by Unknown
She was watching his face, half wofully, half stubbornly, as if, whatever might be the issue of those words, she had to say them. She saw how pained he was. To admit the possible non-existence of a God when you can so easily leave the subject alone was horrible to Tommy.
“I don’t doubt Him,” she continued. “I have believed in Him ever since the time when I was such a lonely child that I did not know His name. I shall always believe in Him so long as He does not take you from me. But if He does, then I shall not believe in Him any more. It may be wrong, but that is what I feel.
“It makes you care less for me!” she cried in anguish.
“No, no, dear.”
“I don’t think it makes God care less for me,” she said, very seriously. “I think He is pleased that I don’t try to cheat Him.”
Somehow Tommy felt uncomfortable at that.
“There are people,” he said vaguely, like one who thought it best to mention no names, who would be afraid to challenge God in that way.”
“He would not be worth believing in,” she answered, “if He could be revengeful. He is too strong, and too loving, and too pitiful for that.” But she took hold of Tommy as if to protect him. Had they been in physical danger, her first impulse would have been to get in front of him to protect him. The noblest women probably always love in this way, and yet it is those who would hide behind them that men seem to love the best.
“I always feel — oh, I never can help feeling,” she said, “that nothing could happen to you, that God Himself could not take you from me, while I had hold of you.”
“Grizel!”
“I mean only that He could not have the heart,” she said hastily. “No, I don’t,” she had to add. “I meant what you thought I meant. That is why I feel it would be so sweet to be married, so that I could be close to you every moment, and then no harm could come to you. I would keep such a grip of you, I should be such a part of you, that you could not die without my dying also.
“Oh, do you care less for me now?” she cried. “I can’t see things as clearly as you do, dearest, darlingest. I have not a beautiful nature like yours. I am naturally rebellious. I have to struggle even to be as good as I am. There are evil things in my blood. You remember how we found out that. God knew it, too, and He is compassionate. I think He makes many pitying allowances for me. It is not wicked, is it, to think that?”
“You used to know me too well, Grizel, to speak of my beautiful nature,” he said humbly.
“I did think you vain,” she replied. “How odd to remember that!”
“But I was, and am.”
“I love to hear you proving you are not,” said she, beaming upon him. “Do you think,” she asked, with a sudden change of manner to the childish, like one trying to coax a compliment out of him, “that I have improved at all during those last days? I think I am not quite such a horrid girl as I used to be; and if I am not, I owe it to you. I am so glad to owe it to you.” She told him that she was trying to make herself a tiny bit more like him by studying his book. “It is not exactly the things you say of women that help me, for though they are lovely I am not sure that they are quite true. I almost hope they are not true; for if they are, then I am not even an average woman.” She buried her face in his coat. “You say women are naturally purer than men, but I don’t know. Perhaps we are more cunning only. Perhaps it is not even a thing to wish; for if we were, it would mean that we are good because there is less evil in us to fight against. Dear, forgive me for saying that; it may be all wrong; but I think it is what nearly all women feel in their hearts, though they keep it locked up till they die. I don’t even want you to believe me. You think otherwise of us, and it is so sweet of you that we try to be better than we are — to undeceive you would hurt so. It is not the book that makes me a better woman — it is the man I see behind it.”
He was too much moved to be able to reply — too much humbled. He vowed to himself that, whether he could love or not, he would be a good husband to this dear woman.
“Ah, Grizel,” he declared, by and by, “what a delicious book you are, and how I wish I had written you! With every word you say, something within me is shouting, ‘Am I not a wonder!’ I warned you it would be so as soon as I felt that I had done anything really big, and I have. I have somehow made you love me. Ladies and gentlemen,” he exclaimed, addressing the river and the trees and the roses, “I have somehow made her love me! Am I not a wonder?”
Grizel clapped her hands gaily; she was merry again. She could always be what Tommy wanted her to be. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she cried, “how could I help it?”
