-day, talked in a tenderly
reminiscent tone of her youth. This vein of reminiscence Mary, on her
normal day, loved. To-day she did not hear a word that Miss Jones said.
“I remember my mother saying so well to my dear brother: 'Do what you
like, my boy. I trust you.' And indeed Alfred was to be trusted if ever
a boy was. It is a remarkable thing, but I cannot remember a single
occasion of dishonesty on Alfred's part. 'A white lie,' he would often
say, 'is a lie, and a lie is a sin--white or black, always a sin'; and
I remember that he would often put mother to a serious inconvenience by
his telling callers that she was in when she had wished it to be said
that she was not at home. He felt it his serious duty, and so he told
Mother. 'Don't ask me to tell a lie, Mother,' I remember his saying. 'I
cannot do it.'”
“Like George Washington,” said Mary, suddenly catching the last words of
Miss Jones's sentence.
“He was like many famous characters in history, I used to think. Once
I remember reading about Oliver Cromwell... 'Where is that dog? Hamlet!
Hamlet! Perhaps he's gone after the sheep. Ah! there he is! Hamlet, you
naughty dog!'”
They were approaching one of their favourite pieces of country--Mellot
Wood. Here, on the wood's edge, the ground broke away, running down in a
field of corn to a little green valley with clustered trees that showed
only their heads, so thickly embedded were they, and beyond the valley
the sea. The sea looked quite close here, although it was in reality
four miles distant. Never was such a place as this view for light and
shadow. The clouds raced like the black wings of enormous birds across
the light green valley, and the red-gold of the cornfield was tossed
into the haze and swept like a golden shadow across the earth, bending
back again when the breeze had died. Behind Mellot Wood was Mellot Farm,
an old eighteenth-century house about which there was a fine tragic
story with a murder and a ghost in it, and this, of course, gave Mellot
Wood an additional charm. When they arrived at the outskirts of Mellot
Wood Mary looked about her. It was here, on the edge of the Rafiel Road
that skirted the wood, that she had once seen the dog-man eating his
luncheon out of a red pocket-handkerchief. There was no sign of him
to-day. All was silent and still. Only the little wood uttered little
sighs of content beneath the flying clouds. Hamlet, tired with his
racing after imaginary rabbits, walked quietly along by Mary's side.
What was she to do? She had once again the desperate feeling that
something stronger than she had swept down upon her and was forcing
her to do this thing. She seemed to have no will of her own, but to be
watching some other commit an act whose dangerous wickedness froze her
heart. How could she? But she must. Someone was doing it for her.
And in very truth it seemed so. Miss Jones said that now they were
here she might as well call upon Miss Andrews, the sister of the Mellot
farmer. Miss Andrews had promised her some ducks' eggs. They pushed open
the farm gate, passed across the yard and knocked on the house door.
Near Mary was a large barn with a heavy door, now ajar. Hamlet
sat gazing pensively at a flock of geese, his tongue out, panting
contentedly.
“Wait here one minute, Mary,” said Miss Jones. “I won't stay.”
Miss Jones disappeared. Mary, still under the strange sense that it
was not she, but another, who did these things, moved back to the barn,
calling softly to Hamlet. He followed her, sniffing a rat somewhere.
Very quickly she pulled back the door; he, still investigating his rat,
followed into the dark excitements of the barn. With a quick movement
she bent down, slipped off his collar, which she hid in her dress,
then shut him in. She knew that for a moment or two he would still be
pursuing his rat, and she saw, with guilty relief, Miss Jones come out
to her just as she had finished her evil deed.
“Miss Andrews is out,” said Miss Jones. “They are all away at Liskane
Fair.”
They left the farm and walked down the road. Hamlet had not begun his
cry.
IV
Miss Jones was pleased. “Such a nice servant,” she said. “One of the
old kind. She had been with the family fifty years, she told me, and
had nursed Mr. Andrews on her knee. Fancy! Such a large fat man as he
is now. Too much beer, I suppose. I suppose they get so thirsty with
all the straw and hay about. Yes, a really nice woman. She told me that
there was no place in Glebeshire to touch them for cream. I dare say
they're right. After all, you never can tell. I remember at home...”
