by Hugh Walpole
To her surprise he sat down, suddenly collapsing as though he were too tired to stand any longer. He said nothing more. She finished the sausages, put them on the table, then took a saucepan (also Emily’s gift), filled it with water and put in the eggs.
“Come on,” she said gently, “or the sausages will get cold.”
He went then to the table, cut off some bread and began to eat ravenously. Her heart felt a dim distant triumph when she saw that he was so hungry, but it was too early to feel triumph yet.
She came to the table and began to eat, although she felt no hunger.
“You’re married, aren’t you?” he asked suddenly.
“Yes,” she answered.
“Where’s your husband?”
“A place called Skeaton.”
“Well, you’d better get back there to-night—”
“I’m staying in London for a day or two.”
“Where?”
“Here. I’ve got a bedroom upstairs.”
“You can do what you damn well please,” he said. “It doesn’t matter to me. I’m going away from here to-morrow morning.” Then, after another pause, he said:
“What sort of a man’s your husband?”
“A clergyman,” she answered.
“A clergyman ... good Lord!” He laughed grimly. “Still religious, I see.”
All this time she was thinking how ill he was. Every breath that he drew seemed to hurt him. His eyes were dull and expressionless. He moved his hands, sometimes, with a groping movement as though he could not see. He drank his tea thirstily, eagerly.
At last he had finished. He bent forward, leaning on his hands, looking her steadily in the face for the first time.
“It was clever of you to do this,” he said; “damn clever. I was hungry, I don’t mind confessing ... but that’s the last of it. Do you hear? I can look after myself. I know. You’re feeling sorry for me. Think I’m in a dirty room with no one to look after me. Think I’m ill. I bet Amy told you I was ill. ‘Oh, poor fellow,’ you thought, ‘I must go and look after him.’ Well, I’m not a poor fellow and I don’t want looking after. I can manage for myself very nicely. And I don’t want any women hanging round. I’m sick of women, and that’s flat.”
“I’m not pretending it’s not all my own fault. It is. ALL my own fault, but I don’t want any one coming round and saying so. AND I don’t want any pity. You’ve had a nice romantic idea in your head, saving the sinner and all the rest of it. Well, you can get back to your parson. He’s the sort for that kind of stuff.”
“Indeed I haven’t,” said Maggie. “I don’t care whether you’re a sinner or not. You’re being too serious about it all, Martin. We were old friends. When I heard you were in London I came to see you. That’s all. I may as well stay here as anywhere else. Aunt Anne’s dead and — and — Uncle Mathew too. There’s nowhere else for me to go. I don’t pity you. Why should I? You think too much about yourself, Martin. It wasn’t to be clever that I got these things. I was hungry, and I didn’t want to eat in an A.B.C. shop.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, turning away from the table.
He stood up, fumbling in his pocket. He produced a pipe and some tobacco out of a paper packet. As he filled it she saw that his hand was trembling.
He turned finally upon her.
“Whatever your plan was it’s failed,” he said. “I’m going to bed straight away now. And to-morrow morning early I’m off. Thank you for the meal and — good-night and good-bye.”
He gave her one straight look. She looked up at him, calmly. He dropped his eyes; then, clumsily he walked off, opened his bedroom door, closed it behind him, and was gone.
She sat there, staring in front of her, thinking. What was she to do now? At least she might clear up. She had nowhere to wash the things. She would put them ready for the morning. She tidied the table, put the plates and cups together, then, overcome by a sudden exhaustion, she sat down on the sofa.
She realised then the fight that the day had been. Yes, a fight! ... and she was still only at the beginning of it. If he really went away in the morning what could she do? She could not follow him all round London. But she would not despair yet. No, she was far from despair. But she was tired, tired to death.
She sat on there in a kind of dream. There were no sounds in the house. The fire began to drop very low. There were no more coals. The room began to be very chilly. She laid her head back on the sofa; she was half asleep. She was dreaming — Paul was there and Grace — the Skeaton sands — the Revival procession with the lanterns — the swish of the sea...