David had been coming back for his fly-book, and though he did not hear their words, he saw a light in Grizel’s face that suddenly set him thinking. For the rest of the day he paid little attention to Elspeth; some of his answers showed her that he was not even listening to her.
* * *
CHAPTER XVI
“HOW COULD YOU HURT YOUR GRIZEL SO!”
To concentrate on Elspeth so that he might find out what was in her mind was, as we have seen, seldom necessary to Tommy; for he had learned her by heart long ago. Yet a time was now come when he had to concentrate, and even then he was doubtful of the result. So often he had put that mind of hers to rights that it was an open box to him, or had been until he conceived the odd notion that perhaps it contained a secret drawer. This would have been resented by most brothers, but Tommy’s chagrin was nothing compared to the exhilaration with which he perceived that he might be about to discover something new about woman. He was like the digger whose hand is on the point of closing on a diamond — a certain holiness added.
What puzzled him was the state of affairs now existing between Elspeth and the doctor. A week had elapsed since the fishing excursion, and David had not visited them. Too busy? Tommy knew that it is the busy people who can find time. Could it be that David had proposed to her at the waterside?
No, he could not read that in Elspeth’s face. He knew that she would be in distress lest her refusal should darken the doctor’s life for too long a time; but yet (shake your fist at him, ladies, for so misunderstanding you!) he expected also to note in that sympathetic face a look of subdued triumph, and as it was not there, David could not have proposed.
The fact of her not having told him about it at once did not prove to Tommy that there had been no proposal. His feeling was that she would consider it too sacred a thing to tell even to him, but that it would force its way out in a week or two.
On the other hand, she could not have resisted dropping shyly such remarks as these: “I think Dr. Gemmell is a noble man,” or, “How wonderfully good Dr. Gemmell is to the poor!”
Also she would sometimes have given Tommy a glance that said, “I wonder if you guess.” Had they quarrelled? Tommy smiled. If it was but a quarrel he was not merely appeased — he was pleased. Had he had the ordering of the affair, he would certainly have included a lovers’ quarrel in it, and had it not been that he wanted to give her the pleasure of finding these things out for herself, he would have taken her aside and addressed her thus: “No need to look tragic, Elspeth; for to a woman this must be really one of the most charming moments in the comedy. You feel that he would not have quarrelled had he had any real caring for you, and yet in your heart you know it is a proof that he has. To a woman, I who know assure you that nothing can be more delicious. Your feeling for him, as you and I well know, is but a sentiment of attraction because he loves you as you are unable to love him, and as you are so pained by this quarrel, consider how much more painful it must be to him. You think you have been slighted; that when a man has seemed to like you so much you have a right to be told so by him, that you may help him with your sympathy. Oh, Elspeth, you think yourself unhappy just now when you are really in the middle of one of the pleasantest bits of it! Love is a series of thrills, the one leading to the other, and, as your careful guardian, I would not have you miss one of them. You will come to the final bang quickly enou
gh, and find it the finest thrill of all, but it is soon over. When you have had to tell him that you are not for him, there are left only the pleasures of memory, and the more of them there were, the more there will be to look back to. I beg you, Elspeth, not to hurry; loiter rather, smelling the flowers and plucking them, for you may never be this way again.”
All these things he might have pointed out to Elspeth had he wanted her to look at the matter rationally, but he had no such wish. He wanted her to enjoy herself as the blessed do, without knowing why. No pity for the man, you see, but no ill will to him. David was having his thrills also, and though the last of them would seem a staggerer to him at the time, it would gradually become a sunny memory. The only tragedy is not to have known love. So long as you have the experiences, it does not greatly matter whether your suit was a failure or successful.
So Tommy decided, but he feared at the same time that there had been no quarrel — that David had simply drawn back.
