BUTthe love which had taken such despotic possession of Bertha’s nature could not be overthrown by any sudden means. When she recovered her health and was able to resume her habits, it blazed out again like a fire, momentarily subdued, which has gained new strength in its coercion. It dismayed her to think of her extreme loneliness; Edward was now her only mainstay and her only hope. She no longer sought to deny that his love was unlike hers; but his coldness was not always apparent; vehemently wishing to find a response to her ardour, she closed her eyes to all that did not too readily obtrude itself. She had such a consuming desire to find in Edward the lover of her dreams, that for certain periods she was indeed able to live in a fool’s paradise, which was none the less grateful because at the bottom of her heart she had an aching suspicion of its true character.
But it seemed that the more passionately Bertha yearned for her husband’s love, the more frequent became their differences. As time went on the calm between the storms was shorter, and every quarrel left its mark, and made Bertha more susceptible to affront. Realizing, finally, that Edward could not answer her demonstrations of affection, she became ten times more exacting; even the little tendernesses which at the beginning of her married life would have overjoyed her, now too much resembled alms thrown to an importunate beggar, to be received with anything but irritation. Their altercations proved conclusively that it does not require two persons to make a quarrel. Edward was a model of good-temper, and his equanimity was imperturbable. However cross Bertha was, Edward never lost his serenity. He imagined that she was troubling over the loss of her child, and that her health was not entirely restored: it had been his experience, especially with cows,that a difficult confinement frequently gave rise to some temporary change in disposition, so that the most docile animal in the world would suddenly develop an unexpected viciousness. He never tried to understand Bertha’s varied moods; her passionate desire for love was to him as unreasonable as her outbursts of temper and the succeeding contrition. Now, Edward was always the same—contented equally with the universe at large and with himself; there was no shadow of a doubt about the fact that the world he lived in, the particular spot and period, were the very best possible; and that no existence could be more satisfactory than happily to cultivate one’s garden. Not being analytic, he forbore to think about the matter; and if he had, would not have borrowed the phrases of M. de Voltaire, whom he had never heard of, and would have utterly abhorred as a Frenchman, a philosopher, and a wit. But the fact that Edward ate, drank, slept, and ate again, as regularly as the oxen on his farm, sufficiently proved that he enjoyed a happiness equal to theirs—and what more can a decent man want?
Edward had moreover that magnificent faculty of always doing right and of knowing it, which is said to be the most inestimable gift of the true Christian; but if his infallibility pleased himself and edified his neighbours, it did not fail to cause his wife the utmost annoyance. She would clench her hands and from her eyes shoot arrows of fire, when he stood in front of her, smilingly conscious of the justice of his own standpoint and the unreason of hers. And the worst of it was that in her saner moments Bertha had to confess that Edward’s view was invariably right and she completely in the wrong. Her injustice appalled her, and she took upon her own shoulders the blame of all their unhappiness. Always, after a quarrel from which Edward had come with his usual triumph, Bertha’s rage would be succeeded by a passion of remorse; and she could not find sufficient reproaches with which to castigate herself. She asked frantically how her husband could be expected to love her; and in a transport of agony and fear would takethe first opportunity of throwing her arms around his neck and making the most abject apology. Then, having eaten the dust before him, having wept and humiliated herself, she would be for a week absurdly happy, under the impression that henceforward nothing short of an earthquake could disturb their blissful equilibrium. Edward was again the golden idol, clothed in the diaphanous garments of true love, his word was law and his deeds were perfect; Bertha was an humble worshipper, offering incense and devoutly grateful to the deity that forbore to crush her. It required very little for her to forget the slights and the coldness of her husband’s affection: her love was like the tide covering a barren rock; the sea breaks into waves and is dispersed in foam, while the rock remains ever unchanged. This simile, by the way, would not have displeased Edward; when he thought at all, he liked to think how firm and steadfast he was.
At night, before going to sleep, it was Bertha’s greatest pleasure to kiss her husband on the lips, and it mortified her to see how mechanically he replied to this embrace. It was always she who had to make the advance, and when, to try him, she omitted to do so, he promptly went off to sleep without even bidding her good-night. Then she told herself that he must utterly despise her.
“Oh, it drives me mad to think of the devotion I waste on you,” she cried. “I’m a fool! You are all in the world to me, and I, to you, am a sort of accident: you might have married any one but me. If I hadn’t come across your path you would infallibly have married somebody else.”
“Well, so would you,” he answered, laughing.
“I? Never! If I had not met you I should have married no one. My love isn’t a bauble that I am willing to give to whomever chance throws in my way. My heart is one and indivisible; it would be impossible for me to love any one but you.... When I think that to you I’m nothing more than any other woman might be, I’m ashamed.”
“You do talk the most awful rot sometimes.”
“Ah, that summarises your whole opinion. To you I’m merely a fool of a woman. I’m a domestic animal, a little more companionable than a dog, but on the whole, not so useful as a cow.”
“I don’t know what you want me to do more than I actually do. You can’t expect me to be kissing and cuddling all the time. The honeymoon is meant for that, and a man who goes on honeymooning all his life, is an ass.”