Suddenly she was wide awake. The lamp had burnt down to a low rim of light. Martin was coughing in the other room. Coughing! She had never heard such a cough, something inhuman and strange. She stood up, her hands clutched. She waited. Then, as it continued, growing fiercer and fiercer, so that in spite of the closed door it seemed to be in the very room with her, she could bear it no longer.
She opened the door and went in. The room was lit by a candle placed on a chair beside the bed. Martin was sitting up, his hands clenched, his face convulsed. The cough went on — choking, convulsing, as though some terrible enemy had hands at his windpipe. He grasped the bedclothes, his eyes, frightened and dilated, staring in front of him.
She went to him. He did not look at her, but whispered in a voice that seemed to come from miles away:
“Bottle ... over there ... glass.”
She saw on the wash-hand stand a bottle with a medicine glass behind it. She read the directions, poured out the drops, took it over and gave it to him. He swallowed it down. She put out her arm to steady him and felt his whole body tremble beneath her hand. Gradually he was quieter. Utterly exhausted he slipped back, his head on the pillow.
She drew her chair close to the bed. He was too exhausted to speak and did not look at her at all. After a while she put her hand on his forehead and stroked it. He did not draw away from her. Slowly his head turned towards her. He lay there in the crook of her arm, she bending forward over him.
Her heart beat. She tried not to be conscious of his closeness to her, but her hand trembled as it touched his cheek.
Still he did not move away. After, as it seemed to her, a long time he was asleep. She listened to his breathing, and only then, when she knew that he could not hear, she whispered:
“Oh, Martin, I love you so! Dear Martin, I love you so much!”
She blew out the candle and, her arm beneath his head, sat there, watching.
CHAPTER II
HOBGOBLINS
The dawn had made the dark room grey when Maggie, stiff and sore from the strained position in which she had been sitting, went up to her room. She had intended not to go to bed, but weariness overcame her; she lay down on her bed, dressed as she was, and fell into a deep, exhausted slumber.
When she woke it was broad daylight. She was panic-stricken. How could she have slept? And now he might have gone. She washed her face and hands in the horrible little tin basin, brushed her hair, and then, with beating heart, went downstairs. His sitting-room was just as she had left it, the unwashed plates piled together, the red cloth over the window, the dead ashes of the fire in the grate. Very gently she opened his bedroom door. He was still in bed. She went over to him. He was asleep, muttering, his hands clenched on the counterpane. His cheeks were flushed. To her inexperienced eyes he looked very ill.
She touched him on the shoulder and with a start he sprang awake, his eyes wide open with terror, and he crying:
“What is it? No ... no ... don’t. Don’t.”
“It’s all right, Martin. It’s I, Maggie,” she said.
He stared at her; then dropping back on to the pillow, he muttered wearily as though he were worn out after a long struggle:
“I’m bad ... It’s my chest. There’s a doctor. They’ll tell you ... He’s been here before.”
She went into the other room and rang the bell. After a time Mrs. Brandon herself appeared.
“I’m afraid Mr. Warlock is very ill,” said Maggie, trying to keep her voice from trembling. “He’s asked me to fetch the doctor who’s been here to see him before. Can you tell me who he is and where he lives?”
Mrs. Brandon’s bright and inquisitive eyes moved round the room, taking in the blue china, the hyacinth and the lamp. “Certingly,” she said. “That must be Dr. Abrams. ’E lives in Cowley Street, No. 4 — Dr. Emanuel Abrams. A good doctor when ‘e’s sober, and the morning’s the best time to be sure of ’im. Certingly ‘e’s been in to see your friend several times. They’ve been merry together more than once.”
“Where is Cowley Street?” asked Maggie.
“First to the right when you get out of the ‘ouse, and then second to the left again. No. 4’s the number. It’s most likely ‘e’ll be asleep. Yes, Dr. Abrams, that’s the name. ‘E’s attended a lot in this ‘ouse. Wot a pretty flower! Cheers the room up I must say. Will you be wanting another fire?”
