Mother and Son (24 page)

“Everything adds to understanding,” said Alice. “That is why people seem better when you don't really know them, and why new friendships are often best.”

“Now that is an attempt to be cynical,” said Mr. Pettigrew.

“And a successful one,” said Francis.

“Will Miss Greatheart and Miss Burke dress like brides for their weddings?” said Adrian.

“Really, Adrian, what an odd point to engage your interest! I am not in a position to say. But it is likely that a quiet travelling dress will in both cases be held to fit the occasion.”

“Did Mrs. Pettigrew wear that kind of dress?”

“I think that would have been the description of it. Her tastes have always been on the quiet side. And possibly the usefulness of the dress was a point to be considered.”

“Perhaps there will be a double wedding.”

“There is no reason to expect it. There is no parallel
between the marriages. Each will probably take place on its own merits.”

“I don't think either has any merits,” said Alice.

“Well, that is an opinion you will be wise to keep to yourself.”

“Uncle has had a varied life,” said Adrian.

“Oh, a second marriage is common enough,” said Francis.

“But in a way it is the third. Will he have any more children? It seems that three are enough.”

“It is late to give Rosebery companions,” said Francis in a sharp tone.

There was a pause.

“We have wasted our time this morning,” said Mr. Pettigrew, rising with his eyes rather brighter than usual. “But we may see the occasion as a reason, and we can make up for it tomorrow. I shall be here at the usual time. Goodbye to you for today.”

“Pettigrew likes to know everything,” said Adrian.

“And you pandered to the taste!” said Francis. “You can feel you have done all you can for him.”

“Oh, I forgot! I forgot. But I did not really say it. Not that Uncle was our father and not Rosebery's.”

“Have I left a book behind?” said Mr. Pettigrew, re-entering and coming to the table. “No, I am mistaken; I have it in my hand. Goodbye to you again.”

“Well, Pettigrew is to be envied,” said Francis. “And so is Mrs. Pettigrew. And with both of them and Bates knowing, so is everyone else.”

“I daresay everyone has always known,” said Alice,
“though Uncle has not thought so. He would be the last to think it. No one could speak of it to him.”

“Ought we to tell Uncle that I have told Pettigrew?” said Adrian. “He might be able to do something.”

“He can undo nothing,” said Francis. “But I daresay he should know. He will soon be coming upstairs.”

Adrian rushed out of the room and cast himself upon Julius.

“I have told Pettigrew! I did it by accident. I forgot he did not know.”

“Well, what could I expect? The fault is the person's who told you. And if he profited by the mischance, I daresay he had guessed. And we are safe from him; he cannot speak of it to us.”

“That is what we said,” said Alice.

“Did you?” said Julius. “Children are always more influenced by an odd education than an ordinary one.”

“And it is not only our education that is not ordinary,” said Adrian.

“Now, Plautus, don't pretend you do not see me. I know you better than that. You are the one person in the world who knows me as I am.”

Hester spoke for her voice to reach the drawing-room, and lifting Plautus, entered with her face buried in his fur.

“I have come to say a word before I vanish. I must ask what will happen to my Plautus when his home is gone. Forth I went and provided people with chances and gave him none; and he the most deserving of them!”

“You told us what you thought of them,” said Emma.

“Well, you thought better of them. Anyhow you did not let them escape you. How this is like old times and unlike them!”

Emma did not speak.

“Oh, the likeness will emerge. The storm and stress are past. I have faced the music, as the phrase goes. I have gone through fire and water and earned my release. Nothing that happens can be laid to my door. We can have an hour of peace before we part. It is Plautus who troubles me. Can you take him to the Humes' house?”

“No, I cannot. I am not going there myself.”

“What do you mean?” said Hester.

“Cats do not like change. I ought to have remembered. They attach themselves to houses, and I forgot that too.”

“Then will Julius Hume come to live here with you?”

“No, he will stay at home with the portraits of Miranda.”

“What do you actually mean?” said Hester.

“I have never had a wish to marry. I succumbed to the flattery of being sought. And I did not like to rebuff him, in case it should alter me in his eyes. That was when I was to be the second person in his life. When I was to be the third, or I suppose the sixth, as the children are his, it was too poor a place. You served
your purpose when you betrayed him. It is not true that wickedness never prospers. Any little wickedness of mine has always prospered. And it is the same with small things and great.”

There was a silence.

“It was a hard moment, but a necessary one. You had to know the truth. Julius might or might not have told you. We shall never be sure.”

“He does tend to put it off. Miranda had so little time to know. I have a great feeling for Miranda. I could never grudge her anything. When I knew she would grudge me everything, I sympathised with her. I liked her to have the first place in Julius's life. I am disturbed now that perhaps she did not have it. But the sixth place is very low.”

There was a pause.

“How right I have been!” said Hester.

“And other things too. But I am not very troubled by them. They are always in us; it depends if anything brings them out; and something brought them out in you. Will you go out into the world again, now you see the danger of it?”

“I must, unless I am to be dependent on you.”

“That would need greatness of spirit. And as I should have the credit, the greatness would be real. But when we have both littleness and greatness in us, ought we to show only the one?”

“Perhaps it would be right to stay. It may be the better and larger thing. Harm did come of the other.”

“How you are improving already! Of course the
influence of the world is known to be bad. And it is worse than I thought.”

“And Plautus's future is secure with yours and mine.”

“The pity is that Miss Burke's future is secure too, and that it is Rosebery who has made it so.”

“What are you saying about me?” said Miss Burke.

“Did she hear what we said?” said Hester.

“No, she sounds preoccupied; and when people are that, it is always with their own affairs. I think that is really what the word means. I was wishing, dear, that I had provided for your future.”

