The Sea Priestess

by Dion Fortune

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  I WOKE up next morning still feeling pretty rotten. It was getting on for eleven; I had overslept, having no Sally to call me, and Mrs Leake had very wisely not shown up. I rang up the office to see how they were getting on. One of the clerks in the outer office answered me, and said they were getting on all right. I asked if Miss Coke were there, and he said, yes, she was there, dealing with a client. I got into some clothes and ambled round to the "George" and had brunch. I thought I should catch Molly at the office, as she always left after the others, but when I got there she had cleared out with the rest. I wanted to have a word with her and see how she was faring, for I thought things might be a bit sticky for her at home, and I reckoned that if a river would unstick them, it would be money well spent. It was Saturday, so she wouldn't be back at the office after lunch; but I knew that Muckley would be at the local dog-races, which started at three, and at which he was a leading light, so I went back to my place to wait till he should be out of the way, and then I reckoned I would drop round and have a word with Molly and her mother, and tell them how awfully sorry I was about everything and see if there was anything I could do towards straightening things out. When I got back to my own quarters they were, of course, exactly as I had left them when I rolled out of bed that morning, so I went back to the empty offices, but the fires were out there, too, by now. So I went on to the "George" and had a drink or two in the saloon bar to kill time till Muckley would have pone to the dogs. Thus does a lot of trouble start in towns like ours. Muckley wasn't the only one who was going to the dogs. When I knew by the cheering that things had got going at the greyhound track I left the bar, only to Rnd that I had taken more than I meant to. I don't say that I couldn't walk all right, but I certainly would not have cared to drive a car. So I decided to stroll about a bit till the church spire had straightened out and steadied down before going to call on Molly and her mother; I also indulged in the good old deacon's remedy of a penn'orth of peppermints. This brought me in touch with the synthetic charmer in the Bon-bon Box, where my old dominie had met his doom, and before I left I had pulled her peroxide curls and promised her a run in my car. When I got out into the fresh air I spat ceremonially in the gutter and decided that I had better not stroll around the town any more in case worse befell me; I fetched from the office the key of the house the cedar came from, and decided I would occupy my idle hands by inspecting my property. All the furniture was gone, save some of the choicer bits I had bought at the sale, and which stood disconsolately along the walls, irregularly spaced out by the gaps left by their departed comrades. In the centre of the floor in the downstairs rooms were various bits I had picked up at various other auctions and that I had dumped in here for storage, having in mind some dim idea of making the place into one of those antique shops which imitate a dwelling-house and that are fashionable nowadays; or perhaps, if the truth were known, from sheer jackdaw acquisitiveness, for there were some nice bits among them that nothing would have induced me to part with. The inside of the windows was stuck up with newspaper to keep out the sun, and in the dim light the rooms looked like the scenes of those traditional card parties that end up in a murder and are then locked up for years for fear of the ghost. I soon had enough of looking round the house, and went out into the garden. The sky was just getting pink in the west for the early winter sunset, and the low light came through the tops of the leafless trees into the rectangular walled garden that Queen Anne considered the correct thing. I had not thought it a particularly promising garden when I had seen it all overgrown with weeds and greenery at midsummer, but now in its leafless bareness it revealed all sorts of treasures that had been smothered then. There was yellow jasmine against the mellow brick, and bushes of wintersweet scenting the whole garden, and to my immense surprise, parties of little irises among their grass-like leaves, palest mauve, deepest blue, and a velvety black and green. They were the nearest thing to orchids I have ever seen, and looked as if their proper place were a hot-house; but here they were, braving the January day and getting the best of it, too, from the looks of them. So I picked a bunch for Molly and her mother, together with some wintersweet, which I thought might be acceptable on Muckley's premises. Then I went round to make my call. Mrs Muckley opened the door to me, looking, I thought, very surprised to see me. I wondered what version of the affair had been given to her. I tendered my floral offering, and she asked me in and took me through into the living-room-kitchen behind the shop, apologising for not taking me up to the drawing-room on the ground that she couldn't manage the stairs. I replied that I wasn't particularly good at them either, and then we swopped symptoms for a few minutes, and got acquainted. I broke the ice by putting my foot through it in my usual jerky manner, and told her that I was