Margaret of the North

by EJourney

  She broke her silence with a brief remark. "Why London for her lying-in?"

  John, engrossed in reading the Milton daily, looked up briefly. "You will have to ask Fanny that." He was about to resume reading his paper but he put it down when he saw his mother's still apprehensive countenance. "Try to relax, mother. You may find London quite diverting and I am sure Fanny will be all right."

  "I have no desire to see London. I cannot imagine anything there of interest to me. I am going only because Fanny needs me."

  "Can I do something to make this trip more comfortable for you?"

  "No. It will have to end at some point. Go back to your paper. I will survive."

  John nodded, smiled calmly and returned to his paper. He looked up from time to time, smiling in the same way whenever he caught her attention. The train ride to London was relatively uneventful but Mrs. Thornton remained uneasy and she sat opposite her son, worried and silent through most of the trip.

  They arrived at Watson and Fanny's apartment in time for a long leisurely luncheon, after which Fanny showed Mrs. Thornton to her room. There, pleading fatigue, she stayed to rest. Shortly thereafter, John left the Watson home for Harley Street. He was staying with Edith and Captain Lennox until his return to Milton Sunday afternoon. Watson and Fanny had initially planned to put him up in a hotel. With only four bedrooms and Mrs. Thornton staying with them, Fanny told him there was not enough room in the apartment for all of them. But a short letter from Margaret to Edith had produced an immediate reply.

  Edith, in her usual effusive style, declared that they were always welcome and, in fact, she would be offended if either or both of them came to London and did not stay with them at Harley Street. Captain Lennox could not wait to renew his acquaintance with the fascinating Mr. Thornton, and that she, herself, was keen to hear first-hand accounts of her cousin and her goddaughter.

  John did not return home until way past dinner time on Sunday. Margaret had waited to have dinner with him in the sitting room where he found her curled up on the couch, her eyes closed and her fingers entwined together on top of an open book. For a long moment, he stood gazing lovingly at her before he took the book gently from under her hands and laid it on the table. He kissed her lightly, trying not to wake her up. When he bent down to pick her up and carry her to bed, Margaret opened her eyes and greeted him with a smile, her eyes half-closed and glazed from sleep.

  "What time is it? Have you had dinner?" She asked, rising from her reclining position and sitting up.

  "It is way past eleven. I am sorry to be so late. I missed my train and came in on the last trip back to Milton. Did you wait to have dinner with me?"

  "Yes but don't worry about it. I am too sleepy for dinner anyway. I can ring for a glass of milk."

  "Let me go and get you some. No need to wake any of the servants up. I could use a glass myself."

  When John returned from the kitchen with two glasses of milk on a tray, the lights in the sitting room had been turned off and Margaret was in her dressing room changing. He went into the bedroom and deposited the tray on the table in front of the fireplace. He had had a long day and he was exhausted. Plopping himself on the nearest armchair, he took off his vest and jacket, peeled off his cravat and unbuttoned the top of his shirt.

  Before long, Margaret entered the room in her robe and nightgown and sat on the opposite chair. She smiled at him and picked up a glass of milk. They each sipped milk, quietly and slowly, listening to the crackle of the fireplace and occasionally exchanging glances across the table. They did not talk and took care not to make any noise that would disturb the silence around them. When they finished and still with nary a word, they went to bed. John turned off the lamp by his bedside, kissed Margaret good night, and gathered her close in his arms as they both sank into a deep dreamless slumber.

  Margaret never asked John how the trip to London was with his mother. Not that night nor the subsequent ones. She thought he would tell her when he was ready. The night following his return, he came home with flowers and was particularly solicitous and charming to her. She naturally attributed all this to their first brief time of being away from each other. She had missed him, as well, the night he was gone. Several times that night, she had reached out in the dark for his reassuring presence next to her and the first time she did so, his absence jolted her into full awakening.

  At dinner in their sitting room, John gave her an account of his stay at Harley Street, describing in detail his evening with Edith and Captain Lennox. Margaret listened without a word until he finished his stories and, then, remarked, greatly amused. "You surprise me. I would never have guessed that vases of flowers, table settings, and roast trimmings would interest you enough to notice, much less describe them. And, in such detail, too!"

  He laughed. "Normally, they are a haze to me but how else could I convince you where I was the night I was away? Besides, I am sure that Edith would have wanted me to let you know she went out of her way to please me."

  "Yes, my dear cousin likes you very much. Frankly, I had been uncertain how she would regard you because she was as snobbish as they come in London about people in the trades but she does have an affectionate heart that serves her well."

  Dinner came to an end a couple of hours later but John hardly said anything about his mother or Fanny except to say that Fanny was, as usual, getting everyone to fuss over her and his mother fell into her indulgent maternal role almost as soon as they arrived.

