VENNIE SELDOM
It was not towards her mother’s house that Vennie directed her steps
when she left the churchyard. She turned sharp to the west, and walked
rapidly down the central street of the village into the square at the
end of it.
Here she found an arena of busy and stirring confusion, dominated
by hissing spouts of steam, hoarse whistlings from the “roundabout”
engines, and occasional bursts of extravagant melody, as the circus-men
made their musical experiments, pending the opening of the show.
Vennie’s intention, in crossing the square, was to pay a morning visit
to Mr. Quincunx, whose absence from Andersen’s funeral had struck
her mind as extraordinary and ominous. She feared that the recluse
must be ill. Nothing less than illness, she thought, would have kept
him away from such an event. She knew how closely he and the younger
stone-carver were associated, and it was inconceivable that any insane
jealousy of the dead could have held him at home. Of course it was
possible that he had been compelled to go to work at Yeoborough as
usual, but she did not think this likely.
It was, however, not only anxiety lest her mother’s queer friend
should be ill that actuated her. She felt,--now that her ultimatum
had been delivered,--that the sooner she entered the Catholic Church
and plunged into her novitiate, the better it would be. When events
had _happened_, Mrs. Seldom accepted them. It was during the days of
uncertain waiting that her nerves broke down. Once the daughter were
actually a postulant in a convent, she felt sure the mother would
resign herself, and resume her normal life.
Valentia was a very independent and self-sufficient woman. With
her favourite flowers and her favourite biographies of proconsular
personages, the girl felt convinced she would be much less heart-broken
than she imagined.
Her days in Nevilton being thus numbered, Vennie could not help giving
way to a desire that had lately grown more and more definite within
her, to have a bold and unhesitating interview with Mr. Quincunx.
Perhaps even at this last hour something might be done to save Lacrima
from her fate!
Passing along the outskirts of the circus, she could not resist pausing
for a moment to observe the numerous groups of well-known village
characters, whom curiosity had drawn to the spot.
She was amazed to catch sight of the redoubtable Mr. Wone, holding
one of his younger children by the hand and surveying with extreme
interest the setting up of a colossal framework of gilded and painted
wood, destined to support certain boat-shaped swings. She felt a little
indignant with the worthy man for not having been present at Andersen’s
funeral, but the naive and childlike interest with which, with open
mouth and eyes, he stood gaping at this glittering erection, soothed
her anger into a smile. He really was a good sort of man, this poor
Wone! She wondered vaguely whether he intended himself to indulge in
the pastime of swinging in a boat-shaped swing or whirling round upon
a wooden horse. She felt that if she could see him on one of these
roundabouts,--especially if he retained that expression of guileless
admiration,--she could really forgive him everything.
She caught a glimpse of two other figures whose interest in the
proceedings appeared extremely vivid, no less persons than Mr. John
Goring and his devoted henchman, Bert Leerd. These two were engaged in
reading a glaring advertisement which depicted a young woman clad in
astounding spangles dancing on a tight-rope, and it was difficult to
say whether the farmer or the idiot was the more absorbed.
She was just turning away, when she heard herself called by name,
and from amid a crowd of women clustering round one of Mr. Love’s
bric-a-brac stalls, there came towards her, together, Mrs. Fringe and
Mrs. Wotnot.
Vennie was extremely surprised to find these two ladies,--by no
means particularly friendly as a rule,--thus joined in partnership
of dissipation, but she supposed the influence of a circus, like the
influence of religion, has a dissolvent effect upon human animosity.
That these excellent women should have preferred the circus, however,
to the rival entertainment in the churchyard, did strike her mind as
extraordinary. She did not know that they had, as a matter of fact,
“eaten their pot of honey” at the one, before proceeding, post-haste,
to enjoy the other.
“May we walk with you, miss, a step?” supplicated Mrs. Fringe,
as Vennie indicated her intention of moving on, as soon as their
salutations were over.
“Thank you, you are very kind, Mrs. Fringe. Perhaps,--a little way, but
I’m rather busy this morning.”
“Oh we shan’t trouble you long,” murmured Mrs. Wotnot, “It’s
only,--well, Mrs. Fringe, here, had better speak.”
Thus it came about that Vennie began her advance up the Yeoborough road
supported by the two housekeepers, the lean one on the left of her, and
the fat one on the right of her.
“Will I tell her, or will you tell her?” murmured the plump lady
sweetly, when they were clear of the village.
Mrs. Wotnot made a curious grimace and clasped and unclasped her hands.
“Better you; much, much better, that it should be you,” she remarked.
“But ’twas thy tale, dearie; ’twas thy tale and surprisin’
discoverin’s,” protested Mrs. Fringe.