“Ah yes, with you love is kept out of sight all day, while you are occupied with the serious affairs of life, such as shearing sheep or hunting foxes; and after dinner it arises in your bosom, especially if you’ve had good things to eat, and is indistinguishable from the process of digestion. But for me love is everything, the cause and reason of life. Without love I should be non-existent.”
“Well, you may love me,” said Edward, “but, by Jove, you’ve got a jolly funny way of showing it.... But as far as I’m concerned, if you’ll tell me what you want me to do, I’ll try and do it.”
“Oh, how can I tell you?” she cried, impatiently. “I do everything I can to make you love me and I can’t. If you’re a stock and a stone, how can I teach you to be the passionate lover? I want you to love me as I love you.”
“Well, if you ask me for my opinion I should say it was rather a good job I don’t. Why, the furniture would be smashed up in a week, if I were as violent as you.”
“I shouldn’t mind if you were violent if you loved me,” replied Bertha, taking his remark with vehement seriousness. “I shouldn’t care if you beat me; I should not mind how much you hurt me, if you did it because you loved me.”
“I think a week of it would about sicken you of that sort of love, my dear.”
“Anything would be preferable to your indifference.”
“But God bless my soul, I’m not indifferent. Any one would think I didn’t care for you—or was gone on some other woman.”
“I almost wish you were,” answered Bertha. “If youloved any one at all, I might have some hope of gaining your affection—but you’re incapable of love.”
“I don’t know about that. I can say truly that after God and my honour, I treasure nothing in the world so much as you.”
“You’ve forgotten your hunter,” cried Bertha, scornfully.
“No, I haven’t,” answered Edward, with a certain gravity.
“What do you think I care for a position like that? You acknowledge that I am third—I would as soon be nowhere.”
“I could not love you half so much, loved I not honour more,” misquoted Edward.
“The man was a prig who wrote that. I want to be placed above your God and above your honour. The love I want is the love of the man who will lose everything, even his own soul, for the sake of a woman.”
Edward shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know where you’ll get that. My idea of love is that it’s a very good thing in its place—but there’s a limit to everything. There are other things in life.”
“Oh yes, I know—there’s duty and honour, and the farm, and fox-hunting, and the opinion of one’s neighbours, and the dogs and the cat, and the new brougham, and a million other things.... What do you suppose you’d do if I had committed some crime and were likely to be imprisoned?”
“I don’t want to suppose anything of the sort. You may be sure I’d do my duty.”
“Oh, I’m sick of your duty. You din it into my ears morning, noon, and night. I wish to God you weren’t so virtuous—you might be more human.”
Edward found his wife’s behaviour so extraordinary that he consulted Dr. Ramsay. The medical man had been for thirty years the recipient of marital confidences, and was sceptical as to the value of medicine in the cure of jealousy,talkativeness, incompatibility of temper, and the like diseases. He assured Edward that time was the only remedy by which all differences were reconciled; but after further pressing consented to send Bertha a bottle of harmless tonic, which it was his habit to give to all and sundry for most of the ills to which the flesh is heir. It would doubtless do Bertha no harm, and that is an important consideration to a general practitioner. Dr. Ramsay likewise advised Edward to keep calm and be confident that Bertha would eventually become the dutiful and submissive spouse whom it is every man’s ideal to see by his fireside, when he wakes up from his after-dinner snooze.
Bertha’s moods were certainly trying. No one could tell one day, how she would be the next; and this was peculiarly uncomfortable to a man who was willing to make the best of everything, but on the condition that he had time to get used to it. Sometimes she would be seized with melancholy, in the twilight of winter afternoons, for instance, when the mind is naturally led to a contemplation of the vanity of existence and the futility of all human endeavour. Edward, noticing she was pensive, a state which he detested, asked what were her thoughts; and half dreamily she tried to express them.
“Good Lord deliver us!” he cried cheerily, “what rum things you do get into your little noddle. You must be out of sorts.”
“It isn’t that,” she answered, smiling sadly.
“It’s not natural for a woman to brood in that way. I think you ought to start taking that tonic again—but I dare say you’re only tired and you’ll think quite different in the morning.”
Bertha made no answer. She suffered from the nameless pain of existence and he offered her—Iron and Quinine: when she required sympathy because her heart ached for the woes of her fellow-men, he poured Tincture of Nux Vomica down her throat. He could not understand, it was no use explaining that she found a savour in the tender contemplation of the evils of mankind. But the worst of itwas that Edward was quite right—the brute, he always was! When the morning came, the melancholy had vanished, Bertha was left without a care, and the world did not even need rose-coloured spectacles to seem attractive. It was humiliating to find that her most beautiful thoughts, the ennobling emotions which brought home to her the charming fiction that all men are brothers, were due to mere physical exhaustion.
Some people have extraordinarily literal minds, they never allow for the play of imagination: life for them has no beer and skittles, and, far from being an empty dream, is a matter of extreme seriousness. Of such is the man who, when a woman tells him she feels dreadfully old, instead of answering that she looks absurdly young, replies that youth has its drawbacks and age its compensations! And of such was Edward. He could never realise that people did not mean exactly what they said. At first he had always consulted Bertha on the conduct of the estate; but she, pleased to be a nonentity in her own house, had consented to everything he suggested, and even begged him not to ask her. When she informed him that he was absolute lord not only of herself, but of all her worldly goods, it was not surprising that he should at last take her at her word.
