The Fortunes of Richard Mahony

by Henry Handel Richardson

  But this was not to be. The morning came when, in place of rising and tapping at his wife’s door, solicitously to inquire how she had passed the night, John, beaten at last, lay prostrate in his bed. . . .from which he never rose again.

  A scene of the utmost confusion followed. Mary, summoned just as she was sitting down to breakfast, found Lizzie in hysterics, John writhing in an agony he could no longer conceal. The scared servants scuttled aimlessly to and fro; the children, but half dressed, cried in a corner of the nursery. Emmy alone had her wits about her—though she, too, shook as with the ague.

  Meeting Mary at the front door, she held out two clasped hands imploringly. “Oh. . . .what is it? Aunt Mary! what is the matter with Papa?”

  “Emmy. . . .your poor, dear father—my darling, I look to you to be brave and help me—he will need all our help now.”

  Long prepared for some such emergency, Mary took control. Dispatching the groom at a gallop for the doctor, she mixed a soothing-draught for Lizzie (“See to her first,” was John’s whispered request) and gave John the strongest opiate she dared. The children were put in the carriage, and sent to “Ultima Thule.” Then, as Richard had directed, Mary cleared the sickroom of superfluous furniture; while Emmy bore a note to Miss Julia—Mary’s sole confidante. And faithful to a promise, Miss Julia was back with Emmy inside an hour. Without her aid—she at once saw to Lizzie, and brought the servants to their senses—without this sane, calm presence, Mary did not know how she would have managed, John from the start obstinately refusing to let her out of his sight. Or for that matter without Emmy either. . . .Emmy was her right hand. Nimble, yet light-footed as a cat; tireless; brave; Emmy now proved her mettle. Nothing was beneath her: she performed the most menial duties of the sickroom with a kind of fiery, inner gratitude. And, these done, would sit still as a mouse, a scrap of needlework in her hand, just waiting for the chance of springing up afresh. Her young face grew thin and peaked, and the life went out of her step; but she never complained, or sought to obtrude her own feelings. Only one person knew what she was suffering. It was on Auntie Julia’s neck that she had had her single breakdown, and wept out her youthful passion of love and despair.

  “What shall I do! Oh, what shall I do?”

  And Auntie Julia, knowing everything, understanding everything, wisely let her cry and cry till she could cry no more. “There, there, my little one! There, there!” But after this Emmy did not again give way. Indeed, thought Mary, there was something in her of John’s own harsh self-mastery: a trait that sat oddly on her soft and lovely girlhood.

  Lizzie was the sorest trial. But then, poor thing, was it to be wondered at in her condition, and after the shock John had given her? For when, that first morning he failed to present himself at her bedside, Lizzie passed in a twinkling from a mood of pettish surprise to one of extreme ungraciousness. The housemaid was peremptorily bidden to go knock at the master’s door and ask the reason of his negligence. The girl’s confused stammerings throwing no light on this, Emmy was loudly rung for. “Pray, my love, be so good as to find out if your Papéh, who has evidently forgotten to wish me a good-morning, does not intend going to town to-day!” And when Emmy, sick and trembling, yet with a kind of horrific satisfaction, returned bearing John’s brutal reply: “No, not to-day, nor ever again!” Lizzie, now thoroughly roused, threw on a wrapper and swept down the passage to her husband’s room.

  On discovering the true state of things she dropped to the floor in a swoon. Restored to consciousness and got back to bed, she fell to screaming in hysterical abandonment—on his arrival the doctor had more to do for her than for John, and pulled a long face. And even when the danger of a premature confinement was over, and the worst of the hysteria got under, she would lie and sob and cry, breaking out, to whoever would listen, in wild accusations.

  “Oh, Mary, love! When I think how I have been deceived!. . . .the trick that has been played on me. . . .me who ought to have known before any one else. John and his secrecy!—he has made a fool of me, even in the eyes of the servants.”

  “My poor, dear Lizzie! Do believe me, he only wanted to spare you. . . .as long as he could. Consider him now, and his sufferings, and don’t make it harder for him than you can help. Think, too, of your baby.”

