by W. W. Jacobs
"Oh, darling, _darling_ Miss Humf'ay, we _will_ be good if you'll stay!"They felt this was the desperate threat that so often followed theirmisdemeanours put into action.
She held them, hugging them. "It isn't that. You have been good."
"Then you said you would stay for ever and ever if we were good."
"Not ever and ever; I said--I said perhaps a fairy prince would come totake me. Didn't I?"
This was the romance that forbade tears. But David had doubts. Heregarded the hansom at the door: "That's a cab, not a carriage. Fairyprinces don't come in cabs."
"The prince is waiting. Kiss me, darling Davie. Angie, dear, dear Angle,kiss me."
She rose. Mrs. Chater had come from the stairs, now laid hands upon thesmall people and dragged them back from the pretty figure about whichthey clung.
They screamed, "Let me go!"
David roared; dropped prone upon the mat to kick and howl: "Take awayyour _hand_, mother!"
Angela gasped: "Oh, comeback, comeback, darling Miss Humf'ay!"
With a glare of defiance into Mrs. Chater's stormy eyes, my Mary stoopedover David.
"David!" The calm ring of the tones he had learned to obey checked hisclamour, his plunging kicks. She stooped; kissed him. "Be good as gold,"she commanded. "Promise."
"Good as gold--yes--p'omise," David choked.
Angela was given, and gave, the magic formula. Mary stepped back. Susanslammed the door.
With quivering lips my Mary walked to the cab.
"Drive down the street," she choked; lay back against the cushions; gaveherself to shaking sobs.
V.
Her George met her a very few yards down the street. He gave an order tothe cabman and sat beside her.
It was not long before her grief was hushed. She dried her eyes; nestledagainst this wonderful fellow who, as love had now constituted herworld, was the solace against every trouble that could come to her, theshield against any power that might arise to do her hurt.
They debated the position and found it desperate; discussed theimmediate future to discover it threatening. Yet the gloom wasirradiated by the glowing light of the prospective future; the rumblingof present fears was lost in the tinkling music of their voices,striking notes from love.
The cab twisted this way and that; clattered over Battersea Bridge, downthe Park, to the right past the Free Library, and so into Meath Streetand to the clean little house of the landlady whom George knew.
To her, in the tiny sitting-room, the story was told.
It appeared that she had never yet taken a lady lodger. In her streetladies were regarded with suspicion; that no petticoats were ever to befetched across the threshold was a rule to which each medical studentwho engaged her rooms must first subscribe.
None the less she was here acquiescent. She knew George well; had forhim an affection above that which commonly she entertained for the noisyyoung men who were her means of livelihood. Mary should pay for thelittle back bedroom that Mr. Thornton had; and, free of charge, shouldhave use of the sitting-room rented by Mr. Grainger. There would be nolodgers until the medical schools reopened in October.
So it was settled--and together in the sitting-room where Mrs. Pinkingmade them a little lunch again they debated the immediate future. Itwas three weeks before George's examination was due. Again he declaredhimself confident that, when actually he had passed, his uncle wouldnot refuse the 400 pounds which meant the world to them--which meantthe tight little practice at Runnygate. But the intervening weeks weremeanwhile to be faced. Mary must have home. At the Agency she must pourforth her tale and seek new situation till they could be married. If theAgency failed them--They shuddered.
Revolving desperate schemes for the betterment of this position intowhich with such alarming suddenness they had been thrust, George tookhis leave. He would have tarried, but his Mary was insistent that hiswork must not be interfered with. Upon its successful exploitationeverything now depended.
Brightly she kissed her George good-bye. He was not to worry about her.She was to be shut from his mind. To-morrow she would go to the Agency.He might lunch with her, and, depend upon it, she would greet him withgreat news.
So they parted.
BOOK IV.
In which this History begins to rattle.
CHAPTER I.
The Author Meanders Upon The Enduring Hills; And The Reader Will LoseNothing By Not Accompanying Him.