  **************

  John did not tell Margaret that he missed his train because an emotional parting with his mother had detained him longer than he had intended. He was, in fact, getting ready to leave on an earlier train and had gone in to bid his mother farewell in her bedroom. She was almost like her old self with him, touching his face affectionately and rearranging his cravat. But she seemed to be avoiding his eyes and John could not help saying, "I hope you have forgiven me for deciding in favor of the workers."

  She glanced at him and turned around to sit on the only armchair in the room. "You decided what you thought was best for the mill."

  "But you are still unhappy. Is there anything else I can do to make it up you."

  She clenched her teeth and answered, her eyes somewhat defiant. "I want you to tell me that you can see why I said all those hurtful things to Margaret."

  "What hurtful things?" He was perplexed and his voice could not hide the reflexive anger her answer elicited. "What do you mean, mother?"

  Mrs. Thornton realized then that Margaret never said anything to John about their encounters but it was too late for her to take back what she said. He stared at her demanding an explanation. "Mother, what did you say to my wife?"

  "I did talk to her the day before we left and told her I did not mean those hurtful words."

  "Mother, what hurtful words?"

  "I forget exactly. I was frustrated and angry. I told her that she did not understand us and did not belong in Milton. I am sorry but I believe those to be true. For me, she will always be from the south. But I said something I should not have. I told her to get out of our lives. That was wrong. She is your wife after all." She replied, avoiding his eyes.

  John glared at his mother with narrowed eyes as she explained. He did not, could not, speak for a moment or two. Then, in a voice he struggled to keep under control, he snarled at her under his breath. "Mother, you had no right."

  He rushed out of the room. Just outside the door, he spun around to face her and, in a low voice still quivering from suppressed anger, he said, "You must see that I love Margaret with all my heart. I do not care what she knows or not about Milton and cotton. What I care about and find amazing is that she loves me for who I am and what I am. So, you see, she belongs nowhere else but with me, in Milton. I can no longer be happy without Margaret, mother." He turned around and left, ignoring her pleas and her obvious distress at what she had wrought in him.

  "John!" Mrs. Thornton cried, "Please do not leave like this. John!" She sta
rted to get up from her chair to stop him but he had moved too fast and was running down the stairs in what seemed like a flash. She sat down again and compressed her quivering lips to steady them. Her hands clutched tightly at the handkerchief in her hand. She had not anticipated the violence of his anger. The few times in the past that she had witnessed it, it was directed at someone else and never at her. She sat very still but her body was aching with tension. What was she to do? Her despair did not last long, however. Fanny came in to ask what had happened and as she reassured her daughter that it was but a misunderstanding that should sort itself out in time, she also convinced herself that her son would come back. He had to. She knew in her heart that her son would and could never disregard what was due to her as his mother.

  John hurried past the drawing room, ignoring Watson and Fanny who gawked at him, startled. He bolted out the door and, in hasty angry strides, headed for the train station, unconcerned that it was rather too far to walk. After some distance, he slowed down but he kept walking until he came upon a park. He stopped under a shady tree and leaned against it. Trying to calm himself further, he stood there for a long time But his anger began to swell up once more as he recalled Margaret, sad and even despondent, clinging to him. Once she even talked about leaving for London and staying there for a little while. Was that, perhaps, after his mother's harsh, unfair tirade?

  He clenched his jaw and compressed his mouth to suppress an urge to shout, hit something, or run away. But he knew only too well that he could not run away. He had never been this angry with his mother, never ever parted with her in acrimony. His rage tore him up. He felt guilty—and angry at himself—for being angry. What right had he to be angry at his mother—he who had hurt her deeply when he decided against her in favor of workers? As Margaret had told him once, his mother had already been through frustration and despair over changes she had to endure after he married.

  Mrs. Thornton hated disruptions in her life and John suspected that it would have suited her if he never married. She had taken pride in the fact that women thought him a good catch but because he never showed any serious interest in any of these women, it had not bothered her. But Margaret changed all that. From the time he apprised her of his regard for Margaret, Mrs. Thornton had been anxious, and probably resented losing her son to someone from a world quite different from that they inhabited, a world that—because it was foreign—intimidated her and elicited her contempt.

  John knew Mrs. Thornton was unhappy that he married Margaret. Still, she might have learned to live with his marriage were it not that Margaret's influence extended to the way he saw important matters related to running the mill. Although John had held many of the same opinions and beliefs as his mother, he proved to be not only curious and interested in other viewpoints but also susceptible to the merits in them. Consistent with Margaret's views and perceptions, he had made changes at the mill which his mother considered wasteful, at the least. Worse, she probably thought these changes—concessions to workers, in her opinion—emboldened them to ask him to tell her to stop coming to the mill. In his mother's reckoning, Margaret was to blame for the workers' request. After taking her son away, Margaret then deprived her of the mill, everything she lived for. John thought he finally saw what Margaret already knew.

