The Passionate Heart (Timeless Classics Collection)

by Ursula Bloom

  ‘It isn’t that.’

  ‘Then what is it?’

  ‘It’s you,’ said Wally redly. ‘I love you and I haven’t got the money to marry you. He has.’

  ‘Oh!’ she answered, and was ashamed that she should feel so gratified. So Wally thought it too. It all was very propitious.

  On the Sunday morning she put on her new chip hat, and the flowered frock with the train, because it made her look older, and she was in the hall waiting before anybody else was ready. She stood there buttoning up her gloves (Mamma was most particular about gloves being on, because she considered it to be most unladylike if one appeared in the street without them), and listening to the bells. It was rather pleasant the jangle they made, with the sound of hurrying footsteps in the little street, and the pleasant warmth of a summer’s day.

  ‘Give me time,’ said Mamma from above. ‘There’s no need to hurry; give me time.’

  Mamma always besought time, and invariably dawdled and arrived at any destination late. It would never do if Mamma were late to-day. Mr. Jones appeared, his hat in his hand, and he took down the brush from its peg, and brushed it carefully; he also glanced with apprehension at the brass-dialed bracket clock, which had been Grandfather’s.

  ‘Only five more minutes,’ said he. ‘We shall be late.’ And he called up the stairs.

  ‘Don’t be so impatient,’ Mamma flared back. ‘Can’t you leave me in peace? I know what I’m doing. Do you think I don’t know what the time is, and how long it takes me? I will not be hurried and flurried like this. Give me time.’

  ‘The maids have all started,’ Mary murmured. ‘And that’s the last bell.’

  ‘The church is sure to be full because of Mr. Carew …’

  ‘And we shall be late.’ She felt quite pale at the thought.

  Here was Mamma, woefully flustered, with her bonnet on all awry (she would cling to a bonnet, in spite of the vogue for hats), and a hole in her veil through which her thin and rather red nose protruded. Mamma, in a terrible muddle, with her big prayer-book, and the lorgnettes which she insisted on using, and her gloves and her purse.

  ‘My sunshade,’ gasped Mamma, as though she had not enough to carry already. ‘And I must put on my gloves. I cannot be seen in the street without my gloves put on properly. Why didn’t you tell me it was the last bell? Why, instead of calling up the stairs and worrying me and flustering me, did not somebody come up quietly and tell me? Of course now we shall be late.’

  ‘Yes, we shall be late,’ echoed Mary, aghast.

  Mamma bridled at that. She always challenged people to agree with her, and then took it the wrong way. ‘And what does it signify? One would suppose you were in love with George Carew already, you are in such a hurry. You two have done nothing but bully me and bustle me. I get no consideration; it is really so provoking.’

  ‘One would have supposed Mary could have helped you get your things,’ interposed Mr. Jones.

  ‘Nobody ever helps me,’ Mamma continued; ‘I’m never even thought about. I don’t expect help. If I did expect it I shouldn’t get it.’

  Mary opened the door; as she did so, the bell stopped. Mamma, in a great hurry, tore the button from her gloves and dropped the purse, then suddenly she remembered that she had forgotten the key. For three harassing minutes nobody could find the key. It wasn’t in the door, nor was it on the dresser, nor in the Dutch tobacco-box where it usually reposed. It was discovered after all to be in Mamma’s purse. After that they went out into the street.

  Mamma held Mr. Jones’s arm with one hand and her sunshade with the other. The sunshade was on a level with Mr. Jones’s eyes, which was more than a little dangerous for him. Mamma spiked him with every step, but he dared say nothing. Mary, walking dutifully behind them, marvelled. The churchyard was full of an ominous silence, which was painful, for they knew that the church would be more than ordinarily full. The first sermon of a new curate was always a great occasion. In the porch all three hesitated; the congregation was in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer. The subdued hum of voices droned out into the porch itself, greyed by time. There were paper notices fluttering untidily from a black board where they were inadequately pinned.

  ‘Why are we late?’ Mamma whispered accusingly. ‘I was not late. You kept on hurrying me.’

  The organ pealed its note to lead Mr. Nason. Mamma set an impatient hand on the rattling ring of the door-handle and in she burst. They proceeded up the aisle to the pew. The church was quite full; Mary observed it all shamedly. Mamma never minded what attention she attracted. Approaching their pew, Mary looked up. Her apologetic eyes met those of George Carew in his stall. What would he think of a family who bustled in half-way through the service?

