by George Eliot
Chapter IV
Tom Is Expected
It was a heavy disappointment to Maggie that she was not allowed to gowith her father in the gig when he went to fetch Tom home from theacademy; but the morning was too wet, Mrs. Tulliver said, for a littlegirl to go out in her best bonnet. Maggie took the opposite view verystrongly, and it was a direct consequence of this difference ofopinion that when her mother was in the act of brushing out thereluctant black crop Maggie suddenly rushed from under her hands anddipped her head in a basin of water standing near, in the vindictivedetermination that there should be no more chance of curls that day.
"Maggie, Maggie!" exclaimed Mrs. Tulliver, sitting stout and helplesswith the brushes on her lap, "what is to become of you if you're sonaughty? I'll tell your aunt Glegg and your aunt Pullet when they comenext week, and they'll never love you any more. Oh dear, oh dear! lookat your clean pinafore, wet from top to bottom. Folks 'ull think it'sa judgment on me as I've got such a child,--they'll think I've donesummat wicked."
Before this remonstrance was finished, Maggie was already out ofhearing, making her way toward the great attic that run under the oldhigh-pitched roof, shaking the water from her black locks as she ran,like a Skye terrier escaped from his bath. This attic was Maggie'sfavorite retreat on a wet day, when the weather was not too cold; hereshe fretted out all her ill humors, and talked aloud to the worm-eatenfloors and the worm-eaten shelves, and the dark rafters festooned withcobwebs; and here she kept a Fetish which she punished for all hermisfortunes. This was the trunk of a large wooden doll, which oncestared with the roundest of eyes above the reddest of cheeks; but wasnow entirely defaced by a long career of vicarious suffering. Threenails driven into the head commemorated as many crises in Maggie'snine years of earthly struggle; that luxury of vengeance having beensuggested to her by the picture of Jael destroying Sisera in the oldBible. The last nail had been driven in with a fiercer stroke thanusual, for the Fetish on that occasion represented aunt Glegg. Butimmediately afterward Maggie had reflected that if she drove manynails in she would not be so well able to fancy that the head was hurtwhen she knocked it against the wall, nor to comfort it, and makebelieve to poultice it, when her fury was abated; for even aunt Gleggwould be pitiable when she had been hurt very much, and thoroughlyhumiliated, so as to beg her niece's pardon. Since then she had drivenno more nails in, but had soothed herself by alternately grinding andbeating the wooden head against the rough brick of the great chimneysthat made two square pillars supporting the roof. That was what shedid this morning on reaching the attic, sobbing all the while with apassion that expelled every other form of consciousness,--even thememory of the grievance that had caused it. As at last the sobs weregetting quieter, and the grinding less fierce, a sudden beam ofsunshine, falling through the wire lattice across the worm-eatenshelves, made her throw away the Fetish and run to the window. The sunwas really breaking out; the sound of the mill seemed cheerful again;the granary doors were open; and there was Yap, the queerwhite-and-brown terrier, with one ear turned back, trotting about andsniffing vaguely, as if he were in search of a companion. It wasirresistible. Maggie tossed her hair back and ran downstairs, seizedher bonnet without putting it on, peeped, and then dashed along thepassage lest she should encounter her mother, and was quickly out inthe yard, whirling round like a Pythoness, and singing as she whirled,"Yap, Yap, Tom's coming home!" while Yap danced and barked round her,as much as to say, if there was any noise wanted he was the dog forit.
"Hegh, hegh, Miss! you'll make yourself giddy, an' tumble down i' thedirt," said Luke, the head miller, a tall, broad-shouldered man offorty, black-eyed and black-haired, subdued by a general mealiness,like an auricula.
Maggie paused in her whirling and said, staggering a little, "Oh no,it doesn't make me giddy, Luke; may I go into the mill with you?"
Maggie loved to linger in the great spaces of the mill, and often cameout with her black hair powdered to a soft whiteness that made herdark eyes flash out with new fire. The resolute din, the unrestingmotion of the great stones, giving her a dim, delicious awe as at thepresence of an uncontrollable force; the meal forever pouring,pouring; the fine white powder softening all surfaces, and making thevery spidernets look like a faery lace-work; the sweet, pure scent ofthe meal,--all helped to make Maggie feel that the mill was a littleworld apart from her outside every-day life. The spiders wereespecially a subject of speculation with her. She wondered if they hadany relatives outside the mill, for in that case there must be apainful difficulty in their family intercourse,--a fat and flouryspider, accustomed to take his fly well dusted with meal, must suffera little at a cousin's table where the fly was _au naturel_, and thelady spiders must be mutually shocked at each other's appearance. Butthe part of the mill she liked best was the topmost story,--thecorn-hutch, where there were the great heaps of grain, which she couldsit on and slide down continually. She was in the habit of taking thisrecreation as she conversed with Luke, to whom she was verycommunicative, wishing him to think well of her understanding, as herfather did.
Perhaps she felt it necessary to recover her position with him on thepresent occasion for, as she sat sliding on the heap of grain nearwhich he was busying himself, she said, at that shrill pitch which wasrequisite in mill-society,--
"I think you never read any book but the Bible, did you, Luke?"
"Nay, Miss, an' not much o' that," said Luke, with great frankness."I'm no reader, I aren't."