She broke off then and cried: “Where's Hamlet?”
Mary, wickeder than ever, stared through her spectacles down the road.
“I don't know, Miss Jones,” she said. They had left the wood and the
farm, and there was nothing to be seen but the long white ribbon of road
hemmed in by the high hedges.
“Perhaps he stayed behind at the farm,” said Miss Jones.
Then Mary told her worst lie.
“Oh, no, Miss Jones. He ran past us just now. Didn't you see him?”
“No, I didn't. He's gone on ahead, I suppose. He runs home sometimes.
Naughty dog! We shall catch him up.”
But of course they did not. They passed through the gates of Cow Farm
and still nothing of Hamlet was to be seen.
“Oh dear! Oh dear!” said Miss Jones. “I do hope that he's arrived.
Whatever will Jeremy say if anything has gone wrong?”
Mary was breathing hard now, as though she had been running a desperate
race. She would at this moment have given all that she possessed, or all
that she was ever likely to possess, to recall her deed. If she could
have seen Hamlet rushing down the road towards her she would have cried
with relief; there seemed now to be suddenly removed from her that
outside agency that had forced her to do this thing; now, having
compelled her, it had withdrawn and left her to carry the consequences.
Strangely confused in her sentimental soul was her terror of Jeremy's
wrath and her own picture of the wretched Hamlet barking his heart
out, frightened, thirsty, and lonely. Her teeth began to chatter; she
clenched her hands together.
Miss Jones went across the courtyard, calling:
“Hamlet! Hamlet!”
The family was collected, having just sat down to tea, so that the
announcement received its full measure of excitement.
“Has Hamlet come back? We thought he was ahead of us.”
A chair had tumbled over. Jeremy had run round the table to Miss Jones.
“What's that? Hamlet? Where is he?”
“We thought he must be ahead of us. He ran past us down the road, and we
thought--”
They thought! Silly women! Jeremy, as though he were challenging a god,
stood up against Miss Jones, hurling questions at her. Where had they
been? What road had they taken? Had they gone into the wood? Whereabouts
had he run past them?
“I don't know,” said Miss Jones to this last. “I didn't see him. Mary
did.”
Jeremy turned upon Mary. “Where was it you saw him?”
She couldn't speak. Her tongue wouldn't move, her lips wouldn't open;
she could but waggle her head like an idiot. She saw nothing but his
face. It was a desperate face. She knew so much better than all the
others what the thought of losing Hamlet was to him. It was part of the
harshness of her fate that she should understand him so much better than
the others did.
But she herself had not realised how hardly he would take it.
“I didn't--I couldn't--”
“There's the dog-man,” he stammered. “He'll have stolen him.” Then he
was off out of the room in an instant.
And that was more than Mary could hear. She realised, even as she
followed him, that she was giving her whole case away, that she was now,
as always, weak when she should be strong, soft when she should be hard,
good when she should be wicked, wicked when she should be good. She
could not help herself. With trembling limbs and a heart that seemed to
be hammering her body into pieces she followed him out. She found him in
the hall, tugging at his coat.
“Where are you going?” she said weakly.
“Going?” he answered fiercely. “Where do you think?” He glared at her.
“Just like you.” He broke off, suddenly appealing to her. “Mary, CAN'T
you remember? It will be getting dark soon, and if we have to wait
until to-morrow the dog-man will have got him. At any rate, he had his
collar--”
Then Mary broke out. She burst into sobs, pushed her hand into her
dress, and held out the collar to him.
“There it is! There it is!” she said hysterically.
“You've got it?” He stared at her, suspicion slowly coming to him. “But
how--? What have you done?”
She looked up at him wild-eyed, the tears making dirty lines on her
face, her hand out towards him.
“I took it off. I shut Hamlet into the barn at Mellot Farm. I wanted
him to be lost. I didn't want you to have him. I hated him--always being
with you, and me never.”
Jeremy moved back, and at the sudden look in his eyes her sobbing
ceased, she caught her breath and stared at him with a silly fixed stare
as a rabbit quivers before a snake.
Jeremy said in his ordinary voice:
“You shut Hamlet up? You didn't want him to be found?”
