She was very ill after her confinement, and for several weeks it was
doubtful if she would recover. The boy throve, but the mother seemed to
be sinking. The local doctor came three times a day, and a physician
was called in, and then other consultations were held between the
physician and a specialist, and it appeared to Kent that he was never
remembered by Mrs. Walford, or the nurse, during this period, excepting
when he was required to write a cheque. "You shall see her for a moment
by-and-by," one or the other of them would say; "she is to be kept
very quiet this afternoon. Yes, yes, now you're not to worry; go and
work, and you shall be sent for later on!" Then he would wander round
the neglected little sitting-room, and note drearily, and without its
striking him that he might attend to them, that the ferns in the dusty
majolica pots were dying for want of water--or he would sit down and
write, by a dogged effort, at the rate of a word a minute, asking
himself anxiously what sum it was safe to expect from Messrs. Cousins.
His banking account was diminishing rapidly under the demands made upon
it now, and he found it almost as hard to write a chapter of a novel
as if he had never attempted to do such a thing before. He returned
thanks to Heaven that he was not a journalist, to whom the necessity
for covering a certain number of pages by a stated hour daily was
unavoidable; but he wished himself a mechanic or a petty tradesman,
whose vocations, he presumed, were independent of their moods.
It was not till the crisis was past and Cynthia was downstairs again,
in a wrapper on the sofa, that he began to feel that he was within
measurable distance of the conclusion. The nine months that he had
allotted to the task had long gone by, but that it would have taken him
a year did not trouble him, for he knew the work to be good. He told
her so one afternoon when they were alone together again, she with her
couch drawn to the fire, and he sitting at the edge, holding her hand.
"I'm satisfied," he declared. "When I say 'satisfied,' you know what I
mean, of course? It's as well done as I expected to do it. Another week
'll see it finished, darling."
She patted his arm.
"Poor old boy! it hasn't been a happy time for him either, has it?"
"I've known jollier. But you're all right again now, thank God! and I'm
going to pack you off to Bournemouth or somewhere soon, to bring your
colour back. I was speaking to Dr. Roberts about it this morning. He
says it's just what you need."
"I've been very expensive, Humphrey," she said wistfully. "How much? We
didn't think it would cost so much as it has, did we? You should have
married a big, strong woman, Humphrey, or----"
"Or what?"
"Or nobody," she murmured.
The eyes that she bent upon the fire glittered. He squeezed her hand,
and laughed constrainedly.
"I'm quite content, thank you," he said, in as light a tone as he could
manage. "What are you crying for? Nurse will look daggers at me and
think I've been bullying you. Tell me--was she kind to you? I've been
haunted by the idea that she was treating you badly and you were too
frightened of her to let anyone know. You're such a kid, little woman,
in some things--such an awful kid."
"Not such a kid as you imagine," she said. "I've been thinking; I've
thought of many things since Baby was born. Often when they believed I
was asleep, I used to lie and think and think, till I was wretched."
"What did you think of?" asked Kent indulgently.
"You mustn't be vexed with me if I tell you. I've thought that,
perhaps, although you don't feel it yet--though you don't suppose
you ever _will_ feel it--it might have been best for you, really and
seriously best, if you had married nobody, Humphrey--if you had had
nothing to interfere with your work, and had lived on with Mr. Turquand
just as you were. There, now you _are_ vexed! Bend down, and let me
smooth it away."
"What can have put such a stupid idea into your head?" said Kent,
wishing pityingly that he had not felt it quite so often. "Don't be a
goose, sweetheart! What nonsense! I should be lost without you."
"I think I suit you better than any other woman would," she said, with
pathetic confidence. "But if you had kept single? That's what I've
wondered--if you wouldn't be better off without a wife at all. Oh, you
should hear some of the stories Nurse has told me of places she has
been in! I didn't think there could be such awfulness in the world.
And in the first confinement, too! It makes one afraid that no woman
can ever expect to understand any man."