  And there was Mamma arranging her book and her lorgnettes and her sunshade and her purse as though she were not late at all, and therefore need not trouble to be quiet about it. Mary hid her reddening face in prayer.

  She rose for the Venite. Over the top of her book her eyes sought George’s. He was not looking now, but was singing lustily, so that she could afford to have a good stare at him. George was very tall and very big. In anybody else she might have called it stout, but that was a horrid word and it really did not describe George, for he had muscle. He had piercing blue eyes, and a mass of fairish sleek hair brushed back from a high brow. There was something attractive about him, from the suggestion of humour in his whimsical mouth to the twinkles in his blue eyes. She looked back at her book.

  George read the prayers. He had a melodious voice and he read neither too quickly like Mr. Philpott, nor too slowly like Mr. Nason, who made the service unsupportably tedious. George added a strange prayer, ‘for our brave soldiers now facing danger and privation in South Africa, mayest Thou give them victory and triumph and be their Guide in their hour of need.’ Mamma gave a noisy dry sob. That was so like Mamma. She must attract attention, and Mary always felt unduly ashamed about it. Mamma wanted all the world to know that she was thinking of Johnny when George Carew prayed like that. It was so annoying of her.

  They sang the hymn preceding the sermon, and George knelt down and prayed; then he rose and ascended the pulpit steps. His eyes again sought those of Mary. ‘He recognises me,’ she thought, ‘I am sure he recognises me,’ and she said ‘Amen’ loudly to his invocation.

  All the while some imp of devilment reminded her of the foolish song that Wally used to sing of a little girl in love with a clergyman, and when he said:

  ‘Look up and love the things above,’

  And the little maid said, “Amen, amen,”

  And the little maid said, “Amen”.’

  It was all wrong, of course. George preached a good sermon, and mentioned the war once or twice, whereupon Mamma sighed heavily and loudly, determined that no one should miss how deeply the inferences stirred her. It was a short sermon, and afterwards they sang ‘Fight the good Fight’ and the service ended.

  Mr. Nason stood in the porch as they left, and he and George were shaking hands with everybody. He introduced Mr. Jones and Mamma, and Mamma simpered and hoped he would be happy among them. He held out his hand to Mary.

  ‘You don’t remember me?’ she said shyly.

  ‘I do,’ he replied; ‘you were the little girl at the party.’

  V

  Fancy his remembering! Why, he had been quite a little boy, and lots and lots of things must have happened to him since then.

  She had to tell Wally, of course, because it was so wonderful. He often came in to supper on a Sunday night, and when he arrived she told him as they sat in the french windows, with Harriet laying the meal behind them.

  ‘He remembered me,’ she said.

  ‘Who remembered what?’

  ‘Why, George Carew.’

  ‘There, I thought as much. None of you girls will have anything to talk about but George Carew for a month of Sundays. What do you mean by his remembering you?’

  ‘He did. He said so. He remembered me at the party. I think it w
as rather nice of him, don’t you?’

  ‘I think he was a liar, and it made a good introduction,’ said Wally with candour.

  ‘But we did meet at a party.’

  ‘Lucky shot.’

  ‘It’s no use you being jealous.’

  ‘I am jealous.’ He glanced round to see that Harriet was safely out of earshot. ‘You know I’m jealous. I love you, my dear, and that’s that.’

  ‘There’ll never be anyone like you,’ she said. It was true. Wally thrilled her, but the knowledge of the impossibility of his obtaining a financial status whereon they could marry did not thrill her. It held her back. ‘If only you could get a job somewhere,’ she said.

  ‘I’m trying, goodness knows I’m trying. My people are all for my taking up farming, but what is there in that? I know nothing about it, and it takes years to understand the ethics of pigs and the morals of cows ‒’

  ‘Oh, Wally!’

  ‘Well, it does. I want to make money quickly, in shares or mines, or something.’

  ‘Yes, but that is so risky.’

  ‘Nonsense. What do you know of finance, little Miss Purple-eyes? You know they are purple, Mary, deliciously purple.’

  But Mary had the horrid sensation that Harriet was listening. It would be very amusing for Harriet, but far from amusing for Mary. She drew herself away.