  But she might as well have talked to a post: Lizzie continued stormily to weep and to rail. The two older women bore patiently with her, even coming to consider it a good thing that she was thus able to vent her emotion. It remained for Emmy, Emmy with the hard and unyoung look her face assumed when she spoke of her stepmother, to make the bitter comment: “She’s not really sorry for Papa—she’s savage, Aunt Mary, that’s what she is!”—a point of view which Mary herself was so rigidly suppressing that it received but scant quarter. “Emmy, Emmy! You must not say such things of your Mamma.” But Richard declared the girl had hit the nail on the head. It was herself and herself alone Lizzie grieved for.

  “And is it so unnatural? Has Fate not played her a shabby trick? She took John, as we all know, because he was by far the best catch that had ever come her way. Now, after a few brief years of glory, and when her main ambition was about to materialise, the Lady Turnham-to-be sees herself doomed to a widow’s dreary existence: all weepers and seclusion: with, for sole diversion, the care of an unwanted infant. Not to speak of the posse of stepdaughters she has loaded herself up with.”

  “It does sound harsh. . . .the way you put it,” said Mary, and re-tied her bonnet-strings; she had run home one evening for a peep at her children.

  However, if he and Emmy were right about Lizzie and her feelings, then what a blessing it was that John, in his illness, made no demands on her, asking neither for nor after her. With his one request on the morning of his collapse, that she should receive first attention, all thought for her seemed exhausted: just as, in the brutal answer he returned her by Emmy, had evaporated his love and care. From the sound of her pitiless crying he turned with repugnance away. Did she enter his room, with a swish of the skirts, either forgetting to lower her voice or hissing in a melodramatic whisper, he was restless till she withdrew. Except for Mary—and he fretted like a child if Mary were long absent—John asked only to be alone.

  On taking to his bed he had severed, at one stroke, every link with the outside world: and soon he was to lie drug-sodden and mercifully indifferent even to the small world of his sickroom. But before this happened he expressed one wish—or rather gave a last order. The nature of his illness was not to be made known beyond the family circle.

  “Trying to keep his Chinese Wall up to the end,” said Mahony. “His death—like his life—is to be nobody’s business but his own. Well, well. . . .as a man lives so he shall die!”

  But Mary was much perturbed. A dying man’s whim—and as such, of course, it had to be respected. But what could it hurt now whether people knew what was the matter with him or not? Concealing the truth meant all sorts of awkward complications. But Emmy, overhearing this, flushed sensitively and looked distressed. “Oh, Aunt Mary, don’t you see? Papa is. . . .is ashamed of having a cancer.”

  Ashamed?. . . .ashamed of an illness?. . . .Mary had never heard of such a thing. But Richard, struck afresh by Emmy’s acumen, declared: “That’s it! The girl is right. You call it a sick man’s fancy, I the exaggerated reserve of a lifetime, but Emmy knows better, sees deeper than any of us.” And added a moment later: “It strikes me, my dear, that if instead of hankering after that impossible scapegrace of a son, just because he was a son, your brother had had a little more eye for the quick wits and understanding of his daughter, he might have been a happier man.”

  News of the serious illness of the Honourable John Millibank Turnham, M.L.C., brought an endless string of callers and inquirers to the door: the muffled knocker thudded unceasingly. People came in their carriages, on horseback, on foot; and included not merely John’s distracted partners, and his colleagues on the
Legislative Council, but many a lesser man and casual acquaintance—Mary herself marvelled to see how widely known and respected John had been. And those who could not come in person wrote letters of condolence, sent gifts of luscious fruit and choice flowers and out-of-season delicacies—anything in short of which kindly people could think, to prove their sympathy. It was one person’s while to receive the visitors, answer the letters, acknowledge the gifts. Fortunately this very person was at hand in the shape of Zara. Zara’s elegant manners and her ease in expressing herself on paper were exactly what was wanted.