In pursuit of our opinion that the novel should hark back to its originand be as a story that is told by mouth to group of listeners, here wemomentarily break the thread.
It is an occasion for advertisement.
As when the personal narrator, upon resumption of his history, will at apoint declare, "Now we come to the exciting part," so now do I.
Heretofore we have somewhat dragged. We have been as host and visitor attea in the drawing-room. Guests have arrived; to you I have introducedthem, and after the shortest spell they have taken their leave.
My Mary and my George--favoured guests--have sat with us through ourmeal; but how fleeting our converse with those others--with Mr. WilliamWyvern, with Margaret, with Mrs. Major and with Mr. Marrapit! I grantyou cause to grumble at their introduction, so purposeless has beentheir part. I grant you they have been as the guests at whose arrival,disturbing the intimate chatter, impatient glances are exchanged; atwhose departure there is shuffle of relief.
Well, I promise you we shall now link our personages and set our historybounding to its conclusion. We have collected them; now to switch on theconnection and set them acting one against the other until the sparks dofly; watching those sparks shall be your entertainment.
The switch which thus sets active the play of forces I shall callcircumstance. If it has been long delayed, I have the precedent ofall the story of human life as my excuse. For we are the childrenof circumstance. We move each in our little circle by a stout hedgeencompassed. Circumstance suddenly will break the wall: some fellow manor woman is flung against us, and immediately the quiet ambulation ofour little circle is for some conflict sharp exchanged. To-day we are atpeace with the world, to-morrow warring with all mankind.
I say with all mankind, because so narrow and so selfish is our outlookupon life that one single man or woman--a dullard neighbour or asilly girl--who may interfere with us, throws into turmoil our wholeexistence. Walls of impenetrable blackness shut out all life save onlythis intruder and ourself; that other person becomes our world--engagingour complete faculties.
Deeper misfortune cannot be conceived. It is through allowing suchoccurrences to crush us that brows are wrinkled before their time;nerves broken-edged while yet they should be firmly strung; deathreached ere yet the proper span of life is lived.
For these unduly wrinkled brows, too early broken nerves, too soonencountered graves, civilised man has agreed upon an excuse. He names itthe strain of life in modern conditions. There is no body in this plea.It is not the conditions that matter; it is our manner of receivingthose conditions. Bend to them and they will crush; face them and theybecome of no avail; allow them to be the Whole of life, and immediatelythey are given so great a weight that to withstand them is impossible;regard them in their proper proportion to the scheme of things, and theybecome of airy nothingness.
For if we regulate each to its right importance all that surrounds us,not forgetting that since life is transient time is the only ultimatestandard of value, how unutterably insignificant must small humantroubles appear in their relation to the whole scheme of things, to theenduring hills, the immense seas, vast space.
Gain strength from strength. Compare vexations encompassed by theartifice of man with the tremendous life that is mothered by nature.
Gain strength from strength. Set troubles against the enduring hills,misfortunes against the immense seas, perplexities against vast space,torments against the stout trees. Learn to take tribute of strength fromevery object that is built of strength--the strength of solidity thata stout beam may give, th
e strength of beauty that from a picture or astatuary irradiates.
Gain strength from strength. It is a first principle of warfare to bandundisciplined troops with tried regiments, to shoulder recruits withveterans. The horse-breaker will set the timid colt in harness with thesteady mare. Thus is stiffening and a sense of security imparted tothe weaker spirit; timidity oozes and is burned by the steady flameof courage that from the stronger emanates. In the heat of that flamelatent strength warms and kindles in the weaker.
Gain strength from strength. Seek intercourse with the minds that areabove you; if not to be encountered, they are to be purchased in books.Avoid communion with the small minds below you and of your level.