"Hang your nurse!" said Humphrey. "Cackling old fool! I suppose in
every situation she is in she talks scandal about the last, and where
there wasn't any, she makes it up. When does she go?"
"She can't leave Baby until we get another, you know. At least, I hope
she won't have to."
"Another?"
"Another nurse. Mamma is going to advertise in _The Morning Post_ for
us at once. We want a thoroughly experienced woman, don't we, dear? We
don't know anything about babies ourselves, and----"
"Oh, rather! Poor little soul! we owe him as much as that. Life is the
cost of the parents' pleasure defrayed by the child. We'll make the
world as desirable to him as we can."
He paused for her to comment on his impromptu definition of life, by
which he was agreeably conscious he had said something brilliant; but
it passed by her unheeded. He reflected that Turquand would either have
approved it, or picked it to pieces, and that for it to go unnoticed
was hard.
She looked at him tenderly.
"I knew you'd say so. It doesn't really make much difference to our
expenses whether we pay twenty pounds a year or twenty-five--and to the
kind of nurse we shall get it makes all the difference on earth. What
shall we call him?"
"Him! You're not going to get a man?"
"Baby, you silly! Have you thought of a name? _I_ have!"
He was still wishing that she had a sense of humour and occasionally
made a witty remark.
"What?" he asked.
"Yours. I want to call him 'Humphrey.' What do you say to it?"
"What for? It's ugly. You said so the first time you heard it. I think
we might choose something better than that."
"But it's yours," she persisted. "I want him called by your name--I
do, I do!" She held his hand tightly, and her lips trembled. "If ...
if I were ever to lose you, Humphrey, I should like our child to have
your name. Don't laugh at me, I can't help feeling that. That night
when he was born--oh, that night! shall I ever forget it?--and Dr.
Roberts looked across at me and said, 'Well, you have a little son come
to see you, Mrs. Kent,' the first thing I thought was, 'We can call
him "Humphrey."' I wanted to say it to you when they let you in, but
I couldn't, I was so tired; I thought it instead. When nurse brought
him over to me, or when he cried, or when I saw him moving under the
blanket in the bassinet, I thought, 'There's my other Humphrey!'"
He kissed her, and sat staring at the fire, his conscience clamorous.
He had not realised that he had grown so dear to her, and the discovery
made his own dissatisfaction crueller. He felt a thankless brute, a
beast. It seemed to him momentarily that the situation would be much
less painful if the disappointment were mutual--if she, too, were
discontented with the bargain she had made. To listen to her speaking
in such a way, to accept her devotion, knowing how little devotion she
inspired in return, stabbed him. He asked himself what he had done that
she should love him so fondly. He had not openly neglected her, but
secretly he had done it often, and with relief. Had she missed him when
he had shut himself in his room, not to write, but to wish that he had
never met her? His mind smote him.
The question obtruded itself during the following days, but now at
least his plea of being busy was always genuine enough; he was writing
fiercely. The pile of manuscript to which he added sheet after sheet
was heavy and thick. Then there came a morning when he went to bed at
three, and rose again at eight, to begin his final chapter, having
told the servant to bring him a sandwich and a glass of claret for
luncheon. When one o'clock struck, and she entered, tobacco had left
him with no appetite and a furred tongue. He threw a "thank you" at
her, and remained in the same bent attitude, his pen traversing the
paper steadily. He was working with an exaltation which rarely seized
him, the exaltation with which the novelist is depicted in fiction as
working all the time. His aspect was untidy enough for him to have
served as an admirable model for that personage. He had not shaved for
three days, and a growth of stubbly beard intensified the haggardness
that came of insufficient sleep.