How he saw through Elspeth’s brave attempts to show that she had never for a moment thought of David’s having any feeling for her save ordinary friendship — yes, they were brave, but not brave enough for Tommy. At times she would say something bitter about life (not about the doctor, for he was never mentioned), and it was painful to her brother to see gentle Elspeth grown cynical. He suffered even more when her manner indicated that she knew she was too poor a creature to be loved by any man. Tommy was in great woe about Elspeth at this time. He was thinking much more about her than about Grizel; but do not blame him unreservedly for that: the two women who were his dears were pulling him different ways, and he could not accompany both. He had made up his mind to be loyal to Grizel, and so all his pity could go to Elspeth. On the day he had his talk with the doctor, therefore, he had, as it were, put Grizel aside only because she was happy just now, and so had not Elspeth’s need of him.
The doctor and he had met on the hill, whence the few who look may see one of the fairest views in Scotland. Tommy was strolling up and down, and the few other persons on the hill were glancing with good-humoured suspicion at him, as we all look at celebrated characters. Had he been happy he would have known that they were watching him, and perhaps have put his hands behind his back to give them more for their money, as the saying is; but he was miserable. His one consolation was that the blow he must strike Elspeth when he told her of his engagement need not be struck just yet. David could not have chosen a worse moment, therefore, for saying so bluntly what he said: “I hear you are to be married. If so, I should like to congratulate you.”
Tommy winced like one charged with open cruelty to his sister — charged with it, too, by the real criminal.
“It is not true?” David asked quietly, and Tommy turned from him glaring. “I am sorry I spoke of it, as it is not true,” the doctor said after a pause, the crow’s-feet showing round his eyes as always when he was in mental pain; and presently he went away, after giving Tommy a contemptuous look. Did Tommy deserve that look? We must remember that he had wanted to make the engagement public at once; if he shrank from admitting it for the present, it was because of Elspeth’s plight. “Grizel, you might have given her a little time to recover from this man’s faithlessness,” was what his heart cried. He believed that Grizel had told David, and for the last time in his life he was angry with her. He strode down the hill savagely towards Caddam Wood, where he knew he should find her.
Soon he saw her. She was on one of the many tiny paths that lead the stranger into the middle of the wood and then leave him there maliciously or because they dare not venture any farther themselves. They could play no tricks on Grizel, however, for she knew and was fond of them all. Tommy had said that she loved them because they were such little paths, that they appealed to her like babies; and perhaps there was something in it.
She came up the path with the swing of one who was gleefully happy. Some of the Thrums people, you remember, said that Grizel strutted because she was so satisfied with herself, and if you like an ugly word, we may say that she strutted to-day. It was her whole being giving utterance to the joy within her that love had brought. As Grizel came up the path on that bright afternoon, she could no more have helped strutting than the bud to open on the appointed day. She was obeying one of Nature’s laws. I think I promised long ago to tell you of the day when Grizel would strut no more. Well, this is the day. Observe her strutting for the last time. It was very strange and touching to her to remember in the after years that she had once strutted, but it was still more strange and touching to Tommy.
She was like one overfilled with delight when she saw him. How could she know that he was to strike her?
He did not speak. She was not displeased. When anything so tremendous happened as the meeting of these two, how could they find words at once?
She bent and pressed her lips to his sleeve; but he drew away with a gesture that startled her.
“You are not angry?” she said, stopping.
“Yes,” he replied doggedly.
“Not with me?” Her hand went to her heart. “With me!” A wounded animal could not have uttered a cry more pathetic. “Not with me!” She clutched his arm.
“Have I no cause to be angry?” he said.
She looked at him in bewilderment. Could this be he? Oh, could it be she?
“Cause? How could I give you cause?”
It seemed unanswerable to her. How could Grizel do anything that would give him the right to be angry with her? Oh, men, men! will you never understand how absolutely all of her a woman’s love can be? If she gives you everything, how can she give you more? She is not another person; she is part of you. Does one finger of your hand plot against another?
He told her sullenly of his scene with the doctor.
“I am very sorry,” she said; but her eyes were still searching for the reason why Tommy could be angry with her.