“Those that knows aren’t always those that tells,” observed the other
sententiously.
“But you do think it’s proper and right the young lady should know?”
said Mr. Clavering’s housekeeper.
Mrs. Wotnot nodded. “If ’taint too shameful for her, ’tis best what
she’d a’ ought to hear,” said the lean woman.
Vennie became conscious at this moment that whenever Mrs. Wotnot opened
her mouth there issued thence a most unpleasant smell of brandy, and
it flashed upon her that this was the explanation of the singular
converging of these antipodal orbits. In the absence of her master,
Mrs. Wotnot had evidently “taken to drink,” and it was doubtless out
of her protracted intoxication that Mrs. Fringe had derived whatever
scandalous piece of gossip it was that she was now so anxious to impart.
“I’ll tell ’ee, miss,” said Mrs. Fringe, “with no nonsense-fangles and
no shilly-shally. I’ll tell ’ee straight out and sober,--same as our
dear friend did tell it to me. ’Tis along of Miss Romer,--ye be to
understand, wot is to be confirmed this same blessed day.
“The dear woman, here, was out a-gatherin’ laurel-leaves one fine
evenin’, long o’ some weeks since, and who should she get wind of, in
the bushes near-by, but Mr. Luke and Miss Gladys. I been my own self
ere now, moon-daft on that there lovely young man, but Satan’s ways be
Satan’s ways, and none shall report that I takes countenance of _such_
goings on. Mrs. Wotnot here, she heerd every Jack word them sinful
young things did say,--and shameful-awful their words were, God in
Heaven do know!
“They were cursin’ one another, like to split, that night. She were
cryin’ and fandanderin’ and he were laughin’ and chaffin’. ’Twas God’s
terror to hear how they went on, with the holy bare sky over their
shameless heads!”
“Tell the young lady quick and plain,” ejaculated Mrs. Wotnot at this
point, clutching Vennie’s arm and arresting their advance.
“I _am_ ’a tellin’ her,” retorted Mrs. Fringe, “I’m a tellin’ as fast
as my besom can breathe. Don’t ’ee push a body so! The young lady ain’t
in such a tantrum-hurry as all that.”
“I am _rather_ anxious to get on with my walk,” threw in Vennie,
looking from one to another with some embarrassment, “and I really
don’t care very much about hearing things of this kind.”
“Tell ’er! Tell ’er! Tell ’er!” cried Mrs. Wotnot.
Mrs. Fringe cast a contemptuous look at her rival housekeeper.
“Our friend baint quite her own self today, miss,” she remarked with a
wink at Vennie, “the weather or summat’ ’ave moved ’er rheumatiz from
’er legs, and settled it in ’er stummick.”
“Tell her! Tell her!” reiterated the other.
Mrs. Fringe lowered her voice to a pregnant whisper.
“The truth be, miss, that our friend here heered these wicked young
things talk quite open-like about their gay goings on. So plain did
they talk, that all wot the Blessed Lord ’is own self do know, of such
as most folks keeps to ’emselves, went burnin’ and shamin’ into our
friend’s ’stonished ears. And wot she did gather was that Miss Gladys,
for certin’ and sure, be a lost girl, and Mr. Luke ’as ’ad ’is bit of
fun down to the uttermost drop.”
The extraordinary solemnity with which Mrs. Fringe uttered these
words and the equally extraordinary solemnity with which Mrs. Wotnot
nodded her head in corroboration of their truth had a devastating
effect upon Vennie. There was no earthly reason why these two females
should have invented this squalid story. Mrs. Fringe was an incurable
scandal-monger, but Vennie had never found her a liar. Besides there
was a genuine note of shocked sincerity about her tone which no mere
morbid suspicion could have evoked.
The thing was true then! Gladys and Luke were lovers, in the most
extreme sense of that word, and Dangelis was the victim of an
outrageous betrayal.
Vennie had sufficient presence of mind to avoid the eyes of both the
women, eyes fixed with ghoulish and lickerish interest upon her,
as they watched for the effect of this revelation,--but she was
uncomfortably conscious that her cheeks were flaming and her voice
strained as she bade them good-bye. Comment, of any kind, upon what
they had revealed to her she found absolutely impossible. She could
only wish them a pleasant time at the circus if they were returning
thither, and freedom from any ill effects due to their accompanying her
so far.
When she was alone, and beginning to climb the ascent of Dead Man’s
Lane, the full implication of what she had learnt thrust itself
through her brain like a red-hot wedge. Vennie’s experience of the
treacherousness of the world had, as we know, gone little deeper than
her reaction from the rough discourtesy of Mr. Clavering and the
evasive aloofness of Mr. Taxater. This sudden revelation into the
brutishness and squalour inherent in our planetary system had the
effect upon her of an access of physical nausea. She felt dizzy and
sick, as she toiled up the hill, between the wet sun-pierced hedges,
and under the heavy September trees.
