by Hugh Walpole
“You said that I wouldn’t come often to see you,” said Maggie.
“And it’s been true. Things have been more difficult for me than I knew at the time.”
“That’s all right,” said Miss Toms.
“But I ought to tell you,” said Maggie, “that although I haven’t been to see you, I’ve felt as though you and your brother were my friends, more than any one in this place. And that’s been a great help to me.”
They started to walk down the road together.
“You’ve been in trouble,” said Miss Toms. “Of course I’ve heard about it. I would have liked to come and see you but I didn’t know how your sister-in-law would like it.”
She put her arm through Maggie’s.
“My dear,” she said, “don’t be discouraged. Because Skeaton is dead it doesn’t mean that all the world is. And remember this. The world’s view of any one is never the right one. I know that the world thinks my brother’s mad, but I know that he’s a lot saner than most people. The world thinks your uncle was a rascal, but if you can remember one good thing he did you know he wasn’t, and I’m sure you can remember many good things.”
“It isn’t that,” said Maggie. “It is that I seem to have done everything wrong and made every one I had to do with unhappy.”
“Nonsense,” said Miss Toms. “I’m sure if they’ve been unhappy it’s their own fault. Isn’t the evening air lovely? At times like these I wonder that Skeaton can dare to exist. You’ll come and see us one day, won’t you?”
“I think — I don’t know,” said Maggie; “I may be going away.”
Miss Toms gave her a penetrating look.
“I daresay you’re right. Skeaton’s not the place for you. I saw that the first time we met. Well, whatever you do, don’t lose your pluck. You’re yourself, you know, and you’re as good as anybody else. Don’t you forget that. Because a lot of people say a thing it doesn’t mean it’s true, and because a set of idiots think a thing shocking it doesn’t mean that it’s shocking. Think how wrong people have always been about everything!”
They turned down a side lane and arrived in the High Street. The street was very empty. In the fading light a large pink poster attracted Maggie’s attention. She went close to it and read the announcement of the Revival services.
When she read the names of Thurston and Mr. Crashaw and Miss Avies it seemed to her incredible, and then at the same time as something that she had always expected.
“Oh,” she cried, “it’s coming here!” She was strangely startled as though the sign of Thurston’s name was strange forewarning.
“What’s coming?” asked Miss Toms.
She read the notice.
“I don’t know what you think,” said Miss Toms, “but that kind of thing’s humbug if you ask me.”
“Oh!” Maggie cried. “It’s so strange. I knew those people in London. I used to go to their services. And now they’re coming here!”
She could not explain to Miss Toms the mysterious assurance that she had of the way that her former world was drawing near to her again. She could see now that never for a moment since her arrival in Skeaton had it let her alone, slowly invading her, bit by bit driving in upon her, forcing her to retire ...
It was quite dark now. Because it was Sunday evening the shops were closed. Only behind some of the curtained windows dim lights burned. Very clearly the sea could be heard breaking upon the shore. The last note of the bell from the Methodist Chapel echoed across the roofs and stones.
“Good-night,” said Miss Toms.
“Good-night,” said Maggie.
She turned back towards home hearing, as she went, Thurston’s voice, seeing beyond all the thick shadow of Martin’s body, keeping pace with her, as it seemed, step by step with her as she went.
She turned into the Rectory drive. She heard with a startled shiver the long gate swing screaming behind her, she could smell very faintly the leaves of the damp cold laurel bushes that pressed close in upon her. It was as though some one were walking with her and whispering in her ear: “They’re coming! They’re coming! They’ve got you! They’ve got you!”
She opened the hall door; the hall was all dark; some one was there. Maggie gave a little cry. A match was struck and revealed the white face of Grace. The two women stared at one another.
Grace had returned from Church; she was wearing her ugly black hat with the red velvet.
“It’s all right,” said Maggie, “I’ve been for a walk.”
“Oh — I didn’t know,” gasped Grace, still staring. “I thought — yes, of course. Fancy, you’ve been for a walk!”