"But if I lent you one of my books, Luke? I've not got any _very_pretty books that would be easy for you to read; but there's 'Pug'sTour of Europe,'--that would tell you all about the different sorts ofpeople in the world, and if you didn't understand the reading, thepictures would help you; they show the looks and ways of the people,and what they do. There are the Dutchmen, very fat, and smoking, youknow, and one sitting on a barrel."
"Nay, Miss, I'n no opinion o' Dutchmen. There ben't much good i'knowin' about _them_."
"But they're our fellow-creatures, Luke; we ought to know about ourfellow-creatures."
"Not much o' fellow-creaturs, I think, Miss; all I know--my oldmaster, as war a knowin' man, used to say, says he, 'If e'er I sow mywheat wi'out brinin', I'm a Dutchman,' says he; an' that war as muchas to say as a Dutchman war a fool, or next door. Nay, nay, I aren'tgoin' to bother mysen about Dutchmen. There's fools enoo, an' roguesenoo, wi'out lookin' i' books for 'em."
"Oh, well," said Maggie, rather foiled by Luke's unexpectedly decidedviews about Dutchmen, "perhaps you would like 'Animated Nature'better; that's not Dutchmen, you know, but elephants and kangaroos,and the civet-cat, and the sunfish, and a bird sitting on its tail,--Iforget its name. There are countries full of those creatures, insteadof horses and cows, you know. Shouldn't you like to know about them,Luke?"
"Nay, Miss, I'n got to keep count o' the flour an' corn; I can't dowi' knowin' so many things besides my work. That's what brings folksto the gallows,--knowin' everything but what they'n got to get theirbread by. An' they're mostly lies, I think, what's printed i' thebooks: them printed sheets are, anyhow, as the men cry i' thestreets."
"Why, you're like my brother Tom, Luke," said Maggie, wishing to turnthe conversation agreeably; "Tom's not fond of reading. I love Tom sodearly, Luke,--better than anybody else in the world. When he grows upI shall keep his house, and we shall always live together. I can tellhim everything he doesn't know. But I think Tom's clever, for all hedoesn't like books; he makes beautiful whipcord and rabbit-pens."
"Ah," said Luke, "but he'll be fine an' vexed, as the rabbits are alldead."
"Dead!" screamed Maggie, jumping up from her sliding seat on the corn."Oh dear, Luke! What! the lop-eared one, and the spotted doe that Tomspent all his money to buy?"
"As dead as moles," said Luke, fetching his comparison from theunmistakable corpses nailed to the stable wall.
"Oh dear, Luke," said Maggie, in a piteous tone, while the big tearsrolled down her cheek; "Tom told me to take care of 'em, and I forgot.What _shall_ I do?"<
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"Well, you see, Miss, they were in that far tool-house, an' it wasnobody's business to see to 'em. I reckon Master Tom told Harry tofeed 'em, but there's no countin' on Harry; _he's_ an offal creatur asiver come about the primises, he is. He remembers nothing but his owninside--an' I wish it 'ud gripe him."
"Oh, Luke, Tom told me to be sure and remember the rabbits every day;but how could I, when they didn't come into my head, you know? Oh, hewill be so angry with me, I know he will, and so sorry about hisrabbits, and so am I sorry. Oh, what _shall_ I do?"
"Don't you fret, Miss," said Luke, soothingly; "they're nash things,them lop-eared rabbits; they'd happen ha' died, if they'd been fed.Things out o' natur niver thrive: God A'mighty doesn't like 'em. Hemade the rabbits' ears to lie back, an' it's nothin' but contrairinessto make 'em hing down like a mastiff dog's. Master Tom 'ull knowbetter nor buy such things another time. Don't you fret, Miss. Willyou come along home wi' me, and see my wife? I'm a-goin' this minute."
The invitation offered an agreeable distraction to Maggie's grief, andher tears gradually subsided as she trotted along by Luke's side tohis pleasant cottage, which stood with its apple and pear trees, andwith the added dignity of a lean-to pigsty, at the other end of theMill fields. Mrs. Moggs, Luke's wife, was a decidedly agreeableacquaintance. She exhibited her hospitality in bread and treacle, andpossessed various works of art. Maggie actually forgot that she hadany special cause of sadness this morning, as she stood on a chair tolook at a remarkable series of pictures representing the Prodigal Sonin the costume of Sir Charles Grandison, except that, as might havebeen expected from his defective moral character, he had not, likethat accomplished hero, the taste and strength of mind to dispensewith a wig. But the indefinable weight the dead rabbits had left onher mind caused her to feel more than usual pity for the career ofthis weak young man, particularly when she looked at the picture wherehe leaned against a tree with a flaccid appearance, his knee-breechesunbuttoned and his wig awry, while the swine apparently of someforeign breed, seemed to insult him by their good spirits over theirfeast of husks.
"I'm very glad his father took him back again, aren't you, Luke?" shesaid. "For he was very sorry, you know, and wouldn't do wrong again."
"Eh, Miss," said Luke, "he'd be no great shakes, I doubt, let'sfeyther do what he would for him."
That was a painful thought to Maggie, and she wished much that thesubsequent history of the young man had not been left a blank.