“Women know nothing about farming,” he said, “and it’s best that I should have a free hand.”
The result of his stewardship was all that could be desired; the estate was put into apple-pie order, and the farms paid rent for the first time since twenty years. The wandering winds, even the sun and the rain, seemed to conspire in favour of so clever and hard working a man; and fortune for once went hand in hand with virtue. Bertha constantly received congratulations from the surrounding squires on the admirable way in which Edward managed the place, and he, on his side, never failed to recount his triumphs and the compliments they occasioned.
But not only was Edward looked upon as master by his farm-hands and labourers; even the servants of Court Leystreated Bertha as a minor personage whose orders were only to be conditionally obeyed. Long generations of servitude have made the countryman peculiarly subtle in hierarchical distinctions; and there was a marked difference between his manner with Edward, on whom his livelihood depended, and his manner with Bertha, who shone only with a reflected light as the squire’s missus.
At first this had only amused Bertha, but the most brilliant jest, constantly repeated, may lose its savour. More than once she had to speak sharply to a gardener who hesitated to do as he was bid, because his orders were not from the master. Her pride reviving with the decline of love, Bertha began to find the position intolerable; her mind was now very susceptible to affront, and she was desirous of an opportunity to show that after all she was still the mistress of Court Leys.
It soon came. For it chanced that some ancient lover of trees, unpractical as the Leys had ever been, had planted six beeches in a hedgerow, and these in course of time had grown into stately trees, the admiration of all beholders. But one day as Bertha walked along, a hideous gap caught her eye—one of the six beeches had disappeared. There had been no storm, it could not have fallen of itself. She went up, and found it cut down, and the men who had done the deed were already starting on another: a ladder was leaning against it, upon which stood a labourer attaching a line. No sight is more pathetic than an old tree levelled with the ground; and the space which it filled suddenly stands out with an unsightly emptiness. But Bertha was more angry than pained.
“What are you doing, Hodgkins? Who gave you orders to cut down this tree?”
“The squire, mum.”
“Oh, it must be a mistake. Mr. Craddock never meant anything of the sort.”
“‘E told us positive to take down this one and them others yonder. You can see his mark, mum.”
“Nonsense. I’ll talk to Mr. Craddock about it. Takethat rope off and come down from the ladder. I forbid you to touch another tree.”
The man on the ladder looked at her, but made no attempt to do as he was bid.
“The squire said most particular that we was to cut that tree down to-day.”
“Will you have the goodness to do as I tell you?” said Bertha, reddening with anger. “Tell that man to unfasten the rope and come down. I forbid you to touch the tree.”
The man Hodgkins repeated Bertha’s order in a surly voice, and they all looked at her suspiciously, wishing to disobey but not daring—in case the squire should be angry.
“Well, I’ll take no responsibility for it.”
“Please hold your tongue and do what I tell you as quickly as possible.”
She waited till the men had gathered up their various belongings and trooped off.
BERTHAwent home, fuming, knowing perfectly well that Edward had really given the orders which she had countermanded, but glad of the chance to have a final settlement of rights. She did not see him for several hours.
“I say, Bertha,” he said, when he came in, “why on earth did you stop those men cutting down the beeches on Carter’s field? You’ve lost a whole half-day’s work. I wanted to set them on something else to-morrow, now I shall have to leave it over till Thursday.”
“I stopped them because I refuse to have the beeches cut down. They’re the only ones in the place. I’m very much annoyed that even one should have gone without my knowing about it. You should have asked me before you did such a thing.”
“My good girl, I can’t come and ask you each time I want a thing done.”
“Is the land mine or yours?”
“It’s yours,” answered Edward, laughing, “but I know better than you what ought to be done, and it’s silly of you to interfere.”
Bertha flushed. “In future, I wish to be consulted.”
“You’ve told me fifty thousand times to do always as I think fit.”
“Well, I’ve changed my mind.”
“It’s too late now,” he laughed. “You made me take the reins in my own hands and I’m going to keep them.”
Bertha in her anger hardly restrained herself from telling him she could send him away like a hired servant.
“I want you to understand, Edward, that I’m not going to have those trees cut down. You must tell the men you made a mistake.”
“I shall tell them nothing of the sort. I’m not going tocut them all down—only three. We don’t want them there—for one thing the shade damages the crops, and otherwise Carter’s is one of our best fields. And then I want the wood.”
“I care nothing about the crops, and if you want wood you can buy it. Those trees were planted nearly a hundred years ago, and I would sooner die than cut them down.”
“The man who planted beeches in a hedgerow was about the silliest jackass I’ve ever heard of. Any tree’s bad enough, but a beech of all things—why, it’s drip, drip, drip, all the time, and not a thing will grow under them. That’s the sort of thing that has been done all over the estate for years. It’ll take me a lifetime to repair the blunders of your—of the former owners.”