The feeling of autumn in the air, so pleasant under normal conditions
to human senses, seemed to associate itself just now with this dreadful
glance she had had into the basic terrors of things. The whole
atmosphere about her seemed to smell of decay, of decomposition, of
festering mortality. The pull and draw of the thick Nevilton soil,
its horrible demonic gravitation, had never got hold of her more
tenaciously than it did then. She felt as though some vast octopus-like
tentacles were dragging her earthward.
Vennie was one of those rare women for whom, even under ordinary
conditions, the idea of sex is distasteful and repulsive. Presented to
her as it was now, mingled with treachery and deception, it obsessed
her with an almost living presence. Sensuality had always been for her
the one unpardonable sin, and sensuality of this kind, turning the
power of sex into a mere motive for squalid pleasure-seeking, filled
her with a shuddering disgust.
So this was what men and women were like! This was the kind of thing
that went on, under the “covert and convenient seeming” of affable lies!
The whole of nature seemed to have become, in one moment, foul and
miasmic. Rank vapours rose from the ground at her feet, and the weeds
in the hedge took odious and indecent shapes.
An immense wave of distrust swept over her for everyone that she knew.
Was Mr. Clavering himself like this?
This thought,--the thought of what, for all she could tell, might exist
between her priest-friend and this harlot-girl,--flushed her cheeks
with a new emotion. Mixed at that moment with her virginal horror of
the whole squalid business, was a pang of quite a different character,
a pang that approached, if it did not reach, the sharp sting of sheer
physical jealousy.
As soon as she became aware of this feeling in herself it sickened her
with a deeper loathing. Was she also contaminated, like the rest? Was
no living human being free from this taint?
She stopped and passed her hand across her forehead. She took off
her hat and made a movement with her arms as if thrusting away some
invisible assailant. She felt she could not encounter even Mr. Quincunx
in this obsessed condition. She had the sensation of being infected by
some kind of odious leprosy.
She sat down in the hedge, heedless of the still clinging dew. Strange
and desperate thoughts whirled through her brain. She longed to purge
herself in some way, to bathe deep, deep,--body and soul,--in some
cleansing stream.
But what about Gladys’ betrothed? What about the American? Vennie had
scarcely spoken to Dangelis, hardly ever seen him, but she felt a wave
of sympathy for the betrayed artist surge through her heart. It could
not be allowed,--it could not,--that those two false intriguers should
fool this innocent gentleman!
Struck by a sudden illumination as if from the unveiled future, she
saw herself going straight to Dangelis and revealing the whole story.
He should at least be made aware of the real nature of the girl he was
marrying!
Having resolved upon this bold step, Vennie recovered something of her
natural mood. Where was Mr. Dangelis at this moment? She must find that
out,--perhaps Mr. Quincunx would know. She must make a struggle to
waylay the artist, to get an interview with him alone.
She rose to her feet, and holding her hat in her hand, advanced
resolutely up the lane. She felt happier now, relieved, in a measure,
of that odious sense of confederacy with gross sin which had weighed
her down. But there still beat vaguely in her brain a passionate
longing for purification. If only she could escape, even for a few
hours, from this lust-burdened spot! If only she could cool her
forehead in the sea!
As she approached Mr. Quincunx’s cottage she experienced a calm and
restorative reaction from her distress of mind. She felt no longer
alone in the world. Having resolved on a drastic stroke on behalf
of clear issues, she was strangely conscious, as she had not been
conscious for many months, of the presence, near her and with her, of
the Redeemer of men.
It suddenly was borne in upon her that that other criminal abuse,
which had so long oppressed her soul with a dead burden,--the affair
of Lacrima and Goring,--was intimately associated with what she had
discovered. It was more than likely that by exposing the one she could
prevent the other.
Flushed with excitement at this thought she opened Mr. Quincunx’s gate
and walked up his garden-path. To her amazement, she heard voices in
the cottage and not only voices, but voices speaking in a language that
vaguely reminded her of the little Catholic services in the chapel at
Yeoborough.
Mr. Quincunx himself answered her knock and opened the door. He was
strangely agitated. The hand which he extended to her shook as it
touched her fingers.
But Vennie herself was too astonished at the sight which met her eyes
to notice anything of this. Seated opposite one another, on either side
of the solitary’s kitchen-fire, were Lacrima and the little Dolores.
Vennie had interrupted a lively and impassioned colloquy between the
two Italians.