glad to have a chance to see her alone, as I wanted to talk to her about Molly, and asked her if she knew what was afoot? She said she did. I asked her would she accept my assurance that Molly and I had behaved ourselves. She said that she was quite satisfied on that point, but that we had been uncommonly foolish and had only ourselves to thank for what had happened. "And I blame Molly more than you," she said. "For you were ill and perhaps did not realise things, but I warned Molly over and over again of the risk she was running, but she would doit." Then I realised, what I had not realised before, that Molly had not blundered into things blindly, as I had, but had taken her risk with her eyes open rather than leave me stranded, and I should have been very badly stranded if she hadn't done so, as nurses were unobtainable owing to the influenza epidemic that was going on. I told Mrs Muckley this, but she offered no comment, and a silence fell between us in which I did some pretty rapid thinking. "Well now," said I to her at length. "What is the position with regard to your daughter? I told your husband I was willing to marry her if she wanted me to, but does she want me to? She has given me no indication of her attitude in the matter." "Molly did not take your words seriously, Mr Maxwell, and she would be the last girl in the world to hold you to them if you did not mean them." "Well, has she got any other views for herself? How is she placed? How, for the matter of that are you both placed since I have been capsizing things for you?" "I have got cancer, and it cannot be very much longer now. After that, Molly will be homeless. She cannot live on the twenty-five shillings a week Mr Scott pays her." "My God!" said I. "Is that all we pay her? Why, she runs the business!" "Yes, she could have got much better posts than that if she had been willing to take them; the Argus would have given her three pounds a week, but she wouldn't take it." "Why ever not?" Mrs Mucklcy did not answer. "I will certainly see she gets a living wage," I said, "but she was saying yesterday that she wanted to leave." Mrs Muckley still kept silence. "Well, Mrs Muckley," I said, "I'll marry her if she wants me to, but I shouldn't have thought I was any catch. She could do a dashed sight better than a wreck like me, old enough to be her uncle. Hasn't she got anyone else in view? We have got some very decent lads in the office, and they treat her like a queen." "There has never been anyone except you, Mr Maxwell, since you gave her a pink sugar mouse when you left the school." "Good Lord I" said I, in a state of utter consternation, and then Molly herself walked in and looked as if she could have gone over backwards at the sight of me. I looked at Mrs Muckley, and Mrs Muckley looked at me, and her eyes had the curious expression that I have seen before when people are getting ready to cross the Great Divide, as if they could see right into the heart of things and knew at last what was worth while and what wasn't. I went up to Molly and took her hand. "I have come round to see what your mother has to say to me, Molly," I said. I had never called her anything except Miss Coke before. "I have no more to say to him than I have already said. You two must settle things between you," said Mrs Muckley, and rose and left the room with her slow, painful, stooping walk and I was left alone with Molly. Molly loosened her coat and sat down in the chair her mother had vacated and looked at me qucstioningly. I felt that frankness was the only thing. It was no use beating about the bush, even if I had any talent in th
at direction, which I have not. I asked her how old she was. She told me twenty-four. I told her I was thirty-six. I also told her that I had been pulling my sister's leg over the question of expense, and that I could perfectly well afford to marry if I wanted to, provided everybody was willing to be reasonable. "But," I said, "there are certain things you ought to know before you come to a decision," and I started to tell her about Morgan. I knew it was going to be difficult, but I had no idea it was going to be as difficult as it was; and I got in a most fearful muddle, and made Morgan sound like a harlot through trying to keep the supernatural clement out of it, which I thought Molly wouldn't understand. Then everything began to come back to me through talking about it, and I forgot who my audience was, and told Molly the blinking lot; and everything I had bottled up got loose, and I ended up by breaking down completely. It was an odd way of proposing. Then Molly did what Morgan had done, and came and sat on the arm of my chair and put her arm round me. "I know you love her," she said, "but I think you need me, so I'll marry you." Then a tremendoos hullabaloo started up outside as Muckley came home unexpectedly and Mrs. Muckley tried to head him off from the living-room. I reacted into one of my tantrums, and went out and told him exactly what I thought of him in most unparliamentary language, and he put himself in a fighting attitude and dared me to hit him. "Of course I daren't hit you," I said, "and I'm not such a fool as to try. But I can hit your business, and will, too, if I have any trouble with you," and I told him, clearly, concisely and conclusively exactly where his back premises contravened the building laws, and what