“You made me promise to tell no one,” he said, “and I have kept my promise: but you — —”
The anguish that was Grizel’s then! “You can’t think that I told him!” she cried, and she held out her arms as if to remind him of who she was. “You can believe that of your Grizel?”
“I daresay you have not done it wittingly; but this man has guessed, and he could never have guessed it from look or word of mine.”
“It must have been I!” she said slowly. “Tell me,” she cried like a suppliant, “how have I done it?”
“Your manner, your face,” he answered; “it must have been that. I don’t blame you. Grizel, but — yes, it must have been that, and it is hard on me.”
He was in misery, and these words leaped out. They meant only that it was hard on him if Elspeth had to be told of his engagement in the hour of her dejection. He did not mean to hurt Grizel to the quick. However terrible the loss of his freedom might be to the man who could not love, he always intended to be true to her. But she gave the words a deeper meaning.
She stood so still she seemed to be pondering, and at last she said quietly, as if they had been discussing some problem outside themselves: “Yes, I think it must have been that.” She looked long at him. “It is very hard on you,” she said.
“I feel sure it was that,” she went on; and now her figure was erect, and again it broke, and sometimes there was a noble scorn in her voice, but more often there was only pitiful humility. “I feel sure it was that, for I have often wondered how everybody did not know. I have broken my promise. I used always to be able to keep a promise. I had every other fault, — I was hard and proud and intolerant, — but I was true. I think I was vain of that, though I see now it was only something I could not help; from the moment when I had a difficulty in keeping a promise, I ceased to keep it. I love you so much that I carry my love in my face for all to read. They cannot see me meet you without knowing the truth; they cannot hear me say your name but I betray myself; I show how I love you in every movement; I am full of you. How can anyone look at me and not see you? I should have been more careful —
oh, I could have been so much more careful had I loved you a little less! It is very hard on you.”
The note of satire had died out of her voice; her every look and gesture carried in it nothing but love for him; but all the unhappy dog could say was something about self-respect.
Her mouth opened as if for bitterness; but no sound came. “How much self-respect do you think is left for me after to-day?” she said mournfully at last; and then she quickly took a step nearer her dear one, as if to caress the spot where these words had struck him. But she stopped, and for a moment she was the Grizel of old. “Have no fear,” she said, with a trembling, crooked smile; “there is only one thing to be done now, and I shall do it. All the blame is mine. You shall not be deprived of your self-respect.”
He had not been asking for his freedom; but he heard it running to him now, and he knew that if he answered nothing he would be whistling it back for ever. A madness to be free at any cost swept over him. He let go his hold on self-respect, and clapped his hand on freedom.
He answered nothing, and the one thing for her to do was to go; and she did it. But it was only for a moment that she could be altogether the Grizel of old. She turned to take a long, last look at him; but the wofulness of herself was what she saw. She cried, with infinite pathos, “Oh, how could you hurt your Grizel so!”
He controlled himself and let her go. His freedom was fawning on him, licking his hands and face, and in that madness he actually let Grizel go. It was not until she was out of sight that he gave utterance to a harsh laugh. He knew what he was at that moment, as you and I shall never be able to know him, eavesdrop how we may.
He flung himself down in a blaeberry-bed, and lay there doggedly, his weak mouth tightly closed. A great silence reigned; no, not a great silence, for he continued to hear the cry: “Oh, how could you hurt your Grizel so!” She scarcely knew that she had said it; but to him who knew what she had been, and what he had changed her into, and for what alone she was to blame, there was an unconscious pathos in it that was terrible. It was the epitome of all that was Grizel, all that was adorable and all that was pitiful in her. It rang in his mind like a bell of doom. He believed its echo would not be quite gone from his ears when he died. If all the wise men in the world had met to consider how Grizel could most effectively say farewell to Tommy, they could not have thought out a better sentence. However completely he had put himself emotionally in her place with this same object, he would have been inspired by nothing quite so good.