They both rose at her entrance, and their host, in hurried nervous
speech, gave Vennie an incoherent account of what had happened.
When they were all seated,--Vennie in the little girl’s chair, and the
child on Mr. Quincunx’s knees,--the embarrassment of the first surprise
quickly subsided.
“I shall adopt her,” the solitary kept repeating,--as though the words
were uttered in a defiance of universal opposition, “I shall adopt her.
You’d advise me to do that, wouldn’t you Miss Seldom?
“I shall get a proper document made out, so that there can be no
mistake. I shall adopt her. Whatever anyone likes to say, I shall adopt
her!
“Those circus-scoundrels will hold their tongues and let me alone for
their own sakes. I shall have no trouble. Lacrima will explain to the
police who the child is, and who her parents were. That is, if the
police come. But they won’t come. Why should they come? I shall have a
document drawn out.”
It seemed as though the little Neapolitan knew by instinct what her
protector was saying, for she nestled down against his shoulder and
taking one of his hands in both of hers pressed it against her lips.
Vennie gazed at Lacrima, and Lacrima gazed at Vennie, but neither of
them spoke. There was an inner flame of triumphant concentration in
Vennie’s glance, but Lacrima’s look was clouded and sad.
“Certainly no one will interfere with you,” said Vennie at last. “We
shall all be so glad to think that the child is in such good hands.
“The only difficulty I can see,” she paused a moment, while the grey
eyes of Mr. Quincunx opened wide and an expression of something like
defiance passed over his face, “is that it’ll be difficult for you to
know what to do with her while you are away in Yeoborough. You could
hardly leave her alone in this out-of-the-way place, and I’m afraid our
Nevilton National School wouldn’t suit her at all.”
Mr. Quincunx freed his hand and stroked his beard. His fingers were
quivering, and Vennie noticed a certain curious twitching in the
muscles of his face.
“I shan’t go to Yeoborough any more,” he cried. “None of you need think
it!
“That affair is over and done with. I shan’t stay here, any more,
either, to be bullied by the Romers and made a fool of by all
these idiots. I shall go away. I shall go--far away--to London--to
Liverpool,--to--to Norwich,--like the Man in the Moon!”
This final inspiration brought a flicker of his old goblin-humour to
the corners of his mouth.
Lacrima looked at Vennie with an imperceptible lifting of her eyebrows,
and then sighed deeply.
The latter clasped the arms of her high-backed chair with firm hands.
“I think it is essential that you should know _where_ you are going,
Mr. Quincunx. I mean for the child’s sake. You surely don’t wish to
drag her aimlessly about these great cities while you look for work?
“Besides,--you won’t be angry will you, if I speak plainly?--what work,
exactly, have you in your mind to do? It isn’t, I’m afraid, always
easy--”
Mr. Quincunx interrupted her with an outburst of unexpected fury.
“That’s what I knew you’d say!” he cried in a loud voice. “That’s what
_she_ says.” He indicated Lacrima. “But you both say it, only because
you don’t want me to have the pleasure of adopting Dolores!
“But I _shall_ adopt her,--in spite of you all. Yes, in spite of you
all! Nothing shall stop me adopting her!”
Once more the little Italian nestled close against him, and took
possession of his trembling hand.
Vennie perceived an expression of despairing hopelessness pass like an
icy mist over Lacrima’s face.
The profile of the Nevilton nun assumed those lines of commanding
obstinacy which had reminded Valentia a few hours ago of the mediæval
baron. She rose to her feet.
“Listen to me, Mr. Quincunx,” she said sternly. “You are right; you are
quite right, to wish to save this child. No one shall stop you saving
her. No one shall stop you adopting her. But there are other people
whose happiness depends upon what you do, besides this child.”
She paused, and glanced from Mr. Quincunx to Lacrima, and from Lacrima
to Mr. Quincunx. Then a look of indescribable domination and power
passed into her face. She might have been St. Catharine herself,
magnetizing the whole papal court into obedience to her will.
“Oh you foolish people!” she cried, “you foolish people! Can’t you see
where God is leading you? Can’t you see where His Spirit has brought
you?”
She turned upon Mr. Quincunx with shining eyes, while Lacrima, white as
a phantom and with drooping mouth, watched her in amazement.
“It’s not only this child He’s helped you to save,” she went on.
“It’s not only this child! Are you blind to what He means? Don’t you
understand the cruelty that is being done to your friend? Don’t you
understand?”
She stretched out her arm and touched Mr. Quincunx’s shoulder.
“You must do more than give this little one a father,” she murmured in
a low tone, “you must give her a mother. How can she be happy without a
mother?
