“Good evening,” he said, touching his hat.
“Oh!” the girl uttered a cry, “higgler! What do you come for?” It was the longest sentence she had ever spoken to him; a sad frightened voice.
“I thought,” he began, “I’d call—and see Mrs. Sadgrove. I wondered . . .”
“Mother’s dead,” said the girl. She drew the door farther back, as if inviting him, and he entered. The door was shut behind him, and they were alone in darkness, together. The girl was deeply grieving. Trembling, he asked the question: “What is it you tell me, Mary?”
“Mother’s dead,” repeated the girl, “all day, all day, all day.” They were close to each other, but he could not see her. All round the house the wind roved lamentingly, shuddering at doors and windows. “She died in the night. The doctor was to have come, but he has not come all day,” Mary whispered, “all day, all day. I don’t understand; I have waited for him, and he has not come. She died, she was dead in her bed this morning, and I’ve been alone all day, all day, and I don’t know what is to be done.”
“I’ll go for the doctor,” he said hastily, but she took him by the hand and drew him into the kitchen. There was no candle lit; a fire was burning there, richly glowing embers, that laid a gaunt shadow of the table across a corner of the ceiling. Every dish on the dresser gleamed, the stone floor was rosy, and each smooth curve on the dark settle was shining like ice. Without invitation he sat down.
“No,” said the girl, in a tremulous voice, “you must help me.” She lit a candle: her face was white as the moon, her lips were sharply red, and her eyes were wild. “Come,” she said, and he followed her behind the settle and up the stairs to a room where there was a disordered bed, and what might be a body lying under the quilt. The higgler stood still, staring at the form under the quilt. The girl, too, was still and staring. Wind dashed upon the ivy at the window and hallooed like a grieving multitude. A crumpled gown hid the body’s head, but thrust from under it, almost as if to greet him, was her naked lean arm, the palm of the hand lying uppermost. At the foot of the bed was a large washing-bowl, with sponge and towels.
“You’ve been laying her out! Yourself!” exclaimed Witlow. The pale girl set down the candle on a chest of drawers. “Help me now,” she said, and moving to the bed she lifted the crumpled gown from off the face of the dead woman, at the same time smoothing the quilt closely up to the body’s chin. “I cannot put the gown on, because of her arm, it has gone stiff.” She shuddered, and stood holding the gown as if offering it to the man. He lifted that dead naked arm and tried to place it down at the body’s side, but it resisted and he let go his hold. The arm swung back to its former outstretched position, as if it still lived and resented that pressure. The girl retreated from the bed with a timorous cry.
“Get me a bandage,” he said, “or something we can tear up.”
She gave him some pieces of linen.
“I’ll finish this for you,” he brusquely whispered, “you get along downstairs and take a swig of brandy. Got any brandy?”
She did not move. He put his arm around her and gently urged her to the door.
“Brandy,” he repeated, “and light your candles.”
He watched her go heavily down the stairs before he shut the door. Returning to the bed he lifted the quilt. The dead body was naked and smelt of soap. Dropping the quilt he lifted the outstretched arm again, like cold wax to the touch and unpliant as a sturdy sapling, and tried once more to bend it to the body’s side. As he did so the bedroom door blew open with a crash. It was only a draught of the wind, and a loose latch—Mary had opened a door downstairs, perhaps—but it awed him, as if some invisible looker were there resenting his presence. He went and closed the door, the latch had a loose hasp, and tiptoeing nervously back, he seized the dreadful arm with a sudden brutal energy, and bent it by thrusting his knee violently into the hollow of the elbow. Hurriedly he slipped the gown over the head and inserted the arm in the sleeve. A strange impulse of modesty stayed him for a moment: should he call the girl and let her complete the robing of the naked body under the quilt? That preposterous pause seemed to add a new anger to the wind, and again the door sprang open. He delayed no longer, but letting it remain open, he uncovered the dead woman. As he lifted the chill body the long outstretched arm moved and tilted like the boom of a sail, but crushing it to its side he bound the limb fast with the strips of linen. So Mrs. Sadgrove was made ready for her coffin. Drawing the quilt back to her neck, with a gush of relief he glanced about the room. It was a very ordinary bedroom, bed, washstand, chest of drawers, chair, and two pictures—one of deeply religious import, and the other a little pink print, in a gilded frame, of a bouncing nude nymph recumbent upon a cloud. It was queer: a lot of people, people whom you wouldn’t think it of, had that sort of picture in their bedrooms.
Mary was now coming up the stairs again, with a glass half full of liquid. She brought it to him.
“No, you drink it,” he urged, and Mary sipped the brandy.
“I’ve finished—I’ve finished,” he said as he watched her, “she’s quite comfortable now.”
The girl looked her silent thanks at him, again holding out the glass. “No, sup it yourself,” he said; but as she stood in the dim light, regarding him with her strange gaze, and still offering the drink, he took it from her, drained it at a gulp, and put the glass upon the chest, beside the candle. “She’s quite comfortable now. I’m very grieved, Mary,” he said with awkward kindness, “about all this trouble that’s come on you.”