“I have to take provision where it is offered.”

“I am so ashamed that I did not offer it. And I am more ashamed of the reason. We blush for our follies more than our sins. I did not think of your outliving me, when I knew how much younger you were.”

“Well, people do not think of that. Survival is no part of my duty.”

“But of course you will have a life after I am gone, a future that I shall not see. And it must be provided for. What a pity that Rosebery has done it!”

“You cannot suggest doing it yourself?” said Hester.

“Well, it might seem that I was doing it for my own sake. Do you think it could go without saying? I feel so many more things would happen, if they could do that.”

“It can indeed,” said Miss Burke. “What a change in my life! I feel the world is full of hope.”

“Then did you accept Rosebery solely from base motives, dear?”

“Well, I could feel he was his father's son. I even fancied a likeness between them. When I saw him
simply as himself, my motives were base. And I suppose they still are. But it is better to have them here. It will mean freedom.”

“No, it will not, dear. That is not all that has to go without saying.”

“Oh, I don't mind working in this house. I shall have essential freedom. That need not mean I am not occupied.”

“Nothing essential has its real meaning. So all is clear between us. That is one of the lowest of human speeches.”

“Will you write my letter for me? I have not had enough education.”

“You mean you have the ability and nothing meaner. I think I have it all. Yes, I will write the letter for you, and Rosebery will see what he has lost.”

“And you will write for youself in the same way?” said Hester.

“No, I shall write in a different way. We do not do things in the same way for ourselves and for other people. I shall try not to realise how I write. It might hardly do for the last vestige of my romance.”

“I think both the men will look forward again.”

“And both look back,” said Miss Burke. “They did not cease from doing so. It was the main thing in Mr. Rosebery's life.”

“Did you call him ‘Mr. Rosebery'?” said Hester.

“Yes, I could not say the simple name.”

“Then of course you cannot marry him,” said Emma.

“He called me ‘Miss Burke'. He said the name had its own sound for him.”

“Take care, dear. You are going to refuse him, and for reasons that are not his fault.”

“What reasons will you give?” said Hester.

“The true ones will be best,” said Miss Burke. “Then the matter will be at an end. That I accepted him to have a provision, and now have one from someone else. I could even say it was Miss Greatheart.”

“He will think I am bribing you,” said Emma. “But it is what he was doing himself. How it will enhance your value to us both!”

“You can refuse Julius on palpable grounds,” said Hester.

“No, I cannot appear to be the slave of convention. He might alter his opinion of me. I think I must just say that I have not enough to give.”

“Well, I suppose that is true. So I hope he will not think I have influenced you.”

“He knows you are not on his side. You did not disguise it.”

“But I mean behind his back. When I was trying to put things in their true light, I did it to his face.”

“Well, he may remember that,” said Emma.

“Will Mr. Hume want Miss Wolsey to go back to him as his housekeeper?” said Miss Burke.

“I expect so,” said Hester, idly. “But I shall not go.”

“I feel guilty about Mr. Rosebery. I am afraid to think of him.”

“Yes, he does make one feel like that. He has a sort of pathos. I remember I felt it myself.”

“You mean when he proposed to you?”

“Yes,” said Hester, just throwing up her brows.

“But it did not prevent you from refusing him?”

“Well!” said Hester, lifting her shoulders. “Now I will leave you to write your letters, and go and make my peace with Plautus.”

Miss Burke looked at Emma as the door closed.

“I don't know what to think about Miss Wolsey,” she said.

“You must think everything, dear. I see it cannot be helped. And I will think the one thing, that she has known the depths, and that I have seen her knowing them. It is a good thing experience is ennobling. I believe she is becoming a little ennobled.”

“I think she ought to be grateful to you.”

“And we dislike people when we owe them gratitude. Just as we do when we owe them anything else. It does seem they might just say nothing about it. So that is what I will do.”

“I do not dislike people when I am grateful to them. I am grateful to you now.”

“It is too much, dear. And when I forgot you would outlive me!”

“But I don't think we owe so much to the men we are rejecting. What they offered was easy to give.”

“Then of course we must reject them. I will write your letter at once. I do feel so equal to it. See how my pen is travelling across the paper; that is the right thing to happen, I know; and it only has to travel a little further. Now you can copy the letter in your own hand.”

“And I suppose the pen must begin to travel again.”

“I am not sure that it ought. This is something no
person of quality would find easy. And my pen is travelling over the paper; I do not seem able to prevent it. I am actually writing the awkward words; I think it is best for them to have the awkwardness; it will not seem that I am trying to make an impression; and that is the impression I want to make. I will not read it over, in case it is not what I think. And re-reading a letter is painstaking and unworthy of me.”

“Shall I take the letters to the post?” said Hester, coming in with Plautus in her arms. “It is better to let them know at once. Then the episode can sink into the past.”

“The postman can take them in the morning,” said Miss Burke.

“No, let Hester take them. We don't want them lingering about in the present, and preventing it from being an episode. I am sure it is salutary for us to feel it is that.”

Hester took the letters in a hand she disengaged from Plautus, and went out, using them to caress him, and Emma looked after her.

“It is a pity we cannot judge by the surface, when it is so often arranged for us to judge by it.”

Hester returned and sat down by the fire.

“So the old times are to come again. Indeed we might say they have come. I daresay a single life is best.”

“Do you?” said Emma. “Wouldn't it have been found out, if it was?”

“You say you like living for yourself.”

“Yes, but it would be very bad to think it was best.”

“I shall always be glad I have known the Humes.”

“I shall not. I would rather not have known them. I did not think of a household's being like that. I was brought up in a household myself, and now I don't know what to think about it. No one told me anything; but then no one told these children anything either; I mean until to-day.”