“Yes,” said Maggie. “Could Emily see to that while I’m away?”
“Certingly,” said Mrs. Brandon, looking at Maggie with a curious confidential smile — a hateful smile, but there was no time to think about it.
Maggie went out. She found Cowley Street without any difficulty. Dr. Abrams was up and having his breakfast. His close, musty room smelt of whisky and kippers. He himself was a little, fat round Jew, very red in the face, very small in the eye, very black in the hair, and very dirty in the hands.
He was startled by Maggie’s appearance — very different she was from his usual patients.
“Looked just a baby,” he informed Mrs. Brandon afterwards.
“Mrs. Warlock?” he asked.
“No,” said Maggie defiantly. “I’m a friend of Mr. Warlock’s.”
“Ah, yes — quite so.” He wiped his mouth, disappeared into another room, returned with a shabby black bag and a still shabbier top hat, and declared himself ready to start.
“It’s pneumonia,” he told her as they went along. “Had it three weeks ago. Of course if he was out in yesterday’s fog that finished him.”
“He was out,” said Maggie, “for a long time.”
“Quite so,” said Dr. Abrams. “That’s killed him, I shouldn’t wonder.” He snuffled in his speech and he snuffled in his walk.
Before they had gone very far he put his hand on Maggie’s arm; she hated his touch, but his last words had so deeply terrified her that nothing else affected her. If Martin were killed by going out yesterday then she had killed him. He had gone out to escape her. But she drove that thought from her as she had driven so many others.
“The pneumonia’s bad enough,” said the little man, becoming more confidential as his grip tightened on her arm, “but it’s heart’s the trouble. Might finish him any day. Tells me his father was the same. What a nice warm arm you’ve got, my dear — it’s a pleasant day, too.”
They entered the house and Dr. Abrams stayed chatting with Emily in the passage for a considerable time. Any one of the opposite sex seemed to hare an irresistible attraction for him.
When they went upstairs the doctor was so held by his burning curiosity that it was difficult to lead him into Martin’s bedroom. Everything interested him; he bent down and felt the tablecloth with his dirty thumb, then the soil round the hyacinth, then the blue china. Between every investigation he stared at Maggie as though he were now seeing her for the first time. At last, however, he was bending over Martin, and his examination was clever and deft; he had been, like his patient, used to better days. Martin was very ill.
“The boy’s bad,” he said, turning sharply round upon Maggie.
From the speaking of that word, for six days and six nights he was Maggie’s loyal friend and fellow-combatant. They fought, side by side, in the great struggle for Martin’s life. They won; but when Maggie tried to look back afterwards on the history of that wrestling, she saw nothing connectedly, only the candle-light springing and falling, the little doctor’s sharp eyes, the torn paper of the wall, the ragged carpet, and always that strange mask that was Martin’s face and yet the face of a stranger, something tortured and fantastic, passing from Chinese immobility to frenzied pain, from pain to sweating exhaustion, from exhaustion back to immobility.
On the eighth day she rose, as a swimmer rises from green depths, and saw the sunshine and the landscape again.
“He’ll do if you’re careful,” said Dr. Abrams, and suddenly became once more the curious, dirty, sensual little creature that he had been at first. Her only contact with the outer world had been her visits to the neighbouring streets for necessaries and one journey to the bank (the nearest branch was in Oxford Street) to settle about her money. But now, with the doctor’s words, the rest of the world came back to her. She remembered Paul. She was horrified to realise that during these days she had entirely forgotten him. He, of course could not write to her because he did not know her address. When she saw that Martin was quietly sleeping she sat down and wrote the following letter:
13A LYNTON STREET, KING’S CROSS, April 28th, 1912.