it would cost to bring them into line with requirements if someone laid an information. He shut up and cleared out, and I have never had any more trouble with him from that day to this. I may not be one of the bulldog breed, but I am a pretty good hand at a cat-fight. Then I returned in triumph to the living-room, where Molly and Mrs Muckley were all of a doo-daa, thinking I'd be murdered, or at least badly knocked about. Frankly, I can't think why I wasn't, for Muckley had that reputation. I was feeling distinctly pleased with myself, for it was no mean achievement to throw a brute the size of Muckley supperless out of his own house; and what with that, and having got my trouble off my chest to Molly, I was feeling better than I had done since I lost Morgan. So I kissed Mrs Muckley, and was officially accepted as prospective son-in-law, and we all sat down to supper, and I told them some of my yarns, including the one about the Friendly Girls and the temperance shandygaff, and they loved it. It was only after I got home that I remembered that I had forgotten to kiss Molly. While we were having supper I noticed a kind of moaning, wailing noise that had apparently been going on for some time, but I hadn't paid any attention to it amid all the alarums and excursions. "What in the world's that?" I said. "It is the calves in the slaughter-shed," said Mrs Muckley. "My husband ought not to have left them over the week-end. They have to be fasted before they are killed." "I'll go and give them a drink," said Molly, "perhaps that will quiet them." It did for a bit, but presently the poor little beasts started off again. I wasn't sorry to get out of earshot when I said good night and set off for home, leaving Molly to put her mother to bed. As I walked back through the frosty starlight I thought of the conditions under which that girl lived. She had all the housework to do now her mother was helpless, and got up God knows what time to do it before she came to the office. At midday she went home and gave the demon Muckley his dinner, and then she came back and put in overtime for Scottie, who worked her like a black. Then she was up with her mother every hour or two through the night. At week- ends she did Muckley's books and a bit of extra housework. Muckley came home drunk fairly frequently and knocked them both about impartially; and week in, week out throughout the year, with never a holiday since Mrs Muckley had married him, they lived amid the sights and sounds and smells of the slaughter-yard. She had married him for the sake of a home for herself and Molly, and he had married her for the sake of the little bit of capital that came from the sale of the school, and that had set him up in his beastly business. My old dominie had hanged himself with his braces in a common lodging-house in Bristol when his synthetic charmer left him after his money came to an end. She had something to answer for, had that girl. Then I fell to wondering why old Coke had abandoned a decent job and a decent wife to go off with the flamboyant creature from the Bon-bon Box, whom even we youngsters had thought pretty awful. He was an Oxford B.A., and when he wasn't in a bad temper his manners were those of a gentleman. But evidently his tastes weren't, or he wouldn't have cottoned on to the Bon-bon Boxer. By this time I had arrived at my own door, and I reckoned the best thing I could do was to go straight to bed and shut my eyes to the Augean stables till the morning, and then shift my ] digs to the "George" till Molly was ready to marry me. But when I got upstairs, I found that everything had been cleared up, and the fire lit and banked with slack, and I knew why it was that Molly had been out when I called. I reckoned that it wasn't Molly who was getting the best of the bargain in the forthcoming marriage, even if I had been the well-to-do eligible I was popularly supposed to be, but which anyone who had inside information knew I decidedly wasn't. Next morning when I arrived at the office, there was Molly at her desk as usual, ready to take my letters. I went over and patted her on the back (I was too shy to kiss her in cold blood) and gave her my signet ring so she would have something to show for her engagement. She thanked me and put it on her finger, and we tackled the correspondence. I told her of my plan to move to the "George", and she said no, it was a very bad one. I asked her why, but she would not give a reason. She said that her mother and she hoped I would come and have supper with them whenever I wanted to, as Muckley was never in in the evenings. I asked her what about coping with the housework, and she said that four servants was a ridiculous allowance for a house the size of ours, and they ought to do it on their heads or explain the reason why; and that I was the master of the house, and it was for me to give my orders. It had never struck me that way before, and I thought it rather a bright idea. So I went down to our kitchen premises and rounded up the staff. I found that my sister had re-engaged those I had sacked, and they were very saucy in consequence, all except the tweeny, who was an orphan from an orphanage, and didn't know whether she stood on her head or her heels. They told me that they worked for my sister, not for me. I told them that they could work for her as much as they liked, but that