Still staring as though she could keep Maggie at bay only by the power of her vision she backed on to Paul’s study door, turned the handle, and disappeared. The hall was in darkness again. Maggie stumbled her way towards the staircase, then, seeing Grace’s terrified eyes, filled with a horror that she, Maggie Cardinal, should cause any one to look at her like that, she ran clumsily upstairs, shutting herself into her bedroom.
During the next fortnight the dominant element in the situation was Grace’s terror. Skeaton was already beginning to forget the story of the suicide. Maggie was marked for ever now as “queer and strange,” but Paul was not blamed; he was rather, pitied and even liked the more. But Grace could not forget. Maggie intended perhaps to murder her in revenge for her uncle’s death; well, then, she must be murdered ... She would not leave her brother. She could not consider the future. She knew that she could not live in the same house with Maggie for long, but she would not go and Maggie would not go ... What was to happen?
Poor Grace, the tortures that she suffered during those weeks will not be understood by persons with self-confidence and a hearty contempt for superstition.
She paid the penalty now for the ghosts of her childhood — and no one could help her.
Maggie saw that Paul was, with every day, increasingly unhappy. He had never been trained to conceal his feelings, and although he tried now he succeeded very badly. He would come into her room in the early morning hours and lie down beside her. He would put his arms around her and kiss her, and, desperately, as though he were doing it for a wager, make love to her. She felt, desperate also on her side, that she could comfort and make him happy, if only he would want something less from her than passion. But always after an hour or a little more, he crept away again to his own room, disappointed, angered, frustrated. These hours were the stranger because, during the day, he showed her nothing of this mood, but was kindly and friendly and distant.
She would have done anything for him; she tried sometimes to be affectionate to him, but always, at once, he turned upon her with a hungry, impassioned look ...
She knew, without any kind of doubt, that the only way that she could make him happy again was to leave him. His was not a nature to brood, for the rest of his days, on something that he had lost.
Only once did he make any allusion to the coming Revival services. He burst out one day, at luncheon: “The most scandalous thing!” he said. “We had them here once, years ago, and the harm they did no one would believe. I’ve been to Tamar about it; he can do nothing, unless they disturb the public peace, of course. He had the impertinence to tell me that they behaved very well last time they were here!”
“I don’t like that man,” said Grace. “I don’t believe he makes his money properly. Look at the clothes Mrs. Tamar wears! What I mean is, I don’t like his wife at all.”
“It’s very hard,” said Paul, his voice trembling with indignation, “that when men and women have been working for years to bring Christ into the hearts of mankind that mountebanks and hypocrites should be allowed to undo the work in the space of a night. I know this man Thurston. They’ve had letters in the Church Times about him.” “Fancy!” said Grace, “and still he dares show his face.”
“But do they really do so much harm?” asked Maggie. “I should have thought if they only came once for a week in ten years they couldn’t make
any real effect on anybody—”
“Maggie, dear,” said Paul gently, “you don’t understand.”
As the day of the Revival approached, Maggie knew that she would go to one of the services. She was now in a strange state of excitement. The shock of her uncle’s death had undoubtedly shaken her whole balance, moral, physical, and mental. The fortnight that had followed it, when she had clung like a man falling from a height and held by a rocky ledge to the one determination not to look either behind or in front of her, had been a strain beyond her strength.
She did not know; she did not feel any weakness; she felt rather a curious atmosphere of light and expectation as though that cry to Martin in her bedroom had truly been answered. And she felt more than this. Old Magnus had once said to her: “I don’t know what religion is except that it is a fight — and some people join in because they want to, some are forced to join in whether they want to or no, some just leave it alone, and some (most) don’t know there’s one going on at all. But if you don’t join in you seem to me to have wasted your time.”
She had not understood in the least what he meant; she did not understand now; but, thinking of his words, it did seem to her that she was sharing in some conflict. The vast armies hidden from her by mist, the contested ground also hidden, but the clash of arms clearly to be heard. Her own part of a struggle seemed to be round her love for Martin; it was as though, if she could get some realisation of that, she would have won her way to a vantage-point whence she could visualise the next place. She did not think this out. She only felt in her heart a little less lonely, a little less wicked and selfish, a little less deserted, as though she were drawing nearer to some hidden fire and could feel the first warm shadow of the flames.