MY DEAR PAUL, — I have been very wrong indeed not to write to you before this. It’s only of a piece with all my other bad behaviour to you, and it’s very late now to saw that I am ashamed. I will tell you the truth, which is that on the day I left you I had received a letter telling me that the friend of whom I have often told you was in England, very ill, and with no one to care for him. I had to go. I don’t know whether it was right or wrong — wrong I suppose — but I always knew that if he ever wanted me I SHOULD go. I’ve always been truthful to you about that. When I came here I found that he was in horrible lodgings, very ill indeed, and with no one to look after him. I HAD to stay, and now for a week he has been between life and death. He had pneumonia some weeks ago and went out too soon. His heart also is bad. I believe now he can get well if great care is taken.
Dear Paul, I don’t know what to say to you. I have a bedroom in this house and every one is very kind to me, but you will think me very wicked. I can’t help it. I can’t come back to you and Grace. Perhaps later when he is quite well I shall be able to, but I don’t think so. You don’t need me; I have never been satisfactory to you, only a worry. Grace will never be able to live with me again, and I can’t stay in Skeaton any more after Uncle Mathew’s death. It has all been a wretched mistake, Paul, our marriage, hasn’t it? It was my fault entirely. I shouldn’t have married you when I knew that I would always love Martin. I thought then that I should be able to make you happy. If now I felt that I could I would come back at once, but you know as well as I do that, after this, we shall never be happy together again. I blame myself so much but I can’t act differently. Perhaps when Martin is well he will not want me at all, but even then I don’t think I could come back. Isn’t it better that at least I should stay away for a time? You can say that I am staying with friends in London. You will be happier without me, oh, much happier — and Grace will be happier too. Perhaps you will think it better to forget me altogether and then your life will be as it was before you met me.
I won’t ask you to forgive me for all the trouble I have been to you. I don’t think you can. But I can’t do differently now. Your affectionate MAGGIE.
She felt when she had finished it that it was miserably inadequate,
but at least it was truthful. As she wrote it her old feelings of tenderness and affection for Paul came back in a great flood. She saw him during the many, many times when he had been so good to her. She was miserable as she finished it, but she knew that there was nothing else to do. And he would know it too.
A day later a long letter came from Paul. It was very characteristic. It began by saying that of course Maggie must return at once. Throughout, the voice was that of a grieved and angry elder talking to a wicked and disobedient child. She saw that, far beyond everything else, it was his pride that was wounded, wounded as it had never been before. He could see nothing but that. Did she realise, he asked her, what
she was doing? Sinning against all the laws of God and man. If she persisted in her wickedness she would be cut off from all decent people. No one could say that he had not shown her every indulgence, every kindness, every affection. Even now he was ready to forgive her, but she must come back at once, at once. Her extreme youth excused much, and both he and Grace realised it.
Through it all the strain — did she not see what she was doing? How could she behave so wickedly when she had been given so many blessings, when she had been shown the happiness of a Christian home? ...
It was not a letter to soften Maggie’s resolve. She wrote a short reply saying that she could not come. She thought then that he would run up to London to fetch her. But he did not. He wrote once more, and then, for a time, there was silence.
She had little interval in which to think about Paul; Martin soon compelled her attention. He was well enough now to be up. He would lie all day, without moving except to take his meals, on the old red sofa, stretched out there, his arms behind his head, looking at Maggie with a strange taunting malicious stare as though he were defying her to stand up to him. She did stand up to him, although it needed all her strength, moral and physical. He was attacking her soul and she was saving his ...
He said no more about his going away. He accepted it as a fact that she was there and that she would stay there. He had changed his position and was fighting her on another ground.
Maggie had once, years before, read in a magazine, a story about a traveller and a deserted house. This traveller, lost, as are all travellers in stories, in a forest, benighted and hungry, saw the lights of a house.
He goes forward and finds a magnificent mansion, blazing with light in every window, but apparently deserted. He enters and finds room after room prepared for guests. A fine meal is laid ready and he enjoys it. He discovers the softest of beds and soon is fast asleep; but when he is safely snoring back creep all the guests out of the forest, hideous and evil, warped and deformed, maimed and rotten with disease. They had left the house, that he might be lured in it, knowing that he would never come whilst they were there. And so they creep into all the rooms, flinging their horrible shadows upon the gleaming walls, and gradually they steal about the bed ...