She nodded her head several times as though now she must convince him
quickly of this--
“Yes, yes, yes. I did... I know I shouldn't, but I couldn't help it--”
He clutched her arm, and then shook her with a sudden wave of fierce
physical anger that was utterly unlike him, and, therefore, the more
terrifying.
“You wicked, wicked--You beast, Mary!”
She could only sob, her head hanging down. He let her go.
“What barn was it?”
She described the place.
He gave her another look of contempt and then rushed off, running across
the courtyard.
There was still no one in the hall; she could go up to her room without
the fear of being disturbed. She found the room, all white and black
now with the gathering dusk. Beyond the window the evening breeze was
rustling in the dark trees of the garden and the boom of the sea could
be heard faintly. Mary sat, where she always sat when she was unhappy,
inside the wardrobe with her head amongst the clothes. They in some
way comforted her; she was not so lonely with them, nor did she feel so
strongly the empty distances of the long room, the white light of the
window-frames, nor the mysterious secrecy of the high elms knocking
their heads together in the garden outside.
She had a fit of hysterical crying, biting the hanging clothes between
her teeth, feeling suddenly sick and tired and exhausted, with flaming
eyes and a dry, parched throat. Why had she ever done such a thing, she
loving Jeremy as she did? Would he ever forgive her? No, never; she saw
that in his face. Perhaps he would--if he found Hamlet quickly and came
back. Perhaps Hamlet never would be found. Then Jeremy's heart would be
broken.
She slept from utter exhaustion, and was so found, when the room was
quite dark and only shadows moved in it, by her mother.
“Why, Mary!” said Mrs. Cole. “What are you doing here? We couldn't think
where you were. And where's Jeremy?”
“Jeremy!” She started up, remembering everything.
“Hasn't he come back? Oh, he's lost and he'll be killed, and it will be
all my fault!” She burst into another fit of wild hysterical crying.
Her mother took her arm. “Mary, explain--What have you done?”
Mary explained, her teeth chattering, her head aching so that she could
not see.
“And you shut him up like that? Whatever--Oh, Mary, you wicked girl! And
Jeremy--He's been away two hours now--”
She turned off, leaving Mary alone in the black room.
Mary was left to every terror that can beset a lonely, hysterical
child--terror of Jeremy's fate, terror of Hamlet's loss, terror of her
own crimes, above all, terror of the lonely room, the waving elms and
the gathering dark. She could not move; she could not even close the
door of the wardrobe, into whose shelter she had again crept. She stared
at the white sheet of the window, with its black bars like railings and
its ghostly hinting of a moon that would soon be up above the trees.
Every noise frightened her, the working of the “separator” in a distant
part of the farm, the whistling of some farm-hand out in the yard,
the voice of some boy, “coo-ee”-ing faintly, the lingering echo of the
vanished day--all these seemed to accuse her, to point fingers at her,
to warn her of some awful impending punishment. “Ah! you're the little
girl,” they seemed to say, “who lost Jeremy's dog and broke Jeremy's
heart.” She was sure that someone was beneath her bed. That old terror
haunted her with an almost humorous persistency every night before she
went to sleep, but to-night there was a ghastly certainty and imminence
about it that froze her blood. She crouched up against the hanging
skirts, gazing at the black line between the floor and the white sheets,
expecting at every second to see a protruding black mask, bloodshot
eyes, a coarse hand. The memory of the burglary that they had had in the
spring came upon her with redoubled force. Ah! surely, surely someone
was there! She heard a movement, a scraping of a boot upon the floor,
the thick hurried breathing of some desperate villain...
Then these fears gave way to something worse than them all, the
certainty that Jeremy was dead. Ridiculous pictures passed before her,
of Jeremy hanging from a tree, Jeremy lying frozen in the wood,
the faithful Hamlet dead at his side, Jeremy stung by an adder and
succumbing to his horrible tortures, Jeremy surrounded by violent men,
who snatched Hamlet from him, beat him on the head and left him for dead
on the ground.