No man, nor book, nor thing can be touched without virtue passing thenceinto you. See to it that who or what you touch gives you strength, notweakness; uplifts, not debases. The aspiring athlete does not seek tomatch his strength against inferiors. These give him--easy victory.Contact with them is for him effortless; they tend to draw him to theirplane. Rather, being wise, he shuns them to pit his prowess against suchas can give him best, from whom he may learn, out of whom he will takevirtue, by whom he will be raised to all that is best in him. Gainstrength from strength. The attributes strength and weakness areas infectious as the plague. Make your bed so that you may lie withstrength and catch his affection.
I do not pretend that these are thoughts which influenced the persons ofmy history. My unthinking George and my simple Mary would care nothingfor such things. Sight of the enduring hills would evoke in my Georgethe uttered belief that they would be an infernal sweat to climb; soundof the immense seas if in anger would move my Mary to prayer for allthose in peril on the wave, if in lapping tranquillity to sentimentalthoughts of her George. But they had laughter and they had love.Adversity can make little fight against those lusty weapons.
And now we have an exquisite balcony scene and rare midnight alarms foryour delectation.
CHAPTER II.
An Exquisite Balcony Scene; And Something About Sausages.
I.
On that day when George left his Mary at the little lodgings in MeathStreet, Battersea, Bill Wyvern returned to Paitley Hill after absencefrom home for a week upon a visit.
His Margaret was his first thought upon his arrival. Letters betweenthe pair were, by the sharpness of Mr. Marrapit's eye, compelled to beexchanged not through the post but by medium of a lovers' postal boxsituate in the hole of a tree in that shrubbery of Herons' Holt wherethey were wont by stealth to meet. Thus when Bill, upon this day of hisreturn, scaled the tremendous wall and groped among the bushes, hesaw the trysting bower innocent of his love--then searched and found aletter.
A sad little note for lover's heart. Mr. Marrapit, it said, abed of achill, prevented Margaret meeting her Bill that afternoon. Her fathermust be constantly ministered; impossible to say when she would bereleased. She heard him calling, she must fly to him. With fondest love.No time for more.
II.
The lines chilled Bill's heart. His was a fidgety and nervous lovethat took fright at shadow of doubt. The week that had divided himfrom Margaret was the longest period they had not embraced since theirdiscovery one of another. Was it not possible, he tortured himself,that loss of his presence had blurred his image in her heart? Countlessheroes of his own stories who thus had suffered rose to assure him thatpossible indeed it was. The more he brooded upon it the more probabledid it become.
Bedtime found him desolated. In apprehension he paced his room. Thethought of sleep with this devil of doubt to thump his pillow wasimpossible. Leaning from his window he gazed upon the stars and groaned;dropped eyes to the lawn, silvered in moonlight, and started beneath theprick of a sudden thought. It was a night conceived for lovers' tryst.He would seek his Margaret's open window, whistle her from her bed, andbring this damned doubt of her to reality or knock the ghostly villaindead.
It was an inspiriting thought, and Bill started to whistle upon it untilhe remembered the demeanour in which he would have sent forth one ofhis own heroes upon such a mission. "Dark eyes gleaming strangely from apale, set face," he would have written. Bill's eyes were of a clearest,childlike blue which interfered a little with the proper conception ofthe role he was to play; but blanketing his spirits in melancholy hestepped from his room and passed down the stairs.
That favoured bull-terrier Abiram, sleeping in the hall, drummed atattoo of welcome upon the floor.
"Chuck it," said Bill morosely.
The "faithful hound" that gives solace to the wounded heart is a prettyenough thing in stories; Abiram had had no training for the part. Thisdog associated his master not with melancholy that needed caressing butwith wild "rags" that gave and demanded tremendous spirits.
Intelligence, however, showed the wise creature that the tone of thatcommand meant he was to be excluded from whatever wild rag might benow afoot. It was not to be borne. Therefore, to lull suspicion,Abiram ceased his drumming; rose when Bill had passed; behind him creptstealthily; and upon the door being opened bounded around his master'slegs and into the moonlight with a joyous yelp.