  She and Hempel were staying in lodgings at Fitzroy, prior to setting out on the forlorn hope of a sea voyage. For, after numerous breakdowns, poor Hempel—he looked as if the first puff of wind would blow him overboard; Richard called him: “The next candidate for the Resurrection!”—had been obliged definitely to abandon his pastorate. In the meantime he was resting in bed from the fatigues of the train journey, before undertaking the fresh fatigues to which Zara, in her wilful blindness, condemned him.

  At John’s, Zara received in the dining-room among horsehair and mahogany, as better befitting the occasion than the gilt and satin of the drawing-room. Lugubriously clad, she spoke with the pious and resigned air of one about to become a mourner. “My poor brother,” “Our great grief,” “God’s will be done!” But of an evening when the rush was over, she carried to Lizzie a list of names and gifts and a sheaf of letters.

  Her sibilant tones were audible through the half-closed door. “Yes, Judge O’Connor—yes, yes, my dear, himself in person!. . . .with his own and his lady’s compliments. . . .desires to be kept informed of our dear John’s progress.”

  And Lizzie’s rich, fruity tones: “Major Grenville, did you say?. . . .on behalf of his Excellency? Very gratifying. . . .very gratifying indeed!”

  Mary was never one to jib at trifles. But as often as Emmy heard them at it, she clenched her fist and ground her teeth. How she hated them!. . . .hated them. To be able to care who called and who didn’t call, when Papa lay dying! In her passionate young egoism she demanded that there should be no room in any mind but for this single thought.

  But, as week added itself to week, and John still lay prostrate, and since, too, the most heartfelt inquiries evoked none but the stereotyped response: “No improvement,” the press of sympathisers visibly declined. People ceased to call daily; came but once a week; then at still wider intervals. And at length even the hardiest dropped off, and a great stillness settled round the dying man. John was forgotten; was reckoned to the dead before he was actually of them. Only once more on earth would he, for a brief hour, play a leading part.

  The flawless constitution that had been so great an asset to him in life stood him now in ill stead. His dying was arduous and protracted. Behind the red rep hangings there went on one of those bitter struggles with death that wring from even the least sensitive an amazed: “Wherefore? To what end?” Cried Mahony, watching John’s fruitless efforts: “The day will come, I’m sure of it, when we shall agree to the incurable sufferer being put painlessly away. We need a lethal chamber, and not for dumb brutes alone.” At which Mary looked apprehensive, and wished he wouldn’t. A good job he was no longer in practice. Or what would his patients have thought?

  “Ah, thank God, the muzzle of medical etiquette is off my jowl!”

  Meanwhile, thought his wife, he was in his element, all tenderness and consideration for John—he went to endless trouble in procuring for him the newest make of water-bed—which was just what one would expect of Richard. Nor would he have him teased about religious questions or his approaching end. On the other hand, had John shown the least desire for religious consolation, Richard would have been the person to see that he got it.

  But this John did not. At those rare moments when he was awake to his surroundings and tolerably free from pain, he lay exhausted and inert, his eyes closed, and with little to distinguish him from one already dead. What his innermost thoughts were, what his hopes and fears of a hereafter, remained his own secret. The single wish that crossed his lips seemed to point to his mind still occupying itself with earthly things.

  Mary, sewing beside the bed, looked up one day to find his sunken eyes open and fastened on her.

  She rose and leaned over him. “What is it, John? Do you want anything?”

  He signified yes with his lids, sparing himself any superfluous word for fear of rousing up his enemy. Then, in a thick, raucous whisper: “I should like. . . .to see. . . .the boy. Yours.”

  Thus it came about—greatly against the wish of Mahony, who held that illness and suffering were evil sights for childish eyes—that Cuffy was one day lifted into the carriage beside Nannan, where he sat his little legs a-dangle, clad in his best velvet tunic and with his Scotch cap on his head. He looked pale and solemn. Nannan and Eliza had made such funny faces at each other, and had whispered and whispered. And while she was dressing him Nannan had talked about nothing but how good and quiet he must be, and what would happen to him if he wasn’t. In consequence, directly he was set down from the carriage Cuffy started walking on the tips of his toes; and on tiptoe, holding fast to his nurse’s hand, crept laboriously up the gravel path to the house.