It is one of the curiosities of sentiment that its most abject slave rarely permits it to interfere with his temporal concerns; it appears as unusual for a man to sentimentalise in his own walk of life as for him to pick his own pocket. Edward, having passed all his days in contact with the earth, might have been expected to cherish a certain love of nature. The pathos of transpontine melodrama made him cough, and blow his nose; and in literature he affected the titled and consumptive heroine, and the soft-hearted, burly hero. But when it came to business, it was another matter—the sort of sentiment which asks a farmer to spare a sylvan glade for æsthetic reasons is absurd. Edward would have willingly allowed advertisement-mongers to put up boards on the most beautiful part of the estate, if thereby he could surreptitiously increase the profits of his farm.
“Whatever you may think of my people,” said Bertha, “you will kindly pay attention to me. The land is mine, and I refuse to let you spoil it.”
“It isn’t spoiling it. It’s the proper thing to do. You’ll soon get used to not seeing the wretched trees—and I tell you I’m only going to take three down. I’ve given orders to cut the others to-morrow.”
“D’you mean to say you’re going to ignore me absolutely?”
“I’m going to do what’s right; and if you don’t approve of it, I’m very sorry, but I shall do it all the same.”
“I shall give the men orders to do nothing of the kind.”
Edward laughed. “Then you’ll make an ass of yourself. You try giving them orders contrary to mine, and see what they do.”
Bertha gave a cry. In her fury she looked round for something to throw; she would have liked to hit him; but he stood there, calm and self-possessed, quite amused.
“I think you must be mad,” she said. “You do all you can to destroy my love for you.”
She was in too great a passion for words. This was the measure of his affection; he must, indeed, utterly despise her; and this was the only result of the love she had humbly laid at his feet. She asked herself what she could do; she could do nothing—but submit. She knew as well as he that her orders would be disobeyed if they did not agree with his; and that he would keep his word she did not for a moment doubt. To do so was his pride. She did not speak for the rest of the day, but next morning when he was going out, asked what was his intention with regard to the trees.
“Oh, I thought you’d forgotten all about them,” he replied. “I mean to do as I said.”
“If you have the trees cut down, I shall leave you; I shall go to Aunt Polly’s.”
“And tell her that you wanted the moon, and I was so unkind as not to give it you?” he replied, smiling. “She’ll laugh at you.”
“You will find me as careful to keep my word as you.”
Before luncheon she went out and walked to Carter’s field. The men were still at work, but a second tree had gone, the third would doubtless fall in the afternoon. The men glanced at Bertha, and she thought they laughed; she stood looking at them for some while so that she might thoroughly digest the humiliation. Then she went home, and wrote to her aunt the following veracious letter:—
My dear Aunt Polly,—I have been so seedy these last fewweeks that Edward, poor dear, has been quite alarmed; and has been bothering me to come up to town to see a specialist. He’s as urgent as if he wanted to get me out of the way, and I’m already half-jealous of my new parlour-maid, who has pink cheeks and golden hair—which is just the type that Edward really admires. I also think that Dr. Ramsay hasn’t the ghost of an idea what is the matter with me, and not being particularly desirous to depart this life just yet, I think it will be discreet to see somebody who will at least change my medicine. I have taken gallons of iron and quinine, and I’m frightfully afraid that my teeth will go black. My own opinion, coinciding so exactly with Edward’s (that horrid Mrs. Ryle calls us the humming-birds, meaning the turtledoves, her knowledge of natural history arouses dear Edward’s contempt); I have gracefully acceded to his desire, and if you can put me up, will come at your earliest convenience.—Yours affectionately, B. C.P.S.—I shall take the opportunity of getting clothes (I am positively in rags), so you will have to keep me some little time.
My dear Aunt Polly,—I have been so seedy these last fewweeks that Edward, poor dear, has been quite alarmed; and has been bothering me to come up to town to see a specialist. He’s as urgent as if he wanted to get me out of the way, and I’m already half-jealous of my new parlour-maid, who has pink cheeks and golden hair—which is just the type that Edward really admires. I also think that Dr. Ramsay hasn’t the ghost of an idea what is the matter with me, and not being particularly desirous to depart this life just yet, I think it will be discreet to see somebody who will at least change my medicine. I have taken gallons of iron and quinine, and I’m frightfully afraid that my teeth will go black. My own opinion, coinciding so exactly with Edward’s (that horrid Mrs. Ryle calls us the humming-birds, meaning the turtledoves, her knowledge of natural history arouses dear Edward’s contempt); I have gracefully acceded to his desire, and if you can put me up, will come at your earliest convenience.—Yours affectionately, B. C.
P.S.—I shall take the opportunity of getting clothes (I am positively in rags), so you will have to keep me some little time.
Edward came in shortly afterwards, looking very much pleased. He glanced slily at Bertha, thinking himself so clever that he could scarcely help laughing: it was his habit to be most particular in his behaviour, or he would undoubtedly have put his tongue in his cheek.
“With women, my dear sir, you must be firm. When you’re putting them to a fence, close your legs and don’t check them; but mind you keep ’em under control or they’ll lose their little heads. A man should always let a woman see that he’s got her well in hand.”
Bertha was silent, able to eat nothing for luncheon; she sat opposite her husband, wondering how he could gorge so disgracefully when she was angry and miserable. But in the afternoon her appetite returned, and, going to the kitchen, she ate so many sandwiches that at dinner she could again touch nothing. She hoped Edward wouldnotice that she refused all food, and be properly alarmed and sorry. But he demolished enough for two, and never saw that his wife fasted.