She was motionless as a wax image, as if she had died in her steps, her hand still extended as when he took the glass from it. So piercing was her gaze that his own drifted from her face and took in again the objects in the room, the washstand, the candle on the chest, the little pink picture. The wind beat upon the ivy outside the window as if a monstrous whip were lashing its slaves.
“You must notify the registrar,” he began again, “but you must see the doctor first.”
“I’ve waited for him all day,” Mary whispered, “all day. The nurse will come again soon. She went home to rest in the night.” She turned towards the bed. “She has only been ill a week.”
“Yes?” he lamely said. “Dear me, it is sudden.”
“I must see the doctor,” she continued.
“I’ll drive you over to him in my gig.” He was eager to do that.
“I don’t know,” said Mary slowly.
“Yes, I’ll do that, soon’s you’re ready. Mary,” he fumbled with his speech, “I’m not wanting to pry into your affairs, or anything as don’t concern me, but how are you going to get along now? Have you got any relations?”
“No,” the girl shook her head, “no.”
“That’s bad. What was you thinking of doing? How has she left you—things were in a baddish way, weren’t they?”
“Oh no.” Mary looked up quickly. “She has left me very well off. I shall go on with the farm; there’s the old man and the boy—they’ve gone to a wedding today; I shall go on with it. She was so thoughtful for me, and I would not care to leave all this, I love it.”
“But you can’t do it by yourself, alone?”
“No. I’m to get a man to superintend, a working bailiff,” she said.
“Oh!” And again they were silent. The girl went to the bed and lifted the covering. She saw the bound arm and then drew the quilt tenderly over the dead face. Witlow picked up his hat and found himself staring again at the pink picture. Mary took the candle preparatory to descending the stairs. Suddenly the higgler turned to her and ventured: “Did you know as she once asked me to marry you?” he blurted.
Her eyes turned from him, but he guessed—he could feel that she had known.
“I’ve often wondered why,” he murmured, “why she wanted that.”
“She didn’t,” said the girl.
That gave pause to the man; he felt stupid at once, and roved his fingers in a silly way along the roughened nap of his hat.
>
“Well, she asked me to,” he bluntly protested.
“She knew,” Mary’s voice was no louder than a sigh, “that you were courting another girl, the one you married.”
“But, but,” stuttered the honest higgler, “if she knew that, why did she want for me to marry you?”
“She didn’t,” said Mary again; and again, in the pause, he did silly things to his hat. How shy this girl was, how lovely in her modesty and grief!
“I can’t make tops or bottoms of it,” he said, “but she asked me, as sure as God’s my maker.”
“I know. It was me, I wanted it.”
“You!” he cried, “you wanted to marry me!”
The girl bowed her head, lovely in her grief and modesty. “She was against it, but I made her ask you.”
“And I hadn’t an idea that you cast a thought on me,” he murmured. “I feared it was a sort of trick she was playing on me. I didn’t understand, I had no idea that you knew about it even. And so I didn’t ever ask you.”
“Oh, why not, why not? I was fond of you then,” whispered she. “Mother tried to persuade me against it, but I was fond of you—then.”
He was in a queer distress and confusion: “Oh, if you’d only tipped me a word, or given me a sort of look,” he sighed. “Oh, Mary!”
She said no more but went downstairs. He followed her and immediately fetched the lamps from his gig. As he lit the candles: “How strange,” Mary said, “that you should come back just as I most needed help! I am very grateful.”
“Mary, I’ll drive you to the doctor’s now.”
She shook her head; she was smiling.
“Then I’ll stay till the nurse comes.”
“No, you must go. Go at once.”
He picked up the two lamps and, turning at the door, said: “I’ll come again tomorrow.” Then the wind rushed into the room. “Good-bye,” she cried, shutting the door quickly behind him.
He drove away in deep darkness, the wind howling, his thoughts strange and bitter. He had thrown away a love, a love that was dumb and hid itself. By God, he had thrown away a fortune, too! And he had forgotten all about his real errand until now, forgotten all about the loan! Well; let it go; give it up. He would give up higgling; he would take on some other job; a bailiff, a working bailiff, that was the job as would suit him, a working bailiff. Of course, there was Sophy; but still—Sophy!