She made one more appeal to Grace on the very morning of the first day of the Revival.
After breakfast Maggie came into the drawing-room and found Grace sitting there sewing.
She stood, timidly, in her old attitude, her hands clasped in front of her, like a child saying her lesson.
“I beg your pardon, Grace.”
Grace looked up. She had of course been conscious of Maggie ever since her entrance into the room. Her hands had trembled and her heart leapt furiously.
“Why, Maggie—” she said.
“I’m afraid I’m disturbing you,” said Maggie, “but we haven’t really said anything to one another for the last fortnight. I don’t suppose that you want me to say anything now, but things get worse and worse if no one says anything, don’t they?” Now that she had begun she went on quickly: “I wanted to say, Grace, how sorry I am for the trouble and unhappiness that you and Paul have had during the last fortnight through me. I’ve been nothing but a trouble to you since I first came here, but it wasn’t that that I wanted to say. I couldn’t bear that you should think that I was just selfishly full of my own affairs and didn’t understand how you and Paul must feel about — about my uncle. Not that I mean,” she went on rather fiercely, raising her head, “that he was to blame. No one ever understood him. He could have done great things if — if — some one had looked after him a little. But he hadn’t any one. That was my fault. I didn’t want you and Paul to think I don’t blame myself. I do all the time. I can’t promise to be better in the future because I’ve promised so often and I never am. But I am sorry.”
Grace said nothing for a moment. Her hands trembled more than ever. Then, without looking up, she murmured as though to her sewing:
“Oh no. Maggie ... no one blames you, I’m sure.”
There was another pause, then Grace said:
“I think I’m not well. No, I can’t be well because I’m not sleeping, although I’ve taken aspirin more, I’m sure, than I ought to. What I mean is that they say it’s bad for your heart. Of course things have been very unfortunate, from the beginning one might say, but I’m sure it’s not been any one’s fault exactly. What I mean is that these things never are ... No, they aren’t really. I expect we all want a change.”
“What are you frightened of me for, Grace,” asked Maggie.
Grace started as though Maggie had indeed dropped a bomb at her feet. She looked up at Maggie, wildly, her eyes staring about the room as though she were looking for some exit of escape.
“Frightened?” she repeated.
“Yes, you are,” said Maggie. “That’s what worries me most. No one’s ever been frightened of me before — at least I don’t think any one has.” Maggie laughed. “Why, Grace, it seems so funny any one being frightened of me. I couldn’t hurt any one if I wanted to, and I’m sure I never want to unless it’s Mrs. Maxse. Be angry with me as much as you like, Grace, but don’t be frightened of me. Why, that’s ridiculous!”
It was the worst word to have chosen. Grace flushed a dull unwholesome purple.
“I’m sorry you think me ridiculous, Maggie,” she said. “Perhaps I am. I’m sure I don’t know. Yes, perhaps I am. What I mean is that what’s ridiculous to one is not ridiculous to another. You’re a strange girl, Maggie, and you and I will never get on. No, never. But all I ask is that you should make Paul happy. That is enough for me. I care for nothing else. He isn’t very happy just now. What I mean is that any one can see he isn’t eating his meals properly.”
“Oh, Grace,” cried Maggie. “I didn’t mean that you were ridiculous. I meant that any one being frightened of me was ridiculous. Anyway, I’m very sorry that I’ve made you and Paul unhappy. That’s all.”
She turned and went.