At night Bertha went to bed and bolted herself in the room. Presently Edward came up and tried the door. Finding it closed, he knocked and cried to her to open. She did not answer. He knocked again more loudly and shook the handle.
“I want to have my room to myself,” she cried out; “I’m ill. Please don’t try to come in.”
“What? Where am I to sleep?”
“Oh, you can sleep in one of the spare rooms.”
“Nonsense!” he cried; and without further ado put his shoulder to the door: he was a strong man; one heave and the old hinges cracked. He entered, laughing.
“If you wanted to keep me out, you ought to have barricaded yourself up with the furniture.”
Bertha was disinclined to treat the matter lightly. “If you come in,” she said, “I shall go out.”
“Oh no, you won’t!” he said, dragging a big chest of drawers in front of the door.
Bertha got up and put on a yellow silk dressing-gown, which was really most becoming.
“I’ll spend the night on the sofa then,” she said. “I don’t want to quarrel with you any more or to make a scene. I have written to Aunt Polly, and the day after to-morrow I shall go to London.”
“I was going to suggest that a change of air would do you good. I think your nerves are a bit groggy.”
“It’s very good of you to take an interest in my nerves,” she replied, with a scornful glance, settling herself on the sofa.
“Are you really going to sleep there?” he said, getting into bed.
“It looks like it.”
“You’ll find it awfully cold. But I dare say you’ll think better of it in an hour. I’m going to turn the light out. Good-night!”
Bertha did not answer, and in a few minutes she was angrily listening to his snores. Could he really be asleep? It was infamous that he slept so calmly.
“Edward,” she called.
There was no answer, but she could not bring herself to believe that he was sleeping. She could never even close her eyes. He must be pretending—to annoy her. She wanted to touch him, but feared that he would burst out laughing. She felt indeed horribly cold, and piled rugs and dresses over her. It required great fortitude not to sneak back to bed. She was unhappy and thirsty. Nothing is so disagreeable as the water in toilet-bottles, with the glass tasting of tooth-wash; but she gulped some down, though it almost made her sick, and then walked about the room, turning over her manifold wrongs. Edward slept on insufferably. She made a noise to wake him, but he did not stir; she knocked down a table with a clatter sufficient to disturb the dead, but her husband was insensible. Then she looked at the bed, wondering whether she dared lie down for an hour, and trust to waking before him. She was so cold that she determined to risk it, feeling certain that she would not sleep long; she walked to the bed.
“Coming to bed after all?” said Edward, in a sleepy voice.
She stopped, and her heart rose to her mouth. “I was coming for my pillow,” she replied indignantly, thanking her stars that he had not spoken a minute later.
She returned to the sofa, and eventually making herself very comfortable, fell asleep. In this blissful condition she continued till the morning, and when she awoke Edward was drawing up the blinds.
“Slept well?” he asked.
“I haven’t slept a wink.”
“Oh, what a crammer. I’ve been looking at you for the last hour!”
“I’ve had my eyes closed for about ten minutes, if that’s what you mean.”
Bertha was quite justly annoyed that her husband shouldhave caught her napping soundly—it robbed her proceeding of half its effect. Moreover, Edward was as fresh as a bird, while she felt old and haggard, and hardly dared look at herself in the glass.
In the middle of the morning came a telegram from Miss Ley, telling Bertha to come whenever she liked—hoping Edward would come too! Bertha left it in a conspicuous place so that he could not fail to see it.
“So you’re really going?” he said.
“I told you I was as able to keep my word as you.”
“Well, I think it’ll do you no end of good. How long will you stay?”
“How do I know! Perhaps for ever.”
“That’s a big word—though it has only two syllables.”
It cut Bertha to the heart that Edward should be so indifferent—he could not care for her at all. He seemed to think it natural that she should leave him, pretending it was good for her health. Oh, what did she care about her health! As she made the needful preparations her courage failed her, and she felt it impossible to go. Tears came as she thought of the difference between their present state and the ardent love of a year before. She would have welcomed the poorest excuse that forced her to stay, and yet saved her self-respect. If Edward would only express grief at the parting, it might not be too late. But her boxes were packed and her train fixed; he told Miss Glover that his wife was going away for a change of air, and regretted that his farm prevented him from accompanying her. The trap was brought to the door, and Edward jumped up, taking his seat. Now there was no hope, and go she must. She wished for courage to tell Edward that she could not leave him, but was afraid. They drove along in silence; Bertha waited for her husband to speak, daring to say nothing herself, lest he should hear the tears in her voice. At last she made an effort.
“Are you sorry I’m going?”
“I think it’s for your good—and I don’t want to stand in the way of that.”
Bertha asked herself what love a man had for his wife, who could bear her out of his sight, no matter what the necessity. She stifled a sigh.
They reached the station and he took her ticket. They waited in silence for the train, and Edward boughtPunchandThe Sketchfrom a newspaper boy. The horrible train steamed up; Edward helped her into a carriage, and the tears in her eyes now could not be concealed. She put out her lips.
“Perhaps for the last time,” she whispered.