Fishmonger’s Fiddle (1925)
Dusky Ruth
AT THE CLOSE OF AN APRIL DAY, CHILLY AND WET, THE traveller came to a country town. In the Cotswolds, though the towns are small and sweet and the inns snug, the general habit of the land is bleak and bare. He had newly come upon upland roads so void of human affairs, so lonely, that they might have been made for some forgotten uses by departed men, and left to the unwitting passage of such strangers as himself. Even the unending walls, built of old rough laminated rock, that detailed the far-spreading fields, had grown very old again in their courses; there were dabs of darkness, buttons of moss, and fossils on every stone. He had passed a few neighbourhoods, sometimes at the crook of a stream, or at the cross of debouching roads, where old habitations, their gangrenated thatch riddled with bird holes, had been not so much erected as just spattered about the places. Beyond these signs an odd lark or blackbird, the ruckle of partridges, or the nifty gallop of a hare had been the only mitigation of the living loneliness that was almost as profound by day as by night. But the traveller had a care for such times and places. There are men who love to gaze with the mind at things that can never be seen, feel at least the throb of a beauty that will never be known, and hear over immense bleak reaches the echo of that which is no celestial music, but only their own hearts’ vain cries; and though his garments clung to him like clay it was with deliberate questing step that the traveller trod the single street of the town, and at last entered the inn, shuffling his shoes in the doorway for a moment and striking the raindrops from his hat. Then he turned into a small smoking-room. Leather-lined benches, much worn, were fixed to the wall under the window and in other odd corners and nooks behind mahogany tables. One wall was furnished with all the congenial gear of a bar, but without any intervening counter. Opposite, a bright fire was burning, and a neatly dressed young woman sat before it in a Windsor chair, staring at the flames. There was no other inmate of the room, and as he entered, the girl rose up and greeted him. He found that he could be accommodated for the night, and in a few moments his hat and scarf were removed and placed inside the fender, his wet overcoat was taken to the kitchen, the landlord, an old fellow, was lending him a roomy pair of slippers, and a maid was setting supper in an adjoining room.
He sat while this was doing and talked to the barmaid. She had a beautiful but rather mournful face as it was lit by the firelight, and when her glance was turned away from it her eyes had a piercing brightness. Friendly and well spoken as she was, the melancholy in her aspect was noticeable—perhaps it was the dim room, or the wet day, or the long hours ministering a multitude of cocktails to thirsty gallantry.
When he went to his supper he found cheering food and drink, with pleasant garniture of silver and mahogany. There were no other visitors, he was to be alone; blinds were drawn, lamps lit, and the fire at his back was comforting. So he sat long about his meal until a white-faced maid came to clear the table, discoursing to him about country things as she busied about the room. It was a long, narrow room, with a sideboard and the door at one end and the fireplace at the other. A bookshelf, almost devoid of books, contained a number of plates; the long wall that faced the windows was almost destitute of pictures, but there were hung upon it, for some inscrutable but doubtless sufficient reason, many dish-covers, solidly shaped, of the kind held in such mysterious regard and known as “willow pattern”; one was even hung upon the face of a map. Two musty prints were mixed with them, presentments of horses having a stilted extravagant physique and bestridden by images of inhuman and incommunicable dignity, clothed in whiskers, coloured jackets, and tight white breeches.
He took down the books from the shelf, but his interest was speedily exhausted, and the almanacs, the county directory, and various guide-books were exchanged for the Cotswold Chronicle. With this, having drawn the deep chair to the hearth, he whiled away the time. The newspaper amused him with its advertisements of stock shows, farm auctions, travelling quacks and conjurers, and there was a lengthy account of the execution of a local felon, one Timothy Bridger, who had murdered an infant in some shameful circumstances. This dazzling crescendo proved rather trying to the traveller; he threw down the paper.
The town was all as quiet as the hills, and he could hear no sounds in the house. He got up and went across the hall to the smoke-room. The door was shut, but there was light within, and he entered. The girl sat there much as he had seen her on his arrival, still alone, with feet on fender. He shut the door behind him, sat down, and crossing his legs puffed at his pipe, admired the snug little room and the pretty figure of the girl, which he could do without embarrassment, as her meditative head, slightly bowed, was turned away from him. He could see something of her, too, in the mirror at the bar, which repeated also the agreeable contours of bottles of coloured wines and rich liqueurs—so entrancing in form and aspect that they seemed destined to charming histories, even in disuse—and those of familiar outline containing mere spirits or small beer, for which are reserved the harsher destinies of base oils, horse medicines, disinfectants, and cold tea. There were coloured glasses for bitter wines, white glasses for sweet, a tiny leaden sink beneath them, and the four black handles of the beer engines.
The girl wore a light blouse of silk, a short skirt of black velvet, and a pair of very thin silk stockings that showed the flesh of instep and shin so plainly that he could see they were reddened by the warmth of the fire. She had on a pair of dainty cloth shoes with high heels, but what was wonderful about her was the heap of rich black hair piled at the back of her head and shadowing the dusky neck. He sat puffing his p
ipe and letting the loud tick of the clock fill the quiet room. She did not stir and he could move no muscle. It was as if he had been willed to come there and wait silently. That, he felt now, had been his desire all the evening; and here, in her presence, he was more strangely stirred in a few short minutes than by any event he could remember.
In youth he had viewed women as futile, pitiable things that grew long hair, wore stays and garters, and prayed incomprehensible prayers. Viewing them in the stalls of the theatre from his vantage-point in the gallery, he always disliked the articulation of their naked shoulders. But still, there was a god in the sky, a god with flowing hair and exquisite eyes, whose one stride with an ardour grandly rendered took him across the whole round hemisphere to which his buoyant limbs were bound like spokes to the eternal rim and axle, his bright hair burning in the pity of the sunsets and tossing in the anger of the dawns.
The Hurly Burly and Other Stories Page 14