there would be no wages for it unless they minded their P's and Q's when I spoke to them. Then I re-re-engaged the tweeny and led her off, dustpan in hand, and handed her over to Molly. I went round to have supper with Molly and Mrs Muckley that evening. As soon as I set eyes on Mrs Muckley I saw there was a change in her. I couldn't define what it was, but it seemed to me as if she had kind of sat back and let go, now that she knew that Molly would be cared for. I felt certain she wasn't going to last long. While Molly was out of the room seeing to the supper, Mrs Muckley called me over to her, and took my hand in hers, and asked me if I would promise her to stop drinking. I nearly dropped. I had no idea that anyone except the wine-waiter at the "George" knew I was doing it. "Do you imagine you can do what you are doing in a town like this, and no one know?" said she. I felt deadly sick about it. I don't care twopence about public opinion in the ordinary way, because the public opinion of a place like Dickford is too futile for words; but letting Scottic in for a scandal at the office and giving way to drink were two things I was genuinely ashamed of, and it got me on the raw that they should have come out. Then in came Molly with the supper, and she saw that something had upset me, and she went for her mother like a tigress. Said she wouldn't have me scolded; that I wasn't in a fit state to stand it; that she had got me well in hand and could manage me perfectly and there was no occasion for anxiety. And all this from Molly, who had never said anything except "Yes, Mr Maxwell," and "No, Mr Maxwell," to me at the office! I told Molly she needn't worry. I had given her mother my promise, and would keep it. I did too, but it gave me a pretty thorough scare when I found how hard it was to keep it; if Molly had n
ot taken me round to Beardmore and made me take him into my confidence, I doubt if I should have kept it. I asked Molly about every two hours for the next few days if she still wanted to go on with the marriage, and she said that if I jilted her she would sue me for breach of promise, and made me stick it. Not having been on the booze very long, I got off comparatively lightly, but I am sorry for the poor devils who arc experienced inebriates. As I had foreseen, Mrs Muckley went downhill rapidly, and one evening when I was there she sent Molly out of the room, and asked me when the wedding was to be, and where I proposed to put Molly after I had married her. I said that I proposed to make our home at the Cedar House, and leave my mother in possession of the old house during her lifetime, even if it meant going into capital a bit. She asked me how long it would take to get the Cedar House ready, and I said I thought about three months. She said that was too long for her, couldn't I take Molly sooner? I said I 'd take her any time she liked if she didn't mind camping out in my quarters. Mrs Muckley said that was a great weight off her mind, and could I get her a letter for the hospital, as she couldn't hang on any longer. I asked her when she wanted to go. She said that wasn't for her to say, she'd have to go when there was a bed. I told her to leave it to me; if she could be ready to-morrow morning, I'd see to the shifting of her. She said she didn't see how I could be sure, but she'd be ready in case. Next morning I came round with my car bright and early as arranged, and took her to the nursing-home, where I had got a room for Molly too. So she ended her days in comfort. She was a sweet soul. Muckley we left to wrestle with the local servant problem that we had already found so intractable. Mrs Muckley died that day fortnight. Molly and I were both with her when she went. She said she died happy, leaving Molly in my care. I thought that if she knew what I was going through, trying to keep off the whisky, with Molly hanging on to me to keep me from doing something desperate, she would have thought the boot was on the other leg. It gave the town a turn to see me in topper and tails riding with Molly and Muckley and a mouldy aunt in the front coach at the funeral. They had been perfectly ready to believe the scandal, but had never credited the rumours of the engagement. As we passed our house I noticed that the blinds of my sister's room were down, as well as those of the rest of the house, which had been drawn by my orders. I thought this was a sign of grace, but I learnt afterwards that she had developed a sick headache out of pure chagrin when she learnt that I was attending the funeral as one of the family, and had vomited her dinner; rather a left-handed tribute, but nevertheless, a tribute. I took Molly to see my mother, and mother mistook her for a Friendly Girl, and asked her if she had been confirmed and whether she was willing to go into service. However, she was quite pleasant to her, and she mightn't have been if she had known that she was the prospective daughter-in-law, so all's well that ends well. Then I went and saw the vicar. He was High, and disliked the idea of a wedding in Lent. I asked him did he expect us to live in sin till after Easter? Anyway, we weren't going to, and if he wouldn't do the job, we'd patronise the rival show at the registry office. So he climbed down, and said he didn't mind so much if it was quiet. I said he could bet it would be quiet under the