72 Eliot Mansions, Chelsea, S.W.April 18.
Dear Edward,—I think we were wise to part. We were too unsuited to one another, and our difficulties could only have increased. The knot of marriage between two persons of differing temperaments is so intricate that it can only be cut: you may try to unravel it, and think you are succeeding, but another turn shows you that the tangle is only worse than ever. Even time is powerless. Some things are impossible; you cannot heap water up like stones, you cannot measure one man by another man’s rule. I am certain we were wise to separate. I see that if we had continued to live together our quarrels would have perpetually increased. It is horrible to look back upon those vulgar brawls—we wrangled like fishwives. I cannot understand how my mouth could have uttered such things.
It is very bitter to look back and compare my anticipations with what has really happened. Did I expect too much from life? Ah me, I only expected that my husband would love me. It is because I asked so little that I have received nothing. In this world you must ask much, you must spread your praises abroad, you must trample under-foot those who stand in your path, you must take up all the room you can or you will be elbowed away; you must be irredeemably selfish, or you will be a thing of no account, a frippery that man plays with and flings aside.
Of course I expected the impossible, I was not satisfied with the conventional unity of marriage; I wanted to be really one with you. Oneself is the whole world, and all other people are merely strangers. At first in my vehement desire, I used to despair because I knew you so little; I was heartbroken at the impossibility of really understanding you,of getting right down into your heart of hearts. Never, to the best of my knowledge, have I seen your veritable self; you are nearly as much a stranger to me as if I had known you but an hour. I bared my soul to you, concealing nothing—there is in you a man I do not know and have never seen. We are so absolutely different, I don’t know a single thing that we have in common; often when we have been talking and fallen into silence, our thoughts, starting from the same standpoint, have travelled in contrary directions, and on speaking again, we found how widely they had diverged. I hoped to know you to the bottom of your soul. Oh, I hoped that we should be united, so as to have but one soul between us; and yet on the most commonplace occasion, I can never know your thoughts. Perhaps it might have been different if we had had children; they might have formed between us a truer link, and perhaps in the delight of them I should have forgotten my impracticable dreams. But fate was against us, I come from a rotten stock. It is written in the book that the Leys should depart from the sight of men, and return to their mother the earth, to be incorporated with her; and who knows in the future what may be our lot! I like to think that in the course of ages I may be the wheat on a fertile plain, or the smoke from a fire of brambles on the common. I wish I could be buried in the open fields, rather than in the grim coldness of a churchyard, so that I might anticipate the change, and return more quickly to the life of nature.
Believe me, separation was the only possible outcome. I loved you too passionately to be content with the cold regard which you gave me. Oh, of course I was exacting, and tyrannical, and unkind; I can confess all my faults now; my only excuse is that I was very unhappy. For all the pain I have caused you, I beg you to forgive me. We may as well part friends, and I freely forgive you for all you have made me suffer. Now I can afford also to tell you how near I was to not carrying out my intention. Yesterday and this morning I scarcely held back my tears; the parting seemed too hard, I felt I could not leave you. If you hadasked me not to go, if you had even shown the smallest sign of regretting my departure, I think I should have broken down. Yes, I can tell you now, that I would have given anything to stay. Alas! I am so weak. In the train I cried bitterly. It is the first time we have been apart since our marriage, the first time that we have slept under different roofs. But now the worst is over. I have taken the step, and I shall adhere to what I have done. I am sure I have acted for the best. I see no harm in our writing to one another occasionally if it pleases you to receive letters from me. I think I had better not see you, at all events for some time. Perhaps when we are both a good deal older we may, without danger, see one another now and then; but not yet. I should be afraid to see your face.
Aunt Polly has no suspicion. I can assure you it has been an effort to laugh and talk during the evening, and I was glad to get to my room. Now it is past midnight and I am still writing to you. I felt I ought to let you know my thoughts, and I can tell them more easily by letter than by word of mouth. Does it not show how separated in heart we have become, that I should hesitate to say to you what I think—and I had hoped to have my heart always open to you. I fancied that I need never conceal a thing, nor hesitate to show you every emotion and every thought.—Good-bye.
BERTHA.
72 Eliot Mansions, Chelsea, S.W.April 23.
My poor Edward,—You say you hope I shall soon get better and come back to Court Leys. You misunderstand my meaning so completely that I almost laughed. It is true I was out of spirits and tired when I wrote—but that was not the reason of my letter. Cannot you conceive emotions not entirely due to one’s physical condition? You cannot understand me, you never have; and yet I would not take up the vulgar and hackneyed position of a femme incomprise. There is nothing to understand about me. I am very simple and unmysterious. I only wanted love, and you could not give it me. No, our parting is final and irrevocable.What can you want me back for? You have Court Leys and your farms. Every one likes you in the neighbourhood; I was the only bar to your complete happiness. Court Leys I freely give you for my life; until you came it brought in nothing, and the income now arising from it is entirely due to your efforts; you earn it and I beg you to keep it. For me the small income I have from my mother is sufficient.
Aunt Polly still thinks I am on a visit, and constantly speaks of you. I throw dust in her eyes, but I cannot hope to keep her in ignorance for long. At present I am engaged in periodically seeing the doctor for an imaginary ill, and getting one or two new things.