  Margaret had seen into his mother's heart before he did, had been alive to the desperation Mrs. Thornton felt over all the changes resulting from his marriage. John took in a long deep breath, his eyes sad and thoughtful. Understanding his mother's despair and her animosity towards Margaret did not easily come with acceptance, did not mollify his anger at his mother or at himself for not having seen right away. If Margaret had loved him less or had not been strong, she might have escaped to London by now, away from his mother, away from him. That possibility perturbed him deeply and he wished with all his heart that he was home with her, prostrate at her feet, telling her how sorry he was for what she had to endure.

  And yet, distressed as John was at what Margaret had been through, he could not reproach his mother for too long. He and she were alike in many ways: Easily provoked to anger when threatened, they jealously guarded what they thought they could rightly lay claim to. That was precisely what she had done, ill-advised though it was.

  His mother's incontrovertible beliefs, sometimes inappropriate and even destructive, also led to much good, of which he was the principal beneficiary. John could not but be grateful for all that. What he was, he owed to his mother. In return, he owed her not only the comfort he could now give her but also the generosity and respect that allowed her to make mistakes and to expect her children to understand and forgive. As hurt as Margaret must have been, she understood what his mother was going through. Mollified, John knew he should do no less and as a son, he needed to do more: He must forgive.

  John felt his chaotic emotions gradually getting spent and he walked to a bench nearby where he sat for a long time. It was growing dark by the time he got up and retraced his steps slowly back to the Watson apartment where he knew his mother waited. He was certain he had missed his train and would have to take the last one to go back home to Margaret.

  XXII. Passage

  In early December, Margaret began to plan for the holidays that were coming. She was going to have her hands full with preparations this year. They would be celebrating their first Christmas in the new house and Elise's very first one but her efforts were going to be directed at the mill. It was doing much better than had been expected the past year and she thought it appropriate, as a gesture of gratitude and goodwill, to have a bigger celebration at Marlborough Mills.

  Her intent was to put together gift baskets for the workers and their families and celebrate Christmas Eve with a dinner at the Dining Hall for everyone involved in the mill including masters, overseers, workers, and their families. When she was pregnant the year before, she had not been able to do more than supervise the purchase and wrapping of gifts for the children. She realized her current plans were rather ambitious, probably unheard of in the other mills but were in keeping with John's desire to encourage communication between masters and hands. She hoped John would go along with them.

  On a pleasant weekend afternoon, John and Margaret sat reading in the conservatory, trying to concentrate on their respective books with relative success. They were often interrupted by the continuous babble and occasional screams from Elise who was playing with Mary on a thick rug on the floor. Accustomed to her daughter's utterings, Margaret sometimes glanced curiously at the two figures on the floor but generally she ignored them and went on reading. John was not quite as successful and found his daughter's utterances inevitably more distracting. He looked up so frequently to see what was going on that, eventually, he decided to put his book down and watch his daughter play.

  "Is she saying something you can understand?" He asked Margaret after a few minutes had passed.

  "She is saying something." She barely looked up from her book. "I am not sure exactly what it is, though."

  "But how do you know?" He persisted.

  Margaret turned her head towards him. "Well, if you listen to her for a while, you'll notice there are sounds she would utter repeatedly and they have a rhythm unique to those sounds. So, I think they must mean something, to her at least."

  "Fascinating! Like what?"

  "I don't know, really. They bear no resemblance to real words." Margaret put the book, open face down, on the table next to her and asked jauntily, "Does all this really interest you or do you just want my attention?"

  "It does interest me more than you might think although, right now, I would not object to taking a turn in the garden." He grinned, got up, grasped her hands and pulled her up from her chair. Margaret grabbed a shawl she had flung on the back of her chair, draped it around her shoulders and strolled into the garden with him.

  "It is cooler than I thought. Are you warm enough in that shawl?"

  "Not really. But if we walk briskly, we should warm up.

  Aft
er several energetic turns around the garden, John slowed down a little. "You are in good shape. You had no trouble keeping up with me."

  She smiled broadly at him. "I take care of a frisky little girl who weighs more than 15 pounds and I carry her up and down the stairs several times a day. I have to be in good shape."

  He smiled, placed his arm around her waist, and drew her close. "Yes, of course. She is growing fast and more active every day." Invigorated by their brisk pace and the fresh cool air, they took a few more turns, slowing gradually to an easy pace. Halfway around the garden, John paused. "I wanted to talk to you about something I have been thinking about since I came back from London."

  "I had something to tell you as well but it probably is not as weighty a matter as yours." She replied, curious about the gravity his voice had just taken on and the scowl that had crept back on his brow.

  "Perhaps, you should tell me first what you had in mind and we shall see."

  She eyed him closely. He seemed determined to hear her out first. "Well, it is about what we should do for the mill this Christmas."

  "Do you think we need to do more than last year?"

  "As a matter of fact, I do. The mill seems to be doing better than you expected and you said it will probably do even better at least through next year."

  "Yes, orders are increasing and new clients are planning to give us their orders next year. I, too, thought we might do more for Christmas. Do you have something specific in mind?"

  "I do have some ideas I have written down and I have costs attached to them. They are merely estimates, of course, particularly the number of children which Nicholas gave me."