Fearful of arousing Korah and Dathan in their kennels to tremendous dinif he bellowed orders, Bill hissed commands advising Abiram to returnindoors under threat of awful penalties.
Abiram frisked and skipped upon the lawn like a young lamb.
Bill changed commands for missiles.
Abiram, entering into the thing with rare spirit, caught, worried, andkilled each clod of earth hurled at him, then bounded expectant forwardfor the next sacrifice that would be thrown for his delight in thisentrancing game.
"Very well," spoke Bill between his teeth. "Very well. You jolly wellcome, my boy. Wait till you get near enough for me to catch you, that'sall."
Beneath this understanding they moved forward across the lawn and downthe road; Abiram sufficiently in the rear to harass rats that might begoing about their business, without himself being in the zone of hismaster's strength.
Heaving a sigh burthened with fond memory as he passed the wallof Herons' Holt where it gave upon the secret meeting-place in theshrubbery, Bill skirted the grounds; for the second time in his lifepassed through the gate and up the drive.
III.
Well he knew his adored's window. From the shrubbery she had pointed ithim. Now with a bang of the heart he observed that the bottom sash stoodopen so that night breezes, mingling freely with the perfumes of herapartment, unhindered could bear in to her his tremulous love-signals.
He set a low whistle upon the air. It was not louder, he felt, than theagitated banging of his heart that succeeded it.
Again he whistled, and once again. There was a rustling from within.
"Margaret!" he softly called. "Margaret!"
She appeared. The blessed damosel leaned out. About her yearning facethe long dark hair abundantly fell; her pretty bed-gown, unbuttoned low,gave him glimpse of snowy bosom, beautifully rounded.
"Oh, Bill!" she cried, stretching her arms.
Then, glancing downwards at her person, she stepped back swiftly.Reappearing, the soft round of her twin breasts was not to view.
She had buttoned up her night-dress.
"Oh, Bill!"
"Oh, Margaret!"
"_Wow!_" spoke Abiram in nerve-shattering welcome. "_Wow!_"
The blessed damosel fled. Bill plunged a kick. Abiram took the skirt ofit; waddled away across the lawn, his waving stern expressing pleasureat having at once shown his politeness by bidding a lady good evening,and at being, like true gentleman, well able to take a hint.
Bill put upon the breeze:
"It's all right. He's gone."
No answer. Shuddering with terror lest that hideous _wow!_ had disturbedthe house the blessed damosel lay trembling abed, the coverings pressedabout her straining ears.
"He's gone," Bill strained again, his larynx torn with the rasp ofwhispers that must penetrate like shouts and yet speed soft-shod. "He'sgone!"
Margaret put a white le
g to the ground--listened; drew forth itscompanion--listened; glimpsed her white legs; shuddered at suchimmodesty with a man so close; veiled them to their toes with herbed-gown; listened; stepped again to the window.
"Oh, Bill!"
"Oh, Margaret!"
"Has anyone heard, do you think?"
"My darling, not a soul. It sounded loud to us. Oh, Margaret--"
"Hush! Yes?"
"Do you know why I am come?"
"Hush!--no."
"I thought--from your note--that you didn't care to see me again. Ithought-being away like that--that you found you didn't-love me afterall. Oh, I was tortured, Margaret. Oh--!"
"Hush! Listen!"
"Damn!" said Bill.
The blessed damosel poked her beautiful head again into the night. "It'sall right. I thought I heard a sound. We must be careful."
"Oh, Margaret, I was tortured--racked. I had to come to you. Tell me Iwas wrong in thinking--"
"Oh, Bill, Bill, I--"
This girl was well-nigh in a swoon of delicious excitement. Emotion tookher and must be gulped ere she found voice. She stretched her arms downtowards him.
"Oh, Bill, I thought so, too."
A steely pang struck at his heart. "You thought you didn't love me afterall?"
"No, no, no."
Emotion dragged her from the window to her waist. Her long hair cascadeddown to him so that the delicious tips, kissing his face, might by hislips be kissed.