Shall we write to one another once a week? I know writing is a trouble to you; but I do not wish you to forget me altogether. If you like, I will write to you every Sunday, and you may answer or not as you please.
BERTHA.
P.S.—Please do not think of anyrapprochement.I amsure you will eventually see that we are both much happierapart.
72 Eliot Mansions, Chelsea, S.W.May 15.
My dear Eddie,—I was pleased to get your letter. I am a little touched at your wanting to see me. You suggest coming to town—perhaps it is fortunate that I shall be no longer here. If you had expressed such a wish before, much might have gone differently.
Aunt Polly having let her flat to friends, goes to Paris for the rest of the season. She starts to-night, and I have offered to accompany her. I am sick of London. I do not know whether she suspects anything, but I notice that now she never mentions your name. She looked a little sceptical the other day when I explained that I had long wished to go to Paris, and that you were having the inside of Court Leys painted. Fortunately, however, she makes it a practice not to inquire into other people’s business, and I can rest assured that she will never ask me a single question.
Forgive the shortness of this letter, but I am very busy, packing.—Your affectionate wife,
BERTHA.
41 Rue des Ecoliers, Paris,May 16.
My dearest Eddie,—I have been unkind to you. It is nice of you to want to see me, and my repugnance to it was perhaps unnatural. On thinking it over, I cannot think it will do any harm if we should see one another. Of course, I can never come back to Court Leys—there are some chains that having broken you can never weld together; and no fetters are so intolerable as the fetters of love. But if you want to see me I will put no obstacle in your way; I will not deny that I also should like to see you. I am farther away now, but if you care for me at all you will not hesitate to make the short journey.
We have here a very nice apartment, in the Latin Quarter, away from the rich people and the tourists. I do not know which is more vulgar, the average tripper or the part of Paris which he infests: I must say they become one another to a nicety. I loathe the shoddiness of the boulevards, with their gaudy cafés over-gilt and over-sumptuous, and their crowds of ill-dressed foreigners. But if you come I can show you a different Paris—a restful and old-fashioned Paris, theatres to which tourists do not go; gardens full of pretty children and nursemaids with long ribbons to their caps. I can take you down innumerable gray streets with funny shops, in old churches where you see people actually praying; and it is all very quiet and calming to the nerves. And I can take you to the Louvre at hours when there are few visitors, and show you beautiful pictures and statues that have come from Italy and Greece, where the gods have their home to this day. Come, Eddie.—Your ever loving wife,
BERTHA.
41 Rue des Ecoliers, Paris,May 25.
My dearest Eddie,—I am disappointed that you will not come. I should have thought, if you wanted to see me, youcould have found time to leave the farms for a few days. But perhaps it is really better that we should not meet. I cannot conceal from you that sometimes I long for you dreadfully. I forget all that has happened, and desire with all my heart to be with you once more. What a fool I am! I know that we can never meet again, and you are never absent from my thoughts. I look forward to your letters almost madly, and your handwriting makes my heart beat as if I were a schoolgirl. Oh, you don’t know how your letters disappoint me, they are so cold; you never say what I want you to say. It would be madness if we came together—I can only preserve my love to you by not seeing you. Does that sound horrible? And yet I would give anything to see you once more. I cannot help asking you to come here. It is not so very often I have asked you anything. Do come. I will meet you at the station, and you will have no trouble or bother—everything is perfectly simple, and Cook’s Interpreters are everywhere. I’m sure you would enjoy yourself so much.—If you love me, come.
BERTHA.
Court Leys, Blackstable, Kent,May 30.
My dearest Bertha,—Sorry I haven’t answered yours of 25th inst. before, but I’ve been up to my eyes in work. You wouldn’t think there could be so much to do on a farm at this time of year, unless you saw it with your own eyes. I can’t possibly get away to Paris, and besides I can’t stomach the French. I don’t want to see their capital, and when I want a holiday, London’s good enough for me. You’d better come back here, people are asking after you, and the place seems all topsy-turvy without you. Love to Aunt P.—In haste, your affectionate husband,
E. CRADDOCK.
41 Rue des Ecoliers, Paris,June 1.
My dearest, dearest Eddie,—You don’t know how disappointed I was to get your letter and how I longed for it.Whatever you do, don’t keep me waiting so long for an answer. I imagined all sorts of things—that you were ill or dying. I was on the point of wiring. I want you to promise me that if you are ever ill, you will let me know. If you want me urgently I shall be pleased to come. But do not think that I can ever come back to Court Leys for good. Sometimes I feel ill and weak and I long for you, but I know I must not give way. I’m sure, for your good as well as for mine, I must never risk the unhappiness of our old life again. It was too degrading. With firm mind and the utmost resolution I swear that I will never, never return to Court Leys.—Your affectionate and loving wife,
BERTHA.
Telegram
Gare du Nord, 9.50 a.m., June 2.
Craddock, Court Leys, Blackstable.
Arriving 7.25 to-night.—BERTHA.