  That week was a harrowing one. Mamma insisted upon getting Johnny’s room ready, although Johnny was not expected for several days. She superintended it herself, perpetually getting in the way. Mamma laboured under the delusion that she was very good at housework. She would tie an enormous apron around herself, and don paper cuffs to keep her sleeves clean, and then launch herself into the attack body and soul. By midday, quite exhausted and very cross, she would give up the domestic side and rail at everybody and everything. By lunch she would have made everybody cry, and would spend the afternoon resting; she would arise from this only to find that somebody had not washed the paint, or had not done something that they should have done, as an excuse for fresh and more vigorous onslaught. For a whole week Mamma was unbearable.

  On the Saturday George Carew called. By a merciful providence Mamma was lying down, the morning’s attack having been a fierce one, and Mr. Jones, who had come in for more than a little of it, was out for a walk. Alone, Mary received George in the Victorian majesty of the dining-room. She wished that Harriet had shown him into the drawing-room; she liked the drawing-room so much better; there were pretty yellow curtains with muslin loops, and a cabinet, and nice cushions. She felt that the drawing-room would have been more in keeping with George. He sat down in Mamma’s chair, little knowing the heinousness of such a sin, and surveyed Mary amiably.

  ‘I don’t suppose you believe me,’ he said, ‘but I do remember you quite well. You were a dear little girl.’

  She hoped that he would not notice how she had reddened.

  ‘You went abroad to school?’

  ‘Yes, to Bonn.’

  ‘You liked it?’

  ‘I hated it.’ She was suddenly fiercely resentful of those wasted years. ‘But I think I hate this more. Mamma ‒’ she came to a guilty stop.

  ‘Yes, I have heard Mother speak of her. She’s rather ‒ well ‒ isn’t she?’ he ended bluntly.

  ‘She is,’ Mary agreed.

  ‘Why don’t you get a job, and go away?’

  ‘Because Mamma says it wouldn’t be ladylike. Mamma exists in a bygone decade. I’ve got to be ladylike, alas.’

  ‘Your job will be marriage,’ said George; ‘that is the last resource of the doomed.’

  ‘Um!’

  ‘There must be plenty of admirers.’ He was pressing the subject, and watching her very closely. She felt the blood rising to her cheeks.

  ‘There’s only one,’ she stammered. She did not know why she told him, save that he seemed to demand it of her, and she felt that she could not refuse. Yes, she wanted to tell him, that was it, here, in Mamma’s prim and proper dining-room, with its suggestion of austere chastity, and its spruce lumbering furniture, and its gilt ornaments. Mary was all wrought up and frightened; life held so many complications and difficulties, she wanted to tell him. Haltingly she told him about Wally. ‘I don’t know why,’ she ended lamely.

  ‘We’re old friends.’

  ‘Yes, but not as old as that.’

  ‘A great deal older,’ he said gravely. ‘I knew you when you wore a short frock, and starched what-do-you-call-’ems.’

  ‘George!’ said she amazedly, and hardly realising that she had addressed him as she had so often thought of him. Of course he was Mr. Carew now.

  ‘Yes, you see, you call me George, and I call you Mary. That is as it should be.’

  ‘You used to call me Pollie to tease.’

  ‘I know. I was a young pig, wasn’t I? There was a little hint of romance behind it all really. We met at a party, and you couldn’t forget me, you know.’

  Her colour was coming again, it was deepening, she could feel it running in warm rivers to her throat; she took up her sewing, trying to hide her head over it.

  ‘You see ‒’ he went on.

  And then Mamma burst in, because Harriet had awakened her. Mamma in no better humour, but very flattered at George’s visit. He must stay to tea, of course he must stay to tea with her. It was invariably a case of new brooms sweeping clean. After he had gone she discussed him appraisingly. What a nice fellow he had grown, what charming people his family had been, how lucky they were in having an energetic and charming young man like that in Mr. Philpott’s place. Mr. Nason was quite right, curates should not have wives; they were a great deal better unmarried. The wives turned their noses up, and gave themselves airs, and thought themselves too good to know anybody. Mamma had a lot to say, and she said it.