It was the most lovely of April days, soft, primrose-coloured, the sea-breeze gently tempered by mist-veiled sun. Maggie sat at her bedroom window overlooking the drive and the blue-grey field that ran to the woods. She knew that there would be no difficulty about her escape to the Revival meeting. Paul had arranged that there should be an evening service at the Church at the same hour, an act of rather Un-Christian defiance. Maggie sat there, looking down in a condition of strange bewildering excitement on to the laurel bushes. It was wonderful to think that in another half-hour she would see Miss Avies once more, hear those wild hymns again, catch the stridency of Thurston’s voice; all these things spoke of Martin. She felt as though he were stealing towards her out of the dusk, it was as though, without any reason, she expected to find him at the service ... although she knew that he could not be there.
She heard the Church bell begin to ring, then the hall-door opened and Paul came out. He had on his soft black hat, he was carrying his Bible and prayer-book under his arm. He stood, for a moment, beside the hall-door as though he were listening or expecting something. She had a strange impulse to run down to him; so strong was it that she got up and moved to the door. Then slowly she came back to the window and stood looking down upon him. Suddenly, as though he felt her gaze, he glanced up, saw her, and waved to her. She waved back to him. He turned and walked quickly away, she heard the gate swing, screaming behind him.
She waited for a little, then put on her hat and coat and went out. She knew the Flower Street Hall, a place occasionally used by touring Companies, Wandering Lecturers, Charitable Concerts, and other casual festivals. It was at the far end of the town towards the end of the Promenade.
The town, dim in the first dusk, hummed with loiterers, girls released from the shops walking with their young men, middle-aged couples sauntering out to take a last whiff of the sea before going in to the evening meal, one or two visitors from the Hotel strolling across to the beach to watch the first evening stars and the rising moon. Pianos were playing, children shouting over the last game of the day; all hushed into a coloured mild tranquillity. In the fields beyond the houses the quiet was absolute.
Maggie found the building. The facade was blazing with electric light. A huge poster, of the now familiar pink, declared:
GRAND RELIGIOUS FESTIVAL. All are invited. IS ALL WELL WITH YOU,
BROTHER?
There was a crowd about the doors, and continually, with giggles and shamefaced laughter, couples broke away and climbed the step
s into the Hall. Maggie, feeling that all eyes were upon her, entered the building. In the vestibule two grave-faced women in black bonnets handed papers with prayers and hymns to every newcomer. Maggie took hers, a door was opened in front of her, and she went in. The auditorium was a large one, semicircular in shape, with tiers of seats rising circus-fashion to a ceiling decorated with silver stars and pink naked cherubs. The stage had upon it a table, some chairs, and a reading-desk draped in crimson cloth. Below the stage was a small orchestra, consisting of two fiddles, a cornet, drum, and a piano. There was also what seemed to Maggie a small choir, some women dressed in white and some men in black coats and white bow ties. Across the stage were suspended broad white bands of cloth with “Come to Jesus!” “Come now!” “He is waiting for you!” in big black letters.
The hall seemed very full, and was violently illuminated with electric light. Maggie took this in as she stood very timidly just inside the door. A steward came forward and showed her a corner-seat. She saw, then, with a dramatic flash of recognition, Thurston and Mr. Crashaw sitting behind the table; then, with a still stranger emotion, Miss Avies as one of the white-robed choir. The sight of those three familiar faces seemed to close, finally and definitely, the impression that she had had during all those last weeks. They had “got” her again, and yet not they, but the power behind them. It seemed only five minutes ago that she had sat in the London Chapel and heard old Crashaw scream “Punishment! Punishment! Punishment!” She turned half in her seat as though she expected to see Aunt Anne and Aunt Elizabeth sitting one on either side of her. She looked at Thurston; he had coarsened very much since she had seen him last. He was fatter, his cheeks stained with an unnaturally high colour, his eyes brighter and sharper and yet sensual too. He was smarter than he had been, his white bow tie stiff and shapely, his cuffs clean and shining, his hair very carefully brushed back from his high and bony forehead. His sharp eyes darted all over the building, and Maggie felt as though at any moment she would be discovered. Crashaw looked more like a decrepit monkey than ever, huddled up in his chair, his back bow-shaped. He breathed into his hands as though he wanted to warm them, and looked at nobody. Miss Avies Maggie could not see clearly.