circumstances. He said that in his opinion I was treating my sister exceedingly badly. I said it was a free country, and he had a perfect right to his opinion. The matron of the nursing-home insisted that the wedding should take place from there, and the nurses fairly spread themselves, for they all loved Molly. We had an awfully funny mixed bag of guests. My mother was not expected, as she had not been out of the house for years. My sister was asked, but wouldn't say whether she would or whether she wouldn't. We hoped to God she wouldn't, and in the end she didn't. I asked the Treths, and Molly asked the mouldy aunt and a couple of girl friends. The wine-waiter from the "George" turned up at the church and we took him back with us to the weddingbreakfast at the nursing-home. Scottie crawled out very shakily to be best man at the risk of his life, and went straight back to bed again after the service. He was awfully pleased about it, to my immense astonishment, for it meant he would have to break in a new secretary. I took Molly to the Grand at Dickmouth for a week-end for the honeymoon, which was all that could be spared from the business in the absence of Scottie, and went down with a go of asthma almost as soon as I set foot inside the doors. Some honeymoon for the child! I brought her back as soon as I was fit to move, perhaps a bit sooner, if the truth were known. In order to get to my quarters, where we were to live till the Cedar House was ready, we had to go through our hall. Now our house is a long, two-story, double-fronted affair, with the offices on the right of the front door, and the living quarters on the left. The street door stands perpetually open, and the real front door is just inside the hall, facing the door leading into the offices. As we drove into the square I saw our chief clerk on the corner signalling to me, so I pulled up to hear what he had to say. He told me that my sister was simply raising hell. Said he thought she was off her head. The clerks had wanted to give us a welcome home, but he saw that there was going to be trouble, and he had judged that the most humane thing he could do was to shut up shop, and clear everybody off, and leave us to wash our dirty linen as privately as might be. I entirely agreed with him, and ran Molly and him round to his little house to wait till the row was over. Then I went back to tackle my sister. As soon as she heard my key in the door, out she came and let fly. Called me a thief and a liar; called Molly a common prostitute and said I'd catch v.d. from her. Didn't I thank God Molly wasn't there! I am never in the sweetest of tempers after a go of asthma, and I hit Ethel a back-hander across the mouth b la Muckley, and knocked her flying. Then I fetched a bricklayer and bricked up the door and brought my bride home in peace. However, it wasn't a peaceful night, for I had more asthma and a heart attack, as I always do after a row. Some home-coming for the child! My sister had to shift the ash-bins and use the back door and explain herself as best she could to visitors. I never spoke to her again. Next day the solicitor she and my mother always go to, a gentleman for whom I have no use, sent for me to come and see him. It seemed that my sister had allowed the servants up from the kitchen to see the fun, so there were witnesses to the assault. Ethel had a cut lip. (For the matter of that, I had cut knuckles.) Then he asked me what settlements I was prepared to make on my sister now I was married. I said, none. They could go on as they were during my mother's lifetime, and then I would give Ethel three pounds a week to live on anywhere except at Dickford. He said she wouldn't accept that. I said she could take it or leave it, and if she made any trouble she wouldn't get that. He offered me a document to sign in which I settled the house on her, all the furniture, and half my interest in the business. Lying beside it on his desk was an application form for a summons. I told him to go to hell. Next day I was served with a summons for assault. My sister had me up in front of the local beaks along with the other drunks, and folk who had been riding bikes without lights, and keeping dogs without licences. The servants gave their evidence with the greatest gusto. According to them, I had knocked my sister down and kicked her. The only difficulty was that they could not agree where I had kicked her. Neither could she produce any footmarks, and if what they said was true, she ought to have looked like a human Dalmatian. So the magistrates discounted the foot-work, though they said, and quite rightly, that I had undoubtedly socked her on the jaw. So I was bound over to keep the peace. With the exception of a few of my pals, the town took sides with Ethel. In addition to which, Muckley sedulously spread a story of an enforced marriage. So we were sent to Coventry, Molly and I. Now I had stopped drinking there wasn't much for me to do at the club or the "George", and Scottie carefully kept me away from clients lest they should feel their houses were polluted. The only person who stuck to Molly was the mouldy aunt; even the two girl friends faded away after the assault. The mouldy aunt stuck closer than glue because we helped her a bit. I don't know that she deserved it, but she certainly needed it, and perhaps that is the best claim that anyone can have.