She passed what seemed to her hours of torture under these horrible
imaginings, tired out, almost out of her mind with the hysteria of her
loneliness, her imagination and her conscience; she passed into a kind
of apathy of unhappiness, thinking now only of Jeremy, longing for him,
beseeching him to come back, telling the empty moonlit room that she
never meant it; that she would do everything he wanted if only he came
back to her; that she was a wicked girl; that she would never be wicked
again.... And she took her punishment alone.
After endless ages of darkness and terror and misery she heard
voices--then HIS voice! She jumped out of the wardrobe and listened.
Yes; it WAS his voice. She pushed back the door, crept down the passage,
and came suddenly upon a little group, with Jeremy in its midst, crowded
together at the top of the stairs. Jeremy was wrapped up in his father's
heavy coat, and looked very small and impish as he peered from out of
it. He was greatly excited, his eyes shining, his mouth smiling, his
cheeks flushed.
His audience consisted of Helen, Mrs. Cole, Miss Jones, and Aunt Amy. He
described to them how he had run along the road “for miles and miles
and miles,” how at last he had found the farm, had rung the bell,
and inquired, and discovered Hamlet licking up sugary tea in the farm
kitchen; there had then been a rapturous meeting, and he had boldly
declared that he could find his way home again without aid. “They wanted
me to be driven home in their trap, but I wasn't going to have that.
They'd been at the fair all day, and didn't want to go out again. I
could see that.” So he and Hamlet started gaily on their walk home, and
then, in some way or another, he took the wrong turn, and suddenly they
were in Mellot Wood. “It was dark as anything, you know, although there
was going to be a moon. We couldn't see a thing, and then I got loster
and loster. At last we just sat under a tree. There was nothing more to
do!” Then, apparently, Jeremy had slept, and had, finally, been found in
the proper romantic manner by Jim and his father.
“Well, all's well that ends well,” said Aunt Amy, with a sniff. In spite
of that momentary softness over the defeat of the Dean's Ernest she
liked her young nephew no better than of old. She had desired that he
should be punished for this, but as she looked at the melting eyes of
Mrs. Cole and Miss Jones she had very little hope.
Mary was forgotten; no one noticed her.
“Bed,” said Mrs. Cole.
“Really, what a terrible affair,” said Miss Jones. “And I can't help
feeling that it was my fault.”
“What Mary--” began Mrs. Cole. And then she stopped. She had perhaps
some sense that Mary had already received sufficient punishment.
Mary waited, standing against the passage wall. Jeremy, who had not
seen her, vanished into his room. She waited, then plucking up all
her courage with the desperate suffocating sense of a prisoner laying
himself beneath the guillotine, she knocked timidly on his door.
He said: “Come in,” and entering, she saw him, in his braces, standing
on a chair trying to put the picture entitled “Daddy's Christmas”
straight upon its nail. The sight of this familiar task--the picture
would never hang straight, although every day Jeremy, who, strangely
enough, had an eye to such matters, tried to correct it--cheered her a
little.
“Won't it go straight?” she said feebly.
“No, it won't,” he began, and then, suddenly realising the whole
position, stopped.
“I'm sorry, Jeremy,” she muttered, hanging her head down.
“Oh, that's all right,” he answered, turning away from her and pulling
at the string. “It was a beastly thing to do all the same,” he added.
“Will you forgive me?” she asked.
“Oh, there isn't any forgiveness about it. Girls are queer, I suppose.
I don't understand them myself. There, that's better... I say, it was
simply beastly under that tree--”
“Was it?”
“Beastly! There was something howling somewhere--a cat or something.”
“You do forgive me, don't you?”
“Yes, yes... I say, is that right now? Oh, it won't stay there. It's the
wall or something.”
He came down from the chair yawning.
“Jim's nice,” he confided to her. “He's going to take me ratting one
day!”
“I'm going,” Mary said again, and waited.
Jeremy coloured, looked as though he would say something, then, in
silence, presented a very grimy cheek. “Good-night,” he said, with an
air of intense relief.
“Good-night,” she said, kissing him.
She closed the door behind her. She knew that the worst had happened. He
had passed away, utterly beyond her company, her world, her interests.
She crept along to her room, and there, with a determination and a
strength rare in a child so young and so undisciplined, faced her
loneliness.