The wind was causing the fire to be more a nuisance than a comfort,
and every now and then a gust of smoke shot out of the narrow stove,
obscuring the page before him, and making him cough and swear. The
atmosphere was villainous, but, excepting in these moments, he was
unconscious of it. He was near the closing lines. His empty pipe was
gripped between his teeth, and he wanted to refill it, but he couldn't
bring himself to take his eyes from the paper while he stretched for
his pouch and the matches. He meant to refill it the instant he had
written the last words, but now an access of uncertainty assailed
him and he could not decide upon them. He stared at the paper without
daring to set a sentence down, and drew at the empty bowl mechanically,
his palate craving for the taste of tobacco, while his sight was
magnetised by the pen's point hovering under his hand. He sat so for a
quarter of an hour. Then he wrote with supreme satisfaction what he had
thought of first and rejected. His pen was dropped. He drew a breath of
relief and thanksgiving, and lit his pipe. His novel was done.
Unlike the novelist in fiction again, he did not mourn beautifully that
the characters who had peopled his solitude for twelve months, and
whom he loved, were about to leave him for the harsher criticism of
the world. He was profoundly glad of it. He felt exhilaration leap in
his jaded veins as he picked up his pen and added "The End." He felt
that he was free of an enormous load, a tremendous responsibility,
of which he had acquitted himself well. Almost every morning, with
rare exceptions, for a year he had, so to speak, awakened with this
unfinished novel staring him in the face; almost every night for a
year he had gone up the stairs to the bedroom remembering what a lump
of writing had still to be accomplished. And now it was done; and
he couldn't do it better. Blessed thought! If he recast it chapter
by chapter and phrase by phrase, he could not handle the idea more
carefully or strongly than he had handled it in the bulky package that
lay in front of him--the story told!
He was eager to forward it to the publishers without delay, but
Turquand had so recently referred to his expectation of reading it in
the manuscript that he sent it to Soho first. "Let me have it back
quickly," he begged; and the journalist's answer in returning the
parcel reached him on the next evening but one. He showed it to Cynthia
with delight; Turquand wrote very warmly. The manuscript was submitted
to Messrs. Cousins with a note, requesting them to give it their early
consideration; and now Kent was asked constantly by the Walfords if
they had written yet, and what terms he had obtained. Cynthia had not
regained strength enough to care to travel at present, and her parents
and brother generally spent the evening at No. 64, where, truth to
tell, Kent found their interest rather a nuisance. His father-in-law
evidently held that it was derogatory for him to be kept waiting a
fortnight for his publishers' offer, and Mrs. Walford made so many
foolish inquiries and ridiculous suggestions that he was sometimes in
danger of being rude. Cæsar alone displayed no curiosity in a matter
so frivolous, but listened with his superior air, which tried Kent's
patience even more. The fat young man's debut had been postponed again.
Now he was to appear for certain in the spring, and he explained, in a
tone implying that he could, if he might, impart esoteric facts, that
the delay had been discreet.
"No outsider can have any idea," he said languidly, "what wheels within
wheels there are in our world." He meant the operatic world, into
which he had still to squeeze a foot. "This last season it would have
been madness for a new bass to sing in London; he was doomed before he
opened his mouth--doomed!" He looked at the ceiling with a meditative
smile, as if dwelling upon curiously amusing circumstances. "_Very_
funny!" he added.
Excepting his master, he did not know a professional singer in England,
and, whenever a benefit concert was to be given, he would chase the
organiser all over the town in hansoms, and telegraph to him for an
appointment "on urgent business" in the hope of being allowed to sing.
But his assurance was so consummate that--although one was aware he
had not yet done anything at all--he almost persuaded one while he
talked that he was the pivot round which the musical world revolved.
Cæsar excepted, Kent had really no grounds for complaint against the
Walfords. The others' queries might worry him, but their cordiality
was extreme; and they made Cynthia relate Turquand's opinion of the
book--for which no title had been found--again and again. Even the
stock-jobber's view that a fort-night's silence was surprising was
due to an exaggerated estimate of the author's importance, and Mrs.
Walford, when she refrained from giving him advice, appeared to think
him a good deal cleverer now that the manuscript was in Messrs.
Cousins' hands than she had done while it was lying on his desk.
Indeed, there were moments at this stage when his mother-in-law gushed
at him with an ardour that reminded him of the early days of his
acquaintance with her in Dieppe.