  At the front door stood Cousin Emmy, who kissed him and led him in. Like Nannan she, too, said: “Now you must be a very good boy, Cuffy, and not make the least noise.” Cuffy’s heart began to thump with anxiety: he walked more gingerly than before. The house fell like the nursery when the Dumplings were asleep. Emmy opened a door into a room that was quite dark. It had also a very nasty smell. Someone was snoring. Cuffy tried to pull back.

  “Now, be good, Cuffy!”

  Then he was at his mother’s knee, mechanically holding out his hands to have his little gloves peeled off. But his thoughts were with his eyes—pinned to some one lying in a bed. . . .a man with a dark yellow face and a grey beard, who was asleep and snoring—like Nannan did. Cuffy did not associate this funny-looking person with his uncle; he just stood and stared stupidly. Nevertheless, something very disturbing began to go round inside him; and he swallowed hard.

  Then two big black shiny eyes were awake and looking at him. They looked and looked. Cuffy stood transfixed, his lips apart, his breath coming unevenly, his own eyes round with a growing fear.

  A yellow hand like a claw came over the bedclothes towards him, and some one tried to speak; and only made a funny sound—and tried again.

  “. . . .does you credit. But. . . .at his age. . . .John. . . .a finer. . . .child.” After which the eyes shut and the snoring began anew.

  Then, though he had only just come, somebody said: “Kiss your uncle good-bye, Cuffy.”

  This was too much. As he was lifted up Cuffy made protest, wildly working his arms and legs. “No, no!”

  But his lips had brushed something cold and clammy before, his clothes all twisted round him, he was put back on the floor. And by then the face on the bed had changed: the eyes were all wrinkles now; the mouth like a big black hole. Somebody screamed. And now people were scurrying about, and there came Aunt Lizzie running in her dressing-gown, and she was naughty and cried, making the noise he had been told not to. His own tears flowed; but true to his promise he did not utter a sound.

  Then some one took his hand and ran him out of the room to the dining-room, where, his eyes wiped and his nose blown, Cousin Emmy gave him a nectarine, which she peeled for him and cut up in quarters, because it was “nicer so.” He was also allowed to eat it messily, and not scolded for letting the juice drip down his tunic.

  But at home again, he felt the need of blowing out his shrunken self-esteem. It was a chance, too, of making himself big in the eyes of his playfellow Josey, the youngest of his three cousins, a long-legged girl of seven, who domineered over him, smacked him and used his toys without asking. There she came along the verandah, dragging his best horse and cart—with he
r nasty big black eyes, and the hair that stuck straight out behind her round comb.

  Under seal of secrecy and with an odd sense of guilt, as if he was doing something he ought not to, Cuffy confided to her his discovery that big people could cry, too. “I seed your Mamma do it.”

  But in place of being impressed Josey was very angry. Grabbing the secretmonger’s silky topknot, she shook him soundly. “That’s a storwy, Cuffy Mahony, and you’re a howwid storwy-teller! Gwownup people never cwy!” The fact that she spoke with a strong lisp, while a baby like Cuffy would talk plainly, always rendered Josey very emphatic. Moreover in the present case, she still burned with shame at the disgraceful knowledge that not only Mamma could cry, but Papa, too.

  John died five days later at midnight.

  The afternoon before, an odd thing happened. Mary and Emmy were alone with him, he lying drugged and comatose, and Mary had been fanning him, for it was very warm. Outside, beneath a copper-coloured sky, a scorching north wind blew; the windows of the room were shut against swirling clouds of dust. There was no sound but John’s laboured breathing, and, exhausted, Mary thought she must have dropped into a doze. For when, warned by a kind of instinct she started up, she saw that John’s eyes were open: he was gazing with a glassy stare at the foot-end of the bed. And as she watched, an extraordinary change came over the shrunken, jaundiced face. The eyes widened, the pin-hole pupils dilated; while the poor, burst lips, on which were black sores that would not heal, parted and drew back, disclosing the pallid flesh of the gums. John was trying to smile.