“Come,” she went on, in a voice vibrating with magnetic authority,
“there’s no other way. You and Lacrima must join hands. You must join
hands at once, and defy everyone. Our little wanderer must have both
father and mother! That is what God intends.”
There was a long and strange silence, broken only by the ticking of the
clock.
Then Mr. Quincunx slowly rose, allowed the child to sink down into his
empty chair, and crossed over to Lacrima’s side. Very solemnly, and
as if registering a sacred vow, he took his friend’s head between his
hands and kissed her on the forehead. Then, searching for her hand
and holding it tightly in his own, he turned towards Vennie, while
Lacrima herself, pressing her face against his shabby coat, broke into
convulsive crying.
“I’ll take your advice,” he said gravely. “I’ll take it without
question. There are more difficulties in the way than you know, but
I’ll do,--we’ll do,--just what you tell us. I can’t think--” he
hesitated for a moment, while a curious smile flickered across his
face, “how on earth I’m going to manage. I can’t think how we’re going
to get away from here. But I’ll take your advice and we’ll do exactly
as you say.
“We’ll do what she says, won’t we, Lacrima?”
Lacrima’s only answer was to conceal her face still more completely
in his dusty coat, but her crying became quieter and presently ceased
altogether.
At that moment there came a sharp knock a the door.
The countenance of Mr. Quincunx changed. He dropped his friend’s hand,
and moved into the centre of the room.
“That must be the circus-people,” he whispered. “They’ve come for
Dolores. You’ll support me won’t you?” He looked imploringly at Vennie.
“You’ll tell them they can’t have her--that I refuse to give her
up--that I’m going to adopt her?”
He went out and opened the door.
It was not the circus-men he found waiting on his threshold. Nor was it
the police. It was only one of the under-gardeners from Nevilton House.
The youth explained that Mr. Romer had sent him to fetch Lacrima.
“They be goin’ to lunch early, mistress says, and the young lady ’ave
to come right along ’ome wi’ I.”
Vennie intervened at this moment between her agitated host and the
intruder.
“I’ll bring Miss Traffio home,” she said sternly, “when she’s ready to
come. You may go back and tell Mrs. Romer that she’s with me,--with
Miss Seldom.”
The youth touched his hat, and slouched off, without further protest.
Vennie, returning into the kitchen, found Mr. Quincunx standing
thoughtfully by the mantelpiece, stroking his beard, and the two
Italians engaged in an excited conversation in their own tongue.
The descendant of the lords of Nevilton meditated for a moment with
drooping head, her hands characteristically clasped behind her back.
When she lifted up her chin and began to speak, there was the same
concentrated light in her eyes and the same imperative tone in her
voice.
“The thing for us to do,” she said, speaking hurriedly but firmly, “is
to go--all four of us--straight away from here! I’m not going to leave
you until things are settled. I’m going to get you all clean out of
this,--clean away!”
She paused and looked at Lacrima. “Where’s Mr. Dangelis?” she asked.
Lacrima explained how the artist had written to Gladys that he was
staying until the following day at the Gloucester Hotel in Weymouth.
Vennie’s face became radiant when she heard this. “Ah!” she cried, “God
is indeed fighting for us! It’s Dangelis that I must see, and see at
once. Where better could we all go,--at any rate for tonight--than to
Weymouth? We’ll think later what must be done next. Dangelis will help
us. I’m perfectly certain he’ll help us.
“Oh yes, we’ll go to Weymouth at once,--before there’s any risk of the
Romers stopping us! We’ll walk to Yeoborough--that’ll give us time to
think out our plans--and take the train from there.
“I’ll send a telegram to my mother late tonight, when there’s no chance
of her communicating with the House. As to being seen in Yeoborough
by any Nevilton people, we must risk that! God has been so good to us
today that I can’t believe He won’t go on being good to us.
“Oh what a relief it’ll be,--what a relief,--to get away from Nevilton!
And I shall be able to dip my hands in the sea!”
While these rapid utterances fell from Vennie’s excited lips, the face
of Mr. Quincunx was a wonder to look upon. It was the crisis of his
days, and he displayed his knowledge that it was so by more convulsive
changes of expression, than perhaps, in an equal stretch of time, had
ever crossed the visage of a mortal man.
“We’ll take your advice,” he said, at last, with immense solemnity.
Lacrima looked at him wistfully. Her face was very pale and her lips
trembled.
“It isn’t only because of the child, is it, that he’s ready to go?” she
murmured, clutching at Vennie’s arm, as Mr. Quincunx retired to make
his brief preparations. “I shouldn’t like to think it was only that.
But he _is_ fond of me. He _is_ fond of me!”