41 Rue des Ecoliers, Paris.
My dear young Friend,—I am perturbed. Bertha, as you know, has for the last six weeks lived with me, for reasons the naturalness of which aroused my strongest suspicions. No one, I thought, would need so many absolutely conclusive motives to do so very simple a thing. I resisted the temptation to write to Edward (her husband—a nice man, but stupid!) to ask for an explanation, fearing that the reasons given me were the right ones (although I could not believe it); in which case I should have made myself ridiculous. Bertha in London pretended to go to a physician, but never was seen to take medicine, and I am certain no well-established specialist would venture to take two guineas from amalade imaginaireand not administer copious drugs. She accompanied me to Paris, ostensibly to get dresses, but has behaved as if their fit were of no more consequence than a change of ministry. She has taken great pains to conceal her emotions and thereby made them the more conspicuous. I cannot tell you how often she hasgone through the various stages from an almost hysterical elation to an equal despondency. She has mused as profoundly as was fashionable for the young ladies of fifty years ago (we were all young ladies then—not girls!); she has played Tristan and Isolde to the distraction of myself; she has snubbed an amorous French artist to the distraction of his wife; finally she has wept, and after weeping over-powdered her eyes, which in a pretty woman is an infallible sign of extreme mental prostration.
This morning when I got up I found at my door the following message:“Don’t think me an utter fool, but I couldn’t stand another day away from Edward. Leaving by the 10 o’clock train.—B.”Now at 10.30 she had an appointment at Paquin’s to try on the most ravishing dinner-dress you could imagine.
I will not insult you by drawing inferences from all these facts: I know you would much sooner draw them yourself, and I have a sufficiently good opinion of you to be certain that they will coincide with mine.—Yours very sincerely,
MARY LEY.
P.S.—I am sending this to await you at Seville. Rememberme to Mrs. J.
BERTHA’Srelief was unmistakable when she landed on English soil; at last she was near Edward, and she had been extremely sea-sick. Though it was less than thirty miles from Dover to Blackstable the communications were so bad that it was necessary to wait for hours at the port, or take the boat-train to London and then come sixty miles down again. Bertha was exasperated at the delay, forgetting that she was now (thank Heaven!) in a free country, where the railways were not run for the convenience of passengers, but the passengers necessary evils to create dividends for an ill-managed company. Bertha’s impatience was so great that she felt it impossible to wait at Dover; she preferred to go the extra hundred miles and save herself ten minutes rather than spend the afternoon in the dreary waiting-room, or wandering about the town. The train seemed to crawl; and her restlessness became quite painful as she recognized the Kentish country, the fat meadows with trim hedges, the portly trees, and the general air of prosperity.
Bertha’s thoughts were full of Edward, and he was the whole cause of her impatience. She had hoped, against her knowledge of him, that he would meet her at Dover, and it had been a disappointment not to see him. Then she thought he might have come to London, though not explaining to herself how he could possibly have divined that she would be there. Her heart beat absurdly when she saw a back which might have been Edward’s. Still later, she comforted herself with the idea that he would certainly be at Faversley, which was the next station to Blackstable. When they reached that place she put her head out of window, looking along the platform—but he was nowhere.
“He might have come as far this,” she thought.
Now, the train steaming on, she recognised the country more precisely, the desolate marsh and the sea—the line ran almost at the water’s edge; the tide was out, leaving a broad expanse of shining mud, over which the seagulls flew, screeching. Then the houses were familiar, cottages beaten by wind and weather, theJolly Sailor, where in the old days many a smuggled keg of brandy had been hidden on its way to the cathedral city of Tercanbury. The coastguard station was passed, a long building, trim and low. Finally they rattled across the bridge over the High Street; and the porters with their Kentish drawl, called out, “Blackstable, Blackstable.”
Bertha’s emotions were always uncontrolled, and so powerful as sometimes to unfit her for action: now she had hardly strength to open the carriage door.
“At last!” she cried, with a gasp of relief.
She had never adored her husband so passionately as then, and her love was a physical sensation that turned her faint. The arrival of the moment so anxiously awaited left her half-frightened; she was of those who eagerly look for an opportunity and then can scarcely seize it.
Bertha’s heart was so full that she was afraid of bursting into tears when she at last she should see Edward walking towards her; she had pictured the scene so often, her husband advancing with his swinging stride, waving his stick, the dogs in front, rushing towards her and barking furiously. The two porters waddled with their seaman’s walk to the van to get out the luggage; people were stepping from the carriages. Next to her a pasty-faced clerk descended, in a dingy black, with a baby in his arms; and he was followed by a haggard wife with another baby and innumerable parcels. A labourer sauntered down the platform, three or four sailors, and a couple of infantry-men. They all surged for the wicket, at which stood the ticket-collector. The porters got out the boxes, and the train steamed off; an irascible city man was swearing volubly because his luggage had gone to Margate. (It’s a free country, thank Heaven!) The station-master, ina decorated hat and a self-satisfied air, strolled up to see what was the matter. Bertha looked along the platform wildly. Edward was not there.
The station-master passed, and nodded patronisingly.
“Have you seen Mr. Craddock?” she asked.
“No, I can’t say I have. But I think there’s a carriage below for you.”
Bertha began to tremble. A porter asked whether he should take her boxes; she nodded, unable to speak. She went down and found the brougham at the station door; the coachman touched his hat and gave her a note.