  During the week Johnny came home unexpectedly. (‘So you see it was a good thing I got the room ready, although you all knew better than I did,’ said Mamma.) Johnny walked in one day, very brown and very handsome in khaki, with a turned-up hat and a strap under his chin. His left arm was in a sling. Johnny, urged on by an imp of devilment, clashed the front-door bell, and told Harriet ‒ who had never seen him before ‒ that his name was ‘Mr. Nobody from Timbuktu.’ Harriet dared not challenge the title, and at the same time she was frightened to death to give it to Mamma, so she very artfully said that a gentleman with a strange name was in the drawing-room.

  ‘Strange name?’ said Mamma, who was turning out the larder to Cook’s horror. ‘Strange name? What strange name?’

  ‘I didn’t quite catch it, ma’am,’ said Harriet.

  ‘You must have caught it. I insist on knowing. Why, he might be anybody; what is the good of keeping servants to answer doors, if they can’t take people’s names in properly? What was the name?’

  Thus foiled, there was nothing for it but for Harriet to blurt out: ‘Mr. Nobody from Timbuktu’ ‒ to Mamma’s intense fury. She flung off the enormous apron, in which she always enveloped herself during domestic operations, and charged into the drawing-room to have things out with the gentleman. The next thing that was heard was the piercing preliminary scream of Mamma in hysterics.

  Harriet seized a pail of water. ‘She’ll burst herself,’ she murmured, ‘and a good job too.’ Mary rushed for the smelling-salts ‒ and in the end it was merely Johnny.

  Mamma wept all day. She wept whenever she caught sight of the sling, and said how she hated the wicked Boers and how dreadful it all was for the poor Queen.

  When Wally called that evening there was Johnny in the best armchair, smoking a huge pipe, and Mr. Jones reduced to taking the air in the garden with Mary. Wally surveyed the two as they walked round the lawn, he tall and willowy with the spareness of middle-age, Mary with the grace of youth.

  ‘Now what’s all this?’ asked Wally.

  ‘Johnny’s come back,’ Mary told him. ‘Mamma always behaves like this with Johnny.’

  ‘What does he do?’

  ‘Usually,’ s
aid Mary in a stage whisper so that Mr. Jones should not hear, ‘he borrows money.’

  Mamma’s one good point was generosity. She always gave handsome presents, and she never grumbled. Johnny’s suggestion that he was ‘stony’ had coaxed repeated cheques out of her. She had already handed over fifty pounds. This had been reserved for a birthday present for Mr. Jones, who, she asserted, could very well do without it. Mr. Jones had agreed a little weakly. Johnny had no compunction in taking it from Mr. Jones, because he considered that ‘that Jones man only married Mamma for her money, and serve him damn well right if he doesn’t get it.’ Johnny looked upon any money made by poor Papa and taken over by poor Papa’s family from the clutches of Mr. Jones as being well and honourably won. Late that night he tapped on his sister’s door.

  ‘I want a word with you, my dear,’ said he.

  ‘Come in.’

  Johnny came in, still in khaki, and sat down on the one and only chair, with its stiff, upright back. ‘I say, Mamma’s got it badly,’ he said, launching gladly into the subject nearest his heart.

  ‘Got what?’

  ‘Being married to Jones hasn’t made her any better.’

  ‘Er ‒ no,’ said Mary politely.

  ‘I shan’t be able to stay the course long, I can promise you that. How do you manage to stick it?’

  ‘I suffer in silence,’ she said. ‘The little heroine’ ‒ and she tried to laugh.

  ‘I’d marry.’

  ‘Yes, and who would you marry? Wally hasn’t two farthings and there isn’t anybody else.’

  ‘Well, I’d find someone. A good-looking girl like you ought not to be at a loss. There’s that Carew chap Mamma is so full of.’

  She coloured. ‘Please don’t,’ she said.

  ‘Whew!’ Johnny whistled. ‘That’s how the land lies, is it? Well, you might do worse.’

  Mary pulled a shawl indignantly round her. ‘The land does not lie like that. It isn’t that way at all. I like George, of course, but ‒’

  ‘Probably George likes you?’

  ‘If he does like me he doesn’t say so.’

  ‘He’s the romantic sort,’ Johnny teased her. ‘His family are all like that ‒ a pretty face and they squirm; give him a forget-me-not and he’